Chapter Text
“Would you ever want to do that?” Cas asks. He’s lying beside Dean in bed, head on Dean’s shoulder, staring unblinkingly at the ceiling hidden in the darkness.
“Gotta be a little more specific there, buddy,” Dean prods him. He’s comfortable and warm in bed with Cas in a way that’s taken years to achieve. Dean likes the solid weight of him on top of his arm. He likes the smell of him after they shared a shower several minutes ago, and the feel of his still-damp hair against his chin; in the morning it will have dried into a crazed mop on top of his head.
“Foster care,” Cas clarifies. “Would you want to take care of another child?”
Dean’s body tenses, one muscle after the other like the toppling of dominoes. It starts in his toes and ends in his shoulders and neck. Suddenly he’s pinned underneath Cas, instead of comforted by the pressure.
“Why, do you?” Dean asks, keeping his voice carefully level. He’s not going to jump the gun. He doesn’t want to ruin the night.
“I don’t know.” Cas hums thoughtfully. “It seems like a worthy endeavor.”
Before he can stop himself, Dean scoffs, “Thought you didn’t like kids.” He doesn’t know if he’s joking, or not.
“That’s what I thought when I didn’t know kids,” Cas replies. Dean can hear the roll of his eyes in his voice. “You know I love Emma.”
“Yeah, well.” Dean shifts, and Cas’s head lifts off his shoulder. Trying to make it seem casual, Dean sits up, moving a couple inches away from Cas on the bed. “Can we even, ah – I mean. It’s Missouri, right? It ain’t the Westcoast.”
“You mean, would we be allowed because we’re two men?”
As usual, Cas’s bluntness makes something in Dean’s chest squirm. “Yeah, I guess.”
Cas just sounds thoughtful. “I suppose I’d have to look into it. We could ask Sam – I’m sure he knows.” Dean can tell by the sound of Cas’s voice that this is more than just a passing thought for his boyfriend. The idea is shaping up to be an action. Cas wants this. And when Cas wants something, he doesn’t let go easy.
Dean’s stomach sinks. He gets out of the bed, muttering something about taking a piss. Cas is silent when he leaves.
Dean passes through the bedroom door and across the hall to Cas’s bathroom – Dean’s bathroom, now, actually. Dean’s apartment, too. Dean and Cas’s apartment. Dean moved in nearly a year ago, but it’s still hard to think of it as theirs. Even though they’ve certainly been dating for long enough. Shit, Sam and Eileen tied the knot after they were together for as long as Dean and Cas are, now.
Six months after Sam and Eileen got married, they fostered their first kids; it wasn’t exactly a surprise. Fostering was always in the cards for them. Five-year-old Ryan and nine-year-old Joe stayed with Sam and Eileen for a seventy-two hour emergency placement before their uncle could make it down from Washington.
Dean came over the first night with some necessities: pillows, blankets, craft supplies, and a pot of chicken stew so Sam and Eileen didn’t have to cook. Dean ended up sticking around for dinner when Joe, the older one, was fascinated by Dean’s tattoos. Dean let him color in the sleeves with the Crayola markers he brought over.
Sam and Eileen’s second placement left just this afternoon, so Dean knows why it’s on Cas’s mind. They say you’re not supposed to get too attached to kids when you know they’re not sticking around, but that’s hard. They’re kids. There’s an empty place in Dean’s chest where Audrey used to fit – a little girl with dark pigtails who arrived at Sam and Eileen’s house with a black plastic bag of clothes and a tattered teddy bear under her arm. She talked a mile a minute about figure skating and ballet, and she picked out a Disney Princess duvet set for the spare room Sam and Eileen made up for her.
Dean knows she’ll be safe and cared for at her grandmother’s, but he also knows she’s five states away, now, when she used to be twenty-minutes. The most he’ll see her again is through the Christmas cards her grandma promised to send Sam and Eileen.
