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“All in,” Cas smirks, pushing his large pile of poker chips to the center of the smaller round table in Dean’s kitchen.
Staring at his 10, Jack offsuit in his hand, Dean knows he has a shot at winning this hand and the game if Cas is bluffing. Mr. I’ve Never Played Texas Hold ‘Em Before either had the best beginner luck Dean’s ever seen or Dean was straight up being hustled by Mr. Move To the Middle of Nowhere New Yorker.
Yep, Castiel Novak apparently had been a big shot accountant working on Wall Street before he decided to leave it all behind to move to the middle of bumfuck nowhere Kansas to work at a small nonprofit that focused on working with families in poverty. Dean swore Cas was honest to God angel on Earth; an angel with devilishly good looks and wicked card shark skills it seems.
As the town’s Jack of all trades, Dean became acquainted rather quickly with the accountant from fixing leaky pipes at Cas’s office to helping Cas fix the starter on his Lincoln Continental aka the ugly ass pimple mobile, Cas called a car, though Dean only called it such in his mind because for some God awful reason Cas seemed to love the old girl. Fast acquaintances turned into even faster friends as if the universe would do anything to see them spend time together even…
Just as Dean is reaching out to turn over the river card to see once in for all whether or not Cas is bluffing, the sirens sound. Fucking tornado season, Dean thinks; rolling his eyes. Cas’s face looks more alarmed than the sirens blaring. In the next second both their phones are vibrating, a tornado warning flashing across both their screens.
So much for their game.
“Dean…” Cas trails, voice filled with a distressed Dean’s only heard when Cas is overly worried.
“It’s fine buddy,” Dean comments, getting up from the table to get them both a cold beer from the fridge, “Come on, let’s go take a look,” he says, twisting the tops of the beers before waving them towards the front door.
Cas tilts his head, eyes squinting at him like he’s grown a second head, “You want to go outside when you are clearly supposed to stay inside and take cover?”
Dean shrugs his shoulders, this is Cas’ first tornado season and the first siren scare is always the worst; soon he’ll be like every other Kansas living resident—a front porch, beer sipping tornado watcher. Take cover, pfft.
“It’s just a warning buddy; means nothing. Come on, I wanna see the storm roll in,” He moves towards the front door, knowing Cas is right behind him because of the unmistakable sound of the chair scouting across the floor.
As Dean steps out onto the wrap around the front porch, the wind almost blows him over; it’s whistling and howling something fierce, picking up speed. The sirens provide dramatic background music to the dark, consuming clouds moving in like an overpriced horror movie. He sips his beer and holds at the second for Cas to take from his hands as lightning lights up parts of the black sky—he can see the lightning but can’t hear yet.
The bitter taste of his beer matches his souring mood, of all the things to ruin his night he never would have expected a damn tornado. Chancing a glance over his shoulder, Cas is gripping his beer tight; his face ghost white, eyes glued to the chaos unfolding in front of him.
Outside the sirens are even more annoyingly loud, so Dean shouts over them to try and at least ease his obviously freaking the fuck out friend’s mind a bit, “It’s kind of beautiful you know?”
“What?” Cas hisses with utter disbelief.
Turning his own eyes back to the storm looming in front of them, “It’s beautiful to see such power; a reminder we are only a small piece of this world.”
Peeking over his shoulder again, Dean catches Cas opening and closing his mouth before breaking out in a blinding, head-shaking smile, “My, my Dean Winchester where have you been hiding this philosopher this whole time?”
Dean can’t fight the smile he returns, so he smiles around another sip of his beer enjoying all the sounds of the raging nature around them.
But as the soft rain transforms into pea-sized hail, a cold shiver runs down Dean’s spine. Rapidly the storm had become increasingly intense—the winds lashing out, the hail pleating against the roof of the small country home, and the thunder and lightning finally made their appearance in a rather impressive manner.
Okay, so maybe the warning is actually a threat.
But the real threat was to his precious Baby, and her slick metal body possibly suffering hail damage. Over my dead body, Dean thinks. Without another thought hesitation he runs out into the hail and wind; he needs to get his girl in the garage. Berating himself for the one time he doesn’t take the time to put Baby in the damn garage is the time she needs to be safe the most.
