AN: Thank you all for the reviews. Thanks innocence2652, Dean is always underhanded with his sexiness, I think. Thanks sidz and Mummabro for the omgs and praise. Thanks winchesteritious for the excitement evident in your review that had not one but three exclamation points. I really enjoyed popcorn fighting Dean and Cas. I am having some struggles with the plotting and my rating choice for this fic, but that is because I am on Ch. 22 in my writing. Hopefully I can work it out soon. For now, enjoy the exposition and banter that is Ch. 18.
He did try to stay awake but sleep won out in the end. He woke up in nearly the same spot that he was in when he first felt Dean's fingers thread through his own. It was easy to sit there and soak up the simple joy of it. He slipped into sleep with thoughts that were Dean. Just Dean in various moments from their dinner, storage locker banter, and movie watching. Mostly it was Dean so close that he could taste him. Dean's breath mingling with his own.
He opened his eyes slowly, wanting to savor the vision a little longer. Wondering if he would be greeted by the sight of Dean still beside him. He looked to the spot that was next to him and found it vacant. He noticed that the popcorn was still everywhere and thought to himself about the clean up that it would entail. It was not an entirely unpleasant thought though. He drifted again to the night before and Dean when he heard the water running at the other end of the condo.
Guess I should get up and start some coffee for us. Cas slipped out of the bed, making a restroom pit stop before padding out to the kitchen. In addition to the water running he now heard something else too. A smile twitched up at the corner of his mouth as he edged closer to the guest room door. The sounds coming from beyond the door could be described as singing, or the raptures of a dying cat. Cas stifled a little laugh at the sound of it. At least I know that you aren't perfect. He edged away from the door then and put on the coffee.
And because it was his habit he turned on the stereo and picked out a song to fill the semi-quiet. He chose Queen's Somebody to Love. He bounced back over to the kitchen and started rummaging through the cabinets to make breakfast. He pulled out eggs and bacon from the fridge. He loved the anthem feel of the song and found himself singing along as he cracked eggs and scramble them up in a bowl. He put a pan on the stovetop and started to heat it up. He swayed a little with the song as he cooked. His volume increasing along with the song. He turned his back on the stove and reached into the tall cabinets behind him for plates.
When he turned back he was fully committed to belting out the verses. At first, he did not know that Dean was out of the shower. He was leaning casually against the door frame watching him. His broad smile was warm and Cas found himself continuing to sing despite being discovered. Dean wandered over, and joined him at the counter. He began singing along with the last lines of the song. Cas was doing his best to not laugh, as his vocals mixed with Dean's gravelled squawk of a melody. Cas threw an arm around Dean's waist and pulled him into his swaying dance. With his other hand he kept stirring the eggs. Dean's arm slipped around Cas too. The song ended and Dean extricated himself and turned to the coffee pot.
"So necessary. You kept me up way too late with your movie watching demands," Dean mocked as he poured himself a mug of coffee. "Oh, Dean, please let me watch Army of Darkness again, that Ash is dreamy." Dean said the last as an impersonation of Cas, if Cas had been a squeaky voiced girl.
Cas laughed at him and said, "You and I both know that I don't sound like that."
"Dean, we should totally not go to the party tonight. We should just stay here and watch movies. That would be dreamy." Dean continued to use the voice and Cas continued to laugh at him.
"God, I wish. This is going to be some small bit of torture." Then he noticed Dean's face and amended, "I mean, it will be the most awesome party ever, and you will have so much fun there."
"Wow, convincing."
"I really have no choice. I can't get out of it, but I completely understand if you have to."
Dean leaned back against the counter and stared at Cas with those piercing green eyes of his. "You know I'm not backing out. I couldn't possibly let you suffer through this alone. Plus, Sam and Jess will be there. It can't all be bad."
In his best impersonation of Dean's mocking girl voice, Cas said, "Oh, Dean thank you. You are so dreamy." They both laughed and carried on with the breakfast preparations.
"So, I have a proposal." Dean said.
"Really, so soon. We only just met." Cas joked as he started scooping up eggs onto each plate. He cast a smile back at Dean.
"Um, no. What if I take the bike with me to my uncle's."
"How would you do that?"
"I could bring a trailer here next week to load it into and haul it there. I think that it will be easier to fix there than here."
"Hmm, I don't think that I want this to become a burden for you. If it can't get fixed here then maybe I just need to let it go." Cas started putting strips of bacon on the hot pan to cook.
"What happened to the guy that wanted to have a redo. You said that this was important. That if you failed at this, getting it to work, then you would never feel right." Dean put a hand onto Cas' shoulder. "Let me help. I really want to."
