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"What are you doing?"
Castiel looked up, letting go of the piece of tissue paper he'd been busy crumpling.
"I'm..." he gestured halfheartedly at his bed, where a dozen crumpled tissues lay disarrayed. "Decorating. It's almost Christmas."
Garth looked at the decorations, unconvinced. "Pretty," he commented.
Castiel picked up another tissue. “I told Dean I’m sick,” he admitted and crumpled the tissue in his fist, avoiding Garth’s eyes. “This is in case he stops by before heading to his parents’.”
"Ooh,” Garth wiggled his eyebrows. “A lovers' quarrel?" He asked. "Trouble in paradise? Problems wi-"
"Please stop saying words."
“Weren’t you supposed to go with him?” Garth asked. “Did his family finally realize you guys are ‘more than pals’ after a year and a half and banned you from their house?”
Two years. He didn’t correct Garth. Dean’s family was fine with them dating. It wasn’t the reason he’d backed out of spending the holiday break at their house last minute.
He didn’t answer, and Garth grew serious. “Are you guys okay?” he asked quietly.
Castiel sat down on the edge of his bed. He fixed his eyes on a spot on the floor. “We’re about to break up.”
“Why?” Garth knelt down on the floor beside him, and Cas wished he wouldn’t. He didn’t want nosy curiosity. He didn’t want pity. He didn’t want someone sitting close enough to see if his eyes got moist due to a completely non-related subject that wasn’t Dean or related to Dean or related to how he lied to Dean about the reason he was ditching him on Christmas or related to how he’d been lying to Dean for weeks.
“I…” his voice died in his throat. “We’re supposed to move in together this summer.” He shook his head slightly and corrected himself. “We were supposed to move in together in the summer. After we both graduated.”
“Right,” Garth said, with enough patience in his voice to make you believe he hadn’t heard this plan eight thousand times in the past year.
“All of last year we waited for something to go wrong, for one of us to decide he wanted to move back to our hometown, or realize we’re moving too fast and take a step back.”
“But then you said you ended up deciding to do this,” Garth said, confusion in the lines of his face, almost hurt. It was touching. They’d been roommates for over a year, and Garth genuinely cared about him, which was a generous sentiment since Cas rarely showed emotions towards him one way or the other.
“Yes,” he said. “On the condition that nothing would happen in the meantime.” They’d made this decision seven months ago, between the second and third year of uni. He’d been starting to relax, let his guard off, believe this might actually happen. That Dean and him could find a shitty apartment, split the rent, come back home to each other every afternoon after work, not have to squeeze together into a narrow dorm bed anymore every time they wanted to spend the night together.
“And now this happened,” said Garth, nodding knowingly.
“Yeah,” Cas said with a sigh.
“…What exactly happened?” Garth asked in the you-never-actually-told-me tone.
“I got a job offer,” said Cas. “Starting this summer.”
“Oh.”
“So it’s settled. That’s what we decided. If one of us has to move too far away, we’re breaking up.”
"I mean," said Garth. “Are you not even gonna give it a chance?”
Cas shrugged. “It’s the most logical thing to do. Dean wants to stay here. He’s been bartending at Shrek's Farts for over a year. He’s got his friends here. He loves his job. He’s close to his family.”
Garth frowned. He seemed almost more concerned than Castiel himself. “Is this job really worth giving up a long term relationship, though?”
“It… it’s a chance to do what I’ve dreamed since I was five. And I don’t have all the reasons Dean has to stay here. I don’t have family here. I don’t have any friends here.”
Garth's frown deepened. “Youch.”
“And a long distance relationship would only make us both miserable. When would we even see each other, anyway? Once a month? Twice a month? I don’t want his life to go by with me sitting in a lab two states over, not knowing what he had for lunch, coming back home every day to an empty apartment, going from seeing him every day to seeing him every other weekend, and then when we finally see each other, not even being able to enjoy the forty-eight hours we have together because we’re constantly stressing over how to make the best of them. It’s better to just cut it now before it ends up hurting much worse.”
