A/N: Thanks for the reviews, folks, they make my day! No particular warnings for this chapter, and (per usual) I have no claims to ownership of the boys or any of the lovely supporting cast.
Dean hadn't seen or even heard from Cas in two fucking weeks. He knew the bastard had been by the Roadhouse – as if the guilty looks on Jo's and Sam's faces weren't enough, the sound of the back door slamming as soon as Dean stepped into the place was a dead friggin giveaway. Dean had taken to haunting the Roadhouse during breaks and after work, to calling Ellen from the garage only to have her snap for the twentieth time that there was no message, boy, don't you think she'd have told you? She hates it when you kids fight. Dean didn't know how to explain that they weren't fighting, not as far as he could tell, but Cas had friggin kissed him and then started friggin ignoring him, so he swallowed and thanked Ellen and hung up and went back to work, Bobby shaking his head at him.
Come the fuck on, Cas, he thought in irritation as he walked into the Roadhouse fifteen days after that night in the park, only to see it was empty except for Ellen and a few early evening dinner patrons. Ellen caught his eyes as he walked through the door and sighed.
"Dean, honey, I woulda called Bobby if I had a message for you."
"I know, Ellen, I know, I'm just," he made an aggravated noise instead of using words to finish his sentence as he collapsed onto a bar stool at the counter. He waited for her to come back over from serving beer to Henrikson (Dean gave an awkward wave) and his friend Jody Mills, the local sheriff. (In Dean's opinion as a professional hooligan, the sheriff and the high school principal should just not be allowed to be friends. It just was not okay.) When Ellen stood in front of him, arms crossed and an expression on her face that was trying to be annoyed but betrayed her underlying sympathy for Dean's distress, he spoke again.
"I'm sick of his shit by now, ya know?"
"Watch your mouth, kid," but it was said without conviction.
"How am I supposed to – to say I'm sorry if he won't even talk to me? It's stupid," Dean groused, "and it's starting to actually piss me off. I mean, there's avoiding me and there's friggin running away just because I'm here, too."
"Look, I understand you're frustrated, Dean, but I don't know what you expect me to do. Kids fight. You and Castiel are pretty much inseparable most of the time, it won't kill you to spend a few weeks apart." She sighed again at the look on Dean's face. "What the hell did you two fight about anyway?" She frowned, hesitating, then leaned over a bit, speaking softly so the other patrons wouldn't hear. "Was it whatever nonsense he's gotten into lately – what is it now, pills, like his mom?"
Dean felt his eyes widen in surprise. "What – how – ?"
Ellen shook her head sadly. "Dean, Bobby and me practically raised you boys, as best we could. Of course I know. Kid tried to light a damn cigarette in my bar the other night, had to remind him that he is underage and he'd best not let me see him with one of those things again until he was eighteen."
"Well, I hope he listens to you more than he does to me, then," Dean snorted. He shoulda figured Ellen knew. She knew everything, almost as much as Missouri. (And Missouri was just scary in how much she knew. Dean was almost willing to believe her age-old claim that she was psychic.) "Anyway, no, that's not what we fought about. It's – we're not even fighting really, he just – I said something, he misunderstood, and now he won't talk to me so I can't even explain that I – " Dean cut off, trying to work around what had actually happened. "That I didn't mean it," he finished.
Ellen just looked at him for a long time before sighing and turning away, mumbling something about, "damn teenagers," in the same fond tone as Bobby's "idjits," and picked up the phone. Dean wondered vaguely if he had managed to make Sam's infamous puppy-dog face.
"Hey, Michael, this is Ellen Harvelle. Is Castiel home?...Mhmm. Yeah, he just left a book here yesterday, Ash just found it. Thanks...Hey, Castiel...Yes, I know damn well you didn't leave a book here. Just come over, will you? I wanna talk to you...Yes, it's about Dean. This is getting ridiculous...No, he's not. I'm just sick of having to step on eggshells because you two had a lover's spat or something." Dean flinched at her choice of words, and again when Ellen frowned at him. "Okay, hon. I'll see you soon." Ellen hung up the phone and turned to Dean, hands on her hips.
