Work Text:
Click click click click.
Dean smiled as he entered the bunker’s library to hear the familiar sounds of Cas knitting, the steady rhythmic soundtrack to every single morning. In his hands he held a pair of mugs, and the scent of coffee curled up into the air, exotifying the musty scent of old books and dust-thick shelves. Dean had splashed out last time he went to the store, and bought a special Colombian blend.
Cas was sitting facing the door, his ball of wool resting on the table in front of him.
“Made you coffee,” Dean said, walking over to the table and setting one of the steaming mugs down, leaning over so that he could neatly place it next to the red wool that Cas was using for his latest project. Cas’ hands didn’t stop their work, but he looked up at Dean and smiled warmly.
“Thank you, Dean,” he said.
His needles flashed as they moved, the gentle lamplight catching on their smooth metallic surface. Dean pulled up a chair opposite Cas and set down his own mug of coffee on the table.
“Ahhhhh,” Dean said, taking a sip. “That’s good stuff.”
Cas smiled at him, before turning his attention back to his knitting. He looked so relaxed, the lines of his face soft and gently-set. He was wearing one of his own creations around his shoulders, a big pink scarf that was almost a blanket, and his cheeks were smooth and shaven. He looked so good, Dean could have sat and watched him forever.
And he really could have done. Perhaps once he would have undercut himself for saying something like that, even within the confines of his own mind, but there was something about this room, this exact moment... the smell of the coffee and the light of the lamps over Cas’ shoulders. The way Dean’s own heartbeat was steady as a rock, his hands relaxed, his eyes easy. He’d slept well the night before, lying beside Cas with their fingers interlaced, his head turned so that his face was resting more on Cas’ pillow that his own. Cas had been lying on his chest, so he hadn’t minded, and Dean had woken with the scent of Cas all around him. It had been a good morning. He couldn’t remember a better one.
“I was thinking we could go to pick up some things later on,” Dean said. “I found some rollers, but we need fresh paint.”
Cas nodded, reaching out for his mug of coffee and taking an appreciative sip. He had his eyes closed as he swallowed, not quite smiling, but not far off. Dean wanted to kiss him, but didn’t want to stand up and move around the table, destabilise the quiet balance of the moment. Instead, he simply watched the gentle stroke of Cas’ fingers over the mug, and the way Cas’ t-shirt moved on his tanned arm as the coffee was set back down on the table. He smiled.
“What?” Cas asked, catching Dean’s expression. Dean blinked, and lifted one shoulder.
“Just happy,” he said. He’d given the same answer a thousand times, recently, and it was always true. He felt light, and good, and eased somewhere deep where there had only been strain for too long. He liked saying those two words, and he liked the ones Cas always said back.
“Me too,” Cas said. Dean’s smile widened. “And about the paint, let’s go this afternoon. I’ve had some ideas about the warding on the second floor. I think if we etch symbols into the balcony railings, that should last.”
Dean nodded.
“We’ll paint over them in waterproof,” he said. “We’ll have to weld the railings ourselves, though, I guess. Never done that before.”
“I’ve forged some celestial swords,” Cas said, whilst picking back up the quilt square that he was working on and frowning at it, counting in his head whilst talking. “Metalwork is not too difficult.”
“You’re human now,” Dean reminded him gently. “You could burn yourself.”
“I won’t,” Cas promised, beginning to click his needles once more. “I’ll be careful.”
Dean sat and watched him quietly for a little longer, and then a little longer than that.
“Don’t change, Cas,” he said quietly, at one point.
Cas looked up from his quilt square, his eyes as bright and touched as they always were whenever Dean told him those same three words. He reached out a hand over the desk, and Dean pressed their palms together, wrapping his fingers briefly around Cas’ wrist.
“I love you, too,” Cas said. He said the words the way he did every time, solemn and sincere. Dean got that feeling in his chest again, the one that made him think of dry sand walls sighing back into rolling dunes; the one that felt like something bad being let go.
*
The house was their new project, their darling.
They’d found it, Dean, Cas, and Sam, when they were driving back from a case. The black-tea night had weakened into a milky morning, and some little way out of Lebanon they’d found themselves driving past an old, beat-up place a little way back from the road. It was ramshackle and broken - and haunted, of course - and all three of them had understood it at once.
They’d purged the ghosts, because they knew how to do that with houses.
