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It was nearly 2AM when Castiel heard a crash from somewhere in the bunker. He paused his Netflix binge and ran to find the source of the noise. It came a second time, leading Castiel into the kitchen.
It was Dean. He was on his hands and knees, using his bare hands to sweep up the two beer bottles that had fallen to their demise on the floor. Castiel looked to the table, and it was apparent that Dean was well into nursing his way through a case of beer. Dean was a hiccupping mess on the floor, and Cas could see that he was completely hammered- at least more than usual.
“Dean, what are you doing?” Cas asked what was likely to be the stupidest question possible at the moment.
The look that Dean gave Cas at first was one of hope, followed by a pang of hurt in his eyes, which then evolved into glare. He turned back to picking up glass. “I’m-” he hiccupped, “I’m cleanin’ up my mess, for once in my damn life…” he growled, then stumbled towards the trash can to dump the shards in his hand. Though Dean tried to hide it, Cas saw that his face was red and puffy from crying. When Dean crouched back down to continue with his task, Cas sunk to the floor along with him.
“Cas, stop. It’s fine,” he sniffed, “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not,” he said, taking one of Dean’s hands, only for him to bat it away.
“Dammit Cas, I said I’m fine!” he barked, standing abruptly and turning away.
“Dean,” Castiel rose up along with him and placed a hand on his shoulder.
“Just leave me alone, Cas!” he stormed to the other side of the room.
“Why should I?” the angel stepped forward in confrontation.
“Why should you?!” Dean whipped around. “Why shouldn’t you?”
“Dean, what has gotten into you? This is not the Dean Winchester that I pulled from Hell!” Cas hadn’t meant to say it, but he couldn’t say it hadn’t gone through his mind once or twice. He immediately regretted letting the words slip out. Dean quieted all of a sudden, but when Castiel looked at him, he could see just how far his words cut him. He could see Dean crumbling behind glazed eyes.
“So,” Dean said softly, “throw me back in.”
Cas took a step back. He felt like he was going to be sick. “Dean, I-”
“Just throw me back in, Cas!” Dean raised his voice, sweeping the remaining beer off the table in one swift motion. “We all know I’m no fuckin’ good here-”
“Dean!” Castiel shouted, instantly silencing him.
Dean was thrown out of his would-be rampage, and his expression softened. He looked at the new mess of beer he had made, and back at Cas, then melted. He sunk down to the floor, covering his face with his hands, and began sobbing.
“Cas, I’m sorry! God, Cas, I’m so sorry!” He got back up on his knees and tried using the table to help himself back on his feet, but slipped on his first attempt. Castiel was quick to help him up when he saw him struggle. Dean fell into him, a death grip on the lapels of his trench coat and his face buried in Castiel’s shoulder. “I’m poison, Cas!” he cried. “I hurt you, Cas, I keep hurting you and I hurt everyone else… I hurt so many people, Cas, I hurt ‘em real bad… I’m just… poison…”
It was then that Sam silently appeared in the doorway, quickly lowering the gun in his hand. He gave a questioning look to Cas, wondering what to do in this extremely rare scenario of witnessing his brother crying. Cas nodded toward Dean, frowning. “I’ll take care of him,” he mouthed to Sam, and gestured for him to leave. Sam nodded awkwardly before retreating, leaving Dean oblivious that he was ever in the room.
Castiel wrapped his arms around Dean’s shoulders, one hand wandering up to cradle the back of Dean’s head, running his fingers through the short hair at the base of his neck. “Shh…” he soothed him, and Dean threw his arms around Cas’s waist, pulling him in as tight as he could. “You are absolutely not poison, Dean. What you did under the influence of the Mark was not you, and whatever happens to people outside of that is not your fault. You may be a lot of things, but poison is not one of them.”
“I still did it, Cas. I let the Darkness out, I got Charlie killed, it’s all because I took that damn Mark…”
Cas sighed. “You couldn’t have known, Dean. There was no way any of us could have known what would come of all this. Come on, it’s late. Let’s get you to bed,” he said, and laced their fingers together, leading Dean out of the room.
Once they reached the doorway, Dean stopped abruptly, pulling Cas back with him. He closed the distance between himself and Cas in one large stride. Placing his hands on the side of Cas’s face, he looked between his eyes and lips for a moment, before kissing him firmly on the lips.
Castiel was frozen by the feeling of Dean’s lips on his, and stood stunned until he finally melted. He closed his eyes, rested his hands on the man’s waist, and allowed himself to kiss back for the slightest moment before pulling away. Their foreheads pressed together as they caught their breath.
“I love you, Cas.” The words came out of nowhere.
“What?” Cas squeaked, truly wondering if he had misheard.
“I said I love you, Cas. I’ve loved you since the moment I saw you. I love you so goddamn much it hurts...”
Castiel gripped Dean tight, squeezing his eyes shut. Surely this was just the alcohol in Dean’s system, but dammit if he was going to let this moment slip away from him…
Eventually though, one of them had to do something. Cas sighed, and pulled away. “Dean, you’re drunk.”
“So?” Dean stopped them both again.
“So,” Cas fought with himself to get the words out. It was too painful. “You don’t know what you’re saying. Now come on, it’s la-”
“DAMMIT CAS I KNOW WHAT I’M SAYING!” Dean threw away Cas’s hand.
