Chapter Text
That’s it. That’s the last. Fucking. Straw.
Dean storms down the hall toward Cas’s room, ready to spit gravel. “CAS!” He bellows, pounding on the door. “Cas, open up! We gotta talk!”
The door blows open of its own accord. Cas is poised like a caged lion, ready to fight. Dean barges in and slams the door.
“What the hell is wrong with you?” he demands. “That was totally uncalled for!”
Castiel says nothing, just rolls his eyes and starts pacing, restless, scowling. Dean jabs a finger at him.
“You can be a dick to me if you need to, OK? Hell, you can be a dick to Sam. We can take it. But Charlie? Kevin? No way. You hurt them, you’re going to have to answer to me.”
“They are not physically harmed,” Cas growls, almost subsonic.
“You made Charlie cry, Cas! That counts!” Dean can hardly believe what he’s hearing. He knew Cas was a little bit stupid with emotions but the level of dickishness he’d been displaying for the past few days was unprecedented. He’d be worried about the guy if he weren’t so pissed off.
“It’s not important.”
“Uh, yes it is. I’m telling you that it is, Cas.”
“Her hobbies --” he says this with a curl of his upper lip that Dean wants to slap.
“Her hobbies are important to HER, you ass. Jeeze. What’s gotten into you lately?”
Cas stops pacing and draws himself up, nostrils flaring. “It’s. None. Of your. Concern.”
“Bullshit. What, is this some kind of angel PMS you got going on? Huh?”
Suddenly Castiel is right up in Dean’s face, barely a handspan between their noses. “You will keep your misogynistic commentary to yourself, Dean,” he growls. “I told you to stop prying, so please. Leave.” Across the room, a light bulb pops and shatters with a bellish tinkle. Dean doesn’t blink. Bingo. He’s hit a sore spot and he knows it.
“That’s it, isn’t it?” Dean almost crows, pushing back into the angel’s space. “This is some holy time of the month or something?”
“Dean... no,” Cas says, turning away. He doesn’t start pacing again; just stands there in the middle of the room, presenting Dean with a standoffish wall of trenchcoat. But Dean has spent a lifetime of getting answers out of reluctant people. He can wait him out.
Patience pays off when Cas sighs, shoulders sagging. “I’m.... molting.”
That -- He can’t have heard that right. Dean blinks hard as if that will make the words make sense. “You -- you’re what?”
Cas turns back, still slumped in defeat and his expression sour. “Molting. Or at least, that’s the closest analogy in your language.”
“Huh.” That was... definitely not what Dean was expecting. “I didn’t know angels even did that.”
“I’m certain it hasn’t happened on Earth in several millennia,” he says, rolling his neck from side to side. “It’s very uncomfortable.”
Come to think of it, he does look uncomfortable. Dean takes a closer look at his friend, stepping near. His face is blotchy, both pale and flushed, and he looks like he hasn’t slept in -- well, he doesn’t sleep ever, but he usually doesn’t LOOK like he hasn’t slept in weeks. He keeps rolling his shoulders like he’s trying to work a kink out of his neck or spine. “Huh,” Dean says again. “So... do you guys actually have, like... feathers?”
And then Cas gives him a truly withering look, all cracking ice, and ok, maybe that was a little personal. Dean holds up both hands in surrender.
“Ok, alright, I’ll drop it. But look.” He brings out his Serious Dad Face, which he never thought he would have to use on Cas, but, well, there it is. “I get that you’re grumpy and hormonal or whatever. But you can’t be taking it out on Kevin and Charlie like that, ok? It’s just -- They don’t deserve that.”
Cas... actually looks chastised, which is surprising. Dean was expecting another sneer and scoff, but he purses his lips at the floor and sighs. “I may have been out of line,” he admits. “I will try to find alternative outlets for my... frustration.” He growls the last word a little, hunching his shoulders again.
Dean nods. “Well, um. Good.” That seems to be the end of his task here, but something keeps him from turning his feet to leave. He stands there like a dumbass, letting the silence stretch thinner and thinner and thinner until he finally asks the stupid question that’s hovering behind his lips --
“Is there, um. Anything I can do? To help?” he asks.
Cas looks up from the floor then, sharp and wide-eyed. His lips fall open, but he closes them again in less than a breath. “No,” he says, with a quick shake of his head. “No, there’s nothing.”
He’s probably lying, and not well. But it’s also probably personal, this whole molting process and whatever it entails, so Dean accepts his rebuttal with as much dignity as possible. “Alright. Just -- let me know if -- yeah.” Finally, his feet obey his directions to lead him out of the room. Even if they make a couple of unplanned rest stops. “And you’ll apologize to Charlie, right?” he asks with one foot angled into the hall.
Cas restrains an eyeroll, but it looks like it costs him something. “Yes, Dean, I will apologize to Charlie.”
“Okay. Okay. Great. I’ll just --” Dean almost runs into the door on the way out, and decides that it would be more graceful just leave that sentence unfinished.
~*~
That night, out of a deep sleep, Dean startles awake to a metallic crash. He almost puts a bullet through the door, but manages to control his trigger finger at the last second to tuck his gun back under his pillow. He’s fine. Safe. He’s still not used to it -- not used to the memory foam bed and the closet space and buying groceries instead of take-out -- but he’ll get there. Having Cas and Charlie and Kevin around all the time is helping. Sam too, of course, but Sam is a given.
The crashing comes again, startling Dean to his feet, gun in hand, just in case. He’s not gonna get caught with his pants down, even if he is in his boxers. He tiptoes to the door and down the hall toward the only source of light he can see: the kitchen. He can hear heavy breathing, shambling footsteps, and his not-quite-awake brain is working overdrive, his heart pumping adrenaline. Slowly he shifts down the hall, back to the wall and gun low but ready, until he can peek around the door frame.
It’s Cas. Cas, and a pile of pots and pans on the floor, knocked off their shelves and hooks. Dean sags in relief and he goes to tuck his gun in his waistband -- only to realize a second too late that he is still not wearing pants, and the gun flops over the elastic and onto the floor. For one heartstopping moment Dean throws himself against the wall, but all that happens is a clatter and skitter of metal on flagstone.
“Dean?”
Welp. Jig is up. Dean picks up his gun and moves into the kitchen, setting it down safely near the coffee pot. “Hey, Cas,” he says. “I thought I heard something. Something dangerous, I mean.”
“Oh,” he says, frowning down at the pots and pans as if it hadn’t occurred to him that they might be noisy. “I’m sorry to disturb you. I was restless.”
“I can see that.” When he takes more than two seconds to look at Cas himself... he’s removed his trenchcoat and suit jacket, his tie is tugged loose and limp around his neck, and he’s sweated through his white shirt. Which is weird. Angels don’t sweat, do they? His face is damp too, and his hair is standing on end like he’s been raking his fingers through it for hours. “You look like hell,” he says.
Cas actually almost laughs at that, then sits on one of the stools, hunching over the table with his head in his hands. Dean takes the seat opposite, waiting to see if Cas will speak. “This -- process,” he says. “It’s significantly more uncomfortable than I anticipated.”
“Have you -- I mean, you’ve done this before, right?”
Cas rolls his shoulders again and speaks to the table top. “No.”
“Really?” That’s.... unexpected. “But aren’t you like... billions of years old?”
Cas sends him the most corner-of-the-eye glare Dean has ever seen. “Do I question you on when you first grew pubic hair?”
That startles a laugh out of Dean. “Uh. I guess not. So... is that what this is? Angel puberty?” Dean asks. He sees Cas tense a little and quickly adds, “I’m not trying to pry or anything. If it’s personal or whatever, tell me to fuck off and I will, but, um...” Dean swallows, and realizes he has nothing to end that sentence with that wouldn’t be uncomfortably revealing. He’s worried. He cares about the angel and would really like to help him through this in any way he can, because seeing him suffer like this pulls like a fishhook under Dean’s ribs. “I just wanna help,” he finishes lamely.