“Wow. You have… thoroughly thought this through.”
“This is kind of all I’ve been thinking about for the past three and a half weeks,” he shrugged.
“Three and a half weeks…?” Garth’s eyebrows knotted together. “And you haven’t told him yet?”
“Turns out he trusts me so much that I can avoid him two to three days at a time without him questioning it.”
“His dorms are one floor down from ours,” Garth protested.
“I know, I thought it would be harder too.”
“So,” Garth gestured at the tissues on the bed. “That’s why you pretended to be sick and backed out of the holiday family visit last second.”
“I just know if we’re together for too long I won’t be able to hide it from him," said Cas. "I need a few more weeks – to find someone who looks like him for after we’re through, or even someone who smells like him – I can close my eyes-”
There was a knock on the door. Garth turned around to open it, and Cas turned to assess his side of the room. He should get into bed and wallow in the unavoidable fate of his relationship just in case Dean comes by and he'll have to look reliably miserable. He pulled on his blanket as Garth opened the door and said to whoever was on the other side, "Oh, hey, girl." His voice was several octaves higher than his usual greeting voice.
"...Hey, Garth," said the person on the other side. “Is Cas around?”
Cas yanked the blanket, wrapped it around himself and pushed Garth away from the door before he could answer.
“Hey, girl,” he said and coughed into his fist. Garth sent him a what-the-hell-are-you-doing look. “I’m sick.”
“I can see that,” said Dean, looking him over, half amused.
“Come in.” Cas wrapped the blanket tighter around himself. He leaned in for a kiss and then pulled back away. “I don’t want to give you my germs.”
“That’s considerate,” said Dean and settled on his bed, crossing his legs. He hadn’t bothered with shoes inside the building. “But not necessary.”
“Eh?” Cas let out as he sat down beside Dean.
Dean tried to push down a grin and absolutely failed. Cas would miss his teeth. “I was going to come by before leaving tonight.”
“Right.”
“But then I decided to call my mom and tell her I’m staying because I have to catch up on schoolwork.”
“What.” Cas blinked at him.
“What,” Garth said from his desk.
“So I can take care of you,” said Dean. Goddamn him. There was no chance Cas was ever going to find someone better. “So there’s no point of trying to avoid your germs if I’m gonna be here all week.”
All week.
Cas exchanged panicked looks with Garth.
“Um,” Garth said, his chest puffing as if he was about to say something brave. “I’m leaving in like, twenty, so you guys’ll have the room to yourselves.”
Cas wanted to punch him in the neck. Not helpful, he thought begrudgingly in his direction. Garth returned him a deliberate look. “To talk about… things.”
What? No. What? No. Don’t leave me alone, Cas wanted to beg him.
“Cool,” Dean smiled.
“Cool,” said Cas. His chest felt tight. Maybe he was coming down with something after all.
“Cool,” said Garth.
It was not cool.
Dean made tea. He turned on the heating. He cleaned the bed of the tissues that were actually clean but he presumably thought were used. Cas saw it as a sign of true love. It stung.
“How’re you feeling?” he asked as he sat down on the bed. It was Christmas eve, one day into their staycation, as Dean had put it.
“Bad,” he answered. “So bad.” It wasn’t a complete lie. He had spent the last twenty-four hours lying to Dean’s face, pretending to be sick, as if lying was all a two-year relationship deserved. And Dean had spent that time believing him blindly, not questioning him for a moment. He didn’t know how much longer he could do this.
“Then I’ll have to distract you,” Dean said now. He sprung up from the bed and pulled two video game controllers from his bag. “By kicking your ass.”
“I’d like to see you try,” said Cas, though he would not like to see Dean try. Dean could kick his ass at video games easily. Too easily.