"Maybe the redo is just letting it go. Somehow everything just feels different now." Cas smiled at Dean.
"Then let me fix it."
"Maybe. Let me think about it."
"Maybe you are just trying to get rid of me now." Dean smirked. "I see. You got some dinner out of me and some preliminary mechanical help, and now there is only regret." Dean grabbed the tongs from Cas and took over the bacon cooking.
"Oh, you found me out. I have had enough of you. Be gone." Cas laughed at Dean's pantomime of hurt and carried his baconless plate over to the table.
"Dude, you are missing the best part-bacon." Dean held up a slice to make his point.
"Meh, not a fan."
"No. This can't be. I had heard that they existed. The elusive bacon-hater. And here I can see one in its natural habitat. I am shocked." Dean started plucking the bacon from the pan and putting it onto a paper towel covered plate. "And to think, you seemed so normal."
"Bacon is just too greasy, or if it is crisp, it is just like crunchy smoke. Like I said, not a fan." Cas began eating his eggs then, and Dean joined him at the table.
"Well, nobody is perfect, I guess. You had to have some flaw." Dean was already working his way through the bacon with glee.
"So, what's the plan today, besides the party anyway?"
"I was thinking that I could get a little done on the motorcycle today and you could tell me awesome blackmail worthy stories about my brother at work."
"Oh, you would have way better stories to tell, I am sure. I might need some of those. He is always pulling something. Just the other day he and Anna were skulking around my office, picking on me and such." Cas looked up and realized that he had almost said too much. They had been picking on him about his phone obsession. His phone obsession was all about Dean, and he did not need to know any of that.
"So, tell me about working with Sam. Is he completely obnoxious?" Dean took a sip of coffee and leaned back a little.
"Sam is great. I remember when he first started at the firm. I wasn't sure about him. I thought, oh, he won't last long. I thought that he had another agenda or something."
Dean cocked his head to the side and asked, "What do you mean?"
"Oh, I don't know. He just seemed like he wasn't there to practice law, but to learn about it. Turns out I was wrong. He is quite good, and he proved that in our first case."
"What was your first case?"
"Oh, it was a guy that we still defend, so he will have to remain nameless. We do a lot with tax law and he came to us with a case that was messy. It is very likely that his tax evasion was tied to some dealings in South America involving maybe some drug trafficking. I did my best to not know about any of that. I just concentrated on the direct accusations. It was a ton of work though. This guy is a bit of an attention seeker. He does all of these TV interviews and such. We just finished another case with him and it was more of the same. Anyway, Sammy got tossed my way, when Zach realized that I was drowning. Now when we defend this ass, he gets a whole team, but back then it was just Sammy and I. He is amazing with the research. He was able to explain where all of the income came from and tie it to his tax records. It was shocking, because the explanation shouldn't have been possible.
Cas got up to get some coffee and scooped up Dean's mug too, as he went. "Sam and I have been friends ever since. He took on the Salvatore case afterwards. You already know about that one."
"Yeah, a guy tries to shoot your kid brother, you tend to remember." Dean looked serious as Cas returned with the coffees.
"Luckily, he was a bad shot."
"From what Sam told me his shooting skills had nothing to do with Sam's luck. He said that he was lucky you were there." Dean amended.
"I have never been so terrified in all my life. We deal with some low-lifes but, they aren't the type to try to shoot their attorneys. We mostly deal with corporate guys, you know the type? Well, Salvatore was not our primary contact; although, he was the one that we were defending. His family had made all of the arrangements with us. At some point, things started to get weird with him. He came into a meeting and demanded that he speak with Sam alone. I shouldn't have left the room. Once I was out, that was when he went rather crazy on Sam. Somehow he had gotten it in his head that Sam was feeding information about him to the DEA. He was yelling all sorts of crazy stuff at him about seeing him talking to a fed and such. It was the yelling that got me back into the room. I saw him holding the gun, but his back was to me, so I took a chance and tackled him. Like I said, we were lucky."
"Thank you, Cas." There was a look of endearment on Dean's face, a look that showed more gratitude than the words.
"I often wonder why he thought Sam would be working against him. Sam is probably the most ethical attorney I know. Anyway, it was always a little weird to me."
"Can't always explain crazy." Dean said by way of explanation. He gulped down the last of the coffee and added, "Well, time to go work on the Triumph. It's not going to fix itself."
The two of them got up and cleared away the dishes before gathering what they needed for the day of work in the storage locker. Cas felt the now constant smile tugging at his lips at the thought of a whole day with Dean. God, even if I am zero help, I can't imagine a better day.
Review, Fav., Follow. Our next chapter will focus on the party.