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expectingtofly · 4 years ago

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Take a Load Off

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fluff, post-canon, human!cas, anxious dean, established dean/cas

(i saw this post by @emptymeg and couldn’t get it out of my head, so here’s a fic :)

also posted on ao3

“What’s in the box?” Dean asked, coming into the library to see Cas setting a large package on the map table with a huff. The table creaked under its weight. “Hey, name that movie.”

Cas cocked his head. “What movie?”

Dean groaned. “Seriously, dude, you’re hopeless. What’s in the box! Brad Pitt?” Cas shrugged and Dean sighed. “Forget it.”

“If it makes you feel better,” Cas said, fetching scissors from a drawer, “This box is for you. I bought you something.”

“Oh?” Dean came to the table, interest even more piqued. “What kind of something?”

Cas gave him a look. “Not what you’re thinking.” He cut through the tape securing the box. “I read that this can relieve stress and help you sleep better.”

“I already know something that can do that.” He added a wink for good measure.

“So,” Cas continued, ignoring him, “I thought you should try it. You haven’t been getting enough sleep lately and I’m worried about your anxiety levels.”

“Wait a moment,” Dean protested. “What do you mean, my ‘anxiety levels’?” Cas opened the box and he leaned over to look at the contents. Folded, silky dark grey fabric. “What is that, a blanket?”

“A weighted blanket,” Cas corrected, heaving it out of the box. “Twenty pounds.”

“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.” He plucked at the fabric. “This is supposed to help?"

“It’s proven by science.” He nodded at a chair by Dean. “Go, sit.”

Rolling his eyes, Dean sat down and Cas draped the blanket over him. “Fuck.” Dean lifted his arms up under the blanket, then dropped them. “This is actually heavy.”

“Do you feel relaxed?”

“I feel ridiculous.”

“You don’t look it at all,” Cas deadpanned and Dean kicked at him. Cas pulled a brochure out of the box. “Soft cotton filled with poly pellets,” he read. “Alleviate anxiety and increase serotonin.” He studied Dean, eyes squinted. “You still look tense.”

“Sorry, Cas.” Dean shoved the blanket to the floor with a thump. “Think you got duped.”

“You’re not doing it right,” Cas grumbled, picking it up off the ground. “You have to give it a chance.”

“I just gave it a chance.” Standing, he brushed Cas’ hair off his forehead, gave him his best you love me smile. “Now, do you really wanna help me relax?”

Cas studied him for a long moment, then said, “Okay.” He carefully folded the blanket. “We’re keeping this, though. I still think it’ll work.”

Dean made a face behind his back and started to follow him out of the room, but the phone Sam had recently installed in the library for a hunter hotline started ringing. He groaned and Cas hesitated in the doorway.

“Do I have to?” Dean asked him.

“I suppose so,” Cas sighed and set the blanket down on a chair. Turns out the call was from a hunter out near Boise who needed help with a case. Of course, Sam was away visiting Eileen, so he and Cas got stuck spending the next two hours going over the case information, trying to figure out what the monster was. They finally settled on vetala, a whole pack of them, and after instructing the hunter on how to kill them, Dean hung up the phone.

“Fuck,” he swore, rubbing at his eyes. “Who knows how big the pack is. Could be a whole dozen of the freaks.”

“Well, now she knows how to kill them,” Cas said. “And there’s other hunters in the area who can help.”

“Yeah...” Dean fiddled with his pen, tapping it on the open pages of his dad’s journal.

“What’s wrong?” Cas asked.

Dean realized he was frowning. “Nothing.” Flexing his shoulders, he stretched out his back, stiff from poring over books. “Just, three people are already dead. I better be right that it’s a pack of vetala.”

Reaching over, Cas rubbed his back in small circles and Dean leaned back into his hand. “We did all we could, Dean.”

Dean wasn’t so sure that was true. But, short of driving all night out to Boise, he supposed there wasn’t much else they could do. Still, he didn’t like the idea that he might’ve missed a clue, might’ve misled the hunter. He clicked his pen again and again, going over the case in his mind, worst case scenarios—

“Are you going to sleep now?” Cas asked, and Dean glanced at him.

“No.” Dropping the pen, he pushed his chair back and got to his feet. “Don’t think I can now.”

“Would you say you’re feeling stressed? Anxious, perhaps?” Cas deliberately looked to his right and Dean followed his gaze to the weighted blanket folded on a chair.

“Dude, don’t even start.”

“You should use it,” Cas urged. “There’s no shame in feeling anxious, I often feel the same way too.”