Cas pulls his head out of his hands to look at Dean, expression unreadable. Dean faces the scrutiny head-on. Finally, Cas closes his eyes and straightens up. “It’s not easy to explain in three-dimensional terminology. It’s a... metamorphosis. Puberty is not an inaccurate analogy. No less accurate than molting.” He sags back to his elbows on the table, cupping the back of his neck with both hands. “This would be a thousand times easier in Heaven,” he mutters.
“Because you wouldn’t be all pent up in a human-shape?” Dean guesses.
Cas slams a palm on the counter. “No, Dean, because there would be others! I wouldn’t be alone here, I --” And then his eyes shock open wide and he draws back, like he can’t believe what just came out of his mouth, and like he really really didn’t mean to say that. Dean stares at him, eyebrows up.
“Dude,” he says with half a chuckle. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you, you’re not alone here.”
Castiel’s eyes squeeze shut. “That is --”
“Is it something only other angels can help with?”
Cas frowns, still wary, but considering. “Not necessarily,” he says slowly. “But --”
Dean cuts him off. “Ok then. I’m here. Just tell me what you need and I’ll do it, okay?” And now he can’t help it, he reaches out and clasps Cas’s shoulder.
He’s tense. The muscles under his skin are like bars of iron, and he jerks under Dean’s touch like he’s shocked him with an electric prod. “Woah, easy. Hey. Look at me.” Cas meets his gaze, barely. Dean can see that he’s on guard, conflicted, breathing heavily through his nose and flinching under Dean’s hand. “Look, I may not know much about angel biology, but -- you gotta relax, man. And, uh.” He bites his tongue, but there’s nothing for it. In for a penny, they say. “That’s something I think I can help with. If you want.”
Cas blinks at him, more confused and head-tilty-squinty than Dean has seen him in a long time. It’s... goddamnit, it’s cute. Dean grins. “C’mere,” he says, and lets go of Cas’s tense shoulder. It takes him a second to actually follow Dean out of the kitchen, but when he does, it’s a relief. Because otherwise Dean was going to feel like an idiot.
He doesn’t even stop to consider that this is a Bad Idea. Or the fact that he’s in a T-shirt and boxers, which will hide absolutely NOTHING. Or that Cas is only wearing one layer of shirt, which makes him almost as undressed as Dean is, relatively speaking. All he’s thinking about -- all he’s letting himself think about -- is the fact that Cas needs his help, and this might not be perfect, but it’s something he can provide.
When they get to the couch, Dean plops down, seated sideways with one leg folded up in front of him. “Have a seat,” he says, gesturing in front of him.
Cas sits cautiously, sitting properly on the couch, facing forward. “What are you going to do?”
Dean sucks in a breath. “I’m just going to rub your shoulders a bit. See if I can work out some of the tension. Is that okay?” He doesn’t add that he’s mostly only done this for women he was trying to sleep with. There’s no reason for Cas to know that. That’s not what this is. It’s not. Really.
Cas’s expression clears. “That... yes. That might help.”
“Good. Now turn, sit sideways so I can get your back.”
It’s awkward. The angle is terrible, and Dean is reaching too far forward so it’s going to put an awful kink in his own shoulders. The muscles under his hands... He’s not even sure if he’s going to be able to help because Cas feels like he’s made out of wire and plywood. There’s no give. None at all.
Dean shifts a little closer -- his bare shin presses against the warmth of Cas’s hips -- and starts to move his hands in long circling sweeps over the breadth of Cas’s shoulders, and a shiver races over him from neck to tailbone. He gasps, then lets out one long, gravelly groan before he clams up and goes rigid again.
“Just relax,” Dean murmurs, a whisper and not entirely intentional.
Cas breathes out again, not quite a sigh but not not a sigh. Dean sweeps his hands in big, broad movements, more just brushing the shirt around than actually massaging, just getting Cas used to his hands. Cas starts to move with the rocking of his hands, so he applies a little more pressure along the edge of Cas’s shoulder blades, up the line of muscle to his neck, firmer over the rounds of his shoulders. By the third circle, that wire-tension starts to give under his hands.
“Feel good?” Dean asks.
Cas’s hair brushes Dean’s fingertips on the next upstroke as he nods. “Yes,” he murmurs on an exhale.
Feeling bold, Dean smirks and starts kneading firmly at the muscles at the top of Cas’s shoulders. It’s different, massaging a dude. The women he’s done this for, he felt like he could break them if he pushed too hard. Their skin gave easily and their muscles and bones were like soft putty in his hands. But Cas? Even after he starts to melt under Dean’s touch, Cas remains reassuringly solid. Thick and firm. Even if he weren’t an angel, Dean could probably stand on him and he wouldn’t feel the pinch.
Dean can feel Cas loosening up under his thumbs, his shoulders starting to roll forward, swaying with the pressure. Dean wants to turn him so that he’s braced against the back of the sofa, but... that might get a little suggestive. He’s already feeling a low swirl of heat in his gut just at getting his hands all over the guy he’s secretly had the hots for since before the apocalypse. It’s not a dangerous situation yet, but if he --
“Ohhhhhhh....” A low moan rumbles into his hands from Cas’s ribs.
A-yup. There it is. Dean tries not to freeze, to just continue the slow rolls of his hands over Cas’s loosening shoulders, even when heat rushes to his groin and he feels himself starting to chub up. He clears his throat and shifts his legs on the couch cushion. This is fine. He’s fine. He’s in control of the situation.
He switches tactics, kneading and squeezing at the swell of Cas’s shoulders until they start to loosen and roll of their own accord. When Cas sits up a little straighter Dean hears his spine crack and chuckles. “I heard that. Feel good?”
Cas just nods. “Harder, please,” he says, and it comes out breathy and low. That... that is not helping.
Following the thick lines of tension, Dean circles his fingertips down both sides of the spine. He finds a knot under the right shoulder blade that gets a soft gasp from Cas as he works and rolls it away; there’s another one on the left and Cas moans. He works lower until he’s pulling and rolling at Cas’s low back with his palms, Cas leaning forward now of his own accord to grant Dean better access. Still, the angle is terrible down there, so he tugs on the shirt a little to pull him up, tries not to think about other reasons he might have for pulling on Cas’s clothes and.... Yeah. Never mind that.
When Cas is sitting up again, listing to the side a little, Dean rolls his shoulders around a little bit, then starts working his way gently up the back of his neck. Cas presses back under his hands, angling his head from side to side to expose new pressure points to Dean’s fingers. He finds the hard ropes of tension on either side of the back of Cas’s neck and starts rolling his thumbs over and over the crunching knots.
“Ah!” Cas gasps.
Unable to help himself, Dean leans up and sinks his fingers into Cas’s hair. It’s thick and wild, and when Dean tightens his grip Cas hummmms, practically purring. Dean alternates short tugs and sweeps through his hair with rubbing slow, small circles into Cas’s scalp, watching Cas slowly melt sideways into the sofa back.
Eventually, his shoulders start to protest at the reach, and he lets his hands sweep down Cas’s neck and shoulders as he pulls away. “Better?” he asks.
Castiel just mumbles into the couch cushion. Dean chuckles at him, shifting himself to make sure he’s decent -- he’d hoped his dick would get the memo that there was no further action to be had, but that had only kind of worked. When he stands up, Cas flops backward against the back of the sofa and all of Dean’s efforts at controlling his body’s reaction goes straight out the window.
Dude looks like he needs a cigarette. There’s a dewy glow in his eyes and a dopey smile on his face, and he’s flopping against the back of the sofa like Dean removed his bones instead of just a few knots from his shoulders. He looks like he’s been dosed with some serious happy drugs, and Dean’s not sure what to make of it. “Guess you needed that, huh?”
“Deann...” is all that Castiel says, and it’s a long quiet moan that Does Things to Dean’s nether regions. He bites down hard on his tongue.
“Yeah?” he answers.
“Thank you. That --” Cas sucks in air and melts a little deeper into the couch cushions. “That was exactly what I needed.”
