Work Text:
Castiel still has a hard time believing it had happened.
And yet, Dean is there, right next to him, sleeping with absolute trust. Castiel gets to see him as he had never thought he would. Their warrior life should never have given them enough room for this, especially since he doesn’t deserve it.
He’s a soldier. He isn’t made for this.
Castiel counts Dean’s breathing and his steady heartbeat that fill the silence of their room. Their room, Dean had insisted, on more than one occasion. Castiel watches his face softened by sleep, his eyes trembling behind his eyelids, the faded lines on his skin. He lifts one of his hands and studies it, counting the creases on his fingers, his nails a little longer than Dean likes, his veins thrumming with blood like scared birds.
It’s real. Castiel can touch it.
And yet he can really believe it.
When Dean had come back from his meeting with the Darkness, he had stared at him. Dean always stares at him, to some extent, as Castiel is almost constantly staring at him, but it had been different. Dean had looked peaceful. Content. Castiel had attributed of their waited victory against the Darkness, but the human had said, “You love me.” It hadn’t been a question. There hadn’t been the tiniest tremor of doubt in his soul. Dean knew, in the same way he knows how to fix Baby or to say his favorite quotes.
Castiel had wanted to fly away at being seen so fully. He would have, if Dean hadn’t taken his hands in his, the hint of a smile curving his mouth, his soul reaching for him by their little touch and pouring his love so gently into Castiel.
Castiel would have flown away, if he wasn’t so weak.
After having caused havoc on Heaven and Earth alike, after having betrayed and lied and killed, after having created so many problems without fixing a single of them, Castiel was rewarded.
The world is unfair.
“Heya,” Dean whispers to him, still half-asleep, completely vulnerable.
This is something he gives to Castiel without a second thought, since they’re together—since longer, since years. He isn’t afraid of showing all his soft spots to him, though Castiel could strike him down.
Castiel drops a kiss on his throat. He breathes in. Dean smells good—he always does—but he smells especially good today.
Castiel travels his nose up his throat. Dean smells really good.
His mouth waters.
Castiel tenses and moves away in a jerk. Dean furrows his brow.
“You fine?”
“I–I am,” Castiel stutters.
He waits, his senses turning inside himself, but he doesn’t find anything off. His grace is humming gently among his frequencies. The tune of his frequencies is right. There’s no disturbance in the connexion to his vessel and his vessel itself is normal.
Castiel shifts his focus back into Dean’s room. He takes two deep breaths, overwhelming his senses with Dean. He waits, tracks. Everything is in order.
“It’s our first Valentine together,” Dean states, flipping a pancake in his pan.
“It is.”
Dean glances over his shoulder and bats his eyelashes at him. It’s a human coursthip ritual. Castiel likes it. Dean’s eyes are beautiful, eyelids up or down, and he loves his eyelashes. Their movements are always so gentle.
Castiel wonders how this courtship ritual feels for humans and why it works on them.
“Did you plan something?”
Castiel’s pleasant thoughts come to a halt. Should he have planned something?
It’s another human courtship ritual, he remembers.
“I see.” Dean smirks. “We’ll have to make do.”
Dean abandons the pan and walks to the table, to him. He leans on it, arching enticingly his throat. Castiel watches his jugular thudding adorably under his skin. If only Dean wore a shirt instead of his usual flannels... his collarbones are elegant, with their soft angles and the thin skin covering them. On another hand, Castiel is thankful for Dean’s dressing habits: this way, not everyone can see his collarbones all the time.
Dean’s eyes rake over Castiel very suggestively.
Oh.
Castiel dips his head. “I will make sure that this day is very pleasurable for you.”
“I hate you both,” Sam groans from the kitchen’s threshold.
Dean’s smile turns mischievous and he stands up.
“You didn’t like when I called it unattached drifter Christmas. Now you don’t like it when I plan stuff with my Cas. You’re never happy.”
“Never,” Castiel confirms.
It earns him a bright smile from Dean. A pit opens in Castiel’s stomach. Worried lines appear on Dean’s forehead and Castiel turns his own expression into a mask. He can’t allow Dean to worry, especially not for him. He doesn’t deserve it.
