Chapter Text
Cas walks towards the kitchen, stopping abruptly when he hears his name in a whisper.
He knows he shouldn’t eavesdrop, but ever the curious one, he stills against the wall and listens.
“Do you think Cas’ll like it?” he hears Dean ask, his voice, still hopeful in its uncertainty.
“Seriously Dean?” – that’s Sam speaking– “Don’t you think you’re a little old for stuff like that?”
“So you don’t think he’ll like it?”
Cas can hear Sam's eyeroll. (Takes one to know one.)
He sighs. “No, it’s kinda sweet. He’ll love it.”
Castiel wonders what “it” is, and hopes he will find out soon enough.
“Can I ask why exactly you decided… that would be the best gift idea though?” Sam continues.
It’s Dean’s turn to sigh now, Cas can only imagine him scrubbing a hand down his face.
“You– you know what he means to me…” Dean’s voice is a little thin, “I just– I just wanna show him somehow.”
“I like it! Do you have another one? Can I have one?” Jack asks, and Cas can tell he’s grinning.
“Nah, just the two, kid, and they’re for your Dad and me. Tell you what, I’ll take you to get one tomorrow, and you can give the other one to whoever you like, ‘kay?”
“I think it’s adorable,” he hears Eileen pipe up, “You know it’s as good as married, right?”
Cas frowns. What on earth is “it”?
“Har har,” Dean says humorlessly and Castiel smiles at the familial teasing.
Waiting for the conversation to change before he enters the kitchen, he sits with his make-shift family while they eat dinner in animated conversation.
And this… this is all he has wanted for a long time now, all he had hoped to have. There’s an ocean inside him, but it’s no rough sea. Just joy, rolling through him in blissful, boundless waves.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Castiel is sitting on the couch, scrolling through Netflix, when Dean taps him on the shoulder to get his attention.
“Yes?” he asks distractedly, mind still focused on why he can’t find that documentary he wanted to watch.
“Cas, I– “
The uncertainty in Dean’s voice calls Cas to focus. He turns to face him, heart and eyes full of apprehension as he waits for Dean to continue.
Dean’s blushing. It’s endearing. It's confusing.
“I uh– I got you somethin’,” he says as he rubs the back of his neck, “‘s no big deal, I can return it if you don’t want it.”
Words evading him, Cas just tilts his head in confusion as he waits for Dean to continue.
Reaching into his pocket, Dean pulls out a little oak box, opening the lid before placing it into Cas’ hands.
On top of a green velvet lining sits a shining silver pendant. It’s a strange thing, Cas thinks, the left side shaped in little waves, the right, a smoother curve. There are letters stamped on it, though they don’t make a lick of sense.
ST ENDS.
The confusion must be evident on Castiel’s face because Dean suddenly makes a little “oh!” sound and reaches into the neck of his shirt.
He pulls out a silver pendant. It’s similar to the one in Cas’ hand, though the shape of it is flipped, and the letters stamped into it are different.
BE FRI.
His eyes flick from the box in his hand to the chain on Dean’s neck as he tries to make sense of what he’s seeing.
“What is this?” he asks.
But when Dean takes the box from Cas’ hands and holds it next to the pendant he wears, Castiel knows what it is– a promise.
A heart, when the two come together.
BEST FRIENDS
Words that only make sense when they’re connected.
Castiel finally reads the inscription on the inner lid of the small wooden box.
“Your friend is your needs answered. He is your field which you sow with love and reap with thanksgiving.”
Cas recognises the poem and a great, gummy grin splits his face.
“Dean,” he breathes, disbelieving the gesture.
Dean wears a small, fond smile beneath his pink, freckled cheeks.
“I know it’s kinda corny–,” is it? Cas thinks, “but it was the best I could think of. I – I know we’re not… I know things aren’t typical between us. But– I’m happy Cas, I’m so damn happy with what we have,” he ducks his head a little, “with what you give me. So I just– I wanted to give you something to remind you… you’re it for me, man. In whatever way we’ll have each other.”
Cas thumbs the pendant where it sits in the box. He doesn’t realise he’d been crying until a tear splatters on to his wrist.
“Thank you,” he whispers, and it’s all he can say, because finally, finally he has everything he has ever wanted. And it doesn’t matter– has never mattered– in which way he got to have this, have Dean , because the man he chose has chosen him back and he’s staring at him like he’s seeing sunrise for the first time. “ Thank you , Dean.”
He leans forwards and presses his lips to Dean’s cheek.
“Do you wanna put it on?” Dean asks cautiously, though Cas can all but feel the buzz of excitement humming just below his skin.
“Please,” Cas breathes, his mind still reeling, still trying to understand how he gets to have this after a decade of wanting.
Dean gently takes Cas’ half of the heart from the box, and clasps it into place around his neck. Then, as if it were something sacred, he lovingly brushes his thumb over it before hauling Castiel into a hug that, were he not an angel, would surely suffocate him.
“Happiness isn’t in the having, it’s just in the being ,” he had said.
Oh , but how fulfilling the having is.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
They find Sam and Eileen in the kitchen the next morning, the latter’s eyebrow raising in question as she regards them over her coffee.
“So, uh– what are you two, then?” Sam asks with a smirk that has all the markings of a meddling younger brother.
Cas looks at Dean. How could he ever define it? The man he loves, who loves him too but not like that but more than that. The best friend he kisses but is not his boyfriend, who is his husband but not his lover, who he would dismantle heaven and earth for and kill for and die for, just as surely as Dean would do for him.
What are you?
"I think," Cas says with a soft smile curling into the corner of his mouth, though he has no idea where the words spilling from his mouth are heading, "we’re just..."
Dean twines their fingers together as he absentmindedly touches his left hand to where Cas knows the silver pendant lies pressed against his chest.
"We're making it up as we go,” Dean says as he regards Castiel with such assured fondness, an openness that Cas never thought he’d be able to receive.
His chosen words echo all they have shared together since that fateful night in Chuck’s living room, when Cas had chosen love for the first time, and continued to choose it ever since.
A grin lights up Dean’s face and it’s like watching the most vibrant California Poppy open its petals to the sun. Cas wants to press it between book pages, preserve its beauty so he can hold it when the Fall rolls in. He makes a silent promise that he would rather hold back the seasons themselves, than let their Summer fade.
If Dean is a meadow of wildflowers, Castiel will be the sun to which they tilt their precious heads.
“ And let your best be for your friend.
If he must know the ebb of your tide, let him know its flood also.
For what is your friend that you should seek him with hours to kill?
Seek him always with hours to live.
For it is his to fill your need but not your emptiness.
And in the sweetness of friendship let there be laughter, and sharing of pleasures.
For in the dew of little things the heart finds its morning and is refreshed.”
– from ‘ On Friendship ’ by Kahlil Gibran
THE END