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“It’s hard to know when to give up the fight
Two things you want will just never be right
It never rained like it has tonight before
Now I don't want to beg you baby
For something maybe you could never give
I'm not looking for the rest of your life
I just want another chance to live”
Rain — Patty Griffin
---
It’s raining when Dean painstakingly opens his eyes to the dimly lit motel room they stumbled into post-hunt last night. There’s a faint odor of cheap laundry detergent in the air and the cream-yellow of the walls are assaulting his eyes even in the half-light. There’s the quiet hum of the vent and the sheets are scratching against the skin of his chest- he’s not wearing a shirt apparently. Dean spent so many nights in motel rooms just like this one that at some point he became desensitized. Instead of dwelling on it he focuses on trying to remember what the hell happened last night.
The whole thing is kind of blurry into his mind, tainted with the faint taste of blood in his mouth and adrenaline in his veins. The dull sound of the rain on the roof lulls him into a false sense of ease that disappears quickly when he tries to rise on his elbows and a sharp pain thrills through his back, running through every single one of his nerves all the way onto the tip of his toes. His back hits the mattress, Dean slightly dizzy and barely able to blink back at the ceiling as the events from yesterday quickly come back to him in several flashes.
Modesto, California. They arrived a couple of days ago, tracking a pack of werewolves. Last night was the culmination of their case, they managed to trick the pack they’d been after into their hideout and wipe them out. It’s then that it happened. One of them got the upper hand on Dean and managed to toss him all the way across the room after mistaking his back for a scratching post. That’s where he laid down for a while, the hustle and bustle of battle around him fainting as he slowly sank into unconsciousness, blood slowly dripping from his back and onto the cold floor.
After that, everything is fuzzy for him. He remembers the rumble of the Impala beneath him. A hand on his chest, never leaving him as they drove. The quiet hum of a Zeppelin song, the sound of the first few chords of “The Battle of Evermore” echoing against the bends of the car and into Dean’s chest. The hand moving from his chest to trace the line of his jaw fleetingly, thumbing at the cut on his bottom lip and drawing a sharp hiss from his mouth. He sank again, into the cottony comfort of the dark.
Then he woke again, when they stumbled into the room they had been occupying the past few days. He remembers the pain, how fresh the water was as it got poured again and again over his back to wash away the blood, the sharp pain of a needle stitching him back together. A hand always on him. Grounding him, keeping him sane. Fingers on his skin. Lips placing a warm kiss on his forehead as he was lured back into sleep, covers and arms tight around him.
It’s the same hand that leads him to open his eyes again, the pain still radiating through him as it slips tenderly through his hair, down the line of his neck, fingers ghosting over his collarbone to finally rest on his heart, warm and heavy. Dean can’t help the smile that appears on his lips as he turns his head slowly to finally stare at the man lying beside him.
His hair is a mess, as per usual. His eyes are the brightest blue Dean has ever seen, and he sure as hell isn’t saying that because he’s completely, utterly in love with him (or maybe he is, but that’s not the point, the point is they’re beautiful and Dean could stare at them for hours). He’s not wearing a shirt either and it’s a sight for sore eyes, miles and miles of tan skin exposed to Dean’s eyes only. But it’s when Cas stares back at him with a tiny smile that Dean feels the actual, goddamn butterfly in his stomach starting to dance.
If anyone had told him years ago that he’d be so hopelessly in love past 42 that he’d feel actual stupid butterflies in his stomach, Dean would’ve laughed and asked for a glass of whisky as payback for wasting a whole ass minute with a lie.
But it’s real. They’re real. They won and they’re free. And Dean loves him so much that sometimes it still feels surreal, being able to stare at him with no shame, knowing they’re allowed the chance to be here together for as long as they want to.
“Looking good, angel,” he mumbles, his eyes closing with a smile as Cas’ hand finds his way to his jaw and cup his cheek, the pad of his thumb running on the apple.
He half expects Cas to retort with something slightly bitter, a “you know I’m not an angel anymore” that would come out of his mouth before he could stop it. But Cas just keeps swiping his fingertips over the line of his jaw and down his neck tenderly.