Of course, it’s not enough to reassure Dean. He’s smart. He needs more than a little smoke and mirror to fall for a lie. Dean opens his mouth to ask him how he feels. Castiel looks Sam.
“Are you going to eat breakfast with us?”
“Errr. Yeah. I guess.”
Castiel narrows his eyes. He looks back at Dean.
“Isn’t your brother weird?”
“He’s always weird.”
“You are the last people of this planet who can say that.”
Castiel doesn’t think so. Sam is the weirdest creature he had ever met. ‘Derogatory’, as humans clarify on their websites.
Those words should have triggered a bickering between the two brothers, and Castiel should have intervened to finish Sam off—he’s skilled to shock Dean’s brother silent, and Dean finds that funny—but the atmosphere is strange. Dean is clinging to his smile, his soul curling on itself in a way that makes Castiel want to shed his limited vessel to coil around it and prevent anything to harm it. Dean holds on his emotions tightly, preventing them to spill out of him like they usually do.
And Sam? Sam keeps glancing at the open door, longing for something that isn’t in the room, fighting against this longing, forcing himself to look focused every single time he catches himself looking at the door.
“Pancakes are ready!” Dean exclaims in a fake-cheerful voice. “You’ll take a bite, Cas?”
Castiel nods. He tries to taste every meal that Dean cooks. It makes Dean happy and this small attention, though not necessary, makes him happy.
Maybe it makes Castiel so happy because he doesn’t need to eat.
Dean shares the pancakes between the three of them and sits across to Castiel. His heartbreakingly fake smile doesn’t waver. Sam struggles in his seat, wanting to be somewhere else.
Humans. Their bodies of flesh must have noticed something.
They are sensitive to their environment, even when their mind doesn’t catch up to it.
Dean grabs his first pancake and twists it between his hands. He toys with it for some time before putting it back to his plate.
“I’m not hungry. Must be nerves. It’s our first Valentine’s day, ya know?”
Castiel nods. He raises his pancake to his mouth to nimble at it but he ends up wolfing it down. The pit re-opens inside him, bigger than at Dean’s awakening—it wasn’t an illusion then. The taste of the pancake is mostly wrong. Sugary. Chemical. Plant-based. Castiel picks up flavors from Southern lands. The texture is wrong too. Spongy. It crumbles against his tongue. Doesn’t resist to his teeth.
It’s a perfect pancake. It just doesn’t suit him.
But there’s something... something that gives Castiel the impression it could suit him.
Castiel inhales the second pancake. Dean. Dean is the one who had cooked. There’s a taste of him left on the food. This is why the food he cooks is bearable, despite the molecules trying to overwhelm Castiel’s senses.
“Cas?”
“Are you going to finish your meal?”
Dean straightens up and slides his pancakes in the plate of Castiel.
“Okay. Spending Valentine’s day with you was too much to ask for.”
Castiel’s eyes dart up to Dean’s, a pancake half-hanging from his mouth. His annoyance is like spikes all around his body. Something settles in Castiel. Dean’s soul keeps expressing itself. It’s fine.
Castiel swallows his third pancake.
“So?”
“Doesn’t remind you something Cas?” Dean looks lazily at his brother. “And you? You hungry for something?”
“Nothing that is going to be a problem,” Sam retorts, too taunt to be honest.
Castiel would like to point that out, but the pit in his stomach isn’t settled at all. The fourth pancake won’t help, but he has to try. He has to keep himself under control.
“So who’s got hold of Famine’s ring and is using it in the bunker?”
“Why are you looking at me?” Sam snaps.
“You’re the one who’s always trying out new spells.”
How does he know that? Sam wonders so loudly that Castiel cannot not hear him.
Not reading in thoughts is easy, not hearing them is impossible. Unfortunately, humans don’t seem to understand the difference between both. Dean doesn’t. Maybe because Castiel hadn’t explained it to him. Castiel doesn’t like to dwell on their differences. There are so many of them and they are all so obvious.
“You are the one who touches everything he shouldn’t!” Sam retorts.
“Well, it’s not my fault!”
Pause.
