Author's Note: Up now is my Day 4 offering for hekate1308 for the "All I Want for Christmas is Drowley" exchange on tumblr. This one ALSO does NOT follow a prompt, or relate back to the season at all. (What can you do?) This is an introspective piece from Crowley's POV.
Hope you like!
Of all things, it was Dean Winchester's laugh that was Crowley's downfall.
That stupid, annoying, rare, bright…laugh.
Damn it to hell for all eternity.
(Please?)
It had been one thing for Crowley to be attracted to Dean Winchester physically. The man is a specimen of perfection that sculptors would weep at the chance to capture in stone. It would be impossible for Crowley to not have a…healthy appreciation for it.
In the same vein, it makes complete sense that Crowley would be aroused by the violence of which Dean is capable. By the pure killer housed within the hunter. Crowley may be a salesman at heart, but he's done his time at the rack, and Dean…well, Dean is an artist.
A pass could even be given for how Crowley's interest is piqued whenever the intelligence that Dean chooses to hide more often than not peeks out. And if Crowley finds it especially entertaining when he gets to witness that intelligence being used against his enemies? Well, he is a demon after all.
Those are all aspects of Dean Winchester for which Crowley can, understandably, claim to have a visceral response. And they are all aspects of Dean Winchester that Crowley could, in theory, rinse from his mind as easily as blood from his hands.
And if that was all it was, he would pay it no mind. He would simply log the many appealing characteristics of Dean Winchester away with everything else that he's found intriguing in his long life, but - ultimately - had to let go.
Unfortunately for Crowley, that's not all that it is.
He first becomes aware of this fact in a terrible dive bar at the ass-end of Nebraska whose owners have clearly never heard of air conditioning. He's settled on a bar stool two down from Dean Winchester's pretty little face, intending to poke and prod at him. Just a bit. For fun.
(Crowley, perhaps,should have realized that he was developing a problem when this particular pastime skyrocketed to the top of his 'most favorite activities list' in quick order. If pressed, he will blame his lack of foresight on the fact that he's a demon and should therefore be immune to such human-like… feelings.
Stupid bloody feelings.)
Dean - unsurprisingly - scowls when Crowley sits down, so he opts to open with a stupid little joke, as an icebreaker. He doesn't even recall what it was he said. Something about it being hotter than hell he thinks.
(It was an awful, awful pun. Of the sort that most people would groan at, and beg to never hear the likes of again. But Dean has a soft-spot for awful puns, and was also just desperately in need of a laugh at that very moment, not that Crowley had anyway of knowing either of these things at the time.)
But it…it makes Dean laugh. It's lighthearted. Genuine. It's accompanied by an unassuming smile the likes of which Crowley can't recall ever having directed at him before. By anyone.
It's at that precise moment that Crowley knows he's well and truly screwed.
*sigh*
From that moment on everything goes downhill for the sometimes King of Hell when it comes to Dean Winchester.
And before Crowley knows it, he finds himself positively charmed by the stupidest things about the hunter. From the laser focus he has right before he swings a blade down into the neck of one Crowley's more idiotic subordinates, to the way that he picks at the damn label on a bottle of beer as he drinks it.
He finds himself playing and replaying conversations in his head. Begins to orchestra schemes both elaborate and (frankly) embarrassing, just as an excuse to be near him. Spending time in his general vicinity, even when he's angry, or frustrated.
Crowley, to his unending horror, even begins to find flannel and denim…attractive.
*shudder*
The whole thing ends up being a study in failure for Crowley. From leading Dean to get the Mark of Cain, and ushering him into a new life as a demon. All his machinations seeming to pay off, as he finally, finally, gets to have Dean all to himself - only to realize that a non-human Dean?
Isn't capable of the sort of laughter that made Crowley really want him in the first place.
He ends up handing him back on a silver platter to the moose and the angel. An unspoken demand of 'fix him' hanging in the air when he departs.
Which they do, of course. It takes them a year and releasing God's sister onto the world to do it, but they put Dean to rights.
It's another year and some change after that before Crowley is gifted with that laugh once more. Another bar in another state. One that even has working air conditioning this time.
He decides it was worth it, right then and there.
Like he said.
Well and truly screwed
~End