“Can’t say the same about you,” Cas says, his voice more gravel than honey, still thick with sleep.
“Geez, give a man some slack, I did get into it with a werewolf,” Dean laughs, wincing as the pain in his back comes to life again.
“How are you feeling, Dean?”
If the clock on the nightstand tells the truth, Dean feels slightly bad for waking him up at barely 5 AM. There’s not much he fears, but an uncaffeinated Cas before 8? Count in him as scared. The simple fact that Cas doesn’t seem to care is enough to tell Dean exactly how bad he must be looking.
“Feeling like I’m getting too old for this shit,” Dean says slowly, enjoying the warmth of Cas’ fingers over his skin, the softness of a thumb following the curve of his lower lip.
The world had been quieter ever since they knocked Chuck off the board and rode into the sunset to wherever life would take them. A couple of hunts here and there, nothing too complicated to take care of, and both brothers had allowed themselves to let go little by little, finding solace in figuring out what the rest of their respective lives could mean now that they were finally free.
For Sam, it meant Eileen. After a while, it meant leaving the bunker for a trip around the world. And now, it means preparing for the arrival of their baby girl in a couple of months, and handling the Hunter Network both he and Eileen have been building for months, with the help of Dean of course, but also Bobby and Charlie. Dean has never seen Sam as happy as he’s been ever since they beat Chuck and it’s been awesome to be able to witness his happiness knowing there’s nothing terrible waiting to jump on them in the darkness.
For Dean, it turned out that riding into the sunset actually meant getting Cas back, knocking some sense into him, getting his own head out of his ass and figuring out this thing that had been left wildly untold between them for a decade. After a while, it also meant a house on a lake, Sunday visits to the farmer market, double dates with Sam and Eileen on the regular, and enjoying the back-and-forth of all their kids and relatives as they fixed up the little house they bought together.
For the first time in 42 years, Dean is content. Free, happy, cared for.
When the call for this hunt came in, Sam and Eileen were already all the way on the East Coast, taking care of a case involving several witches. Which is how Dean and Cas ended up in California taking care of this seemingly salt and burn hunt.
“Seriously,” Cas presses on, nonchalantly propped up on one elbow as he looks at him with concern floating into his eyes.
No one should be allowed to look this hot this early in the morning. It’s criminal. Dean’s pretty sure there should be cosmic laws against this.
“Do you want to walk me through what happened last night?” he sighs instead.
“What do you remember?” Cas asks, his hand resting on the center of Dean’s chest.
Warm. Reassuring. Dean shivers slightly at the contact. It’s not much but it’s enough to ground him, remind him that he’s not alone. Cas got him.
“Not much. I remember the claws on my back and being tossed across the room. And then I remember you driving me here, pulling me into the tub. Falling asleep. That’s pretty much it.”
Cas nods, avoiding Dean’s eyes, and that’s when the alarms sound inside his head. He reaches out, ignoring the dull ache as he moves gently to cup Cas’ chin and force him to look at him.
“Cas. What is it?”
Dean might be exhausted, his brain might feel like cotton candy, but there’s no mistaking the tears welling in Cas’ eyes.
Ever since he became human- which was the only way to drag him out of the Empty- Cas has been dealing with a flow of emotions he wasn’t used to, and in such, he’s been a lot more susceptible to outbursts of every kind. That means he laughs harder and gets angrier than he used to. It also means he cries more, and even if Dean knows that’s just inherent to Castiel’s newfound humanity, it breaks his heart every single time. There’s something about the sight of Cas crying that undoes him in a way that nothing else can, a dull aches that rise from his guts and can send him into panic if he doesn’t manage to control it.
The bottom line is, Dean doesn’t deal well with Cas crying. It sets something alight within him that he can’t control, and that’s what makes him draw him closer and place a soft kiss on his brow in an attempt to soothe him.
“Cas-”
“I thought I had lost you.”