“Did you know that in the Middle Ages 'you' was used to refer to people higher ranked than you, and 'thou' referred to people your rank or lower?” he asked. He was a history major. It had always made him smart in Cas’ eyes. And Cas cherished being able to say to people he was a biochemistry major dating someone whose major was in the humanities. It made the same-sex thing not be the weirdest thing about them anymore. What was he supposed to do now? The thought of introducing a partner to other people who wasn’t Dean, even if it was years from now, made his throat close up.
Dean pointed a finger at him. “I'm gonna destroy thou in Mario kart.”
“Dean,” he said. His voice sounded choked-out. He wasn’t sure what he was doing.
“Okay, okay.” Dean plopped back down beside him. “I’ll be nice.”
“No.” What was his voice doing? “We need to talk.” What was his voice doing?
“Okay.” Dean’s smile turned playful. “Are you breaking up with me?”
Cas looked at his hands.
Dean’s smile dropped. “Are you?”
“Not… exactly.” He sighed and shrugged off the blanket wrapped around him. “I’m not really sick. I lied to get away from spending Christmas at your family’s.”
“Oh.” Dean’s face went blank. Cas knew this expression. He was hurt, and working to hide it. And the anxiety hit Cas out of nowhere, that Dean hadn’t been as naïve as he’d thought, that he had felt something was wrong all this time and tried to repress it as desperately as Cas was trying to hide it. “Is it something they did?”
“I got a job offer.” Better to be out with it. “And it would set us ten hours apart by car. Sixteen by public transport.”
“Okay,” Dean said slowly. Cas watched him try to form his thoughts and gave him his time. He hadn’t noticed when it had happened but their hands were laced together. “I could… go with you?”
“Would you?” Cas asked. It wasn’t hopeful, or sarcastic. But it was more of an answer than a question, and the look in Dean’s eyes and the silence that followed confirmed it.
“Maybe we could make it work…” Dean said, but he was trailing off as he said it. Cas let the quiet settle, let Dean digest the implications of this conversation before he spoke.
“We talked about this.”
“Yes,” Dean said, and it finally felt like they were on the same page. His palm was warm against Cas’. Cas tried not to think about the moment he would have to let it go.
“There’s a reason we did.”
“Yeah.” One side of Dean’s lips tugged upwards, but the warmth didn’t reach his eyes.
“I’ve known for three weeks.” He couldn’t look Dean in the eye as he said it. “I thought maybe I would find a way, despite what we said. But… I don’t know.”
“Right,” said Dean. “So I guess there’s no point in postponing the inevitable.”
“I guess not,” Cas said, his voice a touch colder than before, and he realized Dean’s words hurt him. He’d… been hoping Dean would say “screw it”, maybe, “forget about six months from now”, “I don’t know what to do without you”.
What he actually said was, “So I guess this is it.” And he let out a shaky breath and forced a smile. “Quick and painless.”
Cas said nothing. He was afraid if he spoke he would start crying. He was not going to cry.
He walked Dean to the door. It felt like he’d stepped into an alternate reality or a dream. When a fundamental part of your life changes in a second and now everything feels like it had rotated 90 degrees to the left.
“So what’s the job?” Dean asked at the door. “You didn’t say.”
“It’s more of an internship, actually. For NASA. They found some extraterrestrial life form and they’re recruiting a couple dozen university students from around the country to take a look at it. Apart from the actual scientists, obviously. It’s a whole thing.”
Dean let out a snort. And then he watched Cas’ unchanged expression for a few more seconds. “Oh, God, you’re serious.”
“Well, it’s just bacteria,” said Cas. “Not like…” He put his hands to the sides of his head and wiggled them like antennae. “Actual aliens, so. I’m starting right after graduation and if they like me they might keep me.”
Dean examined his face and let out a short, amazed laugh. “Cas, this is what you wanted since you’ve been five.” He yanked him into a tight hug. “I can’t believe it. That’s amazing.”
Cas nodded against his shoulder. He could feel Dean’s heartbeat with their chests pressed together, and his throat closed up. In all the weeks since he got the call it hadn’t occurred to him to celebrate. It was a thing he owed it to himself to do, but it meant losing the best part of his life for it. It was hard to see the bright side of it when the best part of his life was currently pressed against him saying goodbye.
