Chapter 8

… Sam was bugging the hell out of him.

"Are you hungry?" Sam asked the second Dean rushed into their cottage's living room.

Sammy was sitting on their couch, all by himself for a change, a steaming bowl on his lap, some sitcom running on TV, and Dean vaguely took notice of the horrible stench hanging in the air. It smelled like rotten eggs. Sam seemed to have noticed his disgusted expression and laughed.

"Oh, it's just cabbage. I know, the smell isn't exactly appetizing, but it actually tastes good. I've made soup, try it yourself", he said, pointing at the kitchen.

"I'm full", Dean replied by default, only this time it was actually true.

Sam raised his eyebrows. "Again? Well, guess I can't force you to eat stuff that's good for you. Anyway, where have you been all day?"

While taking off his jacket and shoes and sitting down on his bed, Dean considered simply ignoring the question. Then, he shortly said: "Lisa's."

"Oh, cool", Sam replied, casually. "Didn't know Lisa's living next door now."

Dean grew stiff. Sam gave another laugh at the sight. "I saw you. We have windows, you know. What've you been up to with him?" Sam grinned. "Cheating on Lisa?"

Dean rolled his eyes. "Yeah, hilarious. It doesn't get funnier the more times you say it, Sam."

"Well, to me it does", Sam replied, annoyingly. "I've never thought he'd be cool to hang out with, honestly. I mean, he's nice and all, but he seems like a total loner to me. Did you just drop by or something?"

"Yeah, no", Dean grumbled, pissed off at Sam's borderless curiosity. He stretched out on the mattress, crossing his arms under his head, staring at the ceiling. He sighed, resignated. "I've told you that we hang out sometimes, Cas and me. Cas sort of is a loner, but … he's a cool guy. He makes me laugh. And when I'm with him, I kinda feel like everything is going to be okay one day."

"Aww", Sam made. Dean blushed, flashing him a lethal look. "What, Dean? I'm just happy for you. I'm happy you found a friend like that. Even if he's thirty-two, looks like the guitarist of some new-age Indie band and has a totally obvious crush on you."

"I'm sorry, what?" Dean squeaked. He swirled around on the mattress to face Sam, who was just watching TV, as if he hadn't just said—well, that.

"Dean, it's like the most obvious thing that's ever happened", Sam said, zapping. "I mean, he called you a 'good catch' in the car. Hell, not even married couples talk about each other like that."

"Y—yeah, okay", Dean quickly stuttered, blinking. "But we're not married, Cas and me. Not a couple. We're just friends. Buddies. We're—"

"Dude." Sam looked at Dean, brows way up high. "I know."

"Well." Dean awkwardly waved his hand. "Just making sure."

"Yeah, chill, Dean", Sam laughed, watching TV again, spooning his soop. "I don't really care what you're doing in your free time. Or, well, in all of your time. And like I said, Cas does seem pretty nice. I just thought you knew about this. 'Cause it's—boom, in your face, basically. But if you didn't know, well, get this: He basically carries you over the door sill with his eyes, bridal style. But anyway, have you seen this new show Orange is the new Black? It's pretty funny. And prison chicks, dude."

With that, Sam casually propped up his legs on the armrest, and giggled at some dumb joke on TV.

Dean felt as if Sam had just dropped an anvil on his head.

He basically carries you over the door sill with his eyes, bridal style.

"Oh, almost forgot", Sam suddenly called out, making Dean flinch. Excited, Sam sat up, facing Dean. "I wanted to talk to you all day about this, although I know you don't want to, but—about your birthday."

Dean shook his head, forcefully snapping out of his Cas visions. He gave Sam an annoyed look. "Sam, how many times have I told you—"

"Alright, alright", Sam laughed. "Calm down. Just wanted to make sure. So, you're not gonna get a single present from me. Nothing, just like you said. Tomorrow's gonna be just another day."

Sam then made a pregnant pause, probably still giving Dean a chance to be like 'hell yeah, let's celebrate my fucking birthday', which was the unlikeliest thing to ever happen besides global peace, and their Dad staying at home for more than two seconds, maybe.

