P.O.W

Dead snails could move faster than this work day. Castiel wants to scream at every new article that pops into his inbox. Each one somehow slows time instead of passing it. He isn't even sure if the work he is submitting is up to the usually high standard he's set for himself. His mind is elsewhere—far away in the previous night, tightly wound in another's warmth. It lingers in the early, morning mist, with a half conscious-Dean, pulling at his arm, trying to keep him beneath the sheets. His mind is gone and Castiel doesn't have the heart to rip it away from such happy little moments. The poor, bedraggled thing deserves them; a solid respite from the lonely, dark, stale thoughts it normally deals with.

He dismisses the endless assignments, as the meandering hands of his clock finally decide to grace the top of its face. Cas wanders over to the lunch room, hoping some idle conversation will pass a few minutes without his agonizing attention. The plain space is empty—only a few motivational posters and a sexual harassment handbook to keep him company. The frozen dinner he brought for his lunch seems to take hours to cook. The cool sun doesn't move outside the window. Everything is frozen and Castiel feels that his red hot desperation to leave should have been enough to melt it all into puddles by now.

He eats, and he works; and wanders about the building, only giving the occasional nod or necessary information to accompany a memo for his coworkers. By the time four-thirty actually comes around, Castiel feels like he has been awake for days. He is a P.O.W in his own office and they have performed the most excellent of tortures. The run to his car has never been more desperate or more flailing—onlookers probably thinking he is being chased by hellhounds.

Every crippling red light appears after a mocking yellow slows him down. Even the radio statics in and out, blurring Cas's mind into a rapidity of frustration and eagerness. His nerves are shot by the time he reaches the entrance to his neighborhood; a gnawing suspicion, still saying that Dean may be gone when he pulls up. Another right turn and a gradual left are the only obstacles keeping him from knowing if he can stay happy.

The roof of his house appears at the corner, then his mailbox—then the familiar shape of Sam's charger, sitting in the driveway, and then Dean's shiny, black Impala appears, unmoved from this morning. Pure elation and intense fear clash together like warring armies in Cas's mind. Nothing could be more fulfilling than knowing that Dean hasn't run away from this . . . whatever this is; but then again, Casitel knows that Sam being in his house can't be boding well for Dean. Unless, unless Dean called Sam over; he nearly laughs at the thought. Cas has known Dean way too long, there is no way that a man who doesn't like to share details about his breakfast, would divulge information about last night's romp to his younger brother. No, Sam being at his home is probably a very, very unfortunate occurrence; Castiel only hopes that they are not currently duking it out in his living room.

As he pulls into his garage, there are no sounds of unrestrained screams meeting Cas's ears. Even after the soft grind of the metal corrugated door finishes echoing off the concrete, nothing but eerie silence remains in the room. Castiel inches inside, shutting the interior door softly behind him, avoiding every squeaky floor board in the hall, hugging his body tightly to the molding leading towards the living room. When the space finally comes into view, a very serious-looking Sam, and a petrified Dean are all Castiel can see.

With his hands balled together in fists resting between his knees, Sam stares at Dean—leaning forward, like he is waiting for an answer to a question that Cas didn't get to hear. Dean sits across from his brother, in the middle of the couch—wearing nothing but a pair of white boxers . . . boxers that Cas is starting to think, belong to him.

"Hi, Cas." Sam says, never look away from Dean.

"Sam . . ." Cas responds, slowly sliding into the room, as if approaching a wild animal.

"Perhaps you want to tell me what is going on here, because Dean seems to have lost all use of his vocal cords." Sam spits out the words, finally shooting one quick, judgmental glance up at Castiel.

Cas slips around the side of the couch, finally getting a full view of Dean's face; his green eyes are glued to a bare spot on the coffee table, as if that is the only area in reality that's currently making sense to him. His full lips are slightly parted, a white mess of cracks and flakes covering their dry surfaces. Dean's hands are neatly folded on his lap, covering the button on the white boxers—his spine, flat and rigid against the couch. Castiel begins having flashbacks to Catholic school, and ruler-happy nuns who had nothing better to do than offer lashings for bad posture.

"Is everything alright here, Sam?" Castiel asks finally, stopping a foot away from the armchair that tall Winchester is crushing.