He hears shouts but the actual coherent words are lost to the wind and rain. He’s soaked to the bone by the time he slides into Baby’s black leather bench seat. Girl starts faithfully while the hail tinks against her, Dean cringes at the thought of looking her over in the morning praying for the best but mentally preparing himself for the worst.
Breathing a sigh of relief once she is safely nestled inside her home space, Dean inhales despair staring at the storm he has to reenter. Honestly, there is nothing worse than wet socked feet and his feet are definitely wet inside his boots. But to get dry feet, he must right his way back through the storm.
Resigning himself to his fate, Dean darts from the side door on the garage back to the front porch steps. How is it even possible to even more soaked the second pass through? Once under the cover, Dean shakes himself like a wet dog though, it did little but spray water everywhere.
In between the blinks of his eyes, Cas is in his face. A mix between anger and I’m going to murder you with my bare fucking hands splayed across his face, “What were you thinking! There’s a possible tornado and you just run out into the storm like it’s nothing!”
After two slow blinks, Cas’s words sink—he cares; cares enough to be hell, and brimstone furious with him. Dean feels a bit guilty, but his lips betray him curving into a Sorry, I did something stupid…again smile.
And before he can open his mouth to smart something off, Cas snatches his wrist and dragging him inside; beers and everything else forgotten.
“Cas,” Dean does not whine, as the other man on a gosh dang mission ignores him and leads them through the house, dramatically throwing open the door containing the stairs down to the basement all whilst never letting go of Dean’s wrist. He’s dripping water all over the floor and will probably end up with a cold from hanging out in wet clothes, but all his mind can process is the scorching, tingling sensation wrapped about his wrist.
His basement is partially finished but still resembles your average there’s probably been a murder down here basements. Nonetheless, Cas hauled his ass down here, and luckily, he remembered to flip the light on as they trotted down the stairs.
Only once they are in the center of the basement does Cas drop the limb he had seemingly held for ransom and spins around towards him. Cas ignores the boundaries of personal space and steps right into Dean’s fisting his hands inside Dean’s wet t-shirt as does. Cas likes to grasp things, cool; just a little note Dean files away in his Things I Secretly Like About Cas mental cabinet.
Unbothered by the dripping water, Cas draws Dean closer; a fire smoldering in his eyes. With their noses all but brushing Cas finally speaks, “You idiot, you scared me running into the storm like that.”
Every inch of Dean is soaked and cold but warmth blooms from his chest. Heat rises up his neck and settles across his cheeks. They’ve been toying with this line of friends to something more for weeks now, neither one ballsy enough to cross it and spoil the friendship they had built.
But as Dean watches Cas flick his eyes down to his lips and back up again, all he can think is he run into a million storm to get Cas to look at him like he is right now—like he is the world’s most precious piece of art, admired and loved by for all its details including its flaws.
“Well—” Dean starts but the rest of his sentence is consumed by Cas; the slightly shorter man rocking up onto his toes to crush his lips against Dean’s own in a battle of clanking teeth, stubble burn, and sloppy angles. The kiss is raw, heated, and everything yet nothing like Dean imagined it would be—words don’t do the justice of perfection, of the rightness kissing Cas felt like.
When they break apart for air, Cas pulls back slowly moving a fraction away from Dean only, so he can nuzzle his forehead against Dean’s.
“Don’t ever do something so reckless again,” Cas whispers, carding his fingers through Dean’s hair. There’s probably a story behind Cas’s desperate out of character clinging but he could wait until Cas was ready to tell it.
“I can’t make any promises,” he teases and squeezes the warm body in grasp tight to let Cas know he is in fact only teasing, “I won’t run into storms anymore, Scout’s Honor.” As much as he wants to dive back into the paradise of Cas’s lips if he doesn’t get dry clothes, he’s going to shrivel up worse than a box of forgotten raisins. “How about we both get some fresh clothes and we’ll wait out the storm down here for your peace of mind okay?”
Cas pecks his lips once more before stepping back, a sheepish grin on his face. He nods, “Okay.”
They wait out for the sirens to die down in the basement in fresh clothes, a shared blanket, and the warmth of each other’s arms.