And they could have left it at that, only they didn’t quite. Instead of driving away, Dean had put his hands on his hips outside the house and said, almost to himself,
“It’s a nice place, really.”
Sam had agreed without speaking; Dean had been able to see it in the way he matched Dean’s hip-hand pose. Cas had said that he liked the colour of the roof, but not the broken windows.
Dean had said,
“We could get new windows.”
And that had been the start of something. They’d known it was stupid, of course, to be building up a house like that; it didn’t have any of the wardings or protections that the bunker had. But what it did have was sunlight, hours and hours of it every day - and since the ghosts left, it had a quietness, if not quite a friendliness, yet. A sense of rest.
But it wasn’t warded, so trips out to the house were rare - up until the day when Castiel had put his hand on the wall of the kitchen they were all repainting together, and said,
“I could paint wardings behind the counters before we fix them in. That would seal this room, at least.”
Dean had nodded seriously, and handed him a paintbrush.
“Do it,” he’d said, the warmth of the sun on his back.
Cas had painted for hours, inscribing the walls behind the counters with every ward he could call to his mind. Sometimes he’d asked Sam to make a note of a specific rune that he couldn’t quite remember, to look up later and correct next time they came.
Dean had busied around them as they worked, sanding down edges and scrubbing at dirt on the creaky floor and unwrapping the sandwiches that they’d brought with them, laying out the crinkled brown paper flat and smoothing it under his fingers. It had made him a giant, somehow, to feel the tiny creases. He’d folded it into neat squares after the sandwiches were eaten.
Today, they were headed to the store first to pick up some paint and other bits and pieces, and then they were going out to the house. Dean drove, of course, and Sam rode shotgun, while Cas sat in the backseat, and divided his time between staring out of the window, and smiling at Dean in the rearview mirror.
The store was huge, homewares spread out across shelves in a warehouse big enough to get lost in. Dean busied himself picking out waterproof paint for the railings on the second-floor balcony, and flat white undercoats, and then a nice-looking light blue shade for one of the bedrooms. He and Cas had decided on blue together. Cas said it made him think of the sky. Dean had looked into his eyes, and smiled, and agreed.
For his bedroom, Sam wanted something warmer, a soft peach. He’d blushed when he’d asked, but he’d asked all the same. Since Dean and Cas had relaxed into a way of things that involved more touch, more smiles, more laughter, Sam had been happier, too. And he’d bought himself a new mattress, and a hairbrush rather than a comb, and a peach-coloured cushion.
Permission to be happy, Dean thought to himself, pushing the cart out of the paint aisle and into the brush aisle. They had permission to be happy. All these years of punishing themselves, and they were finally trying to let it go.
The rollers they’d used to paint the downstairs of the house had been gracefully retired after they’d finished the lounge’s gentle sunshine yellow, but Dean had managed to find some new ones in the bunker, so they didn’t need to buy any more. He picked out a few small brushes for painting above the skirting board and right up to the ceiling, and for the details, and tossed them into the cart next to the paint. They fell neatly into the gaps between the pots, clanging a little on the metal of the cart.
Dean found Cas in an aisle full of glassware, his own reflection mirrored back in translucent cups and vases and bottles, richly blue or red or green, or simply transparent and touched with neon-light shine. Cas had picked up a fat, round little jar and was passing it from one hand to the other thoughtfully, a slight frown of concentration on his face that Dean recognised. He was happy, Dean could tell. He had that softness around his eyes.
“What are you gonna do with that?” Dean asked, half-expecting Cas to start in surprise since he was so deep in concentration - but it seemed that Cas had noticed him approach out of the corner of his eyes, or perhaps without even looking. They seemed to have that sense between them, now. A knowledge of when the other was near.
“I’m not sure,” Cas said, turning to him with a smile. “Maybe put honey in it.”
“Honey? From where, exactly?” Dean asked. “Did you pick up a beehive in the next aisle when I wasn’t here?”
Cas’ smile wavered; he put the jar back on the shelf.
“No,” he said. “Maybe next time.”
Dean reached out, and picked the jar back up. Holding it, he understood why Cas had liked it so much. It felt good in his hand; the right size for itself.
Dean put it in the cart, carefully, and then picked up another.
“You can use them for honey later maybe,” he said, catching Cas’ eyes and seeing the puzzlement. “But I saw a couple aisles with indoor plants when we came in. You can buy some seeds, grow herbs in ‘em for now.”