Dean sprawled on the mattress, and uttered an annoyed groan. "If you throw a party, bitch, I swear that tomorrow's gonna be a very special day: The day Sammy died."

Sam nearly choked on his cabbage soup. Serves him right, Dean thought. Soon, his violent coughing turned into hoarse chuckles.

"Dream on, Dean." Sam coughed again. "I wouldn't throw a party for you."

"Well, I sure as hell hope so", Dean grumbled, and pressed his pillow onto his face. "You probably don't even know how to throw one, anyway."

"Jerk."

"Bitch."

Silence.

"'Good catch'".

Dean ripped the pillow off his face and angrily pointed at Sam. "Shut your face!"

Sam just bitch-faced, satisfied.

Successfully gotten another night of fitful, troubled sleep over and done with, Dean slowly faded into consciousness to the muffled sound of clanking dishes and water running in the kitchen sink. The sunlight was painting his inner eyelids luminously red, indicating a reasonable getting up time, despite Dean's exaggerated tiredness.

Yesterday, Dean had been worrying that—after Cas talking to him about his friggin' random erections —he'd never be able to find sleep again.

And, well, he hadn't been wrong.

Rolling around, Dean briefly thought about giving Sam hell for interrupting his four hours, but eventually decided against it.

Lately, Sammy had kind of joined the insomniacs. Always on the run, he was, bursting with energy, and full of spontaneous ideas. The whole week he'd been raving about the power of plants, detoxication and other weird cult-like stuff no one gave a single fuck about. Except for Jess, of course, who was the one that'd brainwashed Dean's lovey-dovey douchebag of a brother in the first place.

By the time Dean lazily got out of bed, Sam was usually done cleaning the whole cottage twice, knew every single subject matter by heart and meanwhile had incidentally saved the whole world by eating oat meal, gluten-free whole-grain bread or whatever the hell he'd gathered in Green Forest at their doorstep. And now, in spite of what Sammy had said the past evening, Dean wasn't sure if he wanted to find out what the insane tree-hugger might had come up with for his goddamn birthday morning.

Contrary to his horrible expectations, Sammy barely paid any attention to Dean wearily slogging along towards the bathroom.

Sam was just busy carrying the trash out, and only muttered something lame along the lines of "happy normal day", shooting a quick smirk at Dean en passant. Newly 17-year-old Dean couldn't believe it, but—that was it.

No delicious surprise pie, no surprise presents, no surprise anything – literally, nada.

The only wish Dean had had on his sarcastic inner birthday list, the simple denial of said thing, had been miraculously fulfilled, it seemed.

On a less positive note, however, as Dean stepped into the shower, he started to feel kind of sick. Probably it was just his body rebelling against visiting math class, but he couldn't shake the feeling that there was more to it. The bad omen boiling deep down in his empty stomach intensified with every passing minute, the irrational feeling that today's day stood a good chance of overtrumping last Friday's haunting events.

Dean had to force himself to move his lazy ass to school, legs as heavy as lead weights, and guts all churned up inside. When Lisa clasped his hand a few minutes later at their venue, her light-heartedly cackling like a goose, him absently nodding at her words every now and then, he desperately struggled to push the bad feeling away.

Little to no effect.

Dean and Gabe were just on their way to math class—wonders will never cease—when the day started to become odd.

The two of them were strolling along the student crowded corridors of St. Tipper High, both wearing the tried and trusted shirt-and-shorts-look. Meanwhile, everyone else seemed to be happily done with summer already. People were wearing scarfs.

"I feel so naked", Gabe sighed, theatrically, covering his chest with both hands. "Don't look, Dean-o, I'm so insecure about my womanly curves", he said, mimicking a shrill, high-pitched voice, and Dean laughed at the horrible imitation.

"The hell was that? You really need to get out there and talk to some girls, Gabe. Lousy performance, buddy, seriously."

"Shut up, asshole, you hurt my feelings", Gabe squeaked, girlishly, and then sneered at Dean. "Two years of dating the same old chick over and over again hardly counts as experience, ya know? You're basically a virgin."

"You're talking bullshit again."

Dean grinned, and scuffed his shoulder.