In spite of the awkward arousal circling his gut, Dean can’t help a shy grin. “No problem, buddy.” Now turn and walk away, Winchester. Just turn. And walk away.
Dean moves around the back of the sofa toward the hall, reaching over it to pat Cas’s shoulder one last time. “Just, uh -- let me know if there’s anything else I can do, alright?” he says.
Cas nods, and Dean could swear he nuzzled his hair against Dean’s wrist on purpose. The wrist of the hand that is still lingering near Cas’s collarbone. The hand that he really should withdraw, like he should withdraw himself from this entire situation. “I will,” Cas promises, and Dean pretends that he doesn’t feel that rumbling voice right through his fingertips.
Finally retrieving his hand, Dean nods. “Well, um. Good.” Step toward the door, Winchester. “Uh. G’night, Cas.” One more step toward the door.
“Good night, Dean.”
And with that, Dean leaves the punch-drunk angel and scurries back down the hall toward his room. He doesn’t exhale until he’s closed the door behind him.
~*~
“Blue shell. BLUE SHELL! -- NO, ugh, stupid mushroom.”
“Get her -- Dammit, Charlie, how’d you get so far ahead?”
“Pffft, it’s called a shortcut, Dean, OBViously!”
“Kevin, get her -- GET HER!”
“I can’t! AAAHHH NOOOO!!”
“WOOO! Suck it, bitches!”
Kevin’s Yoshi follows Charlie’s Toadette across the finish line with a desultory slide, then several computer-controlled characters, and then Dean’s Bowzer in a semi-respectable 9th place.
Well. Respectable for Dean, at any rate.
Charlie does a victory lap around the living room, pausing only to beg a high five out of Sam, then hops up on the couch cushions to crow, “I am the undisputed Kart Champion of the bunker! WOO!”. Dean can’t argue that point, but Kevin still stands half a chance at unseating her.
As they’re debating a (third) rematch, out of the corner of his eye Dean notices Cas shuffle awkwardly into the room, though nobody else seems to. He’s all quiet-like and keeping his back to the wall, and he’s eyeballing Charlie like he doesn’t know quite what to make of her. Dean has seen the guy face down archangels and princes of hell with less trepidation than this.
Which is why Dean can’t help but be a little bit of a dick. “Hey, Cas,” he says, shining a spotlight right on the poor guy. Charlie’s grin falters a little and her friendly debate with Kevin sputters to a halt.
Cas spares a glare for Dean, then he bravely steps toward Charlie. “I want to apologize for last night,” he says. “I was not feeling well. My words were harsh. I’m sorry.” Dean bites down on a smile and wonders how many times he practiced that.
Charlie blinks in surprise, but her grin grows back to full brightness. “S’okay,” she shrugs. “Wanna play Mario Kart?”
“Here -- take my spot.” Dean hands his controller to the angel and vacates his seat. Cas frowns down at the buttons like he’s not sure which side is up, but he gamely takes Dean’s seat on the couch and focuses intently on the screen. While Charlie gleefully explains the basic premise of the game, and Dean sidles slowly back toward where Sam is leaning against a wall, just watching.
“She’s gonna eat him alive, isn’t she?” Sam asks.
“Oh, probably,” Dean grins.
Sam nodded like this was some kind of cosmic justice. “How’d you talk him into apologizing?”
Dean shrugs as easily as he can. “Told him he was out of line. That’s about it.” That’s about all he was willing to reveal, anyway. Half the story wasn’t his to tell, and the other half.... he didn’t really want to get into how he’d spent half an hour fondling the angel in the middle of the night.
“Really? That’s it?”
“Hey, don’t look at me, dude was just having a bad day and I called him on it.”
Sam’s eyebrows quirk in skepticism, but he doesn’t push. Dean looks back at the little group on the couch. Cas looks better, all things considered: less tense and tired. He sits up straight-backed sandwiched between Kevin and Charlie, and they jostle him a little as they lean side to side as if that will help them steer better. Cas just gingerly prods at his joystick and watches his little car move in slow circles. Fond warmth blooms through Dean’s chest and he has to fight a fool grin off his face.
“So. What’ve you got?” Sam has clearly been waiting for the fun to die down long enough for him to bring up the stack of papers he’s got tucked under one arm; Dean knows a case when he sees one.
Sam just grins as he hands the stack to Dean. “Looks like a tulpa. We’ll want Charlie’s help on this one.”
Dean scans the news articles, moving quickly from confusion right through disbelief and landing on incredulous amusement.
“Seriously?” he asks. “Mutant... Ninja... Turtles?”
~*~
“Dean?”
“Hmfgh?” It’s a testament to how deeply asleep Dean is that Cas’s presence only got him a sleepy rumble rather than a loaded gun in his face. Dean pulls his face out of the pillow and squints up at Cas’s face, swimming in the darkness. “Whuzzup Cas?”
“I --” Cas stops. He’s trembling, and he’s stripped down to his shirtsleeves again. “I need help.”
That works wonders to clear the cobwebs from Dean’s brain. He rolls and shifts, wipes a puddle off his cheek -- embarrassing -- and scoots over. “Kay. Hop in.”
He may only be barely awake, but there is no question in his mind about what Cas needs. He’s too dozy to even second-guess his willingness to let Cas crawl right under his lifted blankets. “Turn around,” Dean murmurs, maneuvering Cas with a hand on his shoulder. Cas more or less settles down with his back to Dean, still sort of stiff but making himself comfortable on the pillow.
It’s not really much of a massage this time. Dean’s sleep-drunk hands just sort of wander over the broad planes and firm lines of Cas’s back, digging in here and there when he remembers the supposed purpose of all this, but mostly he’s just... touching. Aimless and slow, soft and circling. It seems to do the trick though and Cas soon sighs and starts to melt into the mattress. He rolls on his belly, and if Dean didn’t know any better he’d say that Cas was settling in to sleep there with him. Dean scoots closer so that he can reach all the way across the breadth of Cas’s back. He feels good there, a warm solid line from Dean’s chest down to his toes. The shirt is a shifting, rough-textured barrier between Dean’s hand and Cas’s skin, and though it carries the heat and warmth of Cas’s skin with it, Dean wonders how much better this would be if Cas weren’t wearing a shirt at all. If he could run his hand over smooth, warm, unhindered skin. Maybe press his lips to a bare shoulder, the nape of his neck, nuzzle his nose into the little curl of his hair...
Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all. Suddenly the little space between their bodies feels like a molten chasm, and Dean snaps abruptly into total lucidity. “Um.”
Cas must feel him freeze up, or maybe he can hear Dean’s heartbeat revving like a shitty engine. Either way, he goes still -- the wrong kind of stillness -- and murmurs into the pillow, “If you’re uncomfortable, I can leave.”
The way he says it is so small and flat that it catches Dean off guard. “No, it’s okay,” he hears himself saying. And it is. It really is. He’s not bothered or uncomfortable... not for the reasons he should be, anyway. Maybe a little bothered, but only in the “hot and” sense.
Easy tiger, he berates his over-eager body. Down boy. There is not much space between Dean’s groin and the swell of Cas’s hip; Dean shifts back to avoid inadvertently bridging the gap.
Cas doesn’t say anything further, so Dean just lets his fingers and palm continue to shift the shirt around, skating up and down the lines of his back and shoulders. He’s not as tense as he was the previous evening, so Dean doesn’t feel too bad about this less-than-effectual massage. Though he’s.... really not sure what this is doing to help with the molting or whatever. The previous evening was about relieving tension. This? He doesn’t really know what this is about. Maybe he should sit up and give Cas an actual massage if that’s what he came in here for... but then Cas gives a little sigh and he sounds so contented that Dean can’t find it in him to suggest anything other than what they’re doing right now.
Fuck it, Dean thinks. If it’s working for Cas, he’s not gonna question it. Maybe he just likes the comfort. Dean doesn’t remember the last time someone just rubbed his back like this, and all at once he aches and itches for that little comfort. Almost asks Cas to return the favor. But no. Hell no. That would be -- no.