Dean let go. His face was bright with genuine happiness. “Have you checked it’s… y’know, legit?”
“I, er… I was there the weekend I told you I flew to visit my grandmother. They showed me around and made me sign things. So yeah, I know it’s not a catfish situation.”
“That’s so cool.” Dean’s smile brightened, and Cas couldn’t believe him. Dean didn’t hold anything against him. Even when he was at his worst. When he lied to him. When he hurt him. Dean forgave him without even having to think about it. “You’ll be like a spy. Having a classified job, flying places in a chopper having to tell people some story about where you’ve spent the weekend.”
“Actually, it was just a regular plane.”
“It’s like Mr. and Mrs. Smith, only you’ll be Mrs. Smith, and I’ll be…” his face fell, though he tried not to let it show. “Happy for you, wherever you are.”
Cas couldn’t bear the silence that followed. “Hey,” he punched Dean’s arm lightly. “Why am I the Mrs.?”
“Because she’s cooler. She’s the better spy. I’m the hot doofus, and you’re the smart badass. That's our dynamic. Why, you got a problem?”
And he was desperately trying to fine one – something to keep Dean talking, to keep him from leaving, to keep him close enough to touch just a few more seconds – but he couldn't.
"I... really don't."
“Well, then.” Dean looked him over with a sad, quiet half-smile that Cas rarely saw on him. “See you.” He did half a wave and Cas returned it, trying not to look devastated, thinking to himself, did you just wave me like I’m a guy at the supermarket who helped you carry your bags to your car?
And then Dean leaned in and kissed him; soft, swift, awkward, with his hand on the back of Cas’ neck, and then over. And that was it.
“I did it.”
“I don’t know how you do it,” said Garth on the other side of the line. “I wouldn’t have been able to lie to my girlfriend for five minutes without her being onto me.”
Cas sighed into the space between his face and his pillow. “Sense the tone, Garth.”
“Oh.” There was a short silence. “Oh. You told him.”
“I’m never leaving my bed again.” He pulled the blanket over his head so that he was now buried underneath it in a fetal position with his head pressed between his phone and his pillow.
“It didn’t go well?” Garth asked carefully.
He replayed his morning with Dean in his head. “Actually, it went pretty well. He was really sweet about it.” He groaned. “I’ll never find someone that good. He raised my standards to an unrealistic level, and I’m going to die alone.”
“No, you’re not,” Garth asserted. “There are plenty of good guys out there. You’ll find someone as good as him.”
“No, I won’t,” Cas muttered into his blanket.
Garth sighed. “You won’t.”
There was something comforting about Garth not trying to comfort him. Letting him be miserable. Sharing his misery.
“I leave you for two days and you break.” Garth had the tone of someone shaking his head ruefully.
“Actually, it’s been a few hours. So more like a day and a half,” Cas said. “I couldn’t keep lying to him.”
“You didn’t call me right away?”
“Mmf.”
“And you call yourself my best friend?” Garth sounded genuinely offended.
“Do I?”
“Have you guys spoken since?”
Cas’ eyebrows knotted together. “Should we have?”
“If he hasn’t said anything,” said Garth, “That means he’s probably waiting for you to say something.”
“It’s only been about five hours.” Cas frowned. “And he seemed okay when he left. I mean, a little sad. But he didn’t seem to be taking it that hard, honestly.” He tried to tell himself not to take offense in that. Dean deserved whatever good the world had to offer. If he wasn’t feeling like he wanted to crawl into the space beneath his bed and let his body slowly decay until time swallowed him and burped up his bones – not that Cas wanted to do that, either – it was for the best.
“If I were him I’d want you to call,” said Garth.
He shrugged at the ceiling. Garth couldn’t see. But the silence spoke for itself, he supposed.
“Oh my god,” Garth said slowly. “You don’t miss him at all, do you?” His voice was so horrified you’d think he was the one who wasn’t missed at all.
