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When Dean wakes up to sunlight streaming through the window, the clock reads 10:34 AM and the other side of the bed is empty. Cas isn't usually a morning person, but the early hours of hot summer days have apparently become his favorite times to tend to the flowers outside. He never wakes Dean up too early, though (except for one incident involving a wasp's nest and the unfortunate loss of several tomato plants).
Usually, Dean would make up a late breakfast and wait for Cas to come back inside, but today he pours himself a coffee and makes his way to the backyard. When he walks out of the door to the back steps and sees Cas, he opens his mouth to say good morning, but gets his breath taken away instead, stopping immediately in his tracks.
Cas practically glows in the sunlight, the grass around him swaying in the light breeze. He's surrounded by the stems of flowers he'd cut to make a flower crown, hydrangeas and lavender and carnations circling his head, a halo for a fallen angel who traded the cold apathy of Heaven for the warmth and love of humanity. He sits cross-legged in front of a marigold plant, a warm smile on his face as he watches a bee hover around it, and Dean thinks he's never seen something as beautiful as the way Cas lights up when the bee lands on his hand.
The flowers are pretty, sure, but they can't compare.
"Morning, sunshine," Dean calls gently.
Cas looks up at him, cheeks flushed from the heat, and his smile grows impossibly wider. Moving carefully to avoid disturbing the bee that's now resting in his palm, he gestures for Dean to come closer. Dean walks slowly towards Cas, pretending he doesn't feel ridiculous trying not to startle a bee.
"Good morning, Dean," Cas replies, his voice soft. The knees of his pants have grass stains on them, and even though the pants are technically Dean's, he can't bring himself to be upset about it. Dean sits next to Cas and presses their shoulders together. They let a few moments pass in silence, and when the bee finally flies away, Dean takes Cas' hand.
Cas picks up a hydrangea that didn't make it into his flower crown and tucks it behind Dean's ear, to which Dean replies by pulling him in for a kiss to hide the blush on his face. "Glad you're with me," he says when they break apart, letting the emotional floodgates open just a little, feeling like this is a special moment to be cherished. "Wouldn't have it any other way."
"I wouldn't either," Cas replies softly. "I'm glad to be here with you, too."
As they sit there in the sun, Cas starts to go on a tangent about pollination and flower types that Dean is barely listening to and has no hope of understanding, but even as Cas' words go completely over his head he thinks there's nowhere in the world he'd rather be.