Dean runs the water down the drain. He splashes some on his face. Drops slide down his chin and neck, soaking into his t-shirt collar. It’s cold in the bathroom. His bare toes curl against the icy tile. Even as he thinks it, he hears Cas’s heat kick on in the ceiling, spilling warmth through the vent. Dean pulls himself together. He pads his face dry on the towel Cas slung over the curtain rod after their shower.
When Dean gets back to the bedroom, Cas is still lying on his back in the dark. Dean can see the faint glint of his eyes in the brief flash of light from the hallway before Dean shuts the door behind him.
He crosses the room. He turns on the lamp on his bedside table, chasing the shadows into the corners, and perches on the edge of the bed, back to Cas.
“You know I can’t, right?” he says to the opposite wall. Cas has his favorite painting hanging there: a colorful abstract of a woman holding a baby another of a man kneeling on the ground beside a little girl. Dean’s stomach hurts to look at it, so he stares at the floor.
“I don’t understand,” Cas says to Dean’s back.
“Foster care.” He doesn’t mean to be abrupt. It’s the only way he can make the words come up his throat. “I’m a felon. Violent offense. Sam wasn’t even allowed to leave me alone in the house with Audrey.”
Dean played teddy bear doctor for Audrey after her toy lost its arm. He showed her how to thread the needle and pull the fur carefully together, pushed the stuffing back into the bear until it was as good as new.
And Emma loved Audrey. At nearly four, Emma loves everyone. But it was good to have her around another kid. Emma’d probably jump at the chance of another sibling.
“Oh, Dean, I’m sorry.” Cas’s voice is painfully warm with sympathy. Dean can’t fucking stand it. He presses his nails into his palms, knuckles aching. The worst fucking year of his life, and he’s still paying for it. “I didn’t realize.”
“Can’t do a lot of shit,” Dean says. He laughs mirthlessly. “Can’t get fucking financial aid if I ever wanted to go back for a degree. Can’t get a car dealership license, so Bobby and Rufus better never move toward selling. Can’t leave the fucking country, ‘cause it’s nearly impossible to get a passport.”
Cas puts his hand on Dean’s shoulder, and Dean flinches hard before he can stop himself. He’s off the bed again. Cas looks shocked and apologetic, already drawing his arm back.
“Sorry –”
“It’s – fine,” Dean says curtly, jaw clenched so hard he feels it ache in his temples. It’s been a while since he’s responded like that to being touched – by anyone, let alone Cas.
“Dean, it doesn’t matter to me –” Cas starts, clearly floundering for something to say.
“I’m just telling you because you have a right to know,” Dean continues. He can’t own a firearm, either. Which is probably damn lucky, because Dean surely would have put a bullet through the roof of his mouth a thousand times over if he’d had one handy. Voice still sharp, “So – if that’s shit you wanna do. Any of it. It can’t be with me.”
Cas looks stricken. “That’s not – Dean, I don’t want to – not if it wasn’t with you, I wouldn’t want to.”
Dean looks away, unable to meet Cas’s eyes. He’s lying. Dean knows he’s lying just to make Dean feel better. Cas wouldn’t have brought it up if he didn’t want to do it.
“Yeah, okay,” Dean says.
“Are you alright?” Dean knows Cas is talking about the flinch. Dean’s embarrassed. He’s not sure why his body reacted like that. It’s Cas. Dean’s used to Cas, by now. Soft touches and firm touches and suggestive touches and everything in-between. Dean rarely dreams about Alastair, anymore. He doesn’t know why he had to screw it up tonight.
“I’m fine,” Dean says.
“Would you like –” Cas stops. Starts again. “Would you like to come back to bed?”
Without a word, Dean turns off the lamp. He climbs back into bed, kicks himself under the covers.
Cas’s hand fishes for his in the darkness. Dean squeezes his fingers, once, twice. Reassuring Cas that he’s okay. Cas softens beside him, melts a little toward Dean’s space. Dean lets him. He examines his body for any other warning signs, and he tries to make himself relax when he doesn’t find any blaring panic.
