Couldn't leave well enough alone, as usual. So here's a snippet to follow the other.
I hope everyone's having safe, healthy and ecstatically happy Holidays.
Christmas Morning.
Castiel awoke, a little chilled and extremely disoriented. Even before he was entirely conscious he was disoriented - he could feel he wasn't in his usual bed, and could sense he was in a different space altogether which left him utterly confused as to where he was in that sleepy kind of way. He opened his eyes to see the crooked little evergreen with its makeshift tinsel, and a few haphazardly newspaper-wrapped gifts under the tree. As he blinked awake he realized that while his front was cold, his back was toasty warm, something heavy weighting down his waist. He looked over his shoulder and nearly gasped out loud when he saw the beautiful, sleeping man behind him - the righteous man.
He'd forgotten.
Castiel had forgotten that he had kissed Dean. He'd forgotten that they'd talked all night, and it entirely slipped his mind that he had fallen asleep with Dean on this ratty old couch. But remembering was a lovely surprise.
He smiled to himself. He may have never been happier to wake up cold with a crick in his neck.
He got up carefully from the couch, draping a blanket over Dean, who's brow seemed to furrow a little in his sleep when Castiel moved away. And Castiel liked that. He pulled the heavy woolen blanket off of the back of the couch an placed it gingerly over him.
He padded silently over to his makeshift Christmas tree, smiling at a spoon that Dean had bent in half at the curve so that it would hang over the branch. It was the extent of his involvement in decorating the thing, but Castiel was fond of the repurposed cutlery. It was just another example of Dean taking something simple and making it extraordinary. He touched the metal lightly with his finger and it shined as it caught a glimmer of pure white light.
Castiel's head tilted to the side, and he turned in search of the source of such a nearly Heavenly shine. His eyes landed on the window, a sliver of the impossibly bright glow shining through a hole in sheer, dusty curtains. Castiel went to the window and pulled the curtains apart, wincing at the brightness. He froze at what his eyes beheld, and stared in awe.
It had snowed again in the night, and now in the early morning sun the undisturbed powder was glistening and breathtakingly beautiful. The snow was crusted over with a sparkling surface that could have been made of millions of little crystals.
He'd never in all his years seen something so simple, so natural, and so beautiful.
Glittering crystals hung from the branches of the trees, lined their trunks like tempered glass. Somehow the Earth had fashioned itself its own ornaments, and in Castiel's opinion they were far superior. He felt he could stand there at that window all day and he still wouldn't have afforded the spectacle enough adoration.
Then he felt warmth against his back, strong arms winding around his waist and pulling their bodies flush. And he remembered that this adoration and desire to worship that natural beauty was familiar after all. Dean kissed the nape of his neck lightly and rested his chin on Cas' shoulder.
"Merry Christmas Cas," he whispered in Castiel's ear.
And Cas could hear his smile. He didn't have the voice right then to say it back. But it didn't matter, Dean wasn't deterred by his loss for words. He only held tighter.
It was as perfect a moment as Castiel could imagine.
A first, perfect Christmas.