"Oh, it's fine. I'm fine, Cas. Just fine. I actually came over here to see if you were okay—thinking maybe you didn't go to work today because you seemed pretty upset last night. I was worried you know, even though you were the one being a dick and splitting on me and my friends."

Sam slowly turns his death rays on Castiel, locking them in, making him feel like he should join Dean on the dunce-couch, "I came here anyway, though, wanting to apologize for pushing you into coming to dinner, and making things even more awkward with Dean. But, who do I find instead of you, just inside your door?" Sam pulls his lanky body from the chair and throws a long limb in the direction of the couch. "I find that same, asshole-brother who tried to break your jaw! In your boxers, no less! Now what the fuck is going on around here?"

Sam launches his head from one uneasy man to the other, and Cas begins shifting his weight between his feet, really hoping that Dean will take on his usual role and come to the rescue. Dean remains motionless in his spot, and Cas thinks there may be an imprint of the freckly-man on his cushion forever.

"Well?" Sam hisses again, pressing his hands into his hips and falling forward, directly into Cas's dipping eye line.

Cas bobs his jaw, trying to untangle some words from the chaotic frenzy in his brain, "Well, umm, Sam . . . Dean and . . . Dean and I—"

Cas's words are cut off by the furious twisting of Dean's neck—now shooting a different set of lasers at his head. The violent motion catches Sam's attention as well. The giant slowly straightens himself, drawing his arms up and looping them together across his chest.

"You and Dean . . . what?" Sam leads; focusing all his energy into Cas's quivering sockets.

Dean's eyes seem to be screaming and Cas wants nothing more than to just disappear. Snap into nothingness, leaving his car keys, suspended in the air where his hand once was, only falling in the next second onto the vacant floor beneath. Castiel closes his eyes, but when he opens them, he is still in the living room, being visually penetrated from every angle.

"I am not leaving until I actually get an answer from one of you!" Sam snorts, firming his stance.

Cas looks again at Dean, hoping he can have some sort of telepathic conversation with the man, to ask just what should be said to diffuse this moose-shaped bomb; but Dean's legs bounce nervously against the cushion, causing the white cotton of his boxers to flutter. Castiel's brain goes into hyper drive, wondering just how long the two men have been sitting here, and just why Dean is wearing his boxers, anyway? On top of that, how did Sam know they were his boxers and not Dean's?

"How did you know, Sam?" Cas asks suddenly—unaware he was that curious; curious enough to ask such a trivial question, now of all times.

"What? Know what?" Sam hisses; his stature shrinking a little with the randomness of the request.

"How did you know those were my undergarments?" Cas asks again; just glad to be committing to some form of words.

Dean's jaw drops as his grassy eyes, brown in the wake of Cas's inquiry.

"I—I" The tall man begins to shift all his weight to his heels, as if he could rock back and avoid the swing of Cas's concern, "I just have noticed that is all you wear, is all." he finally spits out, his ears pulling back on the defense.

"It is; but Dean could have similar pairs. Are you that observant of your brother's choice of briefs as well?" Cas offers haughtily.

Dean shakes his head, mouth still gaping—screaming a slew of silent expletives at Castiel judging by the look of rage in his eyes.

"Whatever, man!" Sam growls, throwing his hands in the air, "Look, it doesn't matter! All I know is: those are your underwear, and they are on Dean! I also know that he didn't go home last night, because I went over there after he left to check on him." Sam regains his stoic posture.

Cas sinks a little with the new information. The likelihood of him or Dean being able to explain this away with anything but the truth is growing slimmer by the second.

"So, that leads me to believe that Dean came over here last night—my guess, to bitch you out for leaving; but somewhere between then and now, he became practically naked, lounging comfortably in your house . . . in your underwear!" Sam's face starts to redden as he looks at Castiel, and Castiel feels his own face burn with a new, cherry hue.

Sam shakes his head a little, the angry clouds in his eyes, seeming to clear "Is—is this . . ." he chokes out, lifting his hand from the crook of his arm and pushing it out in front of himself, "A-are you two . . ."

His index finger juts forward and dances between the two, cowering men, while his large body fall backwards slightly with his growing realization, "Are you two, together?"