Cas snuggles deeper into Dean’s pillow, and Dean’s hand slows as sleep drags at the edges of his consciousness. Through the wooly fuzz of his sleepiness, he can almost imagine that this is an every-night occurrence. That the warmth of Castiel next to him is something he can just have, always, whenever he wants it. That his hands are accustomed to the shift of muscle under Cas’s skin, sharp wing bones softened by the feathers of his shirt. That the breath fanning out over the pillow is nothing more or less than the flutter off a wing coming in for a landing.
In the morning, Dean has vague memories of pulling Cas close to him in sleep, and he’s all set to be equal parts embarrassed and nervously excited to face him.... but he’s alone. If he goes ahead with being honest, it’s a bit disappointing.
Then he spies it. There in the center of the pillow Cas had claimed as his own, there lays a single long oil-slick black-and-blue feather.
~*~
“Ok. Fill ‘er up, Sammy. I’ma get snacks.”
“Why do I have to pump the gas?”
“Once a little brother, always a little brother. Do you want anything?”
“Just something that’s not full of trans fats and salt, please?”
“So that’s a no, then. Got it.”
Charlie follows Dean into the blissful chill of the air conditioned mini-mart. “Jeeze,” she says, “You’d think you guys were brothers or something.”
“Yeah, well, we’ve done this a few times.” Dean shrugs and starts grabbing snacks off the shelf. They don’t have his favorite jerky, but they do have hand-pies, so that’s something. “See anything you want?”
Charlie snags a package of Red Vines, chewing her cheeks and giving Dean a definite side-eye.
“You got something to say?” Dean finally asks.
“I saw somebody coming out of your room last night,” she says, all faux-casual hands in her pockets and eyes on her shoes.
Dean freezes with his hand on a box of Cheez-its. “Uh. W-who?”
“You know exactly who I’m talking about.”
Dean shifts down the aisle, nervous and shuffling. “Look, Cas was just --”
“I KNEW IT!!” Charlie’s tiny fist goes flying, striking the meat of his bicep with surprising force. “Dean! You sure kept the lid on that one. I mean obviously you guys are head over heels for each other but I didn’t think you were brave enough to actually do anything about it! Why didn’t you tell me? Does Sam know?”
Dean rubs at the smarting spot on his arm as his mind does double-time to try and sort out what she knows and what she thinks she knows. “There’s nothing going on,” he says, and even though it’s the truth it doesn’t feel like it. “He’s just... going through... something, and I’m... helping him out. That’s all.” And wow, when he puts it like that it sounds even worse than it is. He sneaks a glance at Charlie out of the corner of his eye. She is bright pink and her eyes are as round as saucers.
“Is this like... some kind of pon farr thing? Are you sure we should have left him alone with Kevin?” she asks from behind her hand.
“What? No! No, it’s -- it’s not a ‘pon farr’ thing. It’s just... I’m just helping a friend, ok?”
“In the middle of the night. In your bedroom. With his shirt unbuttoned. And his hair all...” she wiggles her fingers over her head, “... pillow-fluffed.”
Dean sighs and tries his goddamned hardest not to grin at the mental image. “Look, will you knock it off? I’m serious.” They’re almost at the register; as an afterthought he grabs two sad, green-and-bruised bananas for Sam.
“Okay, okay,” Charlie concedes. “I’ll allow that maybe nothing is currently going on with you two.” And jeeze, she doesn’t have to sound so put out about it. “But -- you want there to be something. Right?”
Dean doesn’t answer right away. He’s distracted by something in a case of sundries beside the register. It’s a strange assortment, including bandannas, bizarre and useless knives, resin casts of gaudy bald eagles, and...
Charlie is nattering on about how she’s always got a bit of a bi vibe off Dean and “I’ll shut up if you really don’t want to talk about it but you should really talk about it,” but Dean is busy. The crusty old man in front of them finishes purchasing his cases of beer and cigarettes, and Dean shuffles forward with his basket full of goodies.
“And, uh -- one of those,” he points at the back of the case, where a long, curved strip of wood hangs in a plastic wrapper.
The bored pimply teenager behind the counter rings him up, and they step out into the sticky heat of late spring in Missouri.
“What’s that for?” Sam asks as they stroll up to the car. Charlie seems to have taken Dean’s silence for the hint it sort of is and has stopped talking about sensitive subjects. But Sam is looking at the unusual purchase poking out the top of the bag.
“What. Never seen a back scratcher before?” Dean blusters, digging into the depths of the plastic. “Here,” he tosses Sam his bananas. “Don’t spoil your dinner.”
He ignores the bitchface Sam sends him in favor of popping the trunk. He nestles the back scratcher carefully down the side of his duffle, right next to the silky blue-black angel feather.
~*~
The hunt takes them three days plus a day of driving on either side. When they get back to the bunker, Charlie is still ecstatic.
“But SPLINTER! Actually! A rat! And the pizza boxes, just -- EVERYWHERE! UGH I am LIVING for this!”
Dean slumps his duffle on the table in the war room, grinning as he stretches the road kinks out of his back. Charlie’s enthusiasm is catching... but he’s more than ready for a shower and a nap.
And then, of course, Kevin comes barreling in.
“Hey guys? I -- I think something’s wrong with Cas.” That’s the first thing he says.
Dean snaps to attention, vague fantasies of hot water and pillows vanishing from his mind. “What -- Why? What’s going on?”
Kevin looks equal parts worried and frustrated. “First he got all moody again after you guys left, but like, worse than before. Then on the second day he started tearing the place apart.”
Sam spares a concerned glance for the artifacts in the room, but Kevin reassures him, “Nothing important broke. I had to change a lot of light bulbs and the library’s gonna need some re-organizing, and... well, we might need a new TV, I’m not sure....”
“Where is he now?” Dean asks.
“In his room, I think. He hasn’t come out all day.”
Dean is gone before Kevin finishes talking. He only pauses for a second to grab the back scratcher out of his duffle.
There’s no answer when he knocks on Cas’s door. “Cas? You in there?”
No verbal answer, anyway. But the light over Dean’s head browns out a few times, fizzing and sputtering. Dean’s pretty sure the Bunker’s ancient wiring is not to blame.
It might have been against his better judgment, but he turns the door knob -- unlocked -- and steps inside.
Kevin may have been able to restore or rescue the rest of the bunker from the angel’s frustrated wrath, but it’s clear that this room has borne the brunt of the assault. The room is a tornado-wrecked shambles. The hideous green loveseat is overturned, lamps are shattered and toppled off their tables. Bedding ripped off the bed, down to bare mattress, and piled in a heap in the middle of the floor. Books are flung off the shelves like baby birds that never made it to flight.
Dean doesn’t see Cas. He takes two steps in and his foot comes down on a shattered framed photo -- some vaguely pretty architecture -- with a loud crunch.
“Dean?” comes Cas’s voice from the direction of the heap of twisted blankets and pillows. The pile squirms and shifts, and Cas’s head pops out from deep within the folds.
“Holy crap, Cas, what happened to you?” He looks awful. Bloodshot eyes, exhausted pallor in his cheeks, dry lips, and unless Dean is very much mistaken, he has been blowing his nose with sandpaper. “Are you sick? Do angels even get sick?” Without thinking about it Dean moves close and lays a hand on Cas’s forehead. “Dude, you’re burning up --”
Cas whimpers and leans his head hard into Dean’s hand for just a second before pulling away with a wince. “It’s -- I’m fine. It’s related to my -- my molting.”
“Yeah, I could have guessed that one,” Dean says with a frown. “How long is this gonna last?”
The blankets move in what might be a shrug. “Until it’s finished.”
Dean moves closer, on his knees, almost kneeling at the edge of Cas’s cocoon. That’s probably what this is, actually -- some kind of makeshift chrysalis. Dean has the weirdest urge to crawl in there with him, burrow into the blankets and wrap Cas up in his arms. It’s probably wildly inappropriate, even if all he wants to do is cuddle the shit out of him, but physical contact seemed to help the last few times. Maybe he’s not too far off base...?