Cas’ eyes lit up, and he picked up a few more jars and put them into the cart.
“We’ll need at least five,” he said. “I believe there are many different kinds of herbs. We can use them when we cook.”
“I think I like basil. Let’s definitely get that,” Dean said. He couldn’t remember why he liked basil, but he definitely did. He had a vague memory of scent and colour and dirt between his fingers and - oh, light blonde hair. And long, soft hands. His mother. He remembered the feel of her guidance over his own clumsy hands, planting up basil in the garden.
Dean blinked. Cas’ hand was on his arm, not too tight - just right.
“We’ll get basil,” he said. Dean smiled at him, and Cas smiled back, with just a touch of sadness in his eyes. He’d seen the brush of sorrow over Dean’s face, and he hadn’t asked, but he knew. They had both seen too many sad things not to feel them once in awhile - but the memories were gentler hands these days than they had been before. Easy to hold, and then let go.
They shopped quietly for a little while. Dean liked a set of candle-holders, wooden and roughly carved. Cas liked a salt and pepper shaker set that they found, in the shape of two pink dinosaurs; Dean rolled his eyes and then took hold of one and made it roar in Cas’ ear.
“Hey, guys,” came Sam’s voice from the end of the aisle, and they turned to see him striding towards them with an armful of papers and thin brushes.
Dean held up the pepper shaker, and made it roar at Sam, too. Sam rolled his eyes, and Dean raised his hand and looked at Cas, as if to say, I told you so.
“See? Sam thinks they’re dumb, too.”
“No, Sam thinks you’re dumb,” Sam said. “The shakers can stay.”
“You’re saying I can’t stay?” Dean said, feigning offence. He looked down at the pepper shaker dinosaur in his hand. “Are you trying to cut me out?”
Cas walked the salt shaker through the air towards the pepper shaker, and made it nod its head.
“Our plan to cut Dean out is proceeding well,” he said, in his low, gravelly voice. Dean snorted with laughter, and Sam grinned as he took the shakers out of their hands.
“We’re keeping these,” he said. “But you can’t have them until later, or we’ll never leave the store.”
Dean made a face of reluctant acquiescence, and began to push the cart forwards again. Sam hurried round before he picked up too much speed, and dropped his armful of papers in along with the paint.
“Stencils,” he explained, answering Dean’s questioning look. “For the walls. I don’t know, I thought it might be…” He ran a hand through his hair. He still seemed embarrassed, sometimes, about the things that he liked to do - as though expecting Dean’s judgement.
“Sounds fun,” Dean said, and Sam caught his eye and smiled.
“Yeah,” he said, his shoulders relaxing. “I want to pick up some different paint colours. Cas said he wanted to give it a go, too. I thought we could do my walls together. There are some pretty cool designs on those stencils.”
Cas was nodding along to what Sam was saying, whilst simultaneously squinting at the shelves as they turned into a new aisle.
“Maybe we also need a vase,” he said, looking at one which was terracotta and tall, and then transferring his attention to another - slimmer, and glassy. “Or two.”
Dean watched him debate the merits of various vases for ten minutes. Sam disappeared and then reappeared with small sample pots of paint in warm colours, for the stencils.
Dean couldn’t believe how easy it all felt. How steady his hand was on Cas’ shoulder; how light and unloaded his eye contact with Sam over Cas’ head when they grinned at each other. It was all just so, so easy.
When they finally surrendered to the lengthening hours and left the dazzle of the store behind, they found the Impala waiting for them, bathed in early afternoon sunlight. The drive to the house was untroubled, wide crop fields stretching out on either side of the road. Spring was reaching out for summer, and the warmth of the April sun spun a little dream of August. They shed layers in the car, emerging at the house in soft t-shirts and worn jeans. Cas took off his shoes immediately, as he always did, curling his toes into the dry grass outside the front porch.
Inside, the place was exactly as they’d left it. Cas laid down the knitted blankets in his arms on a couch they’d bought second-hand, a beat-up but comfortable old thing in red. Dean set down his own armful of paint pots in the next room, the dining room, on top of the table that they’d bought from a guy holding a garage sale before he moved away to Mississippi. Everything in the house was old, but new to them; it all had a history that wasn’t theirs. They liked it that way. The house didn’t know everything about them - the worst parts of what they’d done weren’t allowed here. It only seemed fair that the house, too, had its secrets, and its past.