“I’ve dealt with worse before, this is nothing new. Just comes with the job.”

Cas sighed. “You put too much on your shoulders.”

Dean shrugged. “Like I said, comes with the job.” If he wasn’t always on edge, he figured he was doing things wrong. Get too comfortable and bad things happened. Just the way it was.

“Still, you can admit you need a break.”

“Jeez, Cas, I’m wounded.” Dean pressed a hand to his chest. “It’s like you don’t even know me.”

Cas rolled his eyes and stood. “Don’t stay up too late.” He seemed to hesitate, fighting against saying more, and Dean said,

“I’m fine, Cas, really.”

“Okay.” Cas didn’t look too convinced, but he kissed Dean goodnight and headed off to their bedroom.

Dean cleaned up the mess of books and papers on the table, turned off the lamps just to do something with his hands. Normally, this is when he’d grab a drink, try to calm his head, but he’d been trying to cut back lately—blame Cas’ concern for his liver—so instead he decided to head to the Dean Cave. Maybe a few episodes of Dr. Sexy would distract himself enough to sleep.

Leaving the room, his eyes fell on the weighted blanket again. Cas and his ridiculous ideas. If Dean hadn’t been sleeping too well lately, that was just the result of living their kind of life. Nothing to do about it. Ignore the stress or end up drowning in it, that was his motto.

(And a horrible coping method, according to Sam and Cas)

Either way, lying under twenty pounds of “cotton and poly pellets” wasn’t going to help. Though the blanket had been really soft, he’d give it that.

He forgot all about it the following day, though, when Sam found a case a few towns over, and Dean and Cas drove over to meet him there. Disturbed gravesites, people disappearing near the cemetery at night. A ghoul, by all signs. A day of morgue visits and interviewing witnesses, then another two days of sitting parked in the cemetery, waiting for the ghoul to emerge again and feed. Dean was almost happy to see the thing when it crawled out of its grave. Almost.

Killing the damn thing hadn’t been too easy. But after inadvertently destroying a few gravestones, nearly falling into an open grave, and narrowly avoiding losing a few limbs, they finally bashed the ghoul’s brains in thoroughly, and split up from the cemetery. Dean went to speak to the latest victim’s mother while Cas and Sam got rid of the remains.

Returning to the bunker first, Dean showered, blood and ghoul remains washing away down the drain. But even the warm water couldn’t ease the jitteriness sitting high in his chest. The ghoul had been strong, fast, and Dean’s heart had leapt into his throat when it got a hold of Sam. Even Cas had struggled to stop the thing, gunshots only serving to anger the son of a bitch more.

Getting out of the shower, he scrubbed himself dry with his towel, inspected a cut along his arm. Not deep enough for stitches. If Sam had avoided a concussion, they were lucky. The ghoul was dead, at least. Left a dozen ruined graves and a few torn apart teenagers in its wake, but dead.

As he changed into clean clothes, he heard the bunker door open. “All good?” he asked, entering the war room to find Sam and Cas setting down their bags.

“If you mean will the trunk always reek like ghoul, then yes,” Sam said. He grimaced as he took off his boots, muddy footprints already leaving a trail down the bunker stairs. Then he glanced at his phone and smiled, said, “Eileen’s calling.”

“Whipped,” Dean mouthed at him as Sam answered his phone, smiling at the screen and walking off down the hallway. “Well,” he told Cas, ”you look like shit.”

Cas gave him his best, I can smite you even without my grace look. “Charming.” He headed off down the hallway towards their bedroom and Dean followed. “How did Mrs. Landis take the news?”

Dean sucked in a breath. “Uh, 'bout how you'd expect, I guess. Told her a bear had gotten to her son, but it was all taken care of now. Not much else to say.”

The mother had sobbed and thanked him. He’d done a piss poor job of comforting her and left with an all-too-familiar sick feeling in his stomach; they hadn’t done enough, they could never save everyone.

“And you?” Cas asked, pulling him from his thoughts. He glanced at Dean as he pushed open the door to their bedroom. “Are you alright?”

Dean started to nod, say fine, but he knew Cas would see straight through the lie. Sitting down on the edge of the bed, he shrugged, dropping his hands into his lap. “Just shook up. Coulda been a bad one.”

Cas nodded as he pulled off his trenchcoat, the edges bloody and muddy. “We’re all safe. You don’t have to torture yourself thinking about what could’ve happened.”

Dean shut his eyes, took a deep breath. “I know.” Easier said than done.

