Chapter Text
Like most human maladies, this one -- along with the fever, runny nose, and earache that accompanied it -- would pass, Cas knew. He’d watched such things come and go for millenia.
Yet, never having experienced such irritations first hand, he kept hoping that Dean’s current absence from their motel room would not be long lasting. He suspected that the other man’s return would diminish his current desire to whimper into the pillows.
It wasn’t so much about the pain -- he’d been in much worse before. It was about how he didn’t truly understand anything that was happening to him.
His body temperature was elevated, yet he was freezing. The pressure of the mucus in his nasal cavity hurt, yet expelling it hurt almost as much as leaving it be. The drainage of that same pressure had led to one, and only one, of his ears throbbing steadily. It was all very counterintuitive.
He wasn’t sure he’d be coping at all if Dean weren’t there with him, telling him that was just the way it was. Despite the fact that Dean didn’t realize it, his constant though, perhaps, unintentional assurances that there was nothing unusual about this particular illness comforted Cas tremendously, as did what Cas believed Sam had been referring to as his “mother hen” tendencies.
Having been reminded of them, as he’d nodded listlessly against Dean’s cell phone a few hours earlier, he was unsurprised when Dean returned with two bags full of food, an extra blanket, and ear drops.
“Okay, Cas, you’re in luck. This town had an Indian place right by the burger joint,” Dean said. “Ethnic and spicy. Should clear your sinuses right up.”
Cas squinted at the bags as Dean pulled a burger and fries out of one and rice and sauce out of the other. Even factoring in his “mother hen” tendencies, this seemed beyond normal Dean behavior. “You don’t like Indian food.”
“Yeah, but you do,” Dean said.
“Yes, but why wouldn’t you get both of us burgers?” Cas said. “Wouldn’t it have been less trouble?”
“What’s with the third degree?” Dean said. “Does it matter?”
Cas had a feeling it did matter, but he couldn’t explain why so he let it drop. “No, I guess it doesn’t.”
“Good. Well, I’m not spoon feeding this grub to you. Get over here and dig in,” Dean said waving him towards the table before throwing the blanket over the chair opposite him.
Once they finished their dinner, and Dean had stared disparagingly at what Cas hadn’t eaten, they made their way to the bed. The only bed -- another mysterious decision on Dean’s part.
Cas tumbled onto it and pulled himself under the covers as Dean fiddled with the DVD player. Then, with The Fellowship of the Ring successfully wrangled, he moved to the edge of the bed and stood tensely on the opposite side, his eyes cast on the blue checkers of the comforter. A mixture of apprehension and doubt seemed to hold him in place. Cas didn’t understand what he was afraid of. It was just a bed.
“I don’t believe it will bite,” Cas said.
Dean relaxed as a grin tugged at the corners of his lips. “No, I guess it won’t. Scoot over.”
Cas did so wordlessly, and Dean sat down on top of the covers.
“Well, before I get this rolling, let’s get these ear drops in you,” Dean said. “You have to keep your head tilted for a while, so, uh, why don’t you, uh, just put your head in ...my lap.”
Despite the clear discomfort in Dean’s voice, Cas thought that seemed like a reasonable suggestion. “Okay.”
He turned sideways and let his head fall against Dean’s thigh. Dean took in a deep breath before completely unnecessarily brushing hair away from Cas’ ear. “Now you’ve got to hold still. Try not to flinch.”
“Is this going to hurt?” Cas asked, knitting his eyes and brow together as he turned up to Dean. He’d not thought about that.
“What? No,” Dean said as though that should be obvious. He clapped his hand over Cas’ shoulder. “It’s not going to be a bowl of cherries, but come on, man, don’t chalk out on me. They’re eardrops.”
“This, all of this,” Cas said indignantly, sweeping his hand over his body as he rose, “is new to me, Dean. That includes eardrops.”
Dean’s facial features tightened, and he pulled back slightly with a heavy sigh. “No, Cas, they won’t hurt.”
Cas relaxed and nodded before gripping a handful of Dean’s shirt with one hand. He still didn’t really know how this would feel, and it made him nervous.
“Okay, on three,” Dean said. “One, two...”
A drop of liquid went into his ear. The feeling, though not painful, was unpleasant.
“An odd sensation,” he mumbled into Dean’s jeans.
“And it’ll feel strange for a while,” Dean said. “But you’ve gotta keep your head like it is. Let ‘em work.”
Cas nodded slowly. He wasn’t exactly comfortable, but he didn’t want to move. He was as close to Dean as he could get, and that was exactly where he wanted to be.
Although Cas believed that he had been awake for the start of the film, he couldn’t remember it when he woke up a few hours later, partly curled over Dean’s knees, his neck incredibly stiff, the rest of him sore and inexplicably fatigued. Hadn’t he just slept? Being ill continued to be counterintuitive.
He groaned as he lifted himself up, reached for the box of tissues on the bedside table, and noticed that Dean had fallen asleep sitting up in a position possibly more uncomfortable than the one he’d just found himself in.
“Dean,” Cas said, gripping Dean’s shoulder without much thought. As his hand rested on the place where he’d left his mark long ago, he pulled back. It felt too intimate a touch for his current purposes.
Dean mumbled something unintelligible before focusing on Cas. “Hey, Cas, you need something?”
“You should move,” Cas said, waving emphatically downwards.
“You want me off of here?” Dean asked, springing up instantly, suddenly wide-eyed. He pressed his fingers to his temple and sighed. “I knew this was a bad idea.”
“You mean sharing the bed?” Cas asked, uncertain why Dean would think that. He sniffled into his tissues waiting for what he hoped would be an explanation.
But Dean didn’t answer. He merely pressed his lips together in a way that suggested he didn’t want to.