Actually, maybe this was just a moment of weakness, but Cas did miss him quite a bit right now.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Cas said, and he tried to sound fine, but his voice was all high and choked up.
Garth was quiet for a moment. Cas could actually hear him thinking. Probably something along the lines of what the crack am I supposed to say? Or I don’t want to hear a grown man cry on the phone while I’m having a pleasant holiday time with my family, or yikes.
He said, “That’s alright. I understand.”
“I-” said Cas, and that concluded not wanting to talk about it. “I keep wanting to call, but I just know if I do, I’ll resort to asking him to take me back embarrassingly quickly.”
“And that’s bad because…?”
“Come on.”
“Right. Not causing yourselves more pain than you have to and whatnot. Alright. We can do this," Garth said with confidence. "We can forget about Dean.”
“Why hasn’t he texted?”
Dean wasn’t wailing, per se. It sounded more like whining.
“It’s been five hours,” Sam said over the phone. “He’s probably fallen asleep. Or crying. Or doing schoolwork. Or crying doing schoolwork.”
“Or he’s forgotten about me.”
“Dean-”
“It’s fine, you know.” But it wasn’t fine. His voice was several octaves higher than normal and it made him sound panicked. “It’s not like we didn’t see this coming. We’ve literally had hours-long conversations about this. To make sure if this happened it would be…” his voice wasn’t breaking. “As painless as possible.” His voice wasn’t breaking. “Yep. This is painless.”
Sam started saying something, but Dean spoke right over it. “But he hasn’t even texted. Why hasn’t he texted? Doesn’t he even want to be friends anymore? Is that all this was to him? We decide to break up, and suddenly I don’t exist? And-”
“Dean, it’s been five hours.”
He took a breath.
“Right.”
He stared at his ceiling and willed his eyes not to tear up. It didn’t work. He was lying on his dorm room floor with so little energy in his body that he had to put his phone on speaker and rest it by his head because he couldn’t deal with the effort of holding something right now. Meanwhile, Cas was in his room upstairs, probably doing something useful and smart and forgetting about him more and more by the minute.
“So… you’re feeling better?” Sam asked.
“Yep. For sure.”
“Yeah?”
“Mhm.”
“I can go have dinner and you’ll be fine without me for 30 minutes?”
“What?” Dean ‘pffft’ed from the floor. “I don’t need you. You called me.”
“Alright. I’m hanging up.”
He hung up, and Dean was left on the rug, staring at the dusty floor beneath his bed with his arms wrapped around his chest, hugging himself a little bit tighter.
A full 30 hours later, and Cas was still in bed. Meaning – not still. Obviously not. More like back. After getting up many times. For more than a 5-minute bathroom-slash-frozen burrito break each time.
It was something-p.m. and he was contemplating a shower when there was a knock on the door. He took one sniff at himself and figured there was no way he was about to answer.
“Cas?” It was Dean’s voice, and Dean’s hand pushing the handle gently and letting himself in.
Cas jumped out of bed and combed his fingers through his hair in an attempt to smooth it which was, to put it generously, incredibly optimistic. “I wasn't wallowing,” he said in that tone people use when they say I wasn’t falling asleep. “I took a shower today. I'm functional.”
“Okay…” Dean looked him up and down, but seemed too distracted to notice Cas’ overall haven’t-left-bed-in-you-don’t-want-to-know-how-long look. His eyes settled on the floor between them, one hand awkwardly rubbing the side of his neck. “I just came to get my stuff.”
“Oh. Right.” His stuff.
“That alright?”
“Yes. Of course.”
Cas settled on the edge of his bed and watched quietly as Dean made his way through the room.
It fucked him up a little, watching this. Dean picking socks from his closet which he hadn’t even remembered weren’t his. Taking the book he’d lent Cas a thousand years ago, unsuccessfully trying to convince him to read it. It just was something he’d never honestly thought he would see.