It wasn’t even close to being livable - there was still a solid inch of dust and dirt on some of the surfaces, and the furniture in each room looked like the first baby teeth in empty gums. Still, it felt good to be there together.
They set to working, though it didn’t feel much like work. Dean felt like painting, so he broke out the rollers and used a screwdriver to lever open a paint pot; Sam wanted to be outside, so he took a saw and a hammer and some nails and went to fix up the porch. Cas, as usual, found some obscure detail of the house that fascinated him. Today, it was twisting wire around those glass herb pots and hanging them up in the kitchen, the drawn-thin metal shaped into flowers and vines by Cas’ careful hands. He did the small jobs, like this, and Dean loved him for it. Cas made the house so much more beautiful than he and Sam ever could have done alone.
Afternoon shook hands with evening, and it was time to eat. They hadn’t tried the oven they’d installed in the kitchen last time, having spent so long on it that they weren’t sure they wanted to know whether or not it worked; this time, they were bolder. Flipping the dials, they discovered that their handiwork was good; the oven heated them up a casserole that Dean had brought in a crock pot. They ate it, smiling through lips tingling with the spice.
And they were there the next day, and the next. They couldn’t seem to keep away, not when there was so much to do: floors to sweep, electricity to fix, railings to weld, beds to assemble and shelves to fill. Sam found a rusted metal photo frame in the attic, and met Dean’s eyes briefly, looking a little sad; the next day, Sam had an old film camera in his hands, and they snapped pictures all day long. Sam’s were mostly of Cas and Dean, and Dean’s were mostly of Sam and Cas, and Cas’ were mostly of the jars that he’d put up in the kitchen. He was proud of them.
They were going to fill photo frames, Dean thought, taking a quick picture of Sam grinning as Cas showed him how to paint a warding in the lounge. They were going to fill photo albums. This was the kind of house where one day was beautiful enough to want a thousand memories, let alone a week, or a month, or a year.
None of them talked about the fact that they were slowly spending more and more time at the house than at the bunker, which was starting to feel colder and less lived-in - not that its grey walls and cool tiles had ever warmed them up much, even when they’d spent all their time there. Dean, in particular, still loved the place - it was the first place he’d settled, the place that had taught him how. But he wasn’t sad that they were gently moving away from it, now. It felt natural and good.
“Hey, Cas?” Dean said, late one afternoon. “I know you’re, uh…” Dean gestured at the tiny paintings that Cas had been doing on the tiles in the bathroom, little doodles of flowers mixed in with the enochian wardings. He’d been working for hours, and covered five tiles out of maybe a hundred or so. He had a dab of paint on his cheek. He looked quietly euphoric, as he often did when he was lost in the tininess of a good thing. “I know you’re busy, but, uh, do you wanna… I was gonna do the wardings in our room, so… do you want to help? I have the runes in Sam’s room to work from, I can do it by myself…”
Dean trailed off as Cas dropped his tiny brush.
“I want to help,” Cas said, and reached out a hand for Dean to hold and help pull him to his feet. There were holes in his jeans and his hair was a mess, and he led Dean through the house to their bedroom with his loose t-shirt swishing slightly. Dean gestured towards the paint pots he’d laid out uncertainly.
“I thought white might look good,” he said. “I know in Sam’s room we put the wardings behind the wardrobe because he had the stencils, but I thought maybe - maybe in here, we could make it a feature wall. You know, since your painting skills just keep getting better. And the white might look nice against the blue. I don’t really know much about colour-matching and - and all that shit, though,” he finished. Cas squeezed his hand, and then stooped down to pick up a brush.
“Let’s start over here,” Cas said. Dean grabbed a brush, too, a little bigger than Cas’, and held it clutched awkwardly in his hand, standing back from the wall while Cas approached it. Dean had done the base colours all over the house, but this was a little different, he knew. He hadn’t much of an eye for art so far as he could tell.
“You go for it,” Dean said, gesturing with his brush. “I’ll, uh, I’ll fill bits in here and there. You know, like…” Dean mimed a splodging motion. “Like, my own little added touches.”
Cas looked at him for a long second, and then shook his head firmly. He had a little bit of scruff coming in today, Dean noticed. It looked as good on him as he remembered.
“We’ll take it in turns,” Cas said, holding out the hand that wasn’t wrapped around his brush. “You paint something first, then me. We’ll do it together.”
“Cas, I’m not good at painting…” Dean said awkwardly. “It’ll look prettier if you do it on your own and I’ll colour some of it in or something.”