It almost resonates into the silence of the room, despite the fact that Cas barely said it aloud. Dean feels it in every nerve, carving itself in every bone and clawing its way into his brain, echoing into so many emotions that for a moment he doesn’t know how to react. And when Cas finally looks back at him, there’s a tear rolling down his cheek.
“Hey,” Dean says, instantly brushing the pad of his thumb to wipe the tear off. “I’m here. It’s okay.”
“I’m not an angel anymore, Dean. And I can’t-”
He stops there, voice breaking and eyes going to the ceiling in an attempt to control himself. Dean’s hand falls from his face to his shoulder, trying his hardest to ground him. When Cas looks back at him he looks a bit more composed, despite the tears that have rolled out on his cheeks.
“I can’t lose you again. I can’t, I won’t-”
“Cas, sweetheart-”
“No, let me say this,” Cas interrupts, no real heat behind his words. “I had to get you in that tub not knowing how to take care of you. I had to stitch you back together and I didn’t know- I didn’t know if you were going to make it.”
Dean feels it drop to his stomach- the fear that courses through him every time he thinks about losing Cas again is still here, waiting for any excuses to rise back up again. And what Cas is going through, he gets it. Of course he gets it. He’s lived with it for so long that it’s ingrained into his mind- the memory of a trenchcoat floating in a river, of wings burned out in the sand and kneeling for hours over a dead body; of a dimly lit street and a barely standing telephone booth and the giddiest fucking feeling he’d ever felt; of black ooze taking Cas away from him before Dean went and fought to get him back.
Of losing Cas over and over again until he couldn’t stand it anymore. And there’s nothing he wouldn’t do to prevent it from happening ever again.
So yeah, he gets it.
“I’m not an angel anymore. I can’t save you. I can’t even heal you properly. So you’ve got to stop-”
Cas’ voice breaks again and something inside Dean does at the same time, too. He rolls on his side as if on cue, ignoring the ache in his back in favor of pressing himself in-between Cas’ arms instead. Cas immediately wraps around him, legs slotting easily between his as he places his face into the crook of Dean’s neck.
“You’ve got to stop running into situations that can get you killed,” he keeps going, his voice muffled from where he’s pressed against Dean’s skin. “Because I cannot save you anymore, and I can’t- I can’t lose you, Dean. I just- I just can’t-”
His voice cracks and Dean can feel the tears rolling down Cas’ cheek and onto his own skin. His hands are shaking where they’re pressed on Dean’s back, carefully avoiding last night’s marks, and Dean’s heart breaks all over again.
“What was I supposed to do?” he asks softly, bringing one hand to card through Cas’ mess of hair, grimacing slightly at the pain the simple gesture brings with it. “Let that werewolf have his way with you?”
“I would’ve handled it!” Cas protests, sniffing loudly. “I used to command armies and you used to trust me. What changed?”
Dean swallows with difficulty, his eyes going to the ceiling to try and escape the surge of tears pressing hard behind his eyes.
What changed?
You told me you loved me and then I watched you die as I sat there, useless. I sat there for hours, not knowing what my life meant anymore because you were gone. Nothing had flavor. Everything tasted like ash in my mouth. We beat Chuck and I couldn’t feel a damn thing. We saved the world and it felt like my heart wasn’t beating anymore. We got control of our lives back and for months all I could do was waste away to alcohol and no sleep, haunted by the ghost of the words I didn’t manage to say before you died.
What changed is that I know now. I know my life isn’t worth a damn if you’re not here to share it with. I know what it feels like to wake up in a universe where you’re not anymore. And I never, never want to come close to experiencing it ever again.
That’s what changed. What changed is that I know now, what my life turns around. And it’s you. It’s always going to be you. It used to be Sam, but Sam is safe now. He’s got Eileen and he’s 5 minutes away doing something he loves. He’s happy. But me? There’s no happiness without you.
But the words stay stuck, folded behind his teeth. Dean has been doing better at talking about his emotions over the past year of having Cas back, but one year doesn’t undo years of favoring pushing it all back down and it’s still very much a work in progress.
Cas seems to realize Dean is going through something as he stays silent, and draws back slightly to look at him. His hands on Dean’s skin are running lightly on the curve of his back before they settle gently on Dean’s hips.