“So… How’re you doing?” Dean worked to sound Casual. He could tell. It was a bit ridiculous Dean thought he wouldn’t be able to. They knew each other way past this.
And… well. He knew this was what they decided. And that it was supposed to be for the best. But this didn’t feel right. It didn’t feel like the better way. It just felt horribly pointless, and that scared him more than anything. Because what if they were tearing themselves away from each other for a reason that just wasn’t good enough and he was about to do nothing about it out of respect for a decision that seemed to stop making sense seven I-miss-you-too-much-to-get-up-to-pee’s ago?
Dean looked at him. He’d said something. Cas hadn’t answered. He replayed the last 10 seconds in his head.
“Um. Good. I was just in bed because... I'm so tired,” he scrambled, “Because I did so many things today. None of them included crying in bed.”
“Awesome.”
His eyes followed Dean’s fingers as they closed around a movie ticket, one of a pair, and plucked it from under a bulletin pin. Well, this one was just petty, wasn’t it? Did Dean really need a single movie ticket from two years ago? It wasn’t like he was going to sit on the floor of his room and cry while holding it thinking about their first date. At least let the guy who was going to cry about it have it.
“Yes,” Cas said, his tone a bit sharper, frowning at the ticket.
“Think I’m done,” Dean said finally, a small collection of items tucked under his arms and in his pockets.
Cas stood up. “I’ll walk you.”
“The door is literally right here.”
“To your room, I mean.”
Dean’s eyes ticked in a fleeting second’s squint. “Huh?”
“You took your things,” Cas explained. “I should take mine.”
“Oh.” Dean eyed him, reluctant. “Right. Okay.”
He followed Dean to his room and collected his things. Dean eyed him with a growing frown. And the pettier Dean’s looks grew, the pettier were the things Cas took. A half used eraser. His old charger. Dean’s favorite shirt.
“You’re kidding me,” Dean muttered.
Cas lifted an eyebrow. “It’s mine.”
“I’ve never seen you wear it. Ever.”
Cas crossed his arms slowly. “I want it.”
Dean sighed and flapped his arms at his sides, resigned. “Cas, come on.”
“You can’t be serious,” said Cas. “You took a movie ticket and an empty water bottle and you find me taking my own shirt back unreasonable?”
“It’s an expensive bottle,” Dean protested.
“Why did you take the ticket?”
Dean made an I-don’t-know-what-you-want-from-me gesture. “If the ticket’s so important to you, I’ll give you back the stupid ticket.”
“I want it,” Cas said firmly.
“Well, fuck off. It’s mine.”
“Why do you care?” Cas’ voice rose with his anger.
“It’s two years of my life.” Dean matched him in volume. “I don’t want them to be wiped.”
“Please,” Cas gestured at his clean clothes and his good posture and his general put-togetherness. “You’re clearly already over this. You’re going to shove it in some box in your closet and never look at it again.”
Dean’s voice rose to something that was a worrying middle ground between yelling and breaking. “I’m not going to get over you.” There was a pause. “I’m just not.”
Cas stared at the floor between them. “Please don’t try to indulge me. It’s getting plain mean at this point.”
Dean gave a short, amazed laugh. “If I’d wanted to indulge you, Cas, I would not have chosen to do it by being embarrassingly clingy. I’d have just let you keep your shirt.”
He didn’t reply, and Dean continued. “Look. This isn’t working for me. I thought it would be, but it just isn’t, okay? So I respect your choices and I’m gonna stay out of your way so you can have your own life without me holding you back. And I’ll be happy to do that, because I love you and I want you to be happy. But excuse me if I want to keep the only things I have left from literally my favorite person in the world who I’m not gonna see anymore so I can cry about it in the privacy of my own fucking room.”
There was a painfully long silence. And finally, Cas took a breath and said,
“It’s ‘whom’.”
Dean shook his head slightly, confused. “What?”
“It’s ‘whom I’m not going to see anymore’. Not ‘who’.”
Dean stared at him. “You’re shitting me right now.”