“It’s not Cas’ fault either!” Dean almost snarls, defensive.
“Nothing is never Cas’ fault,” Sam mutters resentfully.
“Exactly.”
Castiel senses the annoyance of Sam increase. Dean’s hand lands on his, to bring him comfort, and Castiel feels everything. Dean’s warmth. The layers of his skin. His muscles and veins right underneath it. The ligaments holding his bones together and the bones holding all of him together.
His flesh.
Castiel’s eyes startle open. When had he shut them?
Dean is looking at him in concern, his soul wide open, reaching out gently to him. And the pit inside Castiel... It’s not only his vessel’s stomach. It’s in his true form, among his frequencies. There’s an emptiness to fill. It’s not normal. Angels aren’t built to feel... that kind of things.
Or anything really.
Castiel slides his hand away from Dean. He can’t... Something shatters in Dean’s expression and Castiel hates being the one who caused this.
The consequences would have been worse if he had touched him longer.
“You think it has something to do with Famine’s ring?”
Dean shrugs. “It’s exactly the same for us both.”
He glances at Sam, who diverts his face.
“I don’t want... demon blood.”
So he wants something.
Castiel sees the same thought crossing Dean’s face, but Dean decides to let it go. He’s too careful and considerate.
“We’ll have to search the bunker. That’s not how I pictured the day,” Dean mutters, rising to his feet.
“Can you cook something for me before?”
Castiel won’t be able to stand so long without eating. The pancakes hardly helped.
Dean’s face softens. “Of course. Burgers?”
Castiel nods curtly. Dean starts moving between the fridge and the table. Sam snorts.
“Shouldn’t we investigate?”
“We’re not stopping you.”
“Why I should do all the work when it’s not my fault?”
Castiel is ready to bet that Sam isn’t sure to be able to focus on the mystery if he leaves the kitchen. Whatever he’s hungry for, it’s somewhere in the bunker.
A warm smell of meat fills the room. Castiel forces himself to concentrate on it. His attention wanders and soon is on Dean’s heartbeat. It’s the most soothing sound in the world, one of his favorite, especially when it’s steady like it is right now. Dean isn’t afraid, or feeling threatened, or anything like this. He’s safe, in his home. But soon—too soon—the pit in his stomach opens wide jaws and Castiel doesn’t like focusing on Dean while feeling that. He tries to shift his concentration on something else—the molecules in the air, the interlacing fibers of the table, the creaking and exhaling concrete.
Nothing manages to hold his attention as much as Dean.
“There it is!” Dean shouts, putting a burger on Castiel’s plate.
Castiel lifts the sandwich to his mouth right away. He bites into it and closes his eyes at the relief of feeling the hunger receeds again, like a wave.
And like a wave, it’ll soon rise again.
“It doesn’t hurt your pride too much?” Sam asks, mocking.
“What?” Dean utters.
“You’re dating and Cas wants food more than you. I’d feel bad, if I were you.”
“I’m an angel! I don’t have to obey as literally as humans to Famine. I redirect it.”
There’s a change in the atmosphere—in Dean. Castiel’s frequencies stop humming. His wings still. He looks up at his human. Dean is watching him with a thoughtful expression. Castiel senses his thoughts following a thread. He itches to listen to them to see if Dean understood, but he had promised—several times—not to.
“I’ll cook another burger.”
“Thank you Dean.”
Castiel wants to relish this meal Dean had cooked for him but he absorbs it as swiftly as the pancakes. It’s better. There’s meat—mammal meat. It tears between his teeth, resists.
“Ordering would be more efficient,” comments Sam. “There’ll be more food.”
“It wouldn’t work as well,” Dean murmurs.
Castiel winces. He looks up, but Dean is turning his back to him, busied by the stove.
It doesn’t matter. Castiel doesn’t have to see his expression: Dean had understood.
Castiel wants to feel sick. His hunger doesn’t allow him to.
He knows, he mourns.
It’s horrible to be perceived without being able to do anything against it.
“Of course it would.”
