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Dean weighs the words on his tongue.
It’s just one sentence. There’s no way Cas doesn’t already know. All that angel telepathy shit must be good for something, and if it’s a shortcut that happens to skip past the speaking stage, well. That’s something, right?
One sentence. Low stakes. Ha.
Cas turns towards him, and Dean puts the words away for another time. They’ll still be there, burning a hole in his pocket, singeing his leg like the end of a cigarette not fully stamped out. This thing’s real hard to stamp out; he’s been trying.
Not trying very hard, lately. Getting more difficult to want to try for that.
They’re in the car, of course they are, and Sam’s back at the motel but Dean’s not thinking about him. Not really. Cas’s hair is being ruffled by the wind, and he closes his eyes against the golden-white glare of the sunlight, and Dean knows he’s supposed to be watching the road. He once died in a car crash, or nearly, so he’s supposed to be aware of basic road safety like don’t stare at your best friend while you’re moving at 70 MPH, even if the road’s clear, because there’s always gonna be something in your way.
He limits himself to glances, as usual. Rations them out like sugar in wartime, measures and justifies: You can look once every fifteen minutes or four songs, unless he talks. You wanna wait to the end of the fifteen-minute block ’cause that way you get to take the next one right after and it’s like looking twice as long. You can look if he says something but not if he’s looking at you. You can look if the red light lasts long enough your fingers start tapping on the wheel. You can look if you’re really looking past him to the window. You can’t look for longer than you can hold your breath. The rules and regulations of falling for your best friend, who probably loves you too, but who’s never gonna say it.
Castiel is not capable of wanting Dean the way he wants to be wanted.
Cas might be. Dean’s not gonna find out the hard way.
The words have snuck out of his pocket: They’re in Dean’s mouth again. He swallows hard and they get caught in his throat. If he weren’t driving he’d wish for a bottle of something to wash ’em down. He’d savor the burn. He's made an art form of how to hold onto something that hurts you and love it anyway.
“Dean,” says Cas. He’s got his eyes closed, which means Dean can look.
He does. “Yeah.”
“If I...” Cas starts, and then his forehead pinches, and he’s quiet for a while. Dean starts holding his breath. Cas speaks before Dean has to look away. “If I made pasta tonight, would you eat it?”
“Sure,” Dean says, ignoring the twinge of disappointment that rises, inevitable as bile, every time Cas opens a sentence with if or we or even just I, because he’s that goddamn pathetic. He clears his throat, drums his fingers against the steering wheel, and adds, “Anything in particular you were thinking of making?”
Cas starts talking about pasta varieties, sauce availability, herb gardens, locally-sourced something or other, and Dean swears he’s listening, but he’s also watching himself listen. Sees himself drink in Cas’s words, and for god’s sake he’s talking about pasta, this isn’t world-saving information, but Dean’s hanging on his every word like the words themselves feel good. Like honey dripping from Cas’s lips.
He can’t think about Cas’s lips.
Or Cas’s jaw, the firm line of when he sets his chin and the prickle of stubble Dean’s dying to get beneath his fingertips. Or Cas’s collarbones, seen on the rare occasion that the neckline of his shirt slips a little, maybe a button coming loose in a fight, and there’s just this expanse of smooth skin Dean wants to bite. Or Cas’s hands, large knuckles and delicate fingers, so powerful they could resurrect the damned and brand the saved, and yet somehow dainty at the same time.
There really isn’t a safe part of Cas to think about. When Dean thinks of him, he tries to keep it an abstraction. Cas, whole; Cas, entire; Cas, angel; Cas, his best friend, who’s not going to kiss him no matter how obviously Dean wants it.
It’s not like he’s been subtle.
That damn sentence. Slippery in his hands, somehow behind his teeth for the third time in an hour. It didn’t use to be this bad. Dean’s getting worse at this whole falling-for-Cas thing. Shit.
He should say it. He should. What’s the worst that could happen?
The worst happens. He hasn’t even said it.