"Alright, listen up. First, you are not to solve your crisis in my establishment, because if he hits you for whatever you said, I do not want to lose customers over it. Second, if he calls the cops on you for kidnapping, I am not bailing you out, and you're on your own explaining this shit to Mills, understood?" Dean nodded, and he could feel a nervous smile growing on his face.
"Yes, ma'am." And then, "Thanks, Ellen."
She shook her head at him. "Just figure this out, okay, kid? This stupid world, you two need each other." Because Ellen was being nice, Dean elected not to roll his eyes at the cheesiness of that particular remark (or to acknowledge the truth of it). "He'll be here in twenty minutes or so. You just hang tight, I'll get you a sandwich or something while you wait."
"You're the best, Ellen."
"Damn right I am."
The sandwich was, of course, delicious, but it got heavy and uncomfortable in Dean's stomach the moment Cas walked in twenty minutes later. The boy froze in the doorway when his eyes found Dean's face, and the expression of mingled horror and embarrassment was enough to make Dean feel sick with guilt. Cas only spared a split second to glare at Ellen for tricking him before he was stalking out the door again. Dean practically tripped over himself chasing after Cas, because no, he was not getting out of this that easy.
Not that anything about this whole shitshow was easy.
"Cas, come on, man, wait up!" Dean called as he ran into the parking lot only a few feet behind Cas. Cas stopped in his tracks, speaking without turning to face Dean.
"Dean, please leave me alone." His voice was tense, almost angry, and it stopped Dean, too. "I thought I'd made it clear I don't particularly want your company right now."
"Yeah, well, you haven't 'particularly wanted my company' for more than two weeks, asshole, and you can't be fucked to give me a damn explanation for it?" Dean's response was angrier than he intended it to be, but he was too busy trying to pretend that Cas' words didn't hurt like hell to care.
Cas turned on him, his expression unreadable. "I did not realize this required explanation."
"Are you shitting me?" Dean demanded, almost laughing with disbelief. "No, dude, it does require explanation and we are talking about this, whatever it is, because I – " and he had wanted to stay mad, but his voice accidentally broke over the words and his sheer desperation for the company of his friend showed through. "I miss you, man, okay? I thought – the hell, everything was fine, we had plans and then you just start ignoring me and seriously, Cas, what the fuck – "
"We are not talking about this here," Cas interrupted sharply, looking around the parking lot. He grabbed Dean's wrist and started dragging him toward the Impala. "If you insist on having this discussion, we are doing it on neutral territory."
"Neutral territory?" Dean asked incredulously as Cas got into the passenger seat like he belonged there (he did, something inside Dean said).
Cas looked at him like he was an idiot. "The park. Now. Or we are not having this conversation at all."
"Fine," Dean snapped, getting in and slamming the door. "Fine."
The ride was surreal. Both of them sat in stony silence, each pissed at the other and neither wanting to be the one to speak first. Dean was getting kind of tired of this silent car ride bullshit, to be honest.
"Are you seriously not going to say anything until we get there?" he asked after, sick of it after the first five minutes.
"Yes." Cas still wasn't looking at him (that was the worst, that was always the worst).
"Fine," Dean growled out (again) and turned on the radio. Zeppelin. Good.
The park was still relatively full when they got there, not like it was when they usually came, late at night and long past closing time. Dean followed an aggressively taciturn Cas along the pathways until they were in a secluded corner of their field, tucked away in a small huddle of trees, far from the kids on the playground and jogging couples and other prying eyes and ears. Only after Cas had checked the immediate vicinity for other people about twenty times did he finally round on Dean, arms crossed defensively over his chest, eyes defiantly meeting Dean's, for once not all up in Dean's personal space.
"What? What is so hard for you to understand about I don't want to be around you right now?"
The vehemence with which he said that hit Dean like a punch to the gut, but he tried to ignore it and answer in a tone as pissed as Cas'. Didn't work. He came out sounding more desperate than angry. "That's not the part I'm having a hard time understanding, Cas. I got that. What I want to know is why you're doing this."