Footsteps sound in the distance—heels hitting the ground. Castiel peers at the doorway. He feels the moment when Dean—and Sam—hears the footsteps too and the way their attention shifts. Rowena appears in the doorway, wearing a black laced dress. Tension holds Sam tighter. Dean’s brother curls his hands into fists, trying to get himself under control.
“What are you waiting for, Samuel?”
“I– I–”
“You slept here, Rowena?” Dean asks.
“A woman doesn’t kiss and tell.”
Dean clicks his tongue. “You wouldn’t know what is happening to us, by chance?”
Of course, Dean has the right to accuse Rowena right away, Sam mutters inwardly. God forbides that I do the same with Cas.
Dean forbides, not God, Castiel wants to retort.
He barely refrains from doing so. Sam would be even more annoyed if Castiel answered to his thoughts.
“This is such a special day... and isn’t it nice to use special days to... accept some things about oneself?”
“Rowena!”
“It’ll only last today.”
“It gives us plenty time to kill each other.”
“Oh, Dean, I control my spells. Nothing that excessive will happen.” Rowena aims a charming smile at Sam. “Will you come with me, Samuel?”
Sam jumps to his feet before thinking. Satisfaction chants in Rowena as Sam clears his throat awkwardly.
“If we just have to wait...”
Dean waves his hand. “Go. You know I won’t stop you from having fun.”
Sam thinks rebelliously that he doesn’t need Dean’s permission, but then he looks at Rowena and his whole world tones down to her. They leave the kitchen. Castiel stares after them in longing. He’d like to give that much to Dean, but even this reduced spell is too much for an angel like him.
“This is why you should never have horny witches as guests,” Dean comments.
Castiel drags back his eyes on him. Dean smiles and puts a second burger in front of him. Castiel’s fingers curl forward, like claws. He stares at the burger.
“It’s okay, Cas.”
“It’s really not.”
Dean’s smile turns sad as Castiel picks up the burger. Castiel decides to make this meal last longer. He can do it. He’s stronger than the spell. He’s proving it by devoring food instead of... Castiel can do better. It’s only a tiny more effort.
He chews slowly, trying to bring back the memories of being graceless and able to taste food. Castiel realizes that his eyes are trailing on Dean’s throat and drags his attention from him, trying to look anywhere but him.
“Would it help if I leave?”
Castiel snaps his head toward Dean.
“No.”
Dean makes an unbelieving face.
“It’d be worse. You– You help keeping it under control.”
Castiel winces. He doesn’t want to confess how much he’s affected, even if Dean already has an idea of the situation. The more he keeps him in the doubt, the better it is for them.
Dean nods. He doesn’t believe it—Castiel feels it at the way his soul is curling onto itself again—but he believes it enough to stay.
Castiel finishes his burger too soon. He wonders uneasily if there’s enough food in the fridge to make him last the whole day. Dean has to feed too. Castiel won’t be one of those things that stands between Dean and a full stomach.
He’s starting to understand why Dean utters that he hates witches everytime he talks about a case about them. It is deeply annoying.
Dean walks back to the fridge.
“How many burgers we can make?”
“I wanna try something else.”
“But...”
“Trust me.”
Dean is trusting him by staying in the very same room as him. Castiel cannot fail to return the favor by allowing him to try whatever he wants to try.
Dean empties a pack of bacon in the pan. He cooks it in his favorite way, humming A Whole Outta Love. Castiel closes his and listens. He loves when Dean hum. Words are using frequencies, too, but when Dean traps his voice in his throat like this... It gives him a glimpse of how he’d be, as an angel. Castiel doesn’t want Dean to be an angel—it wouldn’t make any sense—but he pictures it sometimes. His frequencies would sound so beautifully.
Dean finishes to cook bacon and piles it up on a plate. He lets out a little sigh, before taking a knife and cutting every slice in three parts. Castiel wonders what he’s doing. Dean is always saying that bacon is sacred and that you had to eat it in the traditional way.
Dean puts the plate on the table, to the right of Castiel’s plate, and sits next to him. He picks a piece of bacon between his fingers and lifts it to Cas’ face. Hunger and unease fight inside Castiel. He still had a doubt—a hope—left that Dean hadn’t understood the whole situation, but he was wrong. Nothing else can explain his bevahior. Castiel would fly away, if he could. The bunker is trapping him in.
