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Dean found him in the darkest part of Jody's backyard, looking up into the starry night sky.
"Anything interesting happening up there?" Dean bumped Cas's arm with his. "Comets, meteor showers, eclipses?"
"A UPS jumbo jet is traveling northwest to, presumably, the nearest hub." Cas looked at Dean with a smile in his eyes. "And the air smells like it's going to rain soon."
Dean took a big breath and let it out in a whoosh. He watched Cas for a minute and willed his pulse calmer. His pulse resolutely ignored him. Sometimes, being with Cas was like experiencing the ultimate serenity, a feeling of profound safety. That this happened more and more often was a newer reality, though. So much of what they'd been through together was anything but peaceful or safe.
The date clicked and clacked in Dean's mind like a horror movie skeleton rubbing its finger bones together menacingly. Dean had an idea for the problem of this date; what he didn't know was if the solution would work. It was very small, his plan.
Up on the deck by the house, the cookout continued. Jody was grilling burgers, with the girls on side dish and table setting duties and Donna serving drinks, and a smoky scent was winding its way through the yard. Dean's stomach – less sentimental, perhaps, than his heart – growled.
Cas looked over and grinned at the corner of his mouth. "Time to eat?"
"Almost." Dean hesitated. "So."
"Yes?"
"It's November 5th." Dean waited until he saw Cas acknowledge this. "And I've been thinking."
Cas looked down. "Yes. It's hard not to." He swallowed. "This time last year…" He looked back up at Dean again, his eyes full of a softness Dean had only barely started to be used to seeing directed at himself. "I was the happiest I'd ever been, at that point."
Dean felt his vision start to blur with tears. "Yeah, well. I was the least happy I'd ever been."
He knew he should be less gruff about it, but it was true. When the Empty came for Cas, Dean splintered into a thousand jagged shards, and it was only since they'd pulled Cas back out that Dean had started to heal.
And maybe that was real fucked up, on some level. Dean didn't care.
Cas turned and took his hand, squeezing it lightly. "I'm sorry."
"Don't be," Dean said, voice thick with tears. "Just don't…ever do anything like that again, okay?"
Cas stepped into his arms and Dean sighed with relief, the kind that replenished over and over. Holding Cas was only one of the many things Dean hadn't allowed himself to hope for, for years. It was probably just as well, since what he and Cas had now had proven to be more wonderful than he'd have ever been able to dream about anyway. He tightened his arms around Cas and let himself bask for a minute.
Then he remembered his mission. He made himself let go and fished around in his coat pocket to find the small box stashed there.
Cas's puzzled expression made him smile a little.
"Here," Dean said, holding out the box until Cas took it from him. "You should open it."
Even in shadow, the two rings nestled in velvet still reflected plenty of light.
Cas inhaled sharply and his eyes snapped to Dean's. "Where," he choked out.
"That ren faire we went to, couple months ago." Dean plucked out one of the rings and weighed it in his palm. "There was that silversmith? I don't know. I saw these."
The band, hammered silver with a sliver of gold inset, felt substantial; he'd found it and its match in one corner of the silversmith's locked case, under glass, and his throat had tensed with some kind of recognition. He'd paid for the rings and stashed the box before Cas and Sam rounded into the booth consuming, respectively, a cup of cheap coffee in a decidedly anachronistic styrofoam cup and a giant deep fried turkey leg.
He looked at Cas again. "I knew the rings were supposed to be ours."
Cas's eyes glittered as Dean slid the ring onto his waiting finger. Cas slid the other one onto Dean's. Both of them shivered, staring at each other, hands clasped. The rings fit; Dean gave himself a mental thumbs up for having guessed Cas's size correctly.
"It's not like we can get a license or anything." Dean ducked his head to press a kiss beneath Cas's eye, tasting salt. "But I don't think that matters much."
"No," Cas said. "It doesn't." He admired his ring.
"And they're silver which, you know, comes in handy sometimes."
Cas reached up and kissed his cheek. Held his hand there, and Dean felt the ring against his jaw. "I love them. I love you," Cas said, before kissing Dean's mouth softly.
