It all started with a phone call. A phone call at two in the morning. Dean had only just started to drift off to sleep when his cell phone started to blare loudly. He fumbled around in the dark, he was basically blind without his contact lenses in, before he found the source of the noise.

"Jimmy? The fuck dude, it's two in the morning. You better be dying in a ditch or somethin' or I gonna kick your ass."

"I did it Dean. I asked Amelia to marry me." Jimmy replied without to much as a hello or apology for waking Dean up. "We're getting married!"

"Congratulations. Now can I go the fuck back to sleep?" Dean grumbled.

"Dean..." Oh shit it was that voice. The voice Jimmy had used since their freshman year at KU. It was the voice he used when he wanted something. This could range from the last slice of bacon at breakfast or to copy Dean's notes because Jimmy had slept through his class.

"No I'm not coming to celebrate. It's the dead of ass at night." Dean said yawning loudly.

"Stop being an asshole and listen." Jimmy said. "Dean...will you be my best man?"

"What about..." Dean didn't feel right saying his name even after two years.

"He's out the country. Prague the last time I spoke to him." Jimmy said. That was news to Dean, then again why would Dean know his whereabouts anymore? "You're my best friend Dean, you introduced me to Amelia after all."

"If I say yes then can I go back to sleep?" Dean asked.

"You're an asshole." Jimmy retorted.

"Is that a yes?"

"Is that a yes?" Jimmy pressed with a snort of laughter.

"Of course dude, if anyone is gonna kick your ass down that aisle then it's gotta be me." Dean said. "Now can I go to sleep?"

"Yeah man, you can go to sleep."

"Congratulations. Tell Amelia that she's the only girl I would accept you marrying."

"I'll just tell her you said congratulations, asshole." Jimmy said with a snort. They said their goodbyes and Dean was fast asleep in seconds.

It was only when Dean was showering the next morning that it hit him. Jimmy Novak was getting married and Dean was going to be his best man. That was crazy. He never thought that he would see the day that Jimmy actually got married. Holy fuck, his best friend was getting married and he'd agreed to be best man.

More importantly he'd agreed to be best man for his ex-husband's brother.

Fuck.


The first words to come out of Castiel Novak's mouth were profanities. Dean had only just walked into the small house he was going to be renting with his best friends, Jimmy and Jo for their final year of college, when the front door had been kicked open. Dean whipped round and stared, slack jawed, at the guy stood in front of him. The scruffy, breaded guy in ripped jeans and a faded Bon Iver t-shirt. Fucking Bon Iver. Jo had been obsessed with that damn Skinny Love song when she went through a break up during their freshmen year.

"Fucking boxes weigh a goddamn fucking ton." The guy said with a voice like gravel. Dean knew instantly that it wasn't Jimmy even if the guy looked shockingly like him. Jimmy would never let his hair grow that long and he certainly didn't have tattoos running up and down both arms. He also shared Dean's hatred for Bon Iver. "Fuck, you're not Jimmy." the guy said when his shockingly blue eyes fell onto Dean.

"No I'm not. Neither are you." Dean said. He racked his brain for the guy's name but for the life of him he couldn't remember it. Jimmy had told him about his family, his twin brother and younger sister but Dean was shit with names. He'd met Jimmy's sister as well. Dean was sure it began with an 'A' though.

"Well fucking done Sherlock, you can use your fucking eyes." The guy said rolling those damn blue eyes of his. "Wanna give me a hand here?" He then asked nodding at the boxes in his hands.

"Oh yeah, sure. Sorry dude." Dean said racing over to grab the top box. Fuck, he was right. It was heavy. What the fuck did Jimmy have in there. "So you're…"

"Cas. Jimmy's brother." Cas! That was it. It was short for something but Dean remembered that Jimmy's twin brother went by Cas. jimmy had said that Cas hated his full name. "Jimmy said he was gonna be here. Do you know where he is?" Cas asked. "I've driven all the way from fucking Washington to help you idiots move in and now Jimmy's nowehere to be found." Damn, Cas must love his brother if he'd driven all the way from Washington to help Jimmy move in. Either that or Cas owed him.