He heard Cas’s footsteps, then felt Cas’ fingers on his cheek and tilted his head into his palm. Breathed in and out. Cas smelled like blood and guts and sweat, not a particularly pleasant combination, but his hand was warm and his other hand was carding through his hair and, shit, that felt nice.

“Go to sleep,” Cas said quietly. “You need rest.”

Dean nodded and Cas kissed the top of his head. He left to take a shower and Dean scrubbed his hands over his face.

Fuck, this hunt had been a close one. Closer than they’d had in a long time.

Dropping his hands, his eyes settled on the weighted blanket that Cas had left folded on the chair at the desk, a silent plea for him to use it. He rolled his eyes. Anxious, his ass.

He started to pull the covers back on the bed, but the thought of lying down with the hunt running on repeat through his head was less than appealing. Cas’ trenchcoat hung bloody on the wall, and Dean clenched his hands into fists to stop them from shaking, adrenaline and nerves still rushing through him.

Alright, maybe a little anxious.

With a glance at the door to convince himself Cas would be in the shower for a little while longer, he grabbed the blanket, brought it to their bed.

Getting under the covers, he draped the blanket over himself and lay down, shifting to get comfortable. Once settled, he stared up at the ceiling and waited for the miracle blanket to work its wonders. How much money had Cas spent on this shit? He really had to hide the credit cards.

He shifted again, the mattress creaking, and dropped back with a huff. Not that he didn’t appreciate Cas trying to help, but a twenty-pound blanket wasn’t what he needed. What he needed was a full night of sleep and a blow job and an all-expenses-paid trip to Cancún. His nose was itchy, his knee was bruised, his back was fucked up from getting thrown against a gravestone, Sam had already found another case in Albuquerque, and, fuck, he was just so damn tired.

Shutting his eyes, he forced himself to breathe through the sensation of his chest tightening. He could feel the blanket rise and fall with every deliberate breath, and he counted like Sam had taught him years ago when he’d woken with a panic attack—breathe in for seven seconds, hold for four, let out for eight.

Don’t think about what could’ve happened. We’re all safe. Cas is safe, Sam is safe. I’m safe.

His heartbeat slowly settled. The blanket’s weight was strangely comforting, warm, trapping him under the covers. Forced to stay still, he felt his limbs slowly relax into the mattress, the tenseness in his shoulders dissipating, his back easing and hands curling loosely along the sheets.

Okay. Shit. Maybe there was something to this weighted blanket thing. His mind grew hazier as his thoughts began to wander, and he found himself drifting off to sleep when the bedroom door creaked open and startled his eyes open.

“You’re using it,” Cas whispered excitedly, standing in the doorway. “Are you relaxed?”

“Fuck off,” Dean told him. He would’ve flipped him off, but that would require lifting his hand out from under the blanket and he was too—dammit, Cas was right—relaxed to move.

“I knew it would be perfect,” Cas said, sounding too triumphant. Shutting the door softly, he got into bed next to him—well, tried to. He shoved at the blanket encroaching on his side of the bed. “Dean, move over.”

“Nope.” Dean shut his eyes again. “Reap what you have sown.”

Grumbling, Cas turned off the light and got under the covers with more rustling and movement than necessary. Finally, he settled down. The bunker hummed, the heating running, the pipes in the walls creaking as a shower turned on down the hallway. The blanket heavy on top of him, Dean began to fall asleep again.

“Are you really gonna keep that on all night?” Cas asked, disturbing the quiet.

“Yup.”

Cas huffed and Dean could only keep up the ruse for a few more seconds before lifting the edge of the blanket. “Come on, get under.”

Sliding over, Cas got underneath, and they laid side by side, pressed against each other. Their fingers brushed, and Dean crooked a finger around Cas’ thumb.

“This is nice,” Cas commented, voice quiet. “I’m glad it’s helping.”

“Mhm.” He was starting to think he should’ve bought one of these things a long time ago. He hadn’t realized how strung out he was before until now, all the tension in his body slipping away.

Cas shifted onto his side and Dean blinked open his eyes to look at him. “I guess I was right all along, wasn’t I?”

“Don’t push it.” He caught Cas’ smile in the dark and elbowed him on principle before shifting over to kiss him. Then he tugged at Cas’ arm and turned onto his side, prompting Cas to press close against his back and wrap an arm around him.

He smiled, eyes falling shut at the warm press of the blanket and Cas’ body around his. Now he was relaxed.

tag list:

@becky-srs @xojo @marvelnaturalock @aelysianmuse @prayedtoyou @letsjustdieeveryone @good-things-do-happen-dean @misha-