"Weak!" Gabe breathed out, and raised his voice to that horribly squeaky level again. "You're hitting me, Dean-o, how very unmanly of you! Guess who's not getting it tonight. I will never sleep with you again, I swear—wait a sec—"

Gabe stopped his embarrassingly loud imitation to stare down the crowded corridor to their right.

"—is that Bobberoz? The flying fuck is he doing?"

One quick look was enough to tell Dean—and every other student passing by—exactly what Bobby was doing. The sombrero-wearing janitor was standing in the corridor with some kind of plastic box pressed to his body, cat-calling the hordes of people crowding the corridor like it was the most natural thing in the world.

"Oh, hell no", Dean breathed, making his way through the people, followed by Gabe, who was having a hysterical giggle over the absurd scene. Dean didn't find it funny at all.

"Sellout! Sellout! Ay, muchacho, you look like you could use un poco de relajación! No? Well, you're all totally missin' out on Bobby's torta loca famoso—"

"The hell is wrong with you?" Dean grabbed Bobby's shoulder, brutally pushing him aside. "Stop acting like a friggin' barker, man, what's this madness all about, huh?"

"Yeah, Bobberoz", Gabe chimed in, still struggling to calm himself. "This is not some Mexican market place, we have laws around here, ya know, just saying. No México", he burst out in a deep, grouchy voice, and laughed his ass off about his admittedly not too bad Bobby impersonation.

Dean, however, was still staring at Bobby, accusingly, shaking his head.

"Well, I don't know who bit your asses this morning, mis amigos", Bobby grunted, smacking Gabe's shoulder, "but I'm just sellin' sweets to the children here." With a smirk, he opened the plastic box in his hands and revealed a reasonable amount of neatly stacked pieces of cake. "Thought I was the paranoid bastard here, not you, son."

"Why—why would you sell Brownies?" Dean shook his head in disbelief, and lowered his voice to a discreet whisper. "God, Bobby, it's like you're friggin' trying to lose your job. It's not funny, man, nobody needs your provocation. Who the hell would buy cake from you, anyway?"

Bobby simply turned to Gabe, pointing at Dean's angry face. "What's up with him this mornin'?"

"Oh, you know", Gabe answered. "He's just grumpy 'cause it's his birthday. Little Dean-o here works a little differently than us normal people… or Mexicans. No offense, Bobz."

"Now, ain't that just perfect!" Laughingly, Bobby gave a knock with the fist on Dean's tousled head. Dean couldn't help but smile. "Ay, Dean, you know what—this is my gift for you, my favorito. Have them."

He thrust the plastic box into Dean's hands.

"Uh, thanks? But—well, uh, I'm not sure if—"

"C'mon, man", Gabe exclaimed, excitedly. "Don't complain, Dean-o, that's rude. These look awesome, thanks, Bobz."

Bobby grinned in a strangely devious way. „They're out of this world, kid."

Dean and Gabe were just getting ready to move on to math class, when a painfully familiar voice made them jump in surprise.

"Hello, my darlings", Crowley greeted, hands in his coat's pockets, standing in the hallway. Eyes fixed on Bobby, Crowley went on in a quiet, yet demanding tone. "Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm quite positive that the two of you need to go to class right now. Isn't that right, Dean Winchester? You don't intend to be late to class, do you?"

Dean swallowed, looking at his feet.

Gabe grabbed Dean's shoulder, and the two of them slowly moved away from the scene. Crowley was planting himself dangerously close in front of Bobby, who was now returning Crowley's intimidating look, albeit grudgingly. Dean and Gabe heard Bobby grumbling something inaudible in Spanish, and exchanged an unsteady glance.

"Move along, my underaged friends", Crowley ordered. "Nothing to see here. You might have noticed El Cantante's rather impressive boobs, but I'm afraid to tell you that this is not a bloody peepshow. Shoo!"

Disgusted, Gabe grabbed Dean's arm, and dragged him with him.

By now, the school's corridors were completely emptied, and each of their steps re-echoed in the spacious halls. Up until now, Dean had more or less repressed the upcoming encounter with Mr. Novak in all of this trouble, but as he was slowly approaching the classroom, plastic box pressed to his chest, he felt himself becoming a bag of nerves.