"Jimmy is here." A voice called. Dean grinned as his best friend came strolling into the hallway, carrying the lightest looking box ever with a tray of take-out coffee cups settled on top. "I thought we'd need coffee to get through this so I hit Starbucks on the way here." Jimmy said giving Dean a smile.

"Fucking hell. You know how I feel about that place." Cas said with a groan. Jimmy rolled his eyes heavily and gave his twin brother a light kick on the leg.

"Its caffeine, either fuck off back to Washington for your fix or suck it up." Jimmy said. Dean was lost and he knew he was just standing there staring at the two brothers. Facially they were identical but apart from that the two couldn't have looked more different. Jimmy was clean cut and looked like your typical all American college student. Like Dean he was an engineering major, never skipped a class and even went to church every Sunday morning.

His brother however, was a different story. Cas' dark hair was slightly longer than Jimmy's and less clean cut. His stubble looked less designer and more 'I can't be fucked to shave' and something inside of Dean was itching to get a closer look at the tattoos inked all over Cas' arms.

"So I see you two have met." Jimmy said nodding at Cas and Dean.

"Not in the biblical sense." Cas quipped as he put down the boxes in his hands and grabbed a cup of coffee. He wrinkled his nose at the coffee but still took a sip. "I'm guessing this is the Mid-West farm boy you've waxed lyrical about since freshmen year." He added giving Dean a look over. Dean felt his face flush. He wasn't sure why Cas was rubbing him the wrong way but he was.

"I'm not a farm boy." Dean said. Kansas wasn't all farm land.

"Ignore him Dean, he's out at Evergreen College and thinks he's a tortured writer because he never sees the sun and reads too much Hemingway." Jimmy said putting down his own box and handing Dean one of the coffee cups. Cas flipped his brother off but still didn't stop looking over at Dean, a curious look on his face. There was something in that look that intrigued Dean even if he didn't want to admit it to himself.


"You want to pull this whole thing off in how long?" Dean asked three days after Jimmy called to ask him to be best man. Dean, along with Jimmy and his new fiancée Amelia, sat in a diner booth nursing coffee and a quick dinner of burgers and fries.

"Six weeks." Amelia said between sips of her soda. "I know that it's crazy to plan a wedding in six weeks but it makes sense."

"It does?" Dean asked.

"Oh yeah, because your wedding made sense." Jimmy said. Dean and Amelia stopped. Bringing up what happened with Dean was always a sure fire way to kill any conversation. "Sorry." Jimmy said quickly as he looked at Dean. "I wasn't thinking."

"No shit." Dean muttered before turning back to look at Amelia. "So why six weeks?" He asked.

"Well after the summer I'm going to be so busy with grad school and you and Jimmy are just getting off the ground with work. We'll be so bogged down by work that we'll end up being engaged for about five years and neither of us want that." Amelia explained.

"So you're going to plan a wedding in six weeks?" Dean asked still thinking that both Amelia and Jimmy were crazy. There was no way they would be able to pull it all off.

"Not exactly." Jimmy said with a grin.

"Don't look at me." Dean said quickly.

"Oh we're not." Jimmy said and once again the unspoken hung over them. Not many people would ask someone with a failed marriage to plan their wedding. "Anna has already started planning it." Dean breathed a sigh of relief, with Anna in charge nothing would go wrong.

"She's a bridesmaid along with my younger cousin Jessica." Amelia intoned. "She's as cute as a button, I think you'll love her. Out at Stanford so she might know Sam."

"It's going to be at the family home back in Missouri." Jimmy said. Dean had spent countless time at the Novak's home in Missouri over the years. He'd spent Thanksgiving there and after he'd married Cas they had spent Christmases there. Even after what happened Dean still spent time there. Anna, Jimmy's younger sister, lived in Missouri as did Jimmy's mother. Anna's house wasn't far from the Novak family home.

"She's already got a fair of the planning done." Amelia added with a smile.

"So I just have to show up, look sharp and make sure Jimmy's waiting for you at the end of the aisle?" Dean asked. He knew it wasn't going to be that easy but damn, he could hope.