Then he remembers his flimsy excuse for coming in here. “Oh. Hey. I got you something.” He reaches back to where he’d absently set down the flimsy strip of wood with the finger-curve on one end. Cas lifts his face out of the blankets again and blinks gummy eyes at Dean and the back scratcher. It’s a silly gift, maybe, impulsively purchased, but for a guy who seemed ready to itch himself right out of his skin... “It’s, um. For your back. I mean. I dunno. I just thought -- I mean, not that I’m not here to scratch your back for you, if you want, but -- um.” He shuts his trap as Cas shoulders his way out of the blankets, cocking his head all perplexed-like. “I guess it’s kinda stupid, I’ll just --”
“It’s a gift?” Cas asks.
Dean stops in the act of trying to find somewhere to hide the back scratcher of shame. “Uh. Yeah. I guess.”
One of Cas’s arms extends slowly from the cocoon, palm up. Dean places the back scratcher in Cas’s open palm and it disappears within the depths of the blankets as if swallowed by some great beast.
“Thank you,” Cas rasps.
“Sure thing.” Alright, Dean, escape, now, while you’ve still got some dignity left. Abort, abort, red alert, now, leave.
“Would you --?” Cas’s voice stops him before he makes it two backwards steps toward the door. He can see both of Cas’s shoulders now, and his elbow as he’s shoved himself further out of his nest. There’s a patchy pinprick flush spreading up his neck.
“Would I what?” Dean asks.
The flush consumes the pallor of Cas’s face and he closes his eyes, pulling back in on himself. “You -- you said you would still-” He stops, but what he wants is abundantly clear.
“Yeah, Cas, of course.” In a heartbeat he’s back over by the nest. “Um. Let’s get you back up on the bed, okay?”
Cas is barely better than dead weight when Dean reaches into the tangled blankets and sheets, but he grabs hold under his armpits and hauls him free of the nest. The sight that greets him is… well. Castiel is never exactly immaculate, but now his clothes are rumpled and musty, as if he’s been sleeping in them for three days straight. The shirt hangs off Cas’s shoulders, unbuttoned and hanging open over his bare chest, and his pants are slung low across his.... hipbones. Jesus. Dean tries not to stare -- no really, he tries really fucking hard not to notice the cut of those hipbones. Or the definition of his abs and chest. Or the little mole above his right nipple. No. No noticing.
“You, uh,” he gulps. “This might work better if you lose this shirt?” And where the hell had that come from? He didn’t actually mean to suggest that.
Cas just nods vaguely and stands there, staring at Dean all gummy-eyed and slack-jawed, rumple-headed and -- “Oh,” he says at last, and starts shrugging the shirt off his shoulders.
Only to get caught at the wrists because he hasn’t unbuttoned the cuffs. He struggles weakly for a moment before Dean steps in close and takes his wrist in hand. “Here, hang on --” he says as he works the button free. “There.” Then he does the same to the other side, unable to meet Cas’s dumbfounded gaze straight on, unwilling to acknowledge the pinking blush he can feel in his cheeks. “Go lay down,” he says, and it’s probably too gruff but Cas shuffles toward the bed anyway. Dean grabs a pillow for him but leaves the rest of the blankets where they are.
The sight of Cas face-down on the bed, showing Dean an all-new view of his muscular back and shoulders... Dean is 34 years old. The sight of a dude’s bare back should not be making his belly go supernova with nervous arousal, but, well, there it is. He’s felt those lines before, through the shirt, but like this, nothing but bare skin and the shift of muscles underneath --
He’s so fucked.
But it would be dickish to back out now, so Dean just kicks off his boots and kneels next to him. His knees bump Cas’s hip, warm through Dean’s jeans, and his throat dries up like summer in Nevada. “So --” he coughs, swallows. “Do you, uh. Do you just want me to --?”
“Anything,” Cas sighs into the bare mattress. “Just -- touch. It should help.”
Not like that Winchester, not like fucking that, keep it in your goddamn pants. Dean swallows again and rubs his palms together to warm them up. Anything. Just touch. Yeah. Sure.
Dean starts with his fingertips at the low dip of Cas’s lumbar curve. The skin jumps under his hand, a tremor that ricochets up Cas’s spine and comes out his mouth as a gasp. Dean traces long slow circles over the too-hot skin, from low back to shoulder blades and then out to trail his fingernails down the backs of his arms. Castiel sighs then, a long low exhalation as he wriggles deeper into the bare mattress. Scratching it is, then, gentle blunt nails leaving fine white lines like a musical score over the broad planes of skin. Dean can’t help but be entranced by the shift and play of muscles under skin, bones under muscle, the knowledge that something unseen is going on even under that. Molting, Cas had said. Metamorphosis. And whatever that means to an angel in heaven, here on earth it means that Cas is trapped inside a human body -- one that’s more firmly his than most -- and that doesn’t seem to be doing anything to stop the change. Dean just hopes it’s not complicating the process.
“Is it, um. Going ok?” Dean asks. “Your molting -- thing.”
Cas sighs into the pillow, long and heavy. “It’s... difficult to say.”
Dean waits, still tracing fingertip lines, but Cas doesn’t say anything more. Alright, if he wants to be tight-lipped about it, he can. That’s his prerogative. Dean switches from languid scratching to long, deep rolls with his palms. Cas isn’t so tense on the surface level this time, so he can really get in there, rolling the flesh around, getting to the deeper tension underneath. It would probably work better if he were seated on Cas’s hips but -- no. Absolutely not. He’s already fighting with his body about crossed wires just with the feel of Cas’s skin. He’s not going to go making it worse by having Cas’s hips actually between his legs.
This isn’t about that.
“Ohhh.... Dean......”
... Is it?
Dean’s attention snaps back from the skin directly under his hands to see all of Cas again. Cas is shifting, restless, rolling his spine in a wave down the mattress that ends in a telltale flick of his hips. Fuck. Suddenly Dean is in full meltdown mode, blood pumping to his groin so hard his toes go numb. Son of a bitch. He shifts so he’s more parallel with Cas’s side, fitting his palms on either side of Cas’s lumbar spine, slides up -- should really get some massage oils or something -- sliiiiiiiides his thumbs into the hollows between spine and shoulder blade and --
“AH!” Cas cries out and Dean sees his hands clench into fists. “Dean -- please --”
“Please what?” Dean’s heart is racing. He leaves his thumbs exactly where they are, pressing firmly right at that spot that made Cas light up like Christmas. Cas thrashes, pushing back into the pressure and then squirming away, panting into the pillow. “Does that hurt?”
Cas stills himself with what looks like a lot of effort and, after a moment, says “No.”
“Are you lying?”
“No,” and it sounds truer this time as Cas arches his spine into Dean’s hands. “Please...”
And oh. Fuck. Hearing Cas moaning ‘please’ like that is doing things to Dean’s libido that he really should not encourage. Actually he should probably put a stop to this before Cas notices.
“Dean.”
But he’s already here, and he can’t -- he won’t leave Cas like this. Dean takes a steeling breath and starts to circle his thumbs into the trapezius muscles, working around and over the shoulder blades and apparently driving Cas absolutely crazy. He’s panting and squirming and clenching his fists and Dean can’t tell if he’s in agony or so turned on he can’t help himself -- maybe both? He’s not saying anything intelligible, but the sounds from his lips are practically pornographic, all please and Dean and half-formed curses.
But the balance tips toward frustrated agony with Cas slamming his fists on the bed, his shoulders locking up like he’s bracing himself for impact, and Dean lets his hands still on the wings of his shoulder blades. “You okay?”
Cas growls and slams both fists down on the mattress. “NO!” he bellows. Behind them, a mirror cracks down the middle and Dean’s hands pop free of Cas’s overheated skin. “I am not! This isn’t -- aaaaaaaaaagggghhh --”
Dean scoots away. “Woah. Hey. Buddy. I was just --”
Castiel glares over his shoulder with a snarl on his lips and a spark of electric blue behind his eyes. “You said you would HELP! THIS IS NOT HELPING!” And there’s a skree of the static electricity in the air, that overdriven whine that nearly burst Dean’s eardrums the day he was pulled from the pit.