He thinks for a moment about kissing Cas – long and slow in the dark. Dean could take Cas’s mind off kids or futures or all the many reasons Dean’s an inadequate partner. But he catches himself on the idea, mostly thinking about how embarrassing it would be to admit to Pam that he used sex – again – as a way of distracting himself from his issues.
Instead, he pulls Cas in a little closer, slings an arm around his waist, and tucks Cas’s head back on his shoulder. He puts his chin against the crown of Cas’s head, stops to drop a kiss into his hair, and tries to find the warm comfort they lost from earlier in the night.
OOO
Cas doesn’t bring up kids again until four months pass, by which time Sam and Eileen have had three more overnight emergency placements.
“There are other ways we could, if we ever wanted to.”
“Come again?” Dean asks. He’s used to Cas jumping into the middle of a conversation he’s been having inside his own head; sometimes Dean’s even in-tune with Cas enough to know exactly what he’s talking about. Other times, like now, he has no fucking clue.
“If we wanted more children.”
Dean doesn’t reply. His head is suddenly warm, like there’s a candle lit underneath his brain, raising it to boiling temperature. He wonders how long Cas has been waiting to bring this up again. He wonders if the months between now and when Audrey left were a careful calculation, if Cas’s been sitting on this question, anxiously tracking Dean’s mood, waiting for the perfect chance to pounce, or if it’s something that just crossed his mind.
“I was looking into it.”
Cas’s voice is casual. Then again, his voice is usually casual. He often speaks without inflection unless he’s especially emotional or masking particularly hard.
Dean’s stomach twists with nervousness. He works hard to keep it below deck. He moves away from the stove and turns the bubbling pot of chili down to a simmer. He doesn’t turn to look at Cas standing against the kitchen island. Instead, he moves to the sink and rinses his hands under a cold stream of water even though there’s nothing on his skin. He needs something to do with his hands.
“There’s multiple options – adoption or surrogacy –”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Dean snaps, turning around. His hands drip water onto the mat under the sink. “If I can’t be a foster parent, you think a fucking adoption agency is gonna want me?”
“There – there’s private –” Cas stammers, eyes wide, but he clearly doesn’t get the fucking point because he keeps talking.
“Do you have any fucking clue how much money that is?” Dean asks. He dries his hands on his jeans, two sharp slaps. “And surrogacy? I know you grew up eating off a gold spoon, but some of us have an appreciation for how much things fucking cost. Jesus, Cas, I’ve still got 25 grand in medical debt. You think we can afford that shit?”
Two spots of color appear on Cas’s cheeks. His eyes blaze, and Dean knows he’s made him angry. Dean doesn’t bring up Cas’s family’s money. Sure, Cas grew up rich and he might make more money doing his fancy-ass art shows than Dean does as a mechanic, but Dean knows he got cut off from his mother’s pocketbook after he dropped out of seminary. Any financial assistance since then has come from Gabriel.
“If I’d known you were so sensitive about the topic, I wouldn’t have brought it up,” Cas says haughtily.
“I’m not fucking sensitive!” Dean yells. “Maybe if I didn’t have to keep telling you –”
“I brought it up because I wanted to discuss it, Dean!” Cas matches Dean’s volume. “I wasn’t demanding anything of you!”
“Yeah?” Dean shoots back. “Well, it fucking feels like you are! Sorry I can’t give you a perfect family with a white picket fence and two-point-five kids. Jesus. I told you before that if you wanted that you shouldn’t stick around!”
“I never said that’s what I want!” Cas yells. There are tears of frustration in his eyes. His face is red.
Dean feels himself spiraling uncontrollably into anger, a taut, dangerous, and irrational freefall until he can barely see.
“You wouldn’t keep bringing it up if you didn’t want it,” Dean retorts
“You’re infuriating!” Cas spits at him.
“Yeah? Well. I’m fucking crazy, okay? I thought you knew what you signed up for!”