Cas grabbed Dean’s face and pressed their foreheads together before Dean threw the closest thing to him across the room. The action had an instant calming effect on Dean. “I-” he couldn’t believe he was about to say this, “I love you too, okay? But we’ll discuss this in the morning.” When he opened his eyes, a single tear was running down Dean’s cheek. Cas wiped it away with his thumb. “Now come on,” he whispered, and gently lead Dean back to his bedroom.
Dean sat down on his bed without a word.
“Goodnight, Dean,” Castiel said and turned to head out of Dean’s room. That was when Dean reached forward and grabbed the angel’s hand.
“Wait,” Dean said, causing Cas to turn around. “Stay. Please.”
Castiel looked into Dean’s damn near pathetic puppy eyes and caved. “Okay,” he whispered, and climbed under the covers with him.
With Castiel watching over him, Dean fell asleep instantly in his arms. After an hour or two of watching the steady rise and fall of his breath, Cas crept out of the bed. He stopped in the doorframe to look back, never wanting to miss out on an opportunity to see the rarity that was Dean looking remotely peaceful. Sighing, he stepped out, closing the door behind him.
Morning came, and Castiel was the first in the kitchen to clean up the last of the mess Dean made the night before. He heard footsteps approaching as he was finishing up, and prepared himself for the awkward conversation that was bound to happen soon. Fortunately for Castiel, it was Sam.
“Woah, dude,” Sam said, rubbing his eyes, “you scared me. What are you doing down here?”
“Oh,” Cas said, “I was cleaning up.”
“Cleaning up? From what?” Sam asked. He poured himself a mug of coffee and sat down.
“Dean. He made quite a mess last night."
“Ugh, dude, ew. I did not want to hear about that…” Sam said disgusted.
“Not like that,” Cas rolled his eyes.
“I know, I know,” Sam chuckled. “No, but seriously. What did he do?”
“He was drunk and he threw a fit.” Cas explained.
“Oh…” All at once, Sam remembered what he saw last night. “Oh! Yeah what happened there?”
“He…” Cas hesitated, “he kissed me.”
Sam was now fully awake from the shock of Castiel's statement. He paused before asking: “Exactly how drunk was he?”
“Very. Sam… Dean told me he loved me.”
Sam’s eyes went wide. “Really? And you said…?”
Cas sighed. “I told him that we’d talk about it in the morning.”
“Talk about what?” Dean appeared in the doorway, sporting his usual groggy-morning look, and wrapping himself in his robe.
Sam cleared his throat and stood up. “Well, uh…” he said, patting Dean on the back as he left the room, “be safe, you two.”
“That was weird,” Dean blinked. With Sam gone, Dean repeated his brother’s actions of getting coffee and sitting down across from Castiel. He propped his elbows on the table and rubbed his face in his hands. “Man, I do not feel good…” he pinched the bridge of his nose, “I already puked like three times this morning…”
“Well, you did consume copious amounts of alcohol last night. It was rather concerning.”
“You were there?”
Cas felt his heart drop into his stomach. “You… don’t remember?”
“No dude, I don’t remember a thing. Whole night’s a giant blank.”
“Oh,” Cas averted his eyes.
“Did I…” Dean began shyly, “did I say anything... embarrassing?”
“I suppose that depends on whether or not you decide to be embarrassed by it.” Cas laced his fingers together, resting his elbows on the table.
Suddenly intrigued, Dean leaned forward, trying to get Cas to look at him. “Cas,” he reached forward and touched his wrist, “Cas, what did I say?”
Cas looked him in the eye for only a moment before averting his eyes. “Dean, I really don’t think you want to know.”
“Come on…” Dean smiled, trying to pry the story out of him.
Cas sighed, bringing his eyes up to meet Dean’s. “You said you love me.”
He felt Dean’s fingers instinctively tighten around his wrist, (he suspected out of anxiety), until Cas winced and Dean released his grip.
“Sorry,” Dean pulled his hand away, rubbing it and half-laughing nervously, “I just- I- what?!”
“I told you,” Castiel sighed, “I knew you wouldn’t want to hear it.” Cas decided it would be best to simply leave the room. Hopefully they'd eventually be able to pretend that nothing happened. Unfortunately, Dean had once more thwarted his attempt to make things easy, by turning him by the shoulders.
Dean took his hands off immediately. He looked Cas up and down nervously until he got the courage to ask: “What did you say?”
Castiel shook his head. “It doesn’t matter,” he muttered as he tried to turn away again.
“Dammit Cas, it does matter!” he raised his voice, and it felt like the entire world had come to a stop. “Just… please. Tell me,” he pleaded with a tremor in his voice.
With the same shaky voice, the words flooded out of Cas.
“I love you, too.”
Dean broke eye contact with Cas as a tear ran down his cheek, turning to wipe it away. “Dammit, I am one stupid son of a bitch, aren’t I?”
“Dean…” Slowly, he closed the distance between them. He gently placed a hand on the side of Dean’s face, stroking his cheek with his thumb.
“I meant it, Cas. I…” he struggled to say it sober, “I love you.” He clasped one of his hands over Castiel’s that was resting on his cheek.
Cas leaned forward and pulled him in, touching their foreheads together. “I know,” he said, before their lips crashed together.
Dean’s arm snaked around Cas’s waist and he pulled him in close. “Cas…” Dean gasped between kisses.
“I know, Dean,” Castiel whispered, “I know.”