Dean folded his clothes neatly, leaving them on a bench on the opposite wall before dragging himself into the shower stall and starting the water. It had been a long day on the road, and he needed to feel clean before he could think of enjoying the dinner Sam was preparing. He'd considered checking on Cas as soon as they got home, but the thought of bringing him a surprise meal in his room afterward and taking him up on that Nick-at-Nite marathon had won out.
His shoulders tensed as he thought of sliding in bed next to Cas to watch TV. He'd force himself to maintain maximum distance and stay on top of the covers when what he really wanted was to snuggle close and let Cas rest on his chest while they laughed at the sitcoms. It didn't matter what they watched, only who he watched it with.
If someone had told him five years ago he'd be having these thoughts about the dickhead angel who'd burned out Pamela's eyes, he might have shot them. Somehow, they didn't seem so outlandish now. Cas had become a real rebel, gone against who knew how many millennia of angelic training, to help him and Sam. And that had only been the beginning. He'd hunted side by side with them, fought wars in heaven, practically become God, even died.
Dean didn't like to remember that year, but sometimes it snuck up on him. He had spent weeks fighting Sam and Bobby at every turn, telling them that this was Cas, they had to be wrong, he wasn't capable of hiding things from them, let alone in favor of someone like Crowley. His heart had broken the moment he realized he'd been wrong. Their friendship had already fractured beyond recognition, but they could have fixed it, could have come back, if they'd only had time. Seeing Cas wade into that lake, disappearing into a cloud of black, had been all he could take.
At least, he thought it had been. Until he turned up on that front porch and stared down at blue eyes that didn't recognize him, found a stranger in Cas' form living with a wife and life that didn't have a place for Dean. He'd stolen him, not caring what Emmanuel was leaving behind, only needing to keep him by his side until he could find a way to bring Cas back. It didn't take long, but it didn't stick long, either. The patient they'd left behind with Meg wasn't the Cas he knew, but it was something.
Dean started to shampoo his hair, digging into his scalp harder than was necessary as he thought of purgatory, remembered the constant running, fighting for his life, asking every damned soul he came across where's the angel? Dean told Benny that being in purgatory was the purest versions of themselves, which ended up proving itself in unexpected ways. When it boiled down to his purest need, his most base desire, all he wanted to do was get Cas. Everything else could wait. He'd finally found him, all scruffy beard and tattered coat, finally pulled his angel into his arms for the first time. That moment had shifted something between them, something unsaid, when he realized Cas had never wanted to be found. He had some goddamned penance complex to work out, and he wasn't leaving that hellscape until he'd done so, no matter what it did to Dean.
He'd had horrific flashbacks, hallucinations that left him thrashing against empty space for months. When he saw Cas next, he didn't believe it, assumed it was just his imagination giving him some form of comfort, until he'd reached out and touched Cas, felt a solid form under his fingers.
Dean let the water blast his face, soaking in the mixed-up feelings of the time that followed. The gentle touches, the sweet smiles Cas gave him, all while Dean was trying his damnedest not to look a gift horse in the mouth but failing to understand how Cas was back. Things weren't that simple in their lives, he knew that much. He involuntarily flinched as his mind conjured Cas in that crypt, dead eyes staring him down as he pounded Dean's face to a pulp. The desperation came flooding back, the need for Cas to break free. Dean knew then that he didn't care what happened to himself, only that he couldn't lose Cas, not again.
It seemed impossible for so much to have changed between them in a few short years. After everything, here they were, Cas without wings and Sam unknowingly with an angel riding shotgun, and Dean just trying to keep the three of them alive. Ever since Cas had turned up at the bunker, after that night where they'd helplessly watched angels falling like shooting stars hurtling toward the earth, it had been harder to ignore the pull Dean felt toward him. He'd entertained these longings with stupid domestic shit like cooking him dinner or lending him pajamas, but moments like this, alone with his thoughts, he was free to picture more.