“You have no right – no right to speak to me like this and use your illness as some sort of excuse.” Cas’s voice goes low and dangerous. His hands are shaking, tiny twitches like he’s holding himself back from stimming.
“Like you don’t make excuses all the time!” Dean yells. He does it deliberately. Maliciously. He knows how much it’s going to hurt. “Every time you don’t wanna go somewhere or see someone and do fucking anything.”
“I have never –” Cas breathes unsteadily. “I have never prevented you from doing anything you want. I’m sorry if you’ve ever felt like it.” The disdain in his voice makes it clear he’s no such thing.
“Yeah?” Dean spits. His heart hammers hard in his stomach. “So what? Now I’m preventing you from doing something you want? Is that it? Throw it in my fucking face, why don’t you!”
“Stop it!” Cas yells, bringing up his hands in the way he sometimes does when he’s particularly overwhelmed. He claps his palms over his ears. “I didn’t say that!”
“You didn’t have to fucking say it!” Dean shouts, and even as it leaves his mouth he recognizes the strange tautness in his throat and the burning in his eyes. He’s going to cry – he’s going to fucking cry.
“Why are you always like this?” Cas demands. His eyes are wet, too. His hands are still over his ears. “You’re always like this.” He sounds frantic. “You don’t listen to me – you take one tiny thing I say and spin it out of proportion. You should just listen to me!”
“I listen to you just fine, pal!” Dean responds. “I hear you loud and fucking clear. Just fucking tell me I can’t give you anything you want. Just fucking tell me how fucking annoying it is to be with me –”
“You’re right! You’re maddening! Sometimes I can’t stand you!” Cas says wildly. “Is that what you want to hear? Is that what you’re so fucking afraid of hearing?”
Every word feels like a blow. Maybe something crosses Dean’s face that makes Cas pause, because he suddenly blanches.
“Great!” Dean blurts through his impossibly tight throat. Chokes on it. “Fucking great – about time! Fucking – fucking don’t know why you stuck around this long –”
“Dean –” Cas moves for him.
Dean backs up so fast he gets whiplash. Flinches so hard he cracks his elbow on the granite countertop. “Don’t fucking touch me! Don’t you dare – don’t –”
Cas’s face loses all its heat in a second flat. He doesn’t look angry anymore. He looks scared. What? Is he afraid Dean’s going to hit him? Dean should – he should – Dean tucks his arms tight against his sides, bites his nails hard into his hands. He won’t – won’t –
God, he remembers Dad’s hands on him. Remembers the sharp crack of pain as Dad’s hand whipped across his face. The shove of palms hard against Dean’s chest.
“Dean, please –”
“Don’t –” Dean says. He turns around to point his finger at Cas’s face. He sees his hand shaking. “Don’t.”
He’s not entirely sure how he makes it out of the apartment without exploding. He wonders if any of the neighbors heard them screaming. It’d be just his luck to get hauled away for a domestic.
Ridiculously, he’s not wearing shoes. But he’s got his work boots in the trunk of the impala. He remembered to grab the keys from the hook by the side of the door. He snatches the boots, slams the trunk, and then lets himself into the backseat, intending to lace up the boots, but when he bends at the waist to pull them on, his chest cramps hard and he’s suddenly gasping, unable to breathe.
His lungs twist, wring themselves out inside his chest cavity. Everything’s pulled impossibly tight. It won’t let up until he’s sputtering, curled in on himself and incapable of moving.
Oh, Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. Jesus. It hurts. It fucking hurts. Dean clutches at his chest, gathers his t-shirt into tight fists. Chokes on breath that refuses to leave his lips. There’s a dizzying whirlpool inside his head, spinning him in circles until he can’t tell what’s up or down.
He’s gonna throw up – the need is so urgent he’s barely able to fumble his fingers around the handle before he’s half-way spilling onto the pavement, retching. He dry-heaves, each gasp tugging at his stomach like he wants to bring up his intestines, but nothing comes out. It’s just desperate gulping. A string of saliva hangs off his lips. Tears drip off his chin.