Gabe's loud munching noises only made it worse.

Help me.

„Jesus, man, you need to try 'em! Bobberoz is the real shit, dude, holy crap."

"Not now, Gabe, I'm trying to remember what's gonna be in the test, you know, I don't wanna screw this up…"

"Like you care about math. Come on, now. One bite's not gonna hurt. Your brain needs the energy to think."

"I said no, I don't want to, 'kay? God, did you just fucking spit on my face? Gross. Put them away, Gabe, let's go in now, we're already late as hell—mmhpf!"

With one quick movement, a fat piece of brownie—Bobby's torta loca famoso—was stuffed into Dean's open mouth. Dean coughed and spit and nearly choked on the slimy chocolate-butter-sugar-mixture, while Gabriel casually knocked on their classroom's door, face all lit up with malicious glee.

"What was that?" Gabe grinned at Dean, innocently. "You love me and want to be like me?"

On the other side of the door, the teacher ordered them to come in—Mr. Novak, precisely.

Jesus fuck, it's Cas, Dean thought, the nervousness now hitting him with full force like a baseball bat right in the stomach.

"I fucking hate you", Dean repeated, though it was hard to speak when your tongue was drowned in sticky cake. Gabe laughed it off, and opened the door.

The whole classroom was staring at them.

"Uh, hi", Gabe greeted. "Sorry we're late, we, uh… our Dean here found pie."

Dean smiled awkwardly and nodded, while violently trying to chew the goddamn brownie. His puffed out cheeks made him look like a hamster, who'd just found the biggest piece of corn, only in a gross rather than a cute way. Cas was sitting at the teacher's desk, Dean saw out of the corner of his eyes. He didn't dare to meet Cas' eyes.

"Hello, Dean. Gabriel", Cas greeted. Dean could've sworn there was a smile in his voice. "Please take your seats. The test papers are already spread."

"Sure", Gabe replied, and the two of them sat down on their table in the first row. Basically, diagonally across from Cas.

Eventually, Dean managed to swallow the slimy chocolate mixture down with a really loud gulp (ridiculously loud in the tense pre-test silence), and awkwardly stared at the test paper lying in front of him, seeing the letters but hardly understanding anything. He couldn't shake the feeling that someone was watching him closely—and it wasn't Gabe or Lisa.

"Does anyone have questions?" Cas asked business-like.

Why do you always have to wear such tight shirts, Dean thought.

"Well", Cas said when no one reacted. "Then I wish all of you good luck. You have thirty minutes for taking the test."

Five silent minutes passed. The only sounds in the classroom were the clattering calculator keys, and the scratchy sounds of twenty pencils writing and drafting on paper simultaneously.

Well, nineteen pencils—Dean seemed to be the only one who had no idea what was going on. It was downright ridiculous. He couldn't concentrate at all, and for some reason he didn't give a damn about it anymore. Even Gabe seemed to be totally into the test, well, at least he was doing something on his test papers.

Half the time was over, when Dean leaned back in his chair and sighed, arms crossed above his head. His eyes lazily wandered around the classroom, as if the answers would be written on the other's faces. He wouldn't look at Cas, though. But he saw the yellow classroom door, for example, or Lisa busily typing on her calculator, someone using their phone under the table, the empty blackboard, the globe, the teacher's desk, not Cas, the—dammit.

Dean had sensed it the whole time, but it'd been only a feeling. Feelings didn't always mean anything, most of the time they were only there to confuse you. Dean knew that too well by now. But really, Cas was sitting leaned over his desk, some magazine lying between his elbows which were resting on the table's surface. His stare—of course—was fixed on Dean.

Dean startled, nearly knocking his desk over in fright.

He'd just known that Cas would be staring at him as soon as he'd look up, 'cause that's what he was always doing, had most definitely done it for the entire lesson, it was his thing, and it was irritating as hell. Dean cursed, silently, and tried to put his focus back on the test, but those goddamn blue eyes worked as drawing and inevitable as magnets. Obviously amused, Cas smiled a secret, crooked, weirdly infectious smile, and Dean just couldn't help but grin down at his test papers like the greatest idiot on the planet.