"I love you," Dean said, before another kiss and another. And another. It was so easy to crush Cas to him, make every kiss a promise, a sanctification.
After a few more kisses, they simply held each other. Dean's pulse still hammered away, but finally began to quiet.
"We're eating dinner now," Jody yelled out to them sing-song, accompanied by a cheer from the peanut gallery behind her.
Dean and Cas walked hand in hand through the yard and up onto the deck. No one seemed bothered or excited by their reappearance. Eileen hip-checked Dean in line while scooping pasta salad onto her paper plate and grinned when he hip-checked her back. Cas took a paper plate and stood at the end of the table of food, probably trying to decide what molecules he could tolerate for the evening.
"What is that?" Claire asked Dean loudly, as he walked past her to the grill.
"Burgers?"
"Your hand." Claire grabbed up his left hand and shook it. She dropped his hand to run over to Cas and grab his left hand. She cocked her head and in a tone of pure accusation said, "Did you fucking get married over by Jody's compost heap?"
"Hey, it's a garden," Jody defended. "But it's also November, so maybe my kale doesn't look as– Wait. What." Her doubletake landed on Dean, who shrugged.
"Yes," Cas told Claire, his voice and eyes gentle and his hand still in hers. He waited until her eyebrows climbed down from the moon and nodded to her. "Yes."
Claire's eyes widened, then went wet; she bit her lip and stared at him. After a few breaths, she seemed to find some peace in his answer. "Congrats," she said hoarsely.
"Thank you, Claire," Cas said, and then startled when she threw herself into his arms.
Dean couldn't exactly look at their embrace head on or he'd lose his goddamn mind; he busied himself with sliding a burger onto a bun and was about to squirt mustard atop that when Claire punched him in the arm, hard.
"Ouch."
"Take care of him or else," she said, eyes still glistening but fierce.
"I will," Dean promised, fumbling his plate to the nearest surface to deal with her violent hug. Over her head he saw Cas watching them with a soft smile.
Suddenly everyone seemed to be talking, all excitement and back slaps. Donna came back out on the deck with a bottle of champagne from somewhere; the pop of the cork echoed in the cool air. Dean found himself in a veritable conga line of hugs given as enthusiastically as if everyone was competing to see who could break one of his ribs first. Eileen's high five stung but her grin soothed, and she rose on tiptoe to kiss his cheek.
He'd no sooner signed "Thank you" to her than he turned and saw Sam and Cas talking.
Sam's expression was just this side of weepy, Dean was amazed to discover.
"So we're really brothers now, huh," Sam said to Cas.
"I believe so," Cas said. He was about to cry too, Dean could tell.
They hugged tightly, spontaneously, and both were smiling when they separated.
Dean wasn't almost crying; he was crying, suddenly, his heart far too full for his chest.
Sam grabbed him first, and dragged Cas in too. They surely made a ridiculous hug blob on Jody's deck, and Dean found he didn't mind. Sam kissed his temple with a loud smack and said, "Congratulations, you guys," and Cas wound his arms around Dean again, holding on as Dean pressed his face into his hair and tried to stop hiccuping tears.
It took a while, but eventually they untangled from one another and smiled embarrassed smiles. The ladies were all sitting down, eating and talking and not paying them any attention.
Sam wiped his eyes. "I wish Jack was here."
Dean felt a pang realizing he wished that as well.
"He'll be back from seeing Kelly's parents in a few more days," Cas said.
"Good." Sam held Dean's look for a second.
They were brothers, but Sam was also always gonna be Dean's first kid. And Sam and Cas were best friends too – that was a bonus Dean could be nothing but grateful for. Thinking about any of these things made him want to lie down on the deck and sob for about nine years. Instead, he patted Sam on the head and let Sam roll his eyes at him.
"Gonna go have a burger now." Sam zigzagged back to the table to finish compiling his meal.
Dean caught Cas's hand and leaned near. "You okay?" he whispered.
Cas's eyes were bright as stars as he gazed at Dean and nodded. "Let's go home."
Best idea Dean'd ever heard.