“I don’t want it to be perfect,” Cas said. “I want it to be ours.”
Dean opened his mouth instinctively to argue back, and then ducked his head, and closed it again. Cas saw his smile, and smiled back. He stepped into Dean’s space a little further, and tucked his hand into Dean’s back pocket. Dean let Cas’ touch steady him, as it always did, and pressed a shy, slightly fumbling kiss to Cas’ cheek.
“OK,” he said. “Fine. Together then.”
Cas kissed his lips, just a quick brush that Dean chased, and held for long, long moment. Cas tasted like sunlight and cinnamon after the homemade ice cream they’d eaten earlier.
“Mmmm,” Dean hummed, and put his hand up to Cas’ cheek, holding him close and kissing him a little longer, and a little longer again. Cas smiled against his mouth, the hand in Dean’s back pocket pulling him in closer.
“We were going to paint,” he said, in his low voice. Dean rested their foreheads together, his hands drifting from Cas’ face down to his shoulders, his chest, his hips, where they rested.
“Right,” he said, his voice coming out deeper than usual, too. “Painting. Mmmhmm.”
Some half an hour later, they remembered to pick up their brushes and begin, with Cas’ hair even messier than it had been before and smiles on their faces, cheeks flushed a little pink. Kissing never got old for either of them, never lost its shine. Every time felt like a heady rush and a heart-twist and a homecoming, all at once. They kept their hands intertwined as they approached the wall once more, brushes dipped in white paint.
“You first,” Dean said, a little nervously. Cas squeezed his hand, and then drew a long, curved line.
“Now you,” Cas said. Dean, frowning in concentration, tongue poking out between his teeth, swirled a thick, round circle next to it. He eyed it for a second, and then shrugged.
“It looks stupid,” he said. Cas sent him a sidelong glance that was half warmth and half eye-roll.
“We’ve only done two lines,” he said. He lifted up his own brush again, and added another circle. Dean paused, and then drew a line between them, and then Cas added a spiral. Dean wasn’t quite sure what they were painting; he knew only that it was intricate, in many parts and strange shapes that he didn’t quite recognise, but almost. They worked on, hand in hand, getting paint up their arms and on their t-shirts. The evening light was good to them, strobing in low and strong through the westerly windows, setting the dust motes alight and catching on the shine of Dean’s watch. Dean kept looking at Cas, not quite able to take his eyes off the way that the shadows played over his face, or the way that he smiled, or the way that he looked back at Dean.
“You’re amazing,” Dean said suddenly, quietly, when Cas had held his gaze for a little longer, even than was usual for them. “You know that, right?”
Cas blinked in surprise, and then his expression softened to a smile.
“As are you,” he said, and though he didn’t speak loudly, Dean could feel the rumble of his voice through his own body. They were standing so close, easy in the same space.
“Yeah?” Dean said, meaning it to come out jokingly, but hearing the slight twist in his own voice. Before he could say anything to second-guess the question, Cas nodded.
“Yes.”
His gaze was true, and didn’t waver. He never lied to Dean like that.
“Well,” Dean said, not even trying to hide his smile, “you’re more amazing.”
Cas’ eyes narrowed slightly, and he lowered the brush that he’d been holding up to the wall.
“No,” he said. “You are.”
Dean snorted.
“Please,” he said. “I’m not even in your league. You’re a literal angel, Cas.”
Cas levelled his paintbrush at Dean’s face, his expression a mixture of challenge and affection.
“Was,” he said. “And I might have been an angel, but you are the Righteous Man.”
“Was,” Dean copied. “Definitely was. I don’t qualify for that, since… everything.”
“You still qualify. As far as I’m concerned,” Cas said.
“Well,” Dean said, a little flustered. “To me, uh. You’ll always be my angel. An angel. An angel.” Cas watched him stutter with a smile on his face, and then leaned forwards and kissed him.
“Thank you, Dean,” he said.
“So… I guess that makes you the more amazing one, then,” Dean said, cocking a little smile to spare his blushes attention, trying to get the conversation back to their light teasing. “If you’re the angel.”
“I don’t see your logic,” Cas said, matching him for tone, understanding. “Your criteria is arbitrary.”
“Your face is arbitrary,” Dean said. “Whatever that means.”
Cas smiled, and reached up to brush a thumb over Dean’s cheek.