"Yeah Dean, it's gonna be that easy." Jimmy said rolling his eyes. "I've already spoken to Sam. He's going to fly in on the morning of the wedding as he's got placement up until then. Jo said that she's going to be there and all of Amelia's friends have said they'll be there." Jimmy added. No one mentioned Castiel and Dean certainly wasn't going to bring him up.

"Excellent, so I don't really have to do shit all?" Dean asked.

"No Dean, you don't have to do 'shit all'." Amelia said before going back to sipping her soda.


Dean didn't know how it happened. It took nearly a week to move into the new house and he put this down to the fact that Jo had a shitload of stuff, Jimmy couldn't decide how to sort out all their games and DVDs and Cas, who wasn't even moving in, kept suggesting they fuck off unpacking for getting drinks instead.

At first Dean was wary of Jimmy's twin brother. He might have looked a bit like Jimmy but they were nothing alike. After the first day Dean got used to seeing Cas walk around the place in nothing but his boxers, which Dean didn't mind at all because Cas may have been a 'tortured writer' out in Olympia but he clearly did a fuck load of cardio. It also gave Dean a chance to get a closer look at the seemingly endless tattoos that covered Cas' body.

Scripture, quotes and bible verses adorned Cas' chest and stomach. Various sigils from mythology were inked up his arms and a large pair of black wings spread across Cas' shoulder blades and back. Dean wished that he could have said that the tattoos were the reason he kept finding himself staring at Cas but he knew that was bullshit. He found Cas fucking attractive and it was completely messing with his head.

After a week Cas announced that he was going back to Olympia as his classes were starting. He gave Jo a wicked grin, Jimmy a wink and Dean a knowing look before he climbed into his beaten up old car and made his way back to Washington state.

That night Dean's phone buzzed with an unknown number and to his surprise he saw it was from Cas. He must have gotten Dean's number from Jimmy.

Looking forward to being ogled by you again Farm Boy.

How do you know I was ogling Mr Tortured Writer? Dean shot back before he even realised what he was doing. Jimmy would kill him if he found out Dean was flirting with his brother. True there had always been a 'Don't fucking flirt with Anna you slut' rule since the first time Dean had met Anna the previous year and Jimmy had never said if that rule also applied to his brother. Still, Dean was sure Jimmy would have a things to say if he knew that Dean had been staring at his brother for the past week.

You're not very subtle. Is it just erections you grow on the farm or is it something cliché like corn? Cas fired back. Fuck, he'd noticed the occasional tightness of Dean's jeans.

I didn't actually grow up on a farm and you're from Missouri so you're not so metropolitan yourself.

So it is just erections. That's good to know. Until next time Farm Boy.

Next time turned out to be just a week later when Dean received a photo message from Cas. In the photo he wasn't wearing a lot and seemed to be at some sort of hippy party with a lot of alcohol. Dean might have rubbed one or two out over that photo but he wasn't going to let Cas know that.

Enjoy whacking one out to that Farm Boy Cas sent barely an hour after sending the photo. Dean was fucked, truly fucked.

After that they talked pretty much non-stop. Random musings that seemed to be thinly veiled sexual innuendos became the norm. Neither Jimmy nor Jo knew what was going on and Dean wanted to keep it that way for a while. When Cas announced he was coming to visit them Jimmy thought nothing of it but Dean was nervous. Was Cas coming to see him? Would it be obvious that the pair had been talking for the past month? If it was Dean was going to be fucked. Not in the good way either.


Two weeks before the wedding and the last thing that Dean wanted to hear about was the damn wedding. Anna had been on the phone to him nonstop since Jimmy asked Dean to be the best man. It was actually pathetic how Dean had gotten used to her ringing in the middle of the night with a random question about the colour of his tie or something else completely banal.

"Anna for the last time I don't give a fuck over what kind of salmon is served at the reception." Dean groaned at four in the morning when he picked up his phone. "Actually Jimmy fucking hates salmon and you should know that, he's your brother."