“I’m doing the best I can, Cas!” he shouts back. “I thought I was helping! How can I help you if I have no clue what you need?”
Cas’s expression slams closed, and in a flash he’s leaping to his feet, tearing at his hair. “I don’t KNOW -- You’re supposed to --”
Dean pushes himself off the bed, glaring at Cas over the bare mattress. “Don’t go blaming this on me, alright? You can’t even tell me what’s really going on!”
Cas snarls at him, animal and low, but dissolving into an anguished whimper. He curls in on himself, doubles over, long fingers clutching at his hair, his shoulders, anything. “I need --” he pants nonsense against the mattress. “Dean, I can’t… you are -- But I -- I don’t know…”
Dean’s anger banks, and he clenches his fists against the urge to pull Cas against his chest and just… “Yeah, well. If you figure it out, give me a call, okay?” He stands up off the bed, bends to grab his boots -- and spies the stupid back scratcher half-buried in the blankets. With a tired sigh he picks it up and edges back toward where Cas is curling in on himself on the bed.
“Here,” he murmurs, poking the angel not-quite-gently in the side. Cas jerks around and stares at Dean and the back scratcher. Then he closes his fingers around the handle. Dean tosses out a wry smirk that falls flat. “Better than nothing, right?”
Cas doesn’t say anything, just looks confused with a squint in his eyebrow as he pulls the little strip of wood closer. He’s practically cuddling it by the time Dean, awkward and wrong-footed, finally flees the room.
~*~
“You sure you gotta head out?” Sam asks Charlie with a face full of sad puppy.
“Yeah,” Charlie sighs. “There’s this cute brunette on a motorcycle waiting for me in New Mexico.”
“Hey, if she ever wants to come back to Kansas, let her know she’s welcome, alright?” Dean reels Charlie in for a hug. “Don’t be a stranger,” he says into her hair.
Charlie nods against Dean’s shoulder, and as he tries to let go she just holds on. “Don’t forget about your own cute brunette, ok?”
Worry cinches tight in Dean’s gut. He’d felt awful all last night, torn back and forth between wanting to find Cas and apologize and still being angry -- and he’s not even sure what happened. It had been a very confusing fight and he’d spent a very confusing evening mulling it over, coming to zero conclusions.
In the morning, Cas hadn’t been in his room. Or anywhere else in the bunker that Dean could point to, even though he’d found his trenchcoat wadded up under the overturned loveseat in his bedroom. So he wasn’t gone, gone, but still...
Ok, sue him, he was worried.
When he pulls back from Charlie’s hug, he’s pretty sure that worry is written all over his face, but she just gives him a sympathetic smile and a pat on the arm. Then she’s turning to be dwarfed by Sam’s giant octopus arms, and Dean’s gaze slides up over the hill on the other side of the road to a place where the sun shines down....
Oh. There he is.
Cross-legged in the grass with his face turned up to catch his own personal ray of sunshine. The cuffs of his shirtsleeves are still undone, shoved up to the elbow, and something about that makes Dean’s chest ache. It’s the contrast between the tan forearms and the stark white shirt; or maybe it’s the fact that he unbuttoned those cuffs. Or both.
Dean ambles slowly up the hillside, giving Castiel plenty of time to tell him to fuck off if he needs to and feeling vaguely nauseated. It feels like every emotion he’s ever felt regarding his angel has been poured into his gut at once, and he’s not sure which will come out on top.
“Hey Cas,” he says when he’s in easy hearing distance. “Can we, um. Can I talk to you?”
If Cas is surprised by his presence, he doesn’t show it. He just cracks his eyes open a sliver and gives Dean a quick glance, a barely perceptible nod.
“I, uh.” What the hell was he supposed to say now? “I’m sorry,” he says. “I know this isn’t easy for you, and... I’m just sorry I can’t do more.”
Cas puffs out a sigh. “I’m sorry too,” he says. “Last night was -- it’s not your fault, and you’ve done nothing but try to help.”
“Yeah,” Dean huffs. “Which amounts to about jack squat.”
“That’s not true.” Cas’s eyes open fully and they are startlingly blue, not the electric grace-glow of the night before but a pure earthly blue, like the reflection of the sky in a lake, and Dean’s breath catches for a second. When Cas opens his mouth to speak again no words come out, so he shuts it. “Thank you for this,” he says instead, holding up the back scratcher.
“Oh. Uh. Sure.” Yeah, ok. He can take a hint. Apparently a cheap gas station novelty can get the job done just as well as he can, with less drama. “I’ll just, uh.” He gestures back down the hill. “Come back down when you’re done up here, ok?” He half-turns and starts to walk away.
“Dean.”
Oh thank god. Dean turns back.
Cas pushes himself to his feet and takes two shaky steps toward Dean. “It’s not enough,” he says, staring at the ground between their feet. “If you still want to help --”
“Of course I do, Cas.” With all his heart, for reasons he has been denying for a very long time, he wants to help.
“We need to get deeper.”
Dean’s eyebrows hit his hairline. “‘Scuse me?”
“Simply working with my vessel won’t be enough. I -- I need you to touch -- my grace.”
“Your grace?” Dean’s heart skips a beat.
Cas nods. “Part of my true form, Dean. My -- my wings.”
“Oh.” That. Breathe, Dean. That. Okay.
“Are you willing?”
“Of course, Cas. Anything.” It really should sound more alarm bells, the gravity with which Cas asks that question. In hindsight Dean is reminded uncomfortably of the required permission to become an angel’s vessel and wonders if this might be a similar thing, but -- even if it is, it’s too late. He agreed without a second thought, and he’d do it again. It’s Cas. He’d do anything.
Cas’s relief is visible as he sighs his head forward. “Thank you. Here.” He reaches into the pocket of his trousers and pulls out a piece of paper. It looks like it’s been folded and refolded a dozen times, worried by nervous hands. “You’ll need this.” He hands it to Dean without looking at him and Dean could swear that was a blush on his cheeks.
He opens the paper, turns it the right way to see the sigil scribbled in pen. It’s not terribly complicated, but it contains symbols Dean has never seen before.
“This’ll let me touch your wings?” he asks.
Exactly one heartbeat too much silence passes before Castiel says, “Yes.”
Ahh, there are those alarm bells. There’s something Cas isn’t telling him. Dean opens his mouth, fully prepared to call him on it -- but then his teeth click back together. What would it change? What could Cas possibly tell him that would change a damn thing? This molting business is personal, and he’s already trusting Dean farther than he really deserves.
So. Okay. There’s more going on. But whatever it is, either Dean doesn’t need to know about it or he’ll find out when it’s relevant. “Okay,” he says. “When do you wanna, um, do this?”
“Tonight?” he asks.
“Sure, Cas. Whenever you want.”
As he heads down the hill, Dean tries and fails to keep a fool grin off his face. He resolutely does not finger the edge of the paper he’s tucked safely in his pocket. And he reminds himself -- firmly -- that this is not a date.
~*~
Dean Winchester does not stand in front of mirrors debating his appearance.
Especially not for platonic not-dates with outcast angels who just need a little assistance with their biological processes.
Which is why you will absolutely never find Dean freshly showered at seven o’clock at night, carefully shaving the scruff from his neck (he just happened to notice he was looking a little scraggly around the edges, that’s all).
It’s not until he finds himself debating green plaid vs solid blue that he realizes exactly what a huge child he’s being about this. He grabs the closest shirt -- blue -- and books it to the kitchen. He needs a fucking beer.
He drinks two beers and gets into one pseudo-argument with Sam about the merits of reading the Game of Thrones books over just watching the show (“It’s A Song of Ice and Fire, Dean, Game of Thrones is just the first one.”). Once Kevin joins in on Sam’s side, he decides he’s had enough getting ganged up on for one night and has probably dawdled long enough. So he makes his meandering way down the hall toward Cas’s room. Just heading to Cas’s room. No big deal. Not like anything’s gonna, y’know, happen. Or anything.