“It means I can say that you have more freckles than me, and that makes you more amazing.”
Dean ducked his head, blushing even harder than before.
“That doesn’t make sense,” he protested.
“It makes as much sense as what you said.”
“Yeah? Well, then… then you have those blue eyes,” Dean said, lifting his head up and letting Cas see the smile on his face, how happy he was. “Those big blue eyes. They make you more amazing.”
“You have a better smile,” Cas said, and Dean flashed him a big cheesy mock-grin, making Cas laugh - a little quiet huff, shy and quickly over.
“You have a better laugh,” Dean said, feeling his heart fill up at the sound of it. It was rare to hear - normally Cas’ happiness came utterly quietly, hushing over him like a warm blanket - but every now and then, he would find something funny, and let out a breath of a laugh. It happened more and more these days, when they were out in the house.
Cas was the one looking a little self-conscious now. He shifted in their space, looking pleased, and then glanced up at the wall.
“I have an idea,” he said, lifting up the brush in his left hand, which was still loaded with white paint. He began to coat his right hand in it, covering right up to his fingertips with swift, neat movements. Dean watched him, confused, until Cas beckoned for one of Dean’s hands and began to paint that, too. The brush felt ticklish on Dean’s palm, the bristles swirling.
“Now what?” Dean said, flexing his fingers. They felt strange under the liquid paint, with a few lines of white tippling over the edge, stringing down to the floor.
“Now you put it wherever you want,” Cas said, gesturing towards the wall. They’d already covered most of it in their designs, enochian mixed in with strange whorls and swirls, and countless symbols for warding. Dean glanced sidelong at Cas.
“Anywhere I want?” he said, keeping his tone even.
“Of course,” Cas said. “You choose.” Dean surveyed the situation for a long moment, and then reached out - and clapped his paint-covered hand to the back of Cas’ jeans.
“Dean!”
“What? You said anywhere I wanted!” Dean said, laughing and ducking away from Cas’ first retaliatory swipe. “You said!”
“I meant on the wall,” Cas said, but he was smiling and holding out his own painty hand, chasing Dean across the room. “You know what I meant!”
Dean found himself backed up against the opposite wall, with Castiel still heading right for him. He tried to hold up his hands defensively, but Cas feinted left and then struck right, planting his hand straight onto Dean’s chest and pressing hard, swirling the paint into the fabric. Dean pushed him away, laughing, but Cas gripped onto his t-shirt and brought his other hand up - the one with the brush still clenched inside. Dean yelped with laughter as Cas squidged the brush into his cheek, painting a messy star of white onto his face and across his chin.
Giving Cas a shove, Dean made a break for the paint pot on the floor a few steps away and picked it up, holding it in both hands - one underneath and one on the handle, as if he were about to throw the contents across the room. Cas held up both hands, looking wary.
“Dean…” he said. “The floor…?”
“The carpet’s not down,” Dean said, his boots scuffing on the bare floorboards. “We could cover it up.” He feigned throwing it but pulled back quickly, and grinned when Cas jerked reflexively in response. “I could just throw this whole thing…”
“Or you could put it down,” Cas said. “Be the better person…?”
For a second they were both still, eyeing each other with smiles on their faces - and then, in a flash, Dean dipped one of his hands into the pot, scooped up a handful of thick white paint, and flung it at Cas. It splattered over his t-shirt and jeans, with a generous smatter of splodges in his hair too, and a spray across his face. For a moment, Cas was frozen with shock - Dean watched him with his breath held, waiting for his reaction - and then he reached up a hand and smeared the paint on his cheek, wiping it away from his eyes.
“Dean Winchester,” Cas said, sounding more grave and angry than Dean had been expecting. He quickly put the can of paint on the ground, trying to look contrite.
“Cas…” he said, doing his best to keep the wobble of laughter steady. “Cas, um… I’m sorry…”
“You’re going to be,” said Cas, and then he made a dash for the paint pot. Dean grabbed down for it, but he’d been duped, he was too slow; he managed to get his painty hand back into the pot for a brief moment before it was wrenched away by Cas’ strong hands. He pressed the fresh dripping paint onto Cas’ shoulder; Cas had his hands in the pot too, now, and was shoving paint onto Dean’s t-shirt, all over his stomach and chest, big white handprints everywhere…
Creeeeeak.
Dean and Cas froze. That was the sound of the third step on the staircase, which creaked every time it was stepped on. Which meant that Sam was coming upstairs.