Dean noticed the numbers, the letters, the mathematical problems and the lines in front of him, but couldn't make sense of any of it. It didn't seem to matter, though. It was only when his facial muscles began to hurt, Dean started to wonder what the actual hell was going on. Because usually, he wasn't the kind of guy who'd have a laughing fit in the middle of a test. Again, he normally wasn't the kind of guy whose heart would race at the feeling of a teacher's look resting on him… wait a second.

Gabe turned to smirk at him, glassy-eyed, and fully revealed what he'd been doing the whole time. All over his paper, there was a huge, detailed portrait of a strange butterfly with a human face and, Dean observed randomly, it was actually kind of pretty. A light started to dawn on Dean. As inconspicuous as possible, Gabe mouthed something to Dean that looked like Bobberoz.

Taken aback, Dean breathed out, loudly.

So that was the strangely familiar, yet highly inappropriate sensation he'd been feeling in his head ever since the test had started. The brownies. Dean was sitting in the middle of math class, supposed to be writing an important math test, all the while studied closely by Cas and he was as high as St. Tipper's town hall.

Dean cleared his throat, laboriously trying to get rid of the stupid grin on his face, but it seemed like his muscles were stuck in that position, and Cas, who was now strolling around the classroom all teacher style, only made it worse. Because wherever he went, he just couldn't keep his eyes off Dean for longer than three seconds. And that—friggin' brownies, man—was making Dean irrationally happy.

There was just one small problem. The whole morning Dean had been nervous as fuck, hands all shaky, general feeling of sickness and all that girly crap, and he had had no real clue why and still didn't have one, but what he could say for sure was that his stomach was now starting to rebel again. There were still ten minutes of working time left, and Dean's guts were rumbling as loud as a thunderstorm.

Dean leaned back in his chair, out of breath and suddenly covered in cold sweat. Panting, Dean stared at the ceiling, swallowing hard. He listened to Cas' cautious footsteps at the back of the classroom, and his low voice explaining things to a classmate, whispering.

Jesus, don't puke, Dean thought, close to hysteria, eyes closed.

"So, you see, it's actually quite simple", Cas whispered. "You just take the given information and then, voilà, you interpose the aggregate one between the unknown A and…"

Dean was as white as snow now, so very contrastive to his dark freckles that were now as eye-catching as never before. Breathe in, breathe out, he told himself mantra-like. Don't. Fucking. Puke.

"Exactly, I believe you might have the hang of it now. Wait, is that… No, that's not going to work. See, I can't go into detail here, but here's another hint…"

The ceiling was spinning, the overhead lights being the center of the cosmos above Dean's whitewashed, sweaty face. A rumbling, a twitching, a traction in his guts, felt everywhere, made a pained, disgusted groan escape his thinned lips. That feeling when you simply felt your stomach. It was the grossest thing. Helplessly, he hiccupped and shivered and oh god, don't puke, don't puke, don't puke, don't—

"No, please don't cry. I'm sure you scored a few correct answers. Look, I can't give you any more hints, but—hey, it's okay, don't cry. Listen, uh, here's a little joke I came up with to cheer you up."

Dean tried really hard to think of anything but cake and fatty chocolate things.

"What's a mathematician's favorite dessert?"

The crying student at the back of the room responded with a hopeless sob.

"Oh God…" Dean groaned. Gabe was watching him, fascinated, and basically once again had a blast at his cost.

"Well", Cas whispered, soothingly.

"It's Pi!"

The following events Dean only knew from Gabriel's insane 'that one time when Dean puked all over a math test'-story he'd told him at a later time—and approximately a million times after that.

Apparently, Dean had squirted a ridiculous amount of puke all over Gabe's and his own papers. "My butterfly!" Gabe had shouted out in horror. „You ruined my masterpiece!" And—of course—everyone had laughed their ass off about it, at least according to Gabe. Then, Gabe had given him absurdly detailed information about the looks, physical condition and quantity of the vomit to make the story more vivid and lively, but no none-pervert person would want to hear that. Then, Gabe claimed, Dean had dramatically passed out and, with a loud, disgusting splosh, his face had landed right in the fresh puke puddle. But yeah, Dean had never really bought that part.