"This isn't about salmon though I do have to sort that out. I just wanted to know if you were bringing a date to the wedding." Anna said.

"What is it with your Novak siblings and waking me up in the middle of the night?" Dean asked. "No, I'm not bringing a date with me, I'll be too busy making sure that Jimmy actually marries Amelia."

"Because you're the best person to offer marriage advice."

"Fuck off Anna." Dean said before hanging up. He counted to five then rang her back. "Sorry for telling you to fuck off."

"Its fine, I shouldn't have said that anyway. It' not your fault, you did nothing wrong." Anna said. "One last thing."

"Is it about the table arrangement?" Dean asked. Anna was silent. "I'm not talking about who is sitting where Anna, call Jess and ask her about it." Dean said before hanging up yet again. Not five minutes later his phone buzzed with a text message.

Stop bitching at Anna you ass, she's just trying to make sure the wedding goes without a hitch.

Jimmy. Of course it was Jimmy. In the space of a month he'd turned into a weird, panicking mess over the wedding. God knows what would happen if he was actually planning the wedding and not just getting Anna to do everything.

Stop letting your sister call me at 4am to ask about fucking table arrangements. I'm not a woman.

Stop acting like one then you asshole. Maybe Jimmy had a point, Dean was acting like a bit of a mopey woman. The sooner this whole wedding shit was over the better.


The first time, and fuck if that doesn't sound cheesy as hell, was completely tequilas fault. Cas was staying with them for the weekend. Apparently his roommate had taken up naked tantric yoga and Cas was sick of seeing the guys balls all the time. According to Cas his roommate's balls were not balls he wanted to see.

It started with beers at a local college bar, Dean sat with Cas, Jimmy and Jo in a small booth and swapping anecdotes about life at college. Jo nearly choked on her beer during one of Cas' stories about a party he'd recently been to.

"Your brother is fucking crazy." Jo said to Jimmy. Jimmy just rolled his eyes because he probably heard this all the time. Dean was just trying to concentrate on anything but Cas' thigh pressed against his. He felt his dick twitching and he knew he needed to calm down. He wasn't going to pop a boner in the middle of a bar.

Jo was the first to leave, claiming that she needed to be up in the morning. Jimmy followed thirty minutes later which left Dean and Cas sat next to one another.

"Look after him."

"I don't need looking after." Cas said.

"I meant look after Dean, I know what you're like." Jimmy said giving his brother a look. "If it were up to you the poor guy would end up in Vegas with a stripper named Molly Mount." Jimmy added before leaving the pair.

"Please, there's only one place you're ending up tonight." Cas said to Dean.

"Is it my own bed sans stripper?" Dean asked.

"We'll see." Cas said. Then he suggested shots and that's how the two ended up sneaking back into the house a few hours later incredibly drunk. In the hallway Dean turned to say goodnight to Cas, assuming that Cas would camp down on the couch for the night.

Cas captured Dean's lips and pressed him up against the wall. His tongue exploring Dean's mouth and his hands roaming under Dean's shirt. His hand ghosted over Dean's stomach before moving downwards the palm the erection in Dean's jeans.

"Forward aren't you?" Dean asked cocking an eyebrow.

"Fuck forward, if I left it up to you we'd still be texting like teenagers." Cas said, his voice going even deeper. "So what's it gonna be Dean? More teenage flirting or am I gonna see this dick?"

"Because you asked so nicely." Dean said with a snort. He lead Cas into his room. "Your brother is going to kill me for this."

"Please don't mention my brother when I'm about to fuck you Dean." Cas practically growled as he pulled Dean's shirt up over his head. Well that sent every thought of Jimmy out of Dean's head. He and Cas had never really established who was going to be leading this thing. Clearly Cas had his own ideas over whose ass was going to be whose.


One week. In one week Dean would no longer have to hear about the fucking wedding. If he heard the word 'wedding' anymore he was sure he would break out in hives. Jimmy had basically turned into a woman over the past few weeks. Dean barely recognised his best friend anymore. Part of him wondered if he was anything like that after his wedding. No, he couldn't think about that. That was dangerous territory. He couldn't allow himself to think about anything to do with Castiel.