With unspoken and instant agreement, they set the paint pot down on the floor, flailed for their brushes, tried to neaten their t-shirts and faces.
“It’s not coming off!” Dean hissed, wiping at the paint on Cas’ cheek.
“Just face the wall,” Cas whispered back, and they both turned to look at the wall they’d been painting - just in time, as Sam’s heavy boots came stomping in to stand at the doorway.
Dean and Cas had their brushes up to the wall, painting it in innocuous tranquility.
“So we’re just about done,” Dean said loudly without turning round, acknowledging Sam’s presence with chirpy innocence. “All good here.”
“Uh huh,” Sam said. “Nice work, guys. I especially like what you did with the back of Cas’ jeans. Very tasteful.”
Sam laughed and headed back out of the room, leaving Cas twisting round to find the painted handprint that Dean had left, while Dean put his hands on his hips and laughed.
“Bet you didn’t know it was possible to improve on a masterpiece, huh, Sammy?” he yelled after Sam, and they heard him make a noise of mingled laughter and exasperation halfway down the stairs. Cas swatted him with a painty hand, and Dean snorted.
“We should shower,” he said. “But let’s just…”
He swiped some paint back onto his hand, and pressed it firmly to the wall, just like Cas had originally wanted. Cas smiled, and followed his lead. Their handprints were side by side on the wall, thumbs overlapping. For a moment, they simply stood and stared at them; then Dean hooked his arm around Cas’ waist, and Cas kissed him on the cheek.
“This is a good place,” Cas said.
Dean smiled, and nodded quietly.
“Let’s go shower,” he said, leading Cas away.
*
And so the house was built. They carved sigils into every surface, and Cas tried his hand at some spells - he was always the best at it, more tapped into using supernatural power. Every room smelled of white sage for days after the purifications, but none of them minded particularly.
The kitchen was the first room where the scent of burning faded, since that was the room where Cas’ herb garden flourished in glass jars and terracotta pots. It smelled of rosemary, thyme, and chives - but mostly of basil. It was Dean’s favourite room.
They found furniture, they laid carpets, they put rugs on top of the carpets; they layered the house, building her up and keeping her warm. They put Saltsaurus and Peppersaurus, the pink shaker set, onto the dining room table, and occasionally acted out small dramas over lunch.
Sam printed out pictures and they framed them in gold and silver. Dean liked the one of all three of them best - taken the day when he and Cas had painted the feature wall in the bedroom. Dean and Cas still had slightly damp hair from the shower, and there was a smear of white paint behind Dean’s ear, and Sam was holding the camera out above them so they were all leaned into each other to fit into the frame. Cas was smiling like he usually did when he was truly happy, just a small upward turn of his mouth - he saved the best of his expression for his eyes, which were bright and true. Dean’s grin was huge, he was half-laughing, cheeks pink with sun and happiness - and Sam was looking right into the camera, his hair a handsome mess, his beam wider than in any of the other pictures.
They put that one in pride of place, on the mantelpiece over the fireplace in the lounge, so that they could look at it often.
The first time they stayed the night at the house, it was by unspoken agreement. They were done being busy for the day - all they had left to do now was small things, decorating the place with ornaments, moving the most necessary books from the bunker over to the house. The sun had set, and it was time to go - only Dean didn’t want to pry himself away from the comfort of the big, soft sofa where he was lying on top of one of the quilts that Cas had knitted, and he could see through the wide arch to the dining room that Sam looked comfortable, flicking through an old lore book and making notes. They’d eaten; they were safe, they were settled, in a place that they’d built for themselves. If they stayed, they would wake to the sunrise through their windows tomorrow, and Dean would cook breakfast flavoured with herbs, and maybe they’d sit outside a while in the sun.
Dean looked over his shoulder at Cas, who was sitting in the armchair next to the sofa. Cas was reaching over the arm for something stashed beneath the armchair’s wide wooden legs - there was a brief shuffling - and then he brought out a pair of knitting needles, and some cream-coloured wool.
That settled it, Dean thought. They would stay. If Cas was knitting here, then here was really home. Home. A good place, like Cas had said. Dean looked over and caught Sam’s eye, and they both smiled, knowing that they exactly where they wanted to be. Sam went back to his book, his shoulders relaxed. He was wearing a peach scarf that Cas had made for him.
Dean closed his eyes.
Click click click click.