The only thing he knew for sure was the passing out part.

Because it was only at the school's nurse twenty minutes later that he awoke from his dramatic blackout.

"Dean."

A rusty, excessively deep voice was filtering through to Dean's unconscious mind, but Dean was barely there, underwater. The sound of his name was extending itself in slow motion and, even though he was technically still passed out, he found it creepy as hell.

"Dean. It's me. Castiel. Are you—I think he's waking up."

Waking up felt like coming up after a deep sea dive, at least that was the way Dean had always imagined it. Not like he thought about diving a lot, nor did he do it a lot in his favorite lake, but he also didn't think about Cas watching him sleep a lot, but there he was.

Dean opened his eyes.

He found himself lying on a sick-bed in a white, clinical room with very spare furniture. The air smelled like cleaning agent and—surely an odd mixture—tobacco. The most logical conclusion was that he was located in the nurse's office, but Dean had never been there before, so he could only assume.

Whatever the case may was, anything else but Cas' concerned, gazing eyes was blurry and far, far away. Cas was still there, with all of his frizzy, soft hair, authoritative teacher clothes and that good old fat question mark on his face, so Dean was there, too, he couldn't be dead, 'cause Cas was with him.

Dizzily, Dean reached his hand out for Cas' stubbly chin.

Just to make sure that Cas wasn't an illusion. And also because—let's be honest here—he had an idea at how heavenly it felt. Those dilated pupils were dragging Dean deeper into something that he couldn't name, maybe into some kind of black hole, but possibly into something entirely different.

It was a strange moment when Cas' fingers softly clasped his hand.

Perhaps their warmness and slight pressure was the closest Dean had come to reality in a long time, if not forever. But maybe—and that was the most likely possibility—he was simply as stoned as some reggae fan during some new-age hippie hip-hop concert, and would blast off to the sky any moment.

"Hey, Cas", Dean spoke under his breath.

His fingers squeezed Cas' hand tightly, thumb running over soft, beautifully warm skin, and relieve washed all over Dean. Because Cas was so truly there that Dean could touch and feel him.

"Hello, Dean."

Cas gave a warm, caring smile, one that decorated the corner of his eyes with laughter lines and made his whole appearance glow from the inside out. In a sober state he'd never admit it, but there were times when Dean thought of Cas as the most heartbreakingly adorable thing in the world, and this was one of 'em.

"Why am I here?" Dean asked, breathlessly.

Cas smirked, observing their interlocked fingers. "Oh, that's a long story."

Dean vaguely nodded, as if that had answered his question. Dean couldn't stop thumbing Cas' palm, though deep down he knew that it wasn't okay. Somehow, Cas always made it hard to break the spell.

The school's nurse, however, didn't have any problems on that score.

"You threw up all over your test, darling", she explained from somewhere in the back of the room. "It took me ten minutes and an ice scraper from the janitor to clean that mess up. Can you believe that?" The red-headed woman said while leaning over Dean to put her hand on his forehead, checking for high temperature. Bet he found that hilarious, Dean thought at the mention of Bobby. "Not like that's my job, anyway", she continued while flashing into his eyes with a miniature flashlight. "But who would do it if not me? No one. It's the women who truly run this place, if you ask me. It's one big mega coven, you could say. Or at least it should be. Have you been doing drugs today, darling?"

"Uh, no? Of course not."

"Of course not", she repeated. "Why would you tell me, hm? No one does. Not even my own son tells me what he is up to these days. Is he happy? Is he in love? The world may never know." She shook her head, sighing. "Fergus. He was such a problematic child. But, to be fair, I wasn't world's greatest mother, either. We've all got our very own package to carry, I guess. But anyway. Your pupils are telling me another story, Dean, but I'm pretty sure you know that yourself."

With a wink, she lifted herself off the sick-bed, and elegantly moved towards the door. Then, she turned around and peered back at Dean. Dean was already busy returning Cas' dreamy look again.