He wraps his arms around his belly and holds on hard. He’s going to shake apart. He’s going to rip apart at the seams.
He gasps himself into shallow breathing. His ribs heave under his arms as he tries to pull in enough oxygen to make his head stop spinning. He’s aware enough to know there’s no one else in the parking garage. He hopes to hell the security feed can’t see him.
He weakly pulls himself into the seat, drawing his knees toward his stomach. The side of his face sticks to the leather with sweat and drool. He sucks in trembling breath after trembling breath. He’s quaking. He’s practically convulsing.
Cas doesn’t want him. Cas can’t stand him. Cas thinks he’s annoying and frustrating and pointless. Cas has been waiting for months to kick him out on his ass. Cas doesn’t want to see his sorry face again in his life. He can barely look at him, as is. He can’t imagine living the rest of his life shackled to Dean.
Dean’s desperate huffs of air turn to choked sobs. Tears spill hot down his cheeks, pooling wet against his cheek on the seat. It clogs his throat until he can barely breathe again. He brings his arms up so he’s crying into his sleeves, cradling his face against his forearms.
By the time the tears run out, his throat is raw and head pounding. He’s weak and trembling, barely able to sit up. He coughs to clear his throat and brings up phlegm. He leans out of the door again to spit onto the pavement before he slams it behind him.
Part of him thought maybe –
Disappointment thrums hot and painful through his chest, and Dean was stupid to even hope. But part of him thought that maybe Cas would follow him down. Would – would know that Dean wasn’t okay.
Frustration at himself for even hoping fuels him into scrubbing his face roughly dry. He shoves his feet into his boots and ties the laces with shaking fingers. He climbs out of the backseat and lets himself behind the wheel.
He needs to settle, and nothing settles him better than a good, long drive. He turns the music up so loud it thrums in his skull. He backs up after tossing a look over his shoulder, and the tires squeal on their way out of the garage toward the street outside.
Dean’s three and a half years sober, but his first instinct is still to go to a bar. He parks outside the nearest dump with a neon sign in the window, and he sits there in his car, forehead pressed against the steering wheel.
God, he can taste the whiskey on his tongue. Feel the burn of it down his throat. He wants to get lost in it. Wants to be flooded and washed away. Wants to forget this terrible stabbing pain in his chest every time he thinks of Cas’s desires and Cas’s disappointments.
Fuck, it ain’t like Dean hasn’t already screwed up tonight. Is there really that far left to fall?
He shuts his eyes. There’s a gnawing, torturous want in his body, chewing through his bones. It’d be so easy. So fucking easy. Lydia’s got Emma this week. No one would have to know. Emma would never have to know him as a miserable, stumbling, failure –
Despair flares in Dean’s head. He’s infinitely glad he remembered to bring his cellphone. Benny’s been on speed dial for a long time, and Dean punches his number on instinct.
“Heya, chief,” Benny picks up after the second ring.
It takes a second for Dean to get his voice out. “I thought this – this shit was supposed to get easier.”
“I sure as hell never told you that,” Benny replies measuredly.
“Fuck,” Dean says, voice thick. “I just – fuck.”
“Where are you?”
“Outside a bar,” Dean confesses.
“You drink anything?”
“I fucking want to,” Dean moans. “I really fucking want to.”
“Yeah, but you called me instead. That’s really good, Dean.”
“Cut the after school special crap,” Dean snaps, rage eclipsing his other emotions. Rage at Benny for his level-headedness. Rage at Cas for bringing up kids again. Rage at himself for being such a hopeless loser. For spiraling for the nth time. He’s always going to be floundering.
It’s not like this is the first time Benny’s had to talk him down. Dean called him half-way to sobbing the night before Sammy’s wedding, when all Dean wanted to do was have a Goddamn beer with his baby brother.
