Part Two: Team Free Will

"Dean, where are the angels?"

"Apart from the one sitting on our sofa you mean?"

"Haha…! No, I mean the little porcelain angels I bought for the tree!"

"Oh, did Mr Perfect loose his pretty angels?"

"Jerk!"

"Bitch!"

Sam stuck his tongue out and vanished to search somewhere else for the Christmas decoration, leaving a with tinsel fighting Dean behind.

Geez, those glitter things were so annoying! But what weren't you doing for your little brother and a bit Christmas feeling, when you were stuck somewhere in the nowhere. Further, it was the first time after the "Hell-vs.-Heaven-and-we-will-all-die" period was over and the first time since years that they didn't spend Christmas in a motel.

"Shall I help you decorating?"

"Woah!" Dean jumped up by the sudden voice beside him, burned his hand in a candle and started cursing. "Damn it, Cas! Stop doing that!"

"I'm sorry."

"You better are! Shit, my hand!"

Castiel reached out to heal Dean's hand with a touch of his fingers, but Dean immediately pulled back.

"I'm alright!"

"Your hand is-"

"I'm alright, Cas!", he shouted. Now it was Castiel, who jumped in surprise by the angry tone in Dean's voice, and a hurt look covered his face. Dean realized it a second later and the angry mask on his face vanished for an apologetic.

"I'm sorry", he said. "I didn't mean to shout at you. It's just…" You kissed me.

It was as simple as that- or complicated.

"Sammy is walking on my nerves with this Christmas stuff and I, uhm… Christmas is always busy, not your fault." Dean tried to smile, but it felt awkward.

Castiel tilted his head like he did so often, when he wasn't sure about something- especially about something that humans explained him.

"So, you are not angry about me, for", he started.

Dean closed his eyes and shouted a silent prayer to… wherever. Don't ask for the kiss! Simply don't, I'm not prepared to speak about this now! No kiss, no mistletoe, no-

"…breaking your Impala?"

"Huh?" Dean opened one eye and found Castiel starring at him with the same intense look as ever. "Uh, the Impala? No, that is… alright. I mean, one window is nothing compared to…" a kiss.

Castiel frowned, but didn't ask, although he didn't seem to be content with the answer. "Good."

They stood like this for a few moments in uncomfortable silence- Castiel starring at Dean with his blue eyes, and Dean still with tings in the hands and a slightly frightened expression.

"Everything alright?", he squeaked, when Castiel didn't seem to stop starring at him. God, was there another mistletoe?

But the angel only blinked, as if he just woke up from a daydream. "What?", he asked. " Yes, I… was only… thinking." Concerning from the look on his face when he said that, Dean was pretty sure, what Castiel had been thinking about. But better not mention it.

"Ah." A stupid answer.

Castiel blushed slightly and pointed at the Christmas balls on the table. "Sam asked me to help you with it. Said it would be good for… the right mood."

Silently Dean cursed his brother. The right mood! Oh, just wait, Sammy! I'll give you the right mood!

"Yeah, well, okay then. Just hang them on the branches, but be careful with the candles!" Castiel did as told and for the next minutes they decorated the tree in silence.

The angel sensed Dean felt uncomfortable and he wasn't sure himself how to handle the situation without disappointing the hunter even more. Although Dean said nothing –or perhaps because he said nothing- he was clearly avoiding Castiel's presence as much as it was possible, when you are decorating a tree together in a lonely room. So it happened that Castiel moved around the tree to decorate the other half; in this way they were as far as possible away from each other and weren't in each other's way while hanging Christmas stuff up. Dean's reaction when Castiel had intended to heal his hand had shown him clearly that the hunter wasn't too comfortable with Castiel close around. Silently Castiel wondered if it had something to do with the fact that he had "invaded" Dean's "holy" personal space by kissing him. But they had been close before without Dean complaining. So, maybe it was… the kiss itself…?

The angel shot a quick glance at the other man. Dean seemed still to be a bit upset and Castiel as well felt… well, awkward. When Sam had explained the mistletoe thing it had all made sense, but since Dean's angry reaction, he felt terrible stupid. Not only that he should have known by now that Dean liked to kiss women, but also that he still didn't know why he felt now so nervous. It was more than hurt that his best friend –because that was what Castiel thought Dean and Sam were to him, Dean maybe even a bit more than Sam- had looked at him as if the angel was mad. Living with human beings didn't make you one, but he had expected that he would understand their behaviour sooner; at least the most important of it. However, it seemed he failed.