The golden opportunity to step forward and unleash a decade’s worth of devotion and all he could come up with was Don’t do this: What an idiot. What a fucking moron, what an asshole, letting this happen, letting C— letting him d— letting him go without even telling him. A shitstain on the floor, that’s what he is.
Anger is easier.
The depression’ll come, he’s sure of it, already had a quick taste on the spot with his little teaser trailer of an hours-long crying meltdown. But next on the list’s bargaining, and Dean follows the rules he sets for himself.
Bargaining, huh? He can do some goddamn bargaining. Familiar territory. He should get frequent flier privileges on this shit. The lore doesn’t suggest there’s anything Dean can do about it, but fuck the lore, when’s he ever been one for going by the book? Don’t answer that. He’ll find a way. He will.
That can’t have been the end. It can’t be because he had the words in his hands and he didn’t say them and he didn’t hold them out to say here, to say I’m sorry you thought you couldn’t have me, to say, you stupid dick, you’ve had me all along, I thought you knew.
Dean researches. He doesn’t sleep. Doesn’t drink. Doesn’t speak. He does pray. Not out loud, not anymore. Sam walked in on him once, and the look he gave Dean just about scorched his flesh off in shame, even though Sam never brought it up again and looked more sympathetic than pitying. Well, if anyone’s got experience praying for lost causes, huh?
He keeps looking. Jack doesn’t answer, until he does.
It’s half past three in the morning but Dean couldn’t sleep, so he’s washing and drying all the dishes in the cabinets just to have something to do. The lights are off; he’s scrubbing in the dark, but it’s not like it matters. The plates are clean anyway. He’s not gonna miss a spot.
Cas appears behind him and the hair on Dean’s neck rises before he even hears, exhausted and happy, “Hello, Dean.”
Dean drops the dish he’s holding and spins. His first thought is something like Yes finally thank you. His second is that this isn’t Cas. His third is that if that’s true, the universe is a mean sonofabitch.
He takes half a step toward the being who may or may not be Cas, wary, afraid to trust the pounding of his heart. “Cas?” he says, first word in weeks, eyes narrowed, hands itching to curl into fists. “That you?”
“It’s me,” and that smile, oh, Dean’s heart is shattering a hundred times a minute and if this isn’t real, he doesn’t give a single shit, he’ll kiss the djinn that did this to him. “I’m back.”
“How?” As if it matters, but old habits run deep: a man made of scar tissue and muscle memory.
“Jack,” says Cas, and then he’s there too.
“Hi,” says the kid who might be sorta God now, lifting a hand in an almost-wave. “Sorry it took me so long.”
Dean nods, feeling dazed, feeling vaguely like he’s just been given a ticket to a chocolate factory, or the keys to the place. “Okay, so... So now.”
Jack shrugs. “I’m not sure. I’ll try to be better about keeping in touch, though. Time is... difficult. Small.”
Cas sets a hand on Jack’s shoulder. “You’ll always be welcome with... me,” he says, and Dean could swear he can tell when Cas carefully doesn’t meet his eyes. Like the word he didn’t say is filling the room, shaped like a pachyderm.
“Thank you,” says Jack, because damn if Cas didn’t raise a polite kid, and then Cas is pulling him into a hug with his eyes squeezed shut. Dean should look away, let them have their moment, but Cas isn’t looking, so he’s allowed to.
When they pull apart, Jack vanishes. Dean’s life is so messed up he’s no longer surprised when people just poof into the ether. Great.
“Dean,” says Cas, like deja vu, like a million other instances, but his voice is very small and his posture’s defensive. He opens his mouth like he’s gonna say something else, and Dean crashes into him.
He clings to Cas like — like he’s relying on him to pull him upwards a great distance. Like he might get dragged away at any moment. Dean wraps his arms around Cas and thinks, dimly, this’ll stop it from happening again. If it comes for him Dean’s going with him. They’re not doing this again.
“You asshole,” he says, into Cas’s shoulder. “Don’t you ever do that again, you hear me?”
“Sorry,” says Cas faintly, and it’s gratifying but that’s not enough.
