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“Dean, I do not understand why you want to waste an entire evening, that we could spend doing productive tasks, to watch a movie,” Castiel huffs. He plops down on Dean’s bed, leaning against the headboard. Dean is stood at the foot of the bed, facing the TV with the remote in his hand.
“C’mon, Cas. We spent the entire day looking for hints as to where Lucifer might be, but we’ve got nothing. We’ll pick it up again tomorrow.” Dean finally finds the setting he wants. He drops the remote on the bed and steps closer to the TV, sliding a movie disc into the side of it. “Besides, you’ll like this movie. It’s got demons in it.”
“Why should we watch a movie about things that we deal with in real life?” Cas tilts his head curiously.
“I dunno, Cas. It’s entertaining. Don’t overthink it.” Dean grabs the large bowl of popcorn off his bedside table before sitting down next to Cas. They’re sitting a comfortable distance apart as they both watch the screen fade from black to some logo.
An advertisement for toilet paper pops up and begins to play, at which point Cas asks, “What does this have to do with demons?”
“No- Cas, this is an ad. Hold on.” Dean grabs the remote and presses the fast-forward button, skipping past a few ads before the opening scene comes on. He puts the movie back onto normal speed and turns the volume up.
The beginning of the movie begins to play. The popcorn bowl is sitting right between them, but Dean’s the only one eating any of it. Ever-so-often he looks over at Cas, who’s always staring at the TV with a confused or mildly intrigued look on his face.
Dean half-expected Cas to get up and walk out of the room about a quarter of the way through the movie after growing bored, but even though the angel is silent he seems sufficiently entertained.
The hunter’s enjoying the movie, sure, but he’s mostly focused on appreciating the little time that he gets to spend with Cas. The two have been seeing a lot of each other lately, but they’d always been busy during that time. They haven’t had any time to just kick back, relax and relish in being in each-other’s presence. Since the Darkness and God took a little family vacation, the brothers and Cas have been working tirelessly to shove Lucifer back in his box. Sam drove out to Milwaukee this morning to check out a funky case that ended up being nothing more than an unfortunate cooking accident; but he wouldn’t be back until the next morning. Dean planned to take advantage of his brother’s absence and enjoy a little movie night with his best friend.
After the whole deal with the Darkness, Dean had been ready to admit his feelings about Castiel to the angel in question. To his dismay, Castiel had then trotted off with Crowley to find Lucifer and when he came back, Dean had been so caught up in the grief of his mother leaving them again that he hadn’t even given a second thought about his feelings towards Cas.
Dean finds that he’s sunken pretty deep into the pit that is his inner thoughts, so he quickly swims his way to the top and jerks himself back into reality. He guesses that he’s been zoned out for about five minutes; Castiel’s still staring at the screen with his mouth slightly agape. Dean chuckles quietly and the angel turns his head to look at the hunter, his blue eyes questioning.
“What?”
“Nothing, sorry. Enjoying the movie?” Dean asks, shoving a handful of popcorn into his mouth and looking away from Castiel before he finds himself beginning to stare into the icy-blue lakes that are the angel’s eyes.
“It’s very inaccurate, but I do find the stupidity of the characters rather entertaining.” The angel redirects his attention to the TV, his gaze flicking away from Dean.
Dean tries his best to stifle a yawn but doesn’t manage; his mouth gapes open and his eyes screw shut. He huffs out a breath of air and rubs his eyes as he feels his exhaustion catching up to him.
His eyes lazily track the movements on the screen; he’s seen the movie enough times that he doesn’t startle at any of the jump-scares. The longer he watches, the more the black from the corners of the screen inch to the front of his vision until the lapping waves of sleep claim him completely, and he falls unconscious.
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Warmth.
That’s the first thing that registers in Dean’s brain as he wakes. His arms are wrapped around something that feels strangely like a torso; his legs are curled up under him with his knees tucked to his chest. His head is leaning back against something soft and – oh, my God, it’s totally alive. His face is pressed into the slightly rough skin of something that seems to be in the general shape of a neck.
Dean Winchester is cuddling Castiel, an angel of the lord. What’s more, he did so unknowingly.
“You’re awake.”
The sound of Castiel’s voice seems loud compared to the previous quiet. No sounds are coming from the TV; Dean figures that it’s turned off by now. The more he regains his senses, he realizes that not only is he clinging to Castiel like a monkey, but that Castiel is hugging him back. His arms are wrapped around Dean’s back, pressing him close to Cas’s chest. His chin is resting on the top of Dean’s head, and even when the angel acknowledges that Dean is awake, he doesn’t make an effort to move.
“Yeah,” Dean slurs. His voice is deep and scratchy, and he’s fighting to keep his eyes open.
“It’s 4 AM. You should go back to sleep,” Castiel points out. “I’ll leave if you’d like. You crawled onto me a few hours ago and I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“Oh, jeez. Sorry Cas, I didn’t even realize that I did it.” All of Dean’s instincts are telling him to scramble off of Cas’s lap and leave the room, to pretend that nothing ever happened. But the other side of him is begging for Castiel to stay, wanting to fall back asleep while safely enclosed in the angel’s grasp.
“Would you like me to leave?”
The question takes Dean aback; he expected that Cas would ask him to get off so the angel can go read some lore book or continue to look for clues about Lucifer’s whereabouts. He didn’t even imagine that Castiel would possibly want to stay like this.
“You don’t have to.” The words are out of Dean’s mouth before he can stop them. He almost regrets it; embarrassment bubbles up inside him just to evaporate as soon as he hears Castiel’s reply.
“I’d like to stay, then.”
Dean just hums an acknowledgement, still not moving his head from where it’s tucked under Cas’s chin.
The hunter’s logical side is telling him to shut up and go back to sleep; to not ruin this moment by saying anything else. But his brain is still sleep-clogged and his mouth seems to act faster than his self-control, so he can’t stop himself from murmuring the three words that he’s been wanting to say for years.
“I love you.”
It’s quiet and soft, but audible and unable to be mistaken for any other words. Dean’s breath hitches as he realizes the gravity of what he just said and he’s ready to pull away and apologize.
“I love you too.”
Dean can’t help a huge grin from spreading across his face. Suddenly, all his worries and stresses about his mom and Lucifer fade away and are replaced with a warm, happy feeling that Dean hasn’t felt since his childhood.
“Sleep, Dean.”
The hunter nuzzles even farther into Castiel. “M’kay, Cas.”
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