The door is open a crack when he gets there. His heart beats high in his throat as he knocks twice before pushing it wide.
The room has been put to rights since the morning, bed made and lamps repaired or replaced. Cas jumps up from whatever book he was pretending to read at the desk. At least he looks just as nervous as Dean is.
“Hey,” Dean says, shutting the door and lifting his hand in an awkward little wave.
“Hello.” Cas gestures at the jug at the foot of the bed, not meeting Dean’s eyes. “I have the holy oil.”
Dean draws a blank. “Holy oil?”
“For the sigil.”
Oh. “Oh! Right. Obviously.”
“You’ll have to draw it on my back, between my scapulae, from the 12th to the 19th vertebrae.”
“Oh. Uh. Sure.” Dean digs the sigil out of his pocket. “I hope that doesn’t need to be exact, because --”
“Approximations will be fine.” Cas starts unbuttoning his shirt, revealing that the blush in his cheeks goes all the way down his neck to his chest. He still hasn’t buttoned his cuffs, so it slips right off his arms as he turns toward the bed.
“Cas, are you sure you’re ok with this?” Dean asks, even as he moves closer. “I know I’m probably not your first choice for this, but --”
“That’s where you’re wrong,” Cas says, still facing the bed. “There is no one else I would share this with, even if I could.”
“Not even -- I mean, if there were other angels around, I’m sure --”
“No.” Cas turns around then and finally looks up to meet Dean’s gaze, and there’s an intensity to his stare that brooks no argument, even if Dean doesn’t really understand what he’s being told.
“Ok. I believe you.” He feels his arm reach out as if it belonged to someone else, feels his hand cupping Cas’s elbow. His skin is cool to the touch, dry under the brush of his thumb, and he watches a prickle of gooseflesh rise from his touch up to Cas’s shoulder. “Um. On the bed?” His tongue is thick in his mouth.
Cas turns to lay himself out face down on the bed, and all at once the realization smacks Dean in the gut -- he’s about to see Cas’s wings. The ones he’s only ever seen in shadows. The wings that had shocked him to the core that first night in the barn. Cas’s actual wings. He doesn’t know how many humans have ever had this privilege, but he’s pretty certain it’s a short list. “Uh. This might be a stupid question, but I’m not gonna get my eyeballs burned out, am I?”
Cas snorts into the pillow. “No, Dean,” he says. “I wouldn’t put you at risk.”
“Right.” Dean nods, then reaches for the jug of oil. Here goes nothing. He climbs onto the bed, places Cas’s drawing of the sigil on the pillow where he can see it, then after a moment’s deliberation swings his knee over Cas’s hips. “Is this ok?” he asks, trying to quell the racing of his own heart as he settles down on the swell of Cas’s ass.
“Fine,” Cas sighs.
Dean shifts a little on his seat. Nope. Better not do that too much. Already this position has his heart thumping, blood warming at the root. He gets one foot up on the bed, which raises him up out of the danger zone well enough, angling his pelvis so that if he gets a hard on -- when he gets a hard on, let’s be honest -- it won’t be pressed directly against Cas’s rump.
But thinking about this is not helping. This is just about Cas, he reminds himself firmly. Just... deal with it.
“Ready?”
Cas nods against his folded arms.
The holy oil is cold and slick on his palm -- unnaturally cold, like menthol or freezing rain. He glances at the sigil, then down at Cas’s shifting shoulders. Takes a deep breath. And starts.
Two fingers trace a circle in cold fire on warm skin. In the wake of the smooth glide of his fingers, the holy oil starts to glow, soft and blue, and Cas sucks in a sharp breath. “Cold?” Dean asks.
“No,” Cas breathes, clenching a fist. He doesn’t elaborate, so Dean just keeps going, following the pattern and trying to pretend that this is just another sigil on a wall, another devil’s trap or banishing spell. As if he could ignore the swells and valleys his fingers pass over, the shuddering breaths and flexing of muscle under his hands, the warmth of pliant skin. Tension starts to seep down from Cas’s shoulders to his lower back, his hips shifting between Dean’s thighs. It’s... distracting, but he keeps working, until the room is bathed in the sigil’s electric blue-white glow.
When at last he connects the last line of the sigil, Cas spasms underneath him, and there is a great whoosh of circling wind. Dean blinks against it, and when he opens his eyes the glow has vanished, and in its place --
“Woah,” he breathes.
Two great wings arch up and out from Cas’s shoulder blades and tuck demurely down his sides. Dean’s almost kneeling on one, they’re tucked so close to his body. For a long moment he just... takes in the sight. They’re not quite what he was expecting. Near his body they are solid and feathery, like he thought they’d be -- inky black feathers with a sheen of blue and green -- but as he lets his gaze sweep along the long lines, past the great bend of the wing, the more ethereal and otherworldly they appear. The feathers sharpen, edged like they’re cut from glass, and at the same time they lose some of their physical presence, turning first translucent and then transparent. By the time he reaches the long primary feathers -- down past his knees -- they are defined only by their edges, like he’s seeing them and looking through them at the same time.
“Dean?” Cas shifts under him, looking back over his shoulder. Dean shakes himself. Probably rude to stare.
“Uh --” he stammers. “Yeah. Sorry. This -- this is incredible.”
Cas ducks his head back down to his arm pillow. Dean could swear he sees the feathers fluff up a little bit, like they’re responding to the praise. “Thank you,” he murmurs quietly.
With a great deal of effort Dean reminds himself that he’s here to do a job, in theory. “So, uh. How do you want me to do this?” he asks. “I get to touch ‘em, right?” He hopes Cas doesn’t notice how eager he sounds, but the truth is he’s already clenching his oil-slick hands trying to keep them to himself.
Then Cas arches in something like a yoga move and the wings arch with him, stretching up and out like he’s rousing them from a long sleep, then tucking them back down. Dean sucks in a breath, because woah they are awesome when they move. “Yes, that is very much part of the plan.”
Cas already sounds breathless; Dean’s not sure he’s gonna survive this. He sucks in a deep breath and begs for strength, then spreads his hands through the oily sigil nestled at the base of the wings. Best to start with something familiar, he figures. The breadth of both hands barely fits nestled between the feathers, and the skin there is warm, slippery with oil. Dean gives a few longs slow rubs up and down Cas’s spine, and then with a thick swallow he moves both palms out and up the arch of each wing.
Cas goes rigid for a moment beneath him, but he doesn’t think it’s a bad thing; he pets his hands up and down the feathery arches. Under his hands the feathers fluff and rise, so he smooths them back down into place. Every few strokes he returns to familiar territory to catch his breath, easing tension in Cas’s neck and spine and delving under his wings to maneuver his shoulder blades around. The holy oil lets his hands slide, slick and smooth over warm skin.
“Mmmmm... Oh--” Cas’s voice is a low constant rumble below him, and whenever he moans Dean can feel it in his hands, through his ribs, and somehow it echoes down his wings too in a vibrating wave. The nascent arousal Dean had been fighting off comes roaring back twofold.
But there’s something.... odd. It takes him a while to put his finger on it, but then... “You sure you’re molting?” Dean asks as he works his hands softly through the feathers. “Because you really just look --” Perfect, he catches himself. “All normal and healthy to me.”
“It’s --” Cas gasps as Dean pushes his wings forward, maneuvering them this way and that and exploring their motion. The wings press back into his touch but don’t resist, and the length of them stretches out to either side, unfurling from their tucked position. “It’s not a perfect metaphor. Just -- keep going, please.”
Alright, if that’s how he wants to be, Dean shrugs to himself and figures he’d better roll with it.
He sticks to the more earthly feathers for a while, learning how they lay, how they connect to the skin. They seem more or less like normal feathers, though he’s never spent a lot of time around birds. He’s loathe to rub them the wrong direction, but they fluff and rise under his hands in a way that encourages him to dig his fingers under the softness (and this leads to some delightful panting and shivering from Cas so it’s probably along the right track). Then he gets braver, moving down the bend of the wing to where the feathers start to fade back into the other world, wherever they live when he can’t see them.