His shattered wings are trapping him here.
“C’mon.”
“You–”
“Cas.”
Castiel takes the morcel in his mouth gently, careful to not touch Dean’s skin. His hunger settles. Dean’s skin had tainted the bacon. There’s only the taste of his skin and of the meat—no bread, no ketchup. Castiel’s mind is quieting, soothed by a contentment he had never known and he doesn’t know how to fight off.
“I’m sorry.”
Dean eyerolls. “That’s Rowena’s fault.”
Not this time. Not completely. The spell was meant to be aphrodisiacal, unveiling their desires, and him... and him...
Suddenly, Dean’s free hand is around his wrist. Castiel startles, wondering if Dean had to defend himself from him, but Dean reached out for him. He chose to touch him.
“Do you know I love you?”
Dean’s voice sounds small. Castiel hardly detects his soul despite their touch. It’s completely curled up in the deepest part of Dean, a core trying to cancel itself from the world. Dean’s expression reflects that. There’s much sadness pouring out of his eyes, turning down his mouth, bringing his eyebrows together.
“Of course.”
“But the thing—the spell—it’s not working on me.”
“It didn’t either last time.”
“But I love you.”
“You do.”
“It’s just that– I’m–” Dean lets go of him and gestures at himself. “Ya know?”
Castiel nods. He does know.
Dean’s shoulders collapse in relief. He picks a piece of bacon with his right hand and studies it.
“We love each other,” he states, his cheeks pinkening, not as much as because he loves Castiel, as because Castiel loves him. Castiel wants to nuzzle at the changing color. He holds back. He doesn’t trust himself enough to get that close to Dean. Not now.
Another time.
“It doesn’t matter if that dumb spell doesn’t work on us.”
“Indeed. Though Rowena would disagree about her spell being dumb. She’s having a great time.”
Dean makes a face. “I really do not need to know that about my brother.”
“I’d like to not know that either,” Castiel sighs sadly.
His angelic hearing makes sure he does, though.
Dean laughs. The sound echoes beautifully around them, cutting them away from anything that isn’t necessary. Dean nudges the bacon toward him. Castiel closes his teeth on it and frees it from Dean’s grasp. He chews on it peacefully. It’s much more efficient than burgers. Dean had a great idea.
Castiel’s hunger receeds and stays low. It knows that what it needs is offered to him and that he doesn’t have to hunt for it.
Dean hands him another morcel and another. Grease is dripping from his fingers. Castiel licks it away. It’s even better than the bacon: the meat is tainting Dean’s skin, not the contrary. It tastes more like Dean.
Dean’s heart skips a beat. When Castiel looks at him, his face is flushed. He quirks an eyebrow.
“Are you aroused?”
“You’re hot, okay?” Dean throws like an accusation before picking up another slice of bacon.
“But you know.”
Dean’s brow furrows in concern. “What?”
“You understood what I mean. About redirecting.”
Castiel looks at the emptying plate. Dean hurries to give him another morcel of bacon.
“You explained it well.”
I didn’t want to explain it.
Castiel hadn’t wanted Sam to mock their bond or doubt his devotion to Dean. No one is allowed to belittle their relationship.
“Doesn’t it scare you?”
“You’ve got the hots for me. Why would I whine about it?”
“I want to sink my teeth in your flesh.”
“Kinky.”
“No, Dean. Not this way.”
“We’ve not been together for that long. Maybe I kept my weirdest kinks for later.”
Castiel eyerolls. There’s nothing that Dean is ashamed to share with him.
“What?! It could be.”
“Sure.”
Castiel eats another piece of bacon. He’s leaning into Dean, his shoulder pressing against his. He doesn’t try to move away. The hunger is completely under control. It’d be stupid to do anything that could change the situation.
“Well! I love that you’re eating something and that you mean it, for once.”
“I do mean it, for some things.”
“I don’t mean that Cas,” Dean tries to say sternly.
He fails miles away, a grin spreading on his face.
“I like that you enjoy food,” he says more gently.