"Seriously?" Cas' eyebrows shot up toward his hairline. "Because I should think it was obvious. Or did you forget the part where I assaulted your face with mine while stoned out of my fucking mind?"
Oh. Well, that was direct. But seriously? "Yeah, no, I remember that bit," Dean said, and his voice definitely did not falter just then, no it did not.
"Great. Frankly, considering how that didn't go over all that well, I'm surprised you even want to see me." Cas' eyes dropped to the ground, defiance going out of him, so he didn't see Dean frowning and shaking his head.
"Cas, it's not – " How could he phrase this? Dean felt his stomach sink as he realized how much Cas clearly regretted…what had happened. Okay. So it had just been the drugs. Okay. Deep breath. "It's not your fault, I know that, like you said, you were stoned out of your mind." Deep breath again. "What did you even take, anyway?"
Change of subject. Good. If he could just get Cas past this, then maybe they could go back to being friends again. That would be good enough for Dean. It would.
Cas just rolled his eyes. "Don't make excuses for me, Dean. It was…some stuff of Lilith's, you don't need to know, it doesn't matter. I knew exactly what I was doing."
Cas wouldn't look at him. Dean's breath had stopped in his chest and Cas wouldn't look at him. "You did?"
"Yes. I did." Only now did Cas dare to meet Dean's eyes again. There was that hollow expression again, more raw and painful than before, when it had been muffled by drugs and exhaustion. A note of accusation crept into his voice. "You asked me what I wanted, Dean, and I told you. And you pushed me away."
"No," Dean managed to say. Cas' eyes widened a bit as Dean stepped toward him. His heart was pounding and something like hope was bubbling up inside him and he was struggling for words, but wasn't this the whole point of getting Ellen to force Cas to talk to him? So he could tell Cas what he really meant? So he could explain? "No, I just thought – you weren't, you weren't really there and I thought – I thought you'd be mad at me."
"I am mad at you Dean," Cas said in exasperation, as if Dean didn't friggin get that.
"No, I know, but I thought – so if I kissed you, right now, that'd be okay?" Okay, that wasn't how he intended to phrase it, but Dean Winchester had never been good at words.
Cas' face just went completely blank, his eyes (those eyes) widening in uncomprehending disbelief. "What?"
Feeling incredibly reckless, Dean took a step closer. Cas didn't move away. "I said," step, "if I kissed you," step, "right now," step, and he was right in front of Cas, so close their fingers brushed, so close they seemed to breathe the same air, "would that be okay?" And Dean leaned in so that his nose bumped against Cas' and stopped, giving Cas the option to back out because this was stupid this was terrifying this was perfect and every single fiber of Dean's being hoped against everything that in spite of being sober in spite of being pissed in spite of everything that Cas would –
Cas did.
He closed that last tiny space of distance, slowly, hesitantly – like before – but then Dean responded, pushed closer, opened his mouth under Cas', and it was nothing like before.
Next thing Dean knew, his back was up against one of the trees, his hands were on Cas' hips, fingers hooking into belt loops, tugging him closer, and Cas had a hand carded through the hair on the back of Dean's head. And clearly he shoulda said something to Cas a long time ago because how the hell could he ever have thought this could be a bad idea?
An hour later, they were back at the Roadhouse, Dean grinning from ear to ear and begging Ellen for food in the middle of the dinner rush (which she scolded him for and then shouted in the back for a couple of cheeseburgers for her boys). When she had a spare moment between tables, she paused to look over at Dean and Cas where they sat in a back corner, their chairs scooted up next to each other. It was stupid and probably obvious, but it seemed like Cas and him basically permanently shared personal space now, elbows bumping as they ate, knees pressed together under the table. It was good. Dean was smiling, Cas was laughing in that mild way he had, and Ellen was raising her eyebrows at them.
"I take it you boys worked things out?" she said, maybe a bit too casually.
Dean looked at Cas, whose eyes crinkled in that way that meant he was smiling, and turned back to Ellen with a broad grin. "Yeah, we're good."