“You wanna come over?” Benny asks after a moment.
“You don’t gotta do that, man,” Dean says, already feeling guilty for snapping, for calling, for bugging him. “Andrea and Lizzy –”
“Lizzy’s gonna be in bed in fifteen minutes. And Andrea sure as hell ain’t gonna begrudge you the couch. This is what I’m here for, Dean.”
“It fucking sucks,” Dean groans.
“Come on, I’ll put a pot of water on the stove.”
“You gonna make me tea?” Dean says incredulously.
“Too late for coffee, brother,” Benny replies.
There’s a pit at Dean’s core as he leaves his spot at the curb and maneuvers his way down the streets. The drive to Benny’s feels a lot longer than fifteen minutes. Every bar and liquor store he passes draws him in by a string around his waist. It’s not like there’s anyone here to stop him. Benny’s waiting, sure. But Dean’s a big boy. He could just send him a text: changed my mind and get hammered.
Hell, maybe sleep with someone, too. If he screws up, he might as well go all the way.
The thought sends a surge of guilt up from Dean’s belly. He feels almost ill with it. He’s not gonna cheat. Dean’s not gonna be that douchebag. He’d rather lay himself across train tracks than hurt Cas like that.
When Dean pulls into Benny’s driveway, he’s never felt so stupid. So defeated. There’s a carved out, sunken hole in his chest.
“Howdy,” Benny greets him at the door. Andrea’s not to be seen, but there’s a light underneath the door at the end of the hallway, likely Benny and Andrea’s bedroom. Dean feels guilty for making her hide in her own house.
Sure enough, there’s a kettle of hot water on the stove. Benny pours himself a mug over a teabag, but Dean waves him down. Cas and Sam drink tea, but Dean’s never had the taste for it. He infinitely prefers coffee, but there’s no way in hell he’s gonna risk a cup of caffeine at this time of night. Not when he feels so untethered.
“So, what’s up?” Benny asks straightaway when he takes his seat across from Dean at the kitchen table.
Dean shrugs. “Cas and I had a fight. Decided I wanted a drink. What’s there to tell?”
“Bad fight?”
Dean shrugs. “Just a fight.”
“He know where you’re at?”
“Yeah, I texted him,” Dean lies. Truthfully, he doesn’t think Cas gives a fuck where Dean is, right now. Dean sure as hell doesn’t want to bother him with a pointless text message.
He’s probably grateful to see the back of him. Cas doesn’t want Dean with his unpredictable mood swings and explosive anger. He’s probably already packing Dean’s shit in boxes. Dean braces his elbows on the table and puts his face against his hands.
“Jesus, I want a drink,” he says into his palms, choking out a laugh. The need is a solid thing in his chest, pulsing and heavy. Just one fucking drink. One sip. It’s been three and a half years, but he can still feel the tingle of alcohol on his tongue, the cleansing burn of it down his throat. God. God, he just wants a taste.
“You’re out of luck looking for one here.”
“Fuck,” Dean says pathetically. “Fuck. I just want it to be fucking easier.”
“Sometimes it is easier,” Benny says calmly. “Sometimes it fucking sucks. Right now, it sucks. All you gotta do is get through right now.”
Benny talks Dean down for what feels like an eternity. When Dean finally comes up for air, it’s nearly two in the morning, and there’s a dull ache of exhaustion in his eyes, but he’s steadier. He doesn’t think he’s going to drive to another bar. Or drive off the road.
Benny offers the couch, but Dean shrugs off his concern and climbs back into the impala. For a moment he contemplates heading to Sam’s, but then he takes a breath and tells himself to put on his big boy pants. The streetlights stretch and blur as he drives back toward the heart of the city and Cas’s – their apartment. He’s tired. He’s wiped out and aching. And he’s guilty. Feels fucking terrible for the way he blew up at Cas. For the shit he said. He doesn’t even remember half of it.