-I need your help, because you are the only one, who will help me!

- So, what, I'm Thelma and you're Louise, and we're just gonna hold hands and sail off this cliff together?

-I'm hunted, I rebelled and I did it all of it for you!

-Oh, Cas, not for nothing, but the last person who looked at me like that… I got laid!

-Dean and I do share a more profound bond now! …I wasn't going to mention it!

-Don't ever change!

Castiel found himself smiling at the memory of those and many other moments. Like Dean had said it once, they were "Team Free Will". They had been through so much together and so it was not unusual that after all he liked Dean; and wasn't this was a kiss was for? Showing someone that you… liked the person? And to be really niggling: love was just a more intense way of "liking"-

The Christmas ball felt out of Castiel's hand and he caught it in the very last moment before it hit the ground. His heart was booming in his chest and Castiel was sure his face was tomato red.

Lo-? No way!

Oh, why couldn't he just still be sitting on the lonely rooftop?

Thump!

Both Dean and Castiel looked up at the same moment, rising questioning an eyebrow at the sound.

Thump! Again.

"What the hell?", Dean started and went around the Christmas tree to look out of the window. Snow dropped slowly from the glass.

"Is this… a snowball?", Castiel asked slowly and totally forgot that he had just sworn not to speak to Dean for the rest of the evening.

He had seen some children throwing snowballs at each other before, but he couldn't figure out the sense of being covered with snow.

"Looks like it", Dean answered and opened the window to look out for the responsible. "If this is a joke, just stop it and-"

Thump! Before he could finish the sentence, another snowball covered his mouth. "Damn you!", Dean shouted angrily. "Which idiot-"

Laughter broke his swearing and Castiel looked frowning out for whoever it was.

At the same moment they heard Sam coming down the steps into the living room. He held a new looking box in his hands- apparently he had found the angels.

"Anything happened? I heard noise."

Dean smirked and pointed out of the window. "You will like it, Sammy!"

Surprised Sam went over to his brother and Castiel. "What is there? Santa Claus-"

"After all what I did for you, you don't invite me? Especially when you have cake and Christmas pudding?"

Sam's face immediately lightened up by the familiar sound of the voice from outside.

"Gabriel!"

From a branch of a tree the Archangel waved amused to the three men at the window.

"Hey, kids!"

It didn't take them longer than three minutes to get dressed and run out of the house and on the field behind it, snow flying around their feet. Castiel, however, was of course the first. He zapped directly in front of Gabriel, who was standing under the tree now, before Dean or Sam had even put their shoes on.

"Hey, little brother!" Gabriel patted friendly on the younger angel's shoulder. "We're missing you up there. But of course", he added with a smile full of mischief. "you've got much better things to do down here."

Castiel frowned in not understanding, when Gabriel blinked at him.

"I do not understand, what you mean!"

"Yes, I know that."

"But that is what I owe Sam and Dean. They helped me, they helped us and I was more than once wrong concerning their destiny. If I can offer them my support, I am more than willing to help my…"

"Friends?", Gabriel asked and Castiel nodded. "Friendship is something wonderful, Castiel. Keep it up."

It was a strange situation, for Gabriel's eyes glanced in a way Castiel wasn't sure what it was supposed to mean. As if his brother knew something that was hidden to him, although Gabriel had been in Heaven the last half year –so basically the whole time since he had been brought back- and Castiel had been with the Winchester brothers. Gabriel's hand squeezed friendly his shoulder and then he turned around, before Castiel could ask for an explanation.

"Hello, boys! –Oi!" Just in the last moment Gabriel stepped aside to avoid the collision with a snowball.

"That is the revenge for my face!", Dean growled. "Just wait, Gabe! No one hits Dean Winchester with a snowball!"

"I'm sorry, I must have mistaken your beautiful face for a cheesy Christmas decoration!"

Another snowball followed Gabriel's words, but again he was too fast.

"You gotta learn aiming first, Dean! But actually you've no chance against an Archan-" The rest of his sentence was left unspoken due to a handful of snow that covered his face from behind. Gabriel spied the snow out and whirled around.

"Castiel?"

Castiel looked from his hand to Gabriel's startled face and smiled in view of the surprised expressions on the faces of the three men in front of him.

"That was fun!"