Dean pulls back to look him in the eye. “Seriously, Cas, don’t you fuckin’ disappear on me like that.”
Cas stops shrinking back and says, with a little more heat, “Sorry for saving your life, then.”
“I didn’t ask you to do that, man!” Dean yells. “I never asked you to die for me!”
“What else was I supposed to do?” demands Cas. “Lay down and let it happen?”
“Maybe!” says Dean, hoarse already. “Maybe, Cas, if it meant I didn’t have to—”
“I’m sorry,” Cas says, and this time he does look sorry. “I didn’t mean to burden you with that. It was selfish. I wanted to... I prioritized my own happiness above your comfort, and—”
Dean’s staring at him in a way that normally he doesn’t allow himself, unless they’re fighting. This doesn’t feel like a fight. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Cas sighs. Looks down. “What I told you was true, Dean. I’m not going to take it back, even if you wish I hadn’t said anything.”
Fireworks are going off inside Dean’s chest. He’s going up in flames. “What? Cas. Cas.”
“What, Dean?”
The words, for once, won’t come to his tongue; he puts it to better use anyway and kisses Cas, fiercely, furiously, pressing him up against the sink like it’s their early days and Sam’s asleep in the other room. Dean kisses him like he’s been dreaming of for years, and Cas makes a sharp, quiet noise and finally kisses him back. Carefully, like he’s afraid this will all turn to mist in the daytime, and recklessly, like if that’s the case he wants the most of it before sunup.
Dean would be more than happy to let things stay like this, no words, just his mouth on Cas’s — yes finally thank you — but Cas pulls back and breaks the kiss, frowning a little in that Castiel trademark way, and Dean can’t really breathe.
“What?” he says, stroking a thumb across the roughness of Cas’s cheek.
Cas studies him for a moment. “I wasn’t imagining things, then?” he says eventually. “I did wonder.”
Dean’s giddy with this, with the novelty of having his hand on Cas’s waist and his full attention without shying away. “No,” he says, almost laughing, because this is so goddamn absurd and it’s probably coming up four am by now. “No, you didn’t imagine anything.”
“You...” Cas wets his lips and Dean feels a shock of want to his core. “You don’t need to say it, if you’re not... If you don’t.”
He’s spent years trying not to say it, and now Cas is giving him a backdoor, an excuse, a way to downplay this and spare everyone’s feelings.
Fuck that. Dean kisses him again, less ferociously but more insistently, and again Cas obliges and kisses him back. “Cas,” says Dean. “You wanna talk about who changed who? You wanna talk about who does everything out of—? You’re the best person I know, and the person I...”
He inhales. Cas watches him, holding his breath. Dean doesn’t look away. Neither does Cas. Dean swallows and continues. “The person I care most about, alright? You have any idea what seeing you die for me did—”
“I’m sorry,” says Cas. “I’ve already told you I’m sorry.”
“Stop that,” Dean says, frustrated; this isn’t going like he thought it would. “Only you would apologize for dying.”
Cas smiles a little at that. “It caused you pain.”
“Yeah, but—”
“I don’t want to hurt you. I’ve never wanted to hurt you.”
“I know, Cas, because—”
“Because of what I told you then.”
“Cas, I—”
“And so for causing you anguish, I’m apologizing.”
“For fuck’s sake—”
“It was never my intent—”
“Would you shut up a minute, I’m trying to tell you I love you too,” shouts Dean, and the kitchen falls silent.
Cas is frozen. Dean’s afraid to look at him.
“So,” he says, shrugging. “Just, y’know. So you know. So it’s out there.”
“Dean,” says Cas slowly, coming unfrozen like a late spring thaw. “When I said... I meant that I’m in love with you.”
“No shit,” says Dean, frowning at him. “What do you think I meant?”
“Okay.” Cas beams suddenly, so beautiful Dean can hardly stand it. “I just wanted to clarify.”
The words aren’t weightless yet, but Dean’s sure they will be eventually. “I love you, man,” he says, and it’s been longer than he can hold his breath, but he doesn’t look away. They’ll draw up new rules.