He found that almost impossible though. There had been weeks, if not months afterwards where he could barely stand being around Jimmy because he reminded Dean of Castiel so much. They were very different people but Jimmy was still Castiel's identical twin brother, they still looked like each other if one was tattooed and scruffy. Even if one was the love of Dean's life who had just walked out one day and never come back.

Fuck. Dean thought that after two years he was over it but as the wedding drew closer he found himself thinking about Castiel almost nonstop. They hadn't spoken since that day. Dean hadn't seen him for over two years. Castiel had been ripped out his life, because cutting someone out your life meant you had a say in the matter, and now he was just left with the pain. There were no reminders, Dean had gotten rid of everything in the weeks that followed the divorce papers. In drunken rages he had burnt photos, destroyed mementos and knickknacks they had collected during their summer road trip. He had deleted every single trace of Castiel apart from the tattoo still present on his ring finger.

The worst had been a few days after. After the papers, after he had come home to an empty apartment and found his husband gone. Jimmy had come round to find Dean in a drunken haze. He had been so drunk he had thought that Jimmy was Castiel. Dean had cried, begged him to rethink everything. They could work though it all and Dean would be a better husband. He would be the person that Castiel wanted to love. When he realised that it wasn't Castiel he had lashed out. He had told Jimmy to never step foot in his apartment again. He never wanted to see him again. It had been a brutal day that still made Dean feel sick.

Now, a week before the wedding, Dean sat alone in his apartment nursing the first beer he had drunk in weeks. He was on the couch, a random show playing on the TV screen that he wasn't paying any attention to. His mind was wandering and he couldn't help it. He wondered where Castiel was, he wondered if Castiel ever thought about him. Had Jimmy even gotten in touch with him to tell him about the wedding? Dean had seen the guest list over a hundred times over the past few days thanks to Anna. Castiel's name hadn't appeared anywhere on it. He wasn't going to be there so Dean needed to stop thinking about him. His life with Castiel had been a brief and beautiful thing but it was over. It had been over for two fucking years and Dean needed to accept that. He needed to get that through his thick, fucking skull.

Yes, for a moment he had been happy. He'd been married and every night he held his husband close but that wasn't his life anymore. That hadn't been his life for two years and it wasn't going to be his life any time soon.


It lasted six months. Six months of sneaking around and acting like secret agents. Secret agents that just seemed to have sex whenever they could but secret agents nonetheless.

"If you and my brother are going to continue fucking like bunnies can you be quiet about it?" Jimmy said over breakfast one Sunday morning. Cas had just left to go back to Olympia and Dean nearly choked on his coffee. "Please, you guys are not subtle. Cas hasn't told me any gross stories of guys he's hooked up with for months and you look at him like you're about to pounce."

"I...I...I don't know what you're talking about." Dean said trying to act casual and hide the hickey he k ew was on his collarbone.

"Bullshit, Cas has been sleeping in your room every time he's been here for months. You guys are not subtle with your dirty secret sex."

"It's not...we're..." Dean stammered.

"Oh shit it's not just sex is it?" Jimmy asked when he looked at Dean's flushed face. "If it was you would have told me. Cas would have told me."

"We're sort of a thing. We haven't said what that thing is but it's a thing." Dean stammered out as Jimmy stared at him. "Stop staring dude, I've done the whole relationship shit before."

"Not with my brother you haven't." Jimmy said.

"Don't kill me."

"I would have killed you if it was just fucking but it is t so I don't know what to do." Jimmy said. "Break his heart and I'll break your neck though."

"What would Jesus say?"

"'Do not fuck with Jimmy Novak's brother.'"

"I doubt Jesus would say fuck." Dean pointed out and received a hearty smack from Jimmy for that comment. "I'm not gonna break Cas' heart. I'm not." Dean said and he meant it. He liked Cas, fuck he liked him a lot. There was something about the scruffy guy that was intoxicating and Dean ached when Cas was back at school.

He was falling in love with Cas Novak and that terrified him.