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Dean likes to think of himself as a good driver, he is a treasure on the road. An absolute treasure, he asserts, and Sam laughs, but it’s true: He knows when and where to speed, where highway patrol is gonna be lurking just out of sight, waiting to catch some poor sucker. He knows when to turn on his blinker and slow down, he knows the rules of the road: They may in fact be the only rules he follows. He knows how to be safe, though when he first sat behind the wheel he was anything but: a teenager with barely there stubble and his foot on the pedal, doing what his father called digital driving, no in between, just a heavy boot alternating between riding the breaks and stomping on the gas.
But now he’s a golden boy. He always checks both directions before pulling out of an intersection. He always stops at stop stigns, doesn’t halfass it and roll on through, not anymore, not even on backcountry roads - not unless there’s something with fangs or claws or both after them.
But since Castiel started riding shotgun that careful driving is long gone. Now he can’t be bothered to look at the road, can’t find a moment to check the speedometer, there’s not a thought in his head, cause he’s too busy looking sideways to see if Castiel is laughing at his jokes.
He gets a speeding ticket near Memphis, he gets another in Des Moines. “How haven’t you gotten in a wreck by now?” Sam is asking, Sam always asks. Castiel leans over him to fish something out from the floorboard and Dean accidentally hits the gas and hits the bumper of the truck in front of him. He’s banged up the other truck, busted his own headlight. Dean gives the guy fake everything, fake names, fake numbers. He can’t think straight. His hands are moist and that’s not fake.
“This is unlike you,” Castiel notes, surveying their bumper in the Wal-Mart parking lot. “Are you ok?”
“Peachy,” Dean says. His hands sweat so much these days. They are doing it again, he can’t get a grip on the wheel. He has to rub them again on the side of his legs. When he throws the impala in reverse he backs up over the sidewalk and hits an empty shopping cart.
He hits a parking meter in Illinois because he’s too busy trying to get his arm slung just the right kind of casual on the back of the seat, and his fingertips brush Castiel’s collar, and it’s all over, wham, bang, boom: he wiped out again, and Castiel is giving him that look that means, more than anything, What the fuck? And Dean can only shrug because he’s got no idea, what the fuck, what the heck is going on.
He runs a red light when Castiel reaches out to tap him on the knee, he goes the wrong way down a one-way street when he says Castiel can change the radio station and Castiel smiles at him, meltingly, the way ice cream cones disappear in midday heat, and Dean dissolves instantly, just like fucking that, and he loses his head, and that’s how they almost end up underneath a twelve-wheeler.
“I used to be good at this,” Dean says, he really doesn’t know what’s going on, but he feels like he has to wipe his hands on his pants leg again. “I really did. You think it’s a curse? I’m always getting cursed, we should check for hex bags-”
Castiel is still smiling at him, maybe a little self-conscious, and Dean’s a melted popsicle dripping all over the road, and there’s a stack of unpaid tickets in his glove department, and he still has no idea why.
“I think I know,” Castiel says. Dean risks another glance. Castiel bites his lip, and Dean swerves over the yellow line, and - oh.
Castiel reaches over and takes his hand, and it almost causes a five-car pile-up. “Dean-” he starts, then: “We’ll talk about it later. Eyes on the road.”