He didn’t understand. This was what he wanted. What he’d hoped for in the past three days. And now that Dean was saying “take it”, he hesitated. He wanted this so much, wanted to find a way to make it work, to stay together, screw the distance, but what if that was just the reason they shouldn’t? What if they pushed it too hard and it broke instead of bending? If they tried to go long distance and it would be too hard and they would end up resenting each other and wishing they’d quit while this relationship was still good and right and healthy?
In the silence that followed, Dean’s shoulders straightened, and his eyes hardened.
“Right. Well. If it’s all the same to you, I would like you to leave now.”
Yeah, that sounded about right.
"I’m sorry," Cas said and turned to the door. But when he touched the handle-
"Wait."
He turned around.
"You forgot your shirt." Dean held out a rigid arm with his shirt.
The energy drained out of Cas' body in seconds. The stiff, unforgiving set of Dean's shoulders had made this goodbye final enough without Dean getting rid of the last thing he owned that tied them together. Cas took the shirt and opened the door and stepped outside, when Dean called out,
"Hold on."
He hesitated, then stepped closer and raised his hand towards Cas' face. "Can't go outside like that." He pushed Cas' hair back, adjusting it. Outside was really just the empty hallway, but Cas was too hung up on the feeling of Dean's fingers through his hair to register how redundant the gesture had been.
He cleared his throat.
"Thanks."
He turned to leave.
"Cas, wait."
He turned back, catching Dean's eye, and when Dean didn't speak-
"I love you," Cas blurted.
They looked at each other, several feet apart, as an uncomfortable silence settled.
"Screw our plans," Cas said finally, a little brave from the momentum, but mostly terrified to his core of Dean's silence. He went on before he could realize how embarrassing this was and stop himself. "I trust us. And I don't know how to do adult life without you. And- I’m in if you're in. Was that not what you stopped me for? I thought that's what usually happens in these situations." He'd been talking quickly, words stumbling on top of one another to get out, and stopped abruptly now. Apparently his brain was out of words. That was probably for the best.
Dean looked stunned. "I-" he searched Cas' face in what Cas couldn't stop himself hoping was hope. "I just wanted to say you forgot your earphones." He raised a pair halfheartedly. "But, I mean- yeah- of course. Of course I’m in if you're in." Dean's eyes went soft. "No question."
He stared at Dean. "I don't-" And there he went again. "Dean, I just changed my mind three times in the past five minutes. Maybe it shouldn't be no question."
"Maybe." Dean shrugged. "But I’d rather give you the benefit of the doubt."
Cas' eyebrows furrowed, and he tried not to sound too pleading. "Why?"
"Because I love you?" It came out like a question. "And because you're facing an impossible decision, and I’ve already made it difficult enough? And you know what, yeah, screw our plans. You're about to do something amazing, and I wanna be there to see it happen. And if we need to wait a year or two until we can move in together, it might just be worth it, you know?"
Slowly, carefully, Cas nodded.
"Yeah?" Dean said.
"Yeah," he replied.
Dean shrugged, a little awkward, and shoved his hands in his pockets. He didn't really know what to do next. It didn't matter. Cas crossed the room in one long movement and wrapped both arms around his neck, holding him tightly, shirt clutched in his fist against the spot between Dean's shoulder blades. And Dean inhaled softly, as if to say something, but instead he just wrapped his arms around Cas' waist and leaned his face against Cas' shoulder.
"You're the best person I’ve ever met," Cas breathed into Dean's neck.
Dean shook his head against him, but Cas didn't argue. Standing like this, he felt young and almost helpless, at the face of the future, and the choices he was making. He had no idea whether they were right. That terrified him. But he didn't have to face them alone. And all that felt important right now, in Dean's arms, was he didn't have to go back to his empty room and wonder what this would have felt like. This, right here. Dean's scent. The warmth of his fingers against the back of Cas' neck. The soft, stable rhythm of his chest as he breathed. Nothing else felt safe right now except for this.