“Why do you think this was a bad idea? Are we...is this...”moving too fast”? Cas asked. He wasn’t certain he’d completely grasped the intricacies of that particular figure of speech, but as he said it, he thought he may have truly stumbled on to what was going on. Though he wasn’t sure it was really about the bed. The bed thing seemed to be a symptom of a larger problem.
Dean sighed and rubbed his hand down his face. “We weren’t moving, and that’s on me. So I tried to make us move... but what did I do to you, man? What could I have possibly done to make you think being with me was worth letting those dicks take your mojo?”
“You kissed me,” Cas stated simply, thinking that was blatantly obvious.
“Okay, so we smooched. That doesn’t make me worth this. You shouldn’t be here having me play nursemaid. You should be out there trying to get your juice back. I know they told you that it was gone for good this time, but, well, when is that ever true?”
“But I intend to kiss you again,” Cas said pointedly. “Angels are not allowed romantic relationships with humans. Humans are. If I got my grace back, it would only be taken away again.”
Dean stared at him, disbelief written all over his face.
“I had a choice, Dean, and I chose. I chose you. Is that so impossible to believe?”
There was a yes on the tip of Dean’s tongue; Cas could tell. But somehow Dean choked it back.
“Even if I do believe it, I can’t let you live like this,” Dean said. “You aren’t cut out for this, man. You aren’t. I saw how hard it was for you the first time around. I can’t make you go through it again, not for me.”
“You didn’t make me. You’re right that this isn’t easy for me, Dean. Much of it I don’t think I will ever get used to. Runny noses,” Cas said raising his eyes as he threw a handful of tissues into the wastebasket. “But being human is different than I ever imagined. A lot of it is harder. There are things that I never knew I had taken for granted because your smaller, everyday concerns were so often beneath me, so often outside the scope of Heaven’s larger plans. I think you know that with all the things I’ve done. All the things I’ve done to you. All the things I still have to be sorry for.”
“You think I still haven’t forgiven you after all this time?” Dean asked angrily. “Tell me right now that this isn’t why you did this. Tell me you aren’t still trying to wipe your slate clean because it’s clean. You can’t make me your excuse for putting yourself through hell on earth, Cas. It’s not fair to me, and it’s not fair to you.”
“No, Dean. Listen to me. That isn’t why,” Cas said. “When I was human before, one of my brothers asked me how I wanted to live: as an angel or as a man. At the time, I needed to be an angel. It was the only way I could fix what I had so foolishly and unwittingly done. Yet when we managed to reopen Heaven’s gates and I returned, I felt an emptiness telling me that it wasn’t where I was meant to be or even who I was meant to be. Not anymore. I wasn’t the righteous soldier that pulled you out of Hell and misguidedly tried to right the world. I was no longer the broken angel that needed to fix Heaven; I had done what I could to repair my own damage for my brothers and sisters in Heaven. And I realized they weren’t the ones that really mattered to me. Then I realized what I was meant to be. What I wanted to be.”
“And what are you meant to be, Cas?” Dean asked wearily, running his fingers over a closed eyelid before reaching his hand out towards Cas.
“A Winchester,” Cas said.
“I was afraid you were going to say something stupid like that,” Dean said, shaking his head. “You don’t want that. Why would you possibly want that?”
“Because, Dean, you’re my family,” Cas said. “You have been for a long time. And not only that. I have an incomprehensibly strong feeling for you. I’m not certain I’ve mastered the emotion; It’s more unbalancing and confusing than most, but I believe what I feel for you is love.”
“That’d be your fever talking,” Dean said, clearly trying to brush him off. “All of this is your fever talking.”
“You know that it isn’t,” Cas said, fixing Dean with an intense stare, daring him to believe the truth.
He watched as a single tear fell from Dean’s right eye and trickled down his cheek. As Cas reached forward to press his finger to it, Dean leaned forward and pulled him into a hug. Momentarily startled, Cas flailed his arms before securing them around Dean’s torso.
Dean rested his head on Cas’ shoulder and quietly said, “I know.”
They stayed like that, silently drowsing against each other, letting their affection drift over each other.
After a time, Dean pulled back abruptly and asked, “Cas, why did you want me to move?”
“I had thought you would be more comfortable lying down,” Cas said hoarsely, his voice having all but disappeared somewhere in the middle of his speeches. “Now don’t ask anymore questions. My throat feels much worse than before. I don’t believe it was designed for this much speaking.”
“I’ll get you some water,” Dean said squeezing his shoulder lightly as he got off the bed.
Cas nodded gratefully; water sounded wonderful.
Dean handed him the glass then looked at him with some concern. “How’s your ear feel?”
Cas shot him a look over the rim of the glass. Even if he wanted to talk, he couldn’t.
“Right, sorry,” Dean said. “Well, if you feel worse or anything, wake me up. But let’s catch some Zs before one of us tries to pour more of their guts out.”
Dean was already asleep when Cas set the drained glass on the bedside table. He pressed his head into Dean’s shoulder and let his breathing ease him into a peaceful sleep.
A soft kiss to his forehead pulled Cas into a semi-consciousness the next morning, and he heard an almost inaudible whisper he wasn’t sure he was meant to hear. “I love you.”
Then as Cas blinked awake, Dean rubbed his thumb over his lips. “I’m going to get sick because of you.”
“Most likely,” Cas said. “But I believe I’ve learned how to take care of you.”
Dean snorted.
“And I will,” Cas said, giving Dean a hardened stare. He meant it about more than merely this illness.
“Is that a threat?” Dean asked, raising his eyes with amused skepticism.
“If it needs to be,” Cas said.
He may not be a soldier of Heaven anymore, but he thought he would always have one very special mission, that of guarding Dean against his worst demon: himself.