Dean realizes he hasn’t eaten anything tonight; he left the chili bubbling on the stove, but he doesn’t feel remotely hungry. Guilt and worry swim in equal parts through his stomach. He parks the impala and takes the elevator to their floor.
He wasn’t expecting Cas to be up. If anything, he expected Cas to be in bed, sulking on his side, waiting for Dean to crawl in behind him and drop an apology kiss onto his shoulder. He definitely wasn’t expecting the lights to be blaring in the kitchen and living room and Cas to be pacing back and forth across the carpet, stimming furiously and muttering under his breath.
Cas freezes as soon as Dean comes through the door.
“Um, hi,” Dean says uncertainly.
“Where were you?” Cas demands without preamble, voice hoarse.
Dean swallows, taken aback. He’s not entirely sure why he’s been dropped into the middle of an interrogation. He’d assumed Cas would have dropped the dramatics by now. That’s how their fights usually go: they blow up at each other. Dean takes a walk. Then he comes back with more levelled emotions, and they make up with a kiss, or sex, sometimes even a conversation and an apology.
“Out.”
“I know that!” Cas snaps. “Where? Did you not have your phone? I called you.”
“I didn’t check my phone,” Dean replies. “What are you, my mom? I’m allowed to go out.”
“I was worried,” Cas says with difficulty, breathing through his teeth. “I don’t like it when you – when I don’t know where you are.”
“Well, I was fine,” Dean says shortly. “I was with Benny.”
“Benny?” Cas says disbelievingly. “Why were you with Benny?”
“Why do you think?” Dean snaps, done with this shit. He’s tired. He wants to go to bed. “I wanted to drink a fucking liquor store.”
“And you didn’t think –” Cas takes a deep breath. “You didn’t think to tell me? Benny didn’t think it would be a good idea –”
“It wasn’t Benny’s fault. I told him I texted you.”
“I didn’t think it was Benny’s fault,” Cas says coldly.
The two of them stare at each other, at an impasse. Dean’s not sure why Cas is still mad at him. Sure, it’s immature to storm out and not let Cas know where he’s been all night. But Cas should have known Dean just needed some space to cool off. Just a little time without Cas nagging him like a neurotic wife.
“Well, did you?” Cas asks abruptly.
“Did I what?” Dean demands, narrowing his eyes. Knowing very well what Cas wants to know.
“Drink.”
“Sure as hell wish I had,” Dean scoffs. “What, that’s all you fucking care about? Don’t worry, sunshine, I’m still fucking sober.”
“Of course, that’s not the only thing I care about!” Cas snaps. “I was worried,” he says again, voice not at all worried. “You left upset. I didn’t know what you were going to do. Where you were going to go. If you were coming back.”
“Well, I’m back!” Dean says, spreading his arms. He hopes Cas can see how fucking back he is. “Beginning to wish I wasn’t.”
“Please don’t be so dramatic.” Cas rolls his eyes.
“You’re the one who decided to roleplay the Gestapo, but, sure, I’m the one who’s dramatic,” Dean rattles off.
Cas sniffs indignantly, seems to pull himself back from saying something nasty, and finally says. “I’m exhausted. This night is exhausting. I’m going to bed.”
“I’m not gonna stop you,” Dean says.
Cas squares his jaw. Normally Dean thinks about how sexy Cas looks when he’s angry, but now Dean’s too weary to do anything about it. He wants Cas to leave so he can lay down on the couch. Try to get a couple hours in before his shift at the garage. It’s been a shit night – an exhausting night; Cas is right about one thing.
“Goodnight, Dean,” Cas says, voice an icicle. Clearly, he doesn’t expect Dean to join him in bed. Clearly, he doesn’t want him to. Dean doesn’t fucking blame him.
Dean chokes down about ten different retorts he could throw at Cas. Then he takes off his shoes in a huff, dumps his keys, overshirt, and jeans in a pile on the floor that he knows will drive Cas crazy in the morning, and dives headfirst toward the couch.