"Now, you need a little sugar, hon, to help your circulation", she said. "I'm Rowena, by the way. Very pleased to meet you. I'm going to get you a sugary, refreshing drink from the kiosk and soon you'll be right back on top. I'll be right back, don't run away." She hesitated, door knob in her hand, suspiciously eyeing the two of them. "Mr. Novak, was that the name? I think you can let go of his hand now. He may look like one, but that boy, I'm telling you, is all but a baby."

With that said, she busily left the room, and the door fell shut.

Neither of them reacted to her suggestion.

"Do you feel better, Dean?" Cas asked, his voice lowered to a comforting, quiet tone. He was enclosing Dean's weak fingers with both of his hands now. "You're still very pale in the face. You've been passed out for nearly twenty minutes, and everyone was very concerned about your health. I hope you're better now. I was watching over you."

"Yeah, you always do", Dean breathed.

Smiling, Dean's eyes fluttered shut. For a moment he was drifting away again, but the gentle pressure of Cas' hands made him stay, want to stay a little longer. Being on drugs was weird, really. Not commendable. They made you feel all kinds of real shit and act by intuition, made you do stuff you actually wanted to do and those were never good things.

"I, uh", Cas began, when Dean had been silent for a while. "I occasioned that you'll get a chance to rewrite your test, by the way. So, from another point of view, you have actually done yourself a favor, Dean. I didn't notice any writing from you today."

Dean chuckled at that, thinking that if anyone would know about that, Cas would.

"And, beyond that", Cas continued. "I'd like to visit you later at your place, and check if you're healthy again. Only if that's okay with you, of course. I think my brother can play with himself for a few minutes."

Dean absently nodded at Cas' accidentally ambiguous choice of words, smiling to himself.

"That sounds great, Cas. Thanks."

"My pleasure, Dean."

On a sudden impulse, Dean added: "It's my birthday today, you know."

Dean felt Cas' body stiffen for a moment, surprised by the unexpected information, perhaps not caring at all about it, or thinking that Dean was a pathetic baby. For some reason, Dean was suddenly afraid that Cas would just let go of him, and leave for his following class or, well, just leave. But sometimes Dean's fears were stupid, really. This was not just any guy but Cas after all. And that guy cared a lot about him.

Instead of leaving, Cas decided to do an… interesting thing with his thumb. Copying Dean's movements from earlier, he carefully ran it over Dean's palm, drew circles, drew pictures, bringing back all the memories of the morning he'd caressed his naked arm in the same manner. As if Dean was something fragile or precious, that was how he touched him.

"What a joyless day", Cas replied, eventually.

Dean just smiled. Cas got it.

Surprisingly, Cas still didn't show the slightest inclination of getting up and doing something that was of any importance. He was only there—and that was all. His caress was beyond sweet, and made Dean feel all funny inside. Dean shifted a little, comfortably, lids heavy.

"Hey, Cas?"

Attentively, Cas stopped and took Dean's hand in his own again. "What is it, Dean? Are you in pain? Can I get you anything? Should I—"

"I'm fine, Cas. But—can I tell you something that I shouldn't be telling you?"

"Of course, Dean. You can tell me anything."

Dean paused. "My brother thinks you have a crush on me."

Cas was quiet for a moment. Then, he chuckled, awkwardly. "Wow, that's—strange."

"Yeah", Dean breathed, smiling, numbly. "It is."

"Profoundly."

"Yeah. Probably."

Cas was quiet for another moment. "Can I tell you something I shouldn't be telling you, too, Dean?"

"Sure", Dean grumbled, sleepily, butterflies in his stomach. "Anything."

Dean felt Cas' breath on the back of his hand. Cas hesitated. "This, holding your hand. It makes me feel extremely—"

"—unfriendly?" Dean completed.

"Yes."

"Yeah, me too."

For minutes, none of them said anything, Dean just breathing.

"Getting on with it sucks", Dean then muttered, barely audible.

"Yes", Cas agreed, quietly. "I know."

Dean entangled their fingers.

Cas stayed.

Eventually, Dean's conscience faded away, and he couldn't have been safer when he fell asleep, even if he'd had a gun under his pillow.