I'm not posting a chapter from So Close this week, cause EXAMS, so here's a ficlet I wrote a while ago. Enjoy!
"Perhaps."
It was Cas' favourite word lately, and it was driving Dean crazy. Would he be home before five? Perhaps. Did he want to try out that new sushi place? Perhaps. Did he feel like fucking Dean into the mattress tonight? PERHAPS.
And that wasn't the worst of it either. This was the longest relationship Dean had ever been in, and it was freaking him out. The perhaps thing didn't help. He was terrified of screwing this up, and he would've felt a bit more confident with a couple straight answers here and there.
He knew Cas was just teasing, knew that he said it just to get a reaction out of Dean.
"You're adorable when you're being grumpy!" Cas had laughed.
"Adorable," Dean had grumbled. "I am most definitely NOT 'adorable'."
But Cas was laughing, his eyes sparkling in the light from the windows of their apartment, and Dean couldn't find it in himself to be truly upset.
The only silver lining was that Cas was considerate enough to be unwavering in what his perhaps' meant. They meant yes. Every single time.
Nevertheless, it had confused Dean the first time Cas used that word.
"Hey, you want takeout for dinner tonight?" Dean called out, entering their living room. Cas didn't even look up, torn between staring intently at his computer and shuffling desperately through the papers littering his desk, no doubt looking for some obscure legal document.
"Uh… Perhaps," Cas mumbled.
"Perhaps?" Dean frowned, running his hand through his hair. "What does that mean? Would you rather I cooked?"
"Um," Cas finally looked up. "No. Let's get takeout."
"Chinese?"
"Sure," Cas replied, already back to glaring at his computer screen.
Dean looked at him and smiled affectionately, shaking his head. "Perhaps," he muttered as he headed towards the phone. "What the heck is that supposed to mean?"
Dean caught on fairly quickly. Hanging out with Cas (who was a friggin' genius as far as Dean was concerned) you had to be on your toes. If you weren't careful, you'd become the butt of a slew of affectionate jokes. Dean preferred not to be teased, if at all possible, especially by Cas. Because he liked it, and then he had to admit to himself that he had no dignity whatsoever when it came to Cas. He would gladly suffer through a worrying amount of embarrassing situations, as long as it made Cas laugh.
The next day Dean knew he was in trouble.
"You want me to put the peppers you bought in the spaghetti sauce, babe?" Dean asked, glancing over his shoulder to where Cas was sitting at the kitchen table, this time typing up an email to one of the other lawyers in his firm.
There was a pause, and then, "Perhaps."
Dean, with an impending sense of doom, turned around to see Cas looking at him with a twinkle in his eyes and a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth.
"Oh god," Dean groaned. "This is going to become a thing, isn't it?"
"Probably," said Cas cheerfully, before getting up and giving Dean a kiss, slinking his arms around Dean's waist. "And yes, I'd love it if you put the peppers in."
Cas had had several running jokes about Dean over the years (three years, two months, and eight days now, to be exact. Not that Dean was counting. Alright, yes, he was counting, a little obsessively to be honest). The last one stemmed from an incident where Dean had messed up an attempt at making chocolate chip cookies by confusing beef stew base with brown sugar. Cas had laughed for ten minutes straight when Dean told him, tears running down his cheeks. For the next couple months Dean had been plagued by some awfully pointed remarks.
"I was thinking of making stew tonight, Dean… Do you know where we put the chocolate chips?"
"Go fuck yourself," Dean replied, and felt a grudging sort of joy blossom in his chest at the sound of Cas' answering chuckle.
So the "perhaps" thing, maybe inevitably, had turned into one of Cas's jokes. Every couple days he would answer "Perhaps," to one of Dean's questions, and thank god he meant yes every time, because otherwise Dean would've been hopelessly confused. And every time, Dean would glower at him affectionately, because he knew that was the reaction Cas was hoping for.
But despite the jokes, or maybe partially because of them, the past three years (plus two months and eight days) had been the happiest of Dean's life. Which was why he was just a little nervous for his date with Cas tonight. He stood in front of the mirror, running his fingers through his already tidy hair and making sure that the little black box containing a shiny silver ring was still safely tucked into his suit's jacket pocket.
Cas poked his head in. "You look lovely, Dean. Are you ready to go?"
"Hey, I was the one waiting for you to finish primping," said Dean, raising his eyebrows at his boyfriend.
Cas sniffed. "It's hardly unreasonable to want to look good for a date."
"Yeah, but I always miss your sex hair," replied Dean, looking mournfully at Cas's tidy locks.
"Well maybe after dinner we can do something to fix that," said Cas, smirking. "But right now I'm hungry. Let's go."
The restaurant was a favourite of theirs. A small Italian place, fancy enough that you could dress up if you wanted to, but not so fancy that people would give you funny looks if you walked in wearing jeans. Plus they had calzones to die for. Dean swore by them.
They were seated at a small, candlelit table in a quiet corner of the restaurant. It was a Tuesday night, so there weren't a lot of people out, just enough to create a pleasant amount of background noise. Dean tried to pull his chair closer to the table and ended up just smashing it into one of the table legs, nearly knocking over the candle, which would've been a shame, because Cas's eyes were more than a little mesmerizing in the candlelight.
Cas gave Dean a weird look when he asked for a bottle of champagne with their dinner, since they didn't normally drink champagne, and when the waitress left he leaned forward and asked, "Special occasion?"
"No," Dean replied, too quickly.
Cas narrowed his eyes. "You're up to something."
"No I'm not."
"You know I can tell when you're lying, Dean."
"Do you think we should get a dog?"
"No. Cats are far superior. Don't change the subject." Cas narrowed his eyes even more. "Why are you getting champagne?"
Dean sighed. "It's very difficult to do romantic things for you. I'm not up to something, I just… wanted to get champagne for you," Dean mumbled, knowing he was blushing. He was trying to get past his mental block about romance and all that… stuff. But he still blushed sometimes when Cas caught him doing something even remotely sweet.
Cas's gaze softened. "I love you, Dean Winchester," he said, then smirked. "I also really love champagne."
Dean snorted. "Good to know what your priorities are."
Twenty minutes into their meal, when Cas was almost finished his fettuccini alfredo (Dean had yet to convince him that the calzones were better) Dean cleared his throat.
"So, um. Cas," he said, and coughed. He reached for his champagne, but his hands were shaking, and he just spilled it down his front. "Shit! Um," This was not how Dean had pictured proposing.
"Aw, fuck it." Dean got out of his chair, (nearly knocking over the candle again) grabbed Cas' hand, and got down on one knee. "Cas," Dean said, looking into his eyes. They were very wide. Dean fumbled at his jacket pocket for a moment, taking out the little black box, and flicking it open with his thumb. He held up the box, so that Cas could see the silver ring nestled into the black fabric. "You're the most annoying person I've ever met. And I'd like to keep getting annoyed by you for the rest of my life. Will you… Uh, marry me? Maybe?" Dean could feel his face burning, knew his palms were sweaty, too sweaty. He was probably sweating on Cas. Well, it wouldn't be the first time, he thought distantly. Cas was still staring at him, lips parted slightly, frozen in place.
Except then he wasn't. Then he was grabbing Dean's carefully knotted tie, and dragging him forward so that he could kiss the remaining breath from Dean's lungs.
"That," Cas said, in between kisses. "was the worst proposal ever."
Dean was kissing back, enthusiastically. But there was something else, something Cas hadn't said. "Wait," he said, pulling back, panting. "Is that a yes?"
Cas smiled, his eyes glinting with mischief.
"Perhaps."