“What changed, Dean?” he asks again, this time more softly.
Dean knows he’s giving him an out. Cas is well-aware of how Dean operates, but Dean thinks it’s unfair to not tell him at this point. Cas deserves to know all this, even if Dean can’t vocalize properly. He closes his eyes, trying to put actual words on what he’s feeling.
In the end, like everything, it comes out in three simple words.
“I love you.”
And it’s not really something new. It’s not something that dawned on Dean when Cas got taken away to the Empty. It’s not something Cas doesn’t know or has never heard- hell, the first thing Dean told Cas when he brought him back from the Empty were these exact three words.
But it’s something that’s been sitting by his side for years, a talisman that ke kept close but never dared to touch. Something that burned quietly, coursing through his veins and carving itself into the space between his ribs slowly but surely, until it was all Dean could feel when Cas wasn’t around.
Until Cas went and told him that he, too, was in love with him.
And then Dean’s life skyrocketed around him.
And then Cas was gone, and Dean was left on the floor, reeling.
What changed is that now Dean knows their love is real. Powerful, life-changing, and cosmic-like.
In front of him, Cas’ face twists into a small smile, the strains of tears on his cheeks still visible as the dull light of dawn starts illuminating the room. The rain is still falling, its rhythm still steady but quieter. Dean’s nose brushes against Cas’, one of his hands removing the hair that flopped on his forehead and smoothing them back tenderly. Cas’ eyes close as Dean brushes a kiss on his cheek softly.
“What changed is that I know what it’s like to have you now, and I can’t bear the thought of ever letting you go. So if that means jumping in front of a werewolf to make sure you’re going home in one piece, then that’s what I’m going to do.”
“Dean,” Cas says as Dean brushes a kiss on his cheek, his eyes closing on impact. “We can’t live like that. I can’t live like that. I can’t wake up every morning wondering which one of us is going to bite the dust first because we keep trying to do stupid things in the name of saving the other. Or who’s not going to make it to bed the following night.”
Dean sighs, bathing for a second in that moment, in the warmth of Cas’ arms around him in that shitty motel room that looks like the other hundred motel rooms he’s been into in the past 42 years. In the quiet hum of the rain falling steadily as the city of Modesto, California, slowly wakes up.
In the end, it’s in the blue of Cas’ eyes that Dean finds his solace, unsurprisingly.
“Then I’ll stop. We’ll just- we’ll stop hunting.”
Cas looks taken aback, and it’s quite a sight. His eyes widen slightly and for a second it looks like he might have gotten a handful of grace back because of the way he literally seems to stop breathing and the blue of his eyes almost twinkle with something celestial.
“W-what?” he asks after a full minute of silent staring at Dean, like he can’t really believe what he’s just heard.
“We’ll stop hunting,” Dean repeats, words heavy on his tongue.
“But hunting is your life-”
“Yeah it was. It isn’t my life anymore.”
Cas looks like he’s been struck by lightning then, so Dean keeps going.
“My life is with you now. With you and our house and the hordes of kids that aren’t really ours but are ours anyway coming and going. With Sam and Eileen and their kid to come. It’s not- My life isn’t about hunting anymore. My life is about you, and us, and about everything in-between,” Dean says as he smiles at Cas, his finger smoothing back his hair more as a coping mechanism than actually trying to make his messy hair better. “Don’t you get it?”
Don’t you get it? It’s about you and the smile on your lips when you wake up in the morning, before you get two coffees into you to be functional.
It’s about you and the way you can fall asleep practically anywhere, but especially on me.
It’s about our Friday nights at Sam and Eileen’s, about our monthly game night with Charlie and Stevie and our casual whisky nights with Bobby whenever he pops by.
It’s about spending time watching movies with Jack curled up on our couch and about the bowl of popcorn that you insist on finishing every single time despite knowing it’ll make you sick once in bed.
It’s about the way you laugh when you look at me jumping in the lake, and the way it rockets onto the surface and echoes deep into my bones.