Further down, they feel like... like curtains of soft, cool water, like electrified silk. He pets his hands up and down the long, fine structure, and in the wake of his hands, a change takes place: the ethereal feathers shimmer, phosphorescent and glowing under his touch. The feathers shine briefly a brilliant blue white like the sigil’s glow, then dull back down to their black-brown-green translucency. It’s like fingerpainting with light over a canvass of spreading feathers, and Dean is entranced. Cas unfolds his wings some more, expanding Dean’s canvas up and out so that he’s walled in a V of glowing softness.
He worries at first that where the wings start to fade he might just put his hand right through them, but no -- it’s like pushing on a magnet. They’re there, but they’re not, and wherever he traces his fingers he leaves a glittering white trail. At the farthest end of his reach -- not even halfway down the long primaries that arch up over his head -- his hands start to tingle with a soft static charge.
On a whim, he strums his fingers across the bars of the secondary feathers, watching the bright white splash and flare in the wake of his fingers. They ring out like guitar strings on a subsonic level, vibrating the resonating chamber of his ribcage, and Castiel --
Castiel gasps, and then cries out hoarse and breathy. Dean’s attention snaps to him --
“Cas, are you okay?” he asks in alarm. The angel below him is shivering, rigid like if he lets go of himself he’s going to fly to pieces. His head is hanging down to the pillows and his wings are fully extended, above Dean’s head and far out to the sides, his feathers spread and vibrating and making Dean’s hair stand on end.
“Yes, Dean, I’m fine,” it comes out in a rush. “Please.”
And then Cas’s body does a lithe, sinuous roll underneath him, a telltale rocking of his hips between Dean’s legs.
Oh.
Dean’s heart hammers in his chest and his breath comes short. With a shake in his fingers, Dean returns his hands to the skin between his wings. His skin feels so warm now, compared to stroking through the cool solid-air feeling of his wings.
It’s also -- very slick. He rubs his hands and rolls them over the skin and through the feathers at the joint of human body and angelic wing, and when he touches there, the air punches out of Cas and he goes boneless where he was rigid before, wings splaying out over the bed like Dean’s just cut his strings.
“Cas, there’s um. More oil here than I started with.”
Cas doesn’t answer in words. But his wings lift up again, exposing the apparently sensitive joint between body and wing, and he rocks in a steady rhythm into the bed. The trembling feathers stand up in waves, flashing blue-white deep under their depths.
Dean reaches where Cas seems to want his touch the most, down right where the wings join flesh. When he rubs there with the flats of his fingers he feels a slick rush of oil from the pores, and fuck that probably shouldn’t be hot, but with the way Cas is squirming and pushing up into his hands, it definitely is. “Cas are -- are you leaking?”
Cas still says nothing; just hides his face in the pillow. The oil is light but viscous, and it smells faintly of almonds and damp green growing things. It’s discordantly earth-bound and biological compared to the diaphanous shimmer of the wings around him, but when Dean rubs the oil up into the feathers, Castiel gives him a long open-mouthed moan. It’s encouraging.
“Dean -- Oh -- Yes-- Ahhhhhhh,” Castiel is panting over his shoulder, and the words hit Dean right in the gut. “That’s -- touch me there -- spread it through my feathers. If you would. Please.”
Fuck, yeah, he can do that. Dean shifts his hips to make sure his erection is still out of the danger zone -- it is, no matter how much he wants to grind down on Cas, nestle his cock between his ass cheeks, bend down and press his mouth to the place where skin meets feathers and see if that oil tastes like it smells, fuck, is that kinky? He thinks that might be kinky -- but he doesn’t. This is not about him or his desires. It’s about Cas.
“You good?” Dean asks, and his voice sounds gruff and low to his own hears.
Cas nods furiously, fists twisting the sheets below him. “Yes. It’s good. It’s -- helping.”
Dean nods and turns his attention back to the bright walls of wings around him. He presses his fingers in to stimulate the pooling oil, then sweeps his hands up and over the feathers. “Up here too?” he asks, bringing some of the oil to bear on the cut-glass sparkle of the secondary feathers. Cas just nods, so he spreads oil up and down methodically over every feather he can reach, going back to the source periodically for more oil and just to feel Castiel squirm beneath him as he rubs the sensitive glands.
Sue him. He’s only human.
“Dean --” Cas gasps. “Dean, please,” as one of his hands fumbles back until he can grip weakly at Dean’s knee. Even through his jeans Dean can feel his skin jump, like he’d forgotten he could be touched in return. “Please,” Cas breathes as his fingernails scrabble at the denim seam.
Dean stills with his hands cupped around the slick juncture, both thumbs idly brushing over the joint. “What do you need, angel?” he asks, low, and soft. Like a prayer.
“I don’t -- I don’t know, Dean.” There is breathless frustration here, but it is not the anguish of the previous evening. His fingers clutch harder, finding purchase in his jeans and pulling. “Just -- please.”
Aw, hell. With a swallow and a nod, Dean shifts his knees until his pelvis dips forward. He leans until he can nuzzle between Cas’s wings. “Fuck, Cas...” he murmurs against the oil-slick skin. He inhales deeply against his skin, rubs his nose and cheeks into the oil and, yeah, it’s all over his face now but that is fine. Just fine. In fact, he opens his mouth and lets the flat of his tongue lick a broad, clean stripe right up the base of one of Cas’s wings.
“AH!” comes the shout from beneath him, and Cas is grinding up and back with his hips, grinding with hot satisfaction against the rise in Dean’s jeans. Groaning into Cas’s skin, Dean pushes back, pressing him into the mattress and he can’t even remember why he was trying not to. Not when his head is buzzing from the static tingle of the wings quivering on either side of him and he has a head full of the heavenly-earth scent of wing oil. He lifts his lips from the juncture and presses them to the downy feathers. It feels like pushing his face through an electrical storm, but the shocks are all pleasure and bliss. He wraps his arms under Cas’s chest, nuzzles down the quivering feathers, spreading oil with his lips. Cas is shaking all along the length of his spine where they’re pressed together. Dean can feel his wings pinching back and in, pinning Dean in a strange backwards embrace.
“Ohhh angel... Cas,” he murmurs against the pinions as he rocks his hips gently against his angel. Arousal melts through him, lava-hot in the bowl of his pelvis, urgent in his cock with every push against the resistance of Cas’s ass cheeks. Goddamn, he’s going to come in his pants like a horny teenager and there’s nothing for it but to try and make sure Cas is at least on board the same boat, so he sits back a bit -- Cas follows with his hips, apparently unwilling to relinquish the contact now that he’s got it, which Dean is totally okay with -- pulls Cas’s hips further back into him and reaches around, under. One hand stays high on his belly, just stroking the soft definition there, while the other finds what he’s looking for.
“Ohh fuck yes --” he groans. Cas’s cock is a rock-hard line in his trousers, humid-hot, and Cas chokes on a gasp.
“Dean -- I can’t -- I’m --”
“I know, sweetheart, I know,” Dean murmurs, rolling his hips and stroking Cas’s cock, nuzzling lips and nose into the slick joint of his wing. “Me too,” he pants.
“Dean -- Oh -- DEAN --”
Then several things happen at once.
Just as the wave of Dean’s pleasure starts to crest, he is buffeted by a storm of electric wind. He’s knocked straight off the bed onto his ass, and his poor frustrated dick doesn’t know what to do with this new development but it definitely seems to be a turn for the worse.
Cas is off the bed too, cowering back against the wall, showing his teeth in a feral grimace. His wings are flared out wide, arching up to the ceiling, lightning tips brushing opposite walls. They are flashing, pulsing, striations of blue-white racing from shoulder to wing tip in a rapid-fire dance, and his eyes are glowing electric blue.
“Cas --?”
Cas jerks at the sound of Dean’s voice, and all at once, as Dean pushes himself up to reach out to him, Cas draws his wings back and with one huge flap of wind --
He’s gone.