Summary: AU. Castiel and Dean both have to find the time to work, to care for their siblings, and after a chance meeting in a café belonging to Castiel's brother, they have to find time for each other. Can their soon found romance survive? Destiel! Please R&R!

Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or its characters.

A/N: Yet another Destiel AU which is the first of three stories. The focus for a while will be my sister!fic, The Paths We Tread. If you haven't read it, please, please do! It starts from 1x16 and is going all the way up to the end of season 5 with a follow-on story, an AU featuring the OC and other stuff. No season 6 or 7 angst because I want my OC to have a good ending. I really want more people to be involved with it because when we get to season 4 and Castiel shows up, part of me thinks that more people will be interested and won't have read the previous 3/4 stories and learnt about the character. The second story is coming close to completion and hopefully will have another chapter this weekend.

As for this story, please read and review! I hope you enjoy it!

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Love and Life

Chapter One: A Brand New Day

This is the story of two men who both endured hardships at home, and when they finally met, their lives were changed forever.

Castiel Novak was twenty-one years old, and a 'writer-in-training' for a magazine about music, art, drama, TV, movies, dance, and other aspects of culture, and the job was one he enjoyed and found was flexible with his home life.

Castiel needed flexibility with his home life because of his younger sister Anna, who had been through a traumatic experience when she was fifteen. Now at the age of nineteen, she was a very damaged, very vulnerable adult, who Castiel took as much time to care for as he could. His boss was very good to him and let him work from home on days when Anna became very stressed and upset. They accommodated him the best they could and he did all he could to make sure they knew how much he appreciated it. Ellen Harvelle was Anna's carer when Castiel couldn't stay at home and since she was godmother to all the Novak children, she felt it her duty to come and help so Castiel could go to work to support his sister.

Dean Winchester was a twenty-two year old firefighter who was struggling to support his eighteen year old brother, Sam. Sam wanted to go to college so Dean had been saving up for over five years so the kid could do whatever he wanted. Their dad had moved away after finding out Dean was gay, and their mother had passed away when they were very young. Dean struggled to keep himself going sometimes because if the money he earned wasn't going to his bills, or Sam's account, it was going to Sam himself. Bobby, Dean's godfather, always tried to support the boys as well, and Dean was grateful for the help he could offer. He'd given Sam his first car and Dean had tuned it up as well as paid the insurance and for Sam's driving lessons.

Both Dean and Castiel struggled in their day to day lives. They struggled to keep relationships going, and Castiel had found since 'the incident', as it was referred to, that whenever he was with a man long enough for him to bring them home, they often ran at the first realisation of Anna's state of mind. One of his boyfriends called her a freak. Another told her she needed to be locked away after she'd tried to cut herself. So, Castiel couldn't trust anyone until they proved it to him. Dean had struggled because the guys he'd dated just wanted a sexy fireman and didn't like the kid brother being in the way. He knew that he needed something stable because Sam was sick of man after man hurting his brother and Dean himself was sick of being hurt.

Neither of them expected to run into one another at a café that both visited on a daily basis. Castiel, on this occasion was taking a late break after getting an article completed. He headed over to the property quickly, only to meet the eyes of his twenty-six year old brother Gabriel, who grinned and waved him inside.

"Sorry, Dean." Gabriel said to the man he was serving as Castiel stepped inside, "My brother needs his regular."

The man, Dean, turned to look at Castiel and the younger Novak stopped and stared for a second at the beauty of Dean's green eyes. The man had the most perfect lips Castiel had ever seen, but he was drawn away from the scene of utter gorgeousness by his brother's coughing.

"Cassie...You're late." The older brother said, earning a roll of the eyes from Castiel.

"My name is not Cassie, Gabriel." Castiel growled with embarrassment as he took his coffee, "I just finished my article, and I have a later break, that's all."

"Here's your usual." Gabriel said, smiling as Castiel handed over the money for the coffee, "Oh, Castiel, this is Dean Winchester. He's a friend of mine. Dean, this is Cas."

"Hi." Dean said with a smile, holding his hand out to Castiel who shook it.

"Hello." Castiel replied in his deep, gruff voice, "I'm sorry to have to do this, but I need to get back to the office. Nice to meet you."

"And you." Dean said as the shorter man scowled at his brother before leaving, "Didn't realise that you had such a gorgeous brother."

"That's because I don't talk about my brother much." Gabriel replied as he handed Dean his coffee.

"He's hot." Dean said, earning a warning look from Gabriel.

Gabriel didn't like men, friends or not, looking at his brother in that manner. A lot of men had hurt Castiel so much, but Gabriel also knew that Dean had been hurt a lot. This made him wonder if Dean would actually stick with Castiel if anything happened between them. But Castiel had standards and Dean, despite him being a sexy fireman (and this was coming from Gabriel who was as straight as an arrow), wasn't really Castiel's type. Dean could be boisterous, loud and inappropriate sometimes, and Castiel liked classy men who knew how to behave. That's why he liked to date men over the age of twenty-five, because to him they seemed more mature.

"Well, the chances of you guys meeting again is very unlikely." The older man said, "He's got trust issues pretty bad."

"Aw, come on, man!" Dean cried with exasperation as he handed over his money, "I wanna get to know him, huh? If I see him again by some miracle, I'll give him my..."

At that moment, Castiel rushed back in and stared at Gabriel wide-eyed. The older brother looked confused but then gasped and grabbed a paper bag that rested by the coffee maker. Castiel's guilty pleasure. An iced doughnut.

"Hey, Castiel..." Dean said, catching the attention of the younger man as he handed Gabriel more money, "You have some time?"

"Um...I-I guess..." Castiel stammered, "Why?"

"I wanna get to know you." Dean said with an award winning smile.

Castiel blushed and instantly felt panic set in, before he looked to Gabriel who smiled at him, and he felt relaxed almost immediately. He smiled at Dean who smiled back cheekily, sighing and rolling his eyes in a dramatic way.

"Where are we sitting then?"

Dean grinned and the two walked to a seat, Castiel glaring at Gabriel before sitting opposite Dean. Neither man had the slightest idea that he was sitting opposite the love of his life.

-TBC-


Soppy, right?

Hope you enjoyed!

Thanks for reading so far!

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