It's about the way you touch me like I’m some kind of work of art, about the way your fingers keep running over each scar embedded into my skin with utter reverence.
It’s about the way you say my name when we make love, about the way your hands find mine under the covers and never let go, even once we’re both spent.
It’s about the nights we spend lying in the backyard watching the sky when it’s clear and you’ll spend hours showing me the constellations and talking about how they were made, even once I’ve dozed off onto your chest.
It’s about you, and it’s about me, and it’s about us. It’s about the way I love you and the way you love me, and so much more than just hunting monsters.
But as usual, Dean can’t find the strength within to just let all of this out. So instead, he sums it up.
“I can’t bear the thought of losing you, which motivates me to do stupid shit that, in turn, makes you terrified of losing me. So we’ll stop. Whatever. We’re too old for this shit anyway.”
He tries to appear careless, like he didn’t just drop a big bomb, like it’s not a big deal. Like Dean Winchester who’s hunted his entire life deciding to give up hunting at barely 5AM in a motel room in California is just a regular Tuesday.
But he’s been thinking about it more and more in the past few months as the hunts went rarer- which may be a result of Sam sending cases less and less because he’d picked up on them wanting to move on-, and as he figured out that he didn’t really miss it. He just didn’t have a way to voice it until now.
Cas brings one of his hands to Dean’s face and he carefully follows the line of Dean’s bottom lip with his thumb before looking back at him. His eyes are shining with unshed tears and this time, Dean doesn’t get it.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, before kissing Cas’ thumb gently.
He tries to retain a groan at the way his back is hurting, focusing on Cas instead, but Dean’s been through this shit enough times by now to know it’s going to be hurting like a son of a bitch for a long while.
“Nothing’s wrong, I just-,” Cas says before stopping, finally tearing his gaze away from his thumb on Dean’s lip to stare at his eyes instead. “I never thought you’d want to quit.”
Dean scoffs. “Are you kidding? I wanted to quit years ago. Treat myself to some beach vacations with tiny cocktails and matching Hawaiian shirts with you and Sam. I just- Things kept happening and I’ve hunted my entire life, it’s my default state. I just made peace with never quitting because it didn’t seem like we could at the time.”
Cas cups his jaw, tenderly running his thumb on the line of his cheekbone as Dean finally talks and lets it all out.
“But now we’re together and we have a life, and I just- I kept saying yes to those simple hunts because it’s what I’ve done my whole life, but I don’t have to anymore. We don’t have to. There are plenty of hunters that can take care of this.”
For a moment they’re silent, Cas’ eyes following the way his fingers lingers on Dean’s skin, drawing the contour of his anti-possession tattoo distractly.
“I don’t want you to stop because of me,” Cas finally says with a voice so tiny that Dean barely recognizes it, his gaze down on Dean’s chest.
Dean ducks down to catch his eyes. “Hey. I’m not stopping because of you. We’re retiring. Together. Because we’re old and we have a life that’s worth more than dying because of a werewolf. Okay?”
Cas smiles, a tear rolling down his cheek. “Yeah.”
Dean kisses him then, soft and slow, just the way he knows Cas loves. Just the way it is now, between them both. Simple and quiet, but fiery and consuming under the surface. Cas’ hand stays on Dean’s jaw for a long while as they trade shallow kisses and soft moans, clutching each other closer and closer as the minute passes.
In the end, Dean falls back asleep into Cas’ arms. He dreams of a road trip to Mexico with Jack and Claire in the backseat; of Cas in the seat next to him wearing a Hawaiian shirt; of the waves of the Pacific ocean crashing into their tangled legs and their shared laughs as they fool around in the water; of Cas’ head on his shoulder as they watch the sun set above the mountains.
When he wakes up Cas is still awake, petting his hair tenderly as he watches the rain still pouring out the window.
Dean raises his head slowly to catch his eyes. Cas smiles back softly, runs his hand down his cheek before speaking.
“Ready to go home?”
Dean smiles.
“I’m home, right here.”
Cas smiles at him, blue eyes electric in the soft lights of morning, and dives down to give him a kiss.
Outside, the rain keeps falling, unbothered.