Castiel accepts another piece of bacon. It makes sense. Dean loves taking care of people and, being human, it covers feeding them.
Dean lifts the last bit of bacon and presses it against his mouth. He stands as Castiel eats it. Castiel’s wellbeing strains as Dean steps away from the table, forcing him to notice how complete was his presence. Castiel was surrounded by his warmth and his smell. The breathing, the heartbeat and the body movements of Dean were filling his eyes, cutting him from the rest of the world. Castiel shakes his wings, trying to get rid off the unpleasant contrast. He’s hearing everything about the bunker now, smelling the stale air of underground places.
Dean washes his hand, rinses the pan and cooks more bacon. Castiel dislikes to have him so far away, but the hunger is leaving him alone. He feels it stir in his stomach, hardly noticeable.
Dean’s solution is efficient.
Dean fills another plate with bacon and walks to the table. Castiel waits but Dean doesn’t sit down. He grins.
“Let’s bring that to our room.”
“Dean.”
“It’ll be fine.”
“You can’t know that.”
“I know you. That’s enough.”
Castiel should argue. He could at least refuse to follow Dean. He’s good at this too, being ‘uselessly’ stubborn. But he wants and he wants and he wants, in a way he can’t fight today.
“It’s a terrible idea,” he says, standing up.
“It’s one of my ideas.”
“Your other idea was good. It was working.”
“So who’s to say it won’t work better?”
Castiel scowls. He has no argument against that. Dean grins harder.
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
Dean’s expression softens. “You won’t.”
There isn’t the slightest doubt in his face, in his eyes. The certainty is so deep that Castiel believes it too.
Castiel is satiated. He understands better human’s relationship to food
He thought he had reached a good level of understanding in the thirty-four days where he had been graceless, sharing human needs, but it hadn’t been so absolute.
He buries his face in the crook of Dean’s neck, filling his lungs with his warm and irony smell. The hunger doesn’t even stir. It had disappeared.
Castiel drifts in a state that isn’t unlike sleep.
As Rowena had said, things are back to normal the next morning.
Castiel is lying in their bed, next to Dean, listening his deep breath filling the silence, brushing with his fingertips the arm Dean had thrown across him.
The experience had concluded pleasantly, but he’s relieved that it’s behind them. It hadn’t been dangerfree.
Castiel accompanies Dean in the kitchen and takes advantage of being back to his senses to admire him. He’s happy for the ordeal to be behind them. Genuinely. But maybe... Maybe he’s grateful to have felt how much he needs Dean and have acted on it.
A little.
Within himself.
Dean cooks his breakfast and settles next to him. Castiel watches him eat, turning him down when Dean offers him a bite. Dean had hardly eaten yesterday and he’s hungry.
Their shoulders brush each other. They won’t move away from each other any time soon.
Maybe the spell’s effect are still acting. Maybe it’s only the way they are.
Rowena enters the room in a black and purple nightgown, her hair done, only to show off the hickeys covering her arms and throat and probably many other places. Castiel knows it’s for this reason, given her satisfaction when Dean grimaces.
“You should be ashamed of yourself, Rowena,” Dean says.
Rowena looks between the two of them.
“You shouldn’t look so happy with yourself if you want me to believe that.”
Dean grins over his coffee.
“You do look happy,” Castiel points out.
Dean shoves his shoulder playfully. “Stop praising yourself.”
“I’m not...”
Dean quirks an eyebrow so Castiel lets his sentence drags out.
“You can, you know?”
“I’ll leave you, then, boys,” Rowena says, turning her back to them so swiftly that her dress flows.
She walks out of the kitchen. Dean shakes his head.
“Unbelievable,” he mutters, his annoyance interlaced with affection.
He finishes his meal, pressing his shoulder into Castiel’s. It is nice to be here and now.
Dean offers him a smile.
“Rowena writes down all her spells, so if you ever wants to try again...”
He winks and raises to his feet. He gathers the dishes and steps toward the sink.
“You’d want to...?”
“We had fun,” Dean shrugs.
He glances over his shoulder, waiting.
“We did,” Castiel admits.
When Dean turns his back to him, Castiel allows a smile over his face.