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There was a local makeout point, not too far from the public high school, an old dirt road that faded into trees. You could always find a couple cars with giggling teens up there. The police went around and knocked on fogged up windows, scaring the living daylights out of the occupants and dragging them home to sit shamefaced in front of their parents while the cops lectured on about where they’d been found (and what, exactly, they’d been doing at the time), but not often enough to discourage people from taking advantage of the secluded spot for their romantic liaisons.
Dean had been caught a couple times up there, enough to know Officer Hendrickson’s eyeroll well, but his dad only grinned every time Victor showed up with Dean in tow to tell him that he’d been caught with a girl and that they were underage so could they please just keep it in their pants? Victor was a decent cop, Dean didn’t know how he’d gotten stuck on Penis Patrol, and he felt kinda bad for the guy. That’s why he gave him the pleasure of his smiling face so often. So yeah, Dean was no stranger to groping in darkened cars, but when he got the chance to finally take out Castiel treating him like all the rest of his hookups seemed kinda cheap. And maybe, some squirming part of his stomach insisted, getting caught with a boy wouldn't make his dad smile.
That’s why Friday night found him breaking through a locked fence (What? It was rusty, obviously no one cared) to get to the riverside so he could park the impala while Cas stood nervously by, biting his lip and trying not to worry about being arrested for breaking and entering. He didn’t set out today intending to break any laws, and he knew what hell Michael would rain down on his head for "endangering my career and this family, Castiel", but when Dean looked at him like that—with trouble glinting in the shadows of his eyes and a half dimpled smile—Cas couldn’t resist following him wherever he wanted to go.
It was hardly a grand picnic, a couple of filched beers and some sandwiches Dean had handmade earlier while Sam teased him, long legs knocking against the kitchen counter where he sat poking fun as Dean painstakingly assembled cold cuts, but it tasted good after a long day and both of them had contentedly eaten their fair share. Now the sun had dipped below the skyline, watercoloring the world around them in strokes of red, pink, orange. The beer was gone, sipped away in bottles passed from hand to hand, lip to lip, and they were both pleasantly tipsy, lying shoulder to shoulder, grass tickling their necks, and watching the river burble along happily, the sun setting to its full and the moon rising to hang bright in the sky. Suddenly, breaking the hazy silence that had come to blanket them, Cas shot upwards, and turned to Dean, wide-eyed, hair sticking up from his head at all angles like some caricature of mad scientist.
“Let’s go exploring,” He said lowly, with the conviction of the slightly drunk that whatever they had to do at that moment was deathly important. Cas’s eyes were unblinking as they met Dean’s own, his determined gaze glinting in the fading light as he stared down at the still prone boy.
“It’s nice here,” Dean protested, watching as Cas’s head spun slowly in his vision. Perhaps he’d drunk a bit more than he’d originally anticipated, but it was nice. He felt his cheeks with the back of his hand, they were flushed warm, and also he felt fuzzy on the inside. Like a teddy bear. Inside his chest. Being with Cas made him feel like a teddy bear. That was more important than the comfy grass. “Okay,” he decided, “Fine. I’ll come with you.”
Cas’s smile, gummy in its wideness, crinkling the corners of his eyes, was a reward in itself. Dean waved his hand in the air lazily, a silent call to help him up from the ground. His body was gooey, like warm molasses, he felt like, if he laid here long enough, he could just spread out and sink into the ground and disappear. Except Cas’s cool hand was there, grasping onto him, anchoring him to the earth. He hauled him upward, hoisting him off the grass with a strong arm. Too strong. He’d misjudged how much force was needed and Dean stumbled forward as he stood, pulled into Cas’s chest. Noses tip to tip. Hands still locked together between them. Cas felt immolated. By Dean’s presence; his bottle green eyes, the sprinkle of freckles across the bridge of his nose, his distracting lips turned up into a half-grin. He couldn’t stand this close to the flames and not get burned. Cas turned his face away from the heat, so pressing it felt real.
Dean’s smile faded, his eyes fell from his, and Cas mourned the loss of connection. Emboldened, he squeezed Dean’s hand in his, enjoying the brush of his broad palm against his own skin. “C’mon,” he said, tugging Dean into step beside him, “We’re going on an adventure.”
Many minutes later, they had lost count, found them dirt-smudged and giggling as they sat side by side on an abandoned swing-set.
“You shouted ‘I’m king of the world’ while sitting at the top of a tree, you’re such a dork,” Dean cackled.
Cas mock-punched him on the arm before letting his hand drop into the space between the seats of their swings.
“At least I’m not scared of heights, like some people,” he muttered.
“In the interest of my manly honor, I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” Dean replied with an over exaggerated pout, hand held over his heart in a pretendedly wounded fashion. When it fell to his side it brushed against Cas’s and he shyly laced their fingers together, pulling their joined hands up to his mouth for a chaste kiss. Cas glanced at each him from the corner of his eye, meeting Dean’s gaze boring into him. It seemed like the whole world was holding its breath, all the other sounds falling silent in the electric silence that drew them closer to one another.
Dean could practically hear the indie-pop music swelling in the background of their personal rom-com as they leaned in to meet each others’ lips.
It was, in a word, awful. And a little wonderful, but mostly bad. Cas clearly had no idea what he was doing, mouths moved awkwardly together, teeth clacked painfully, and, Dean thought as he discreetly wiped some spit off his mouth, tongues were an issue.
Still, Dean thought smugly, as he watched Cas pull back, cheeks stained as red as his kiss-bruised lips, at least that meant he got to teach him how to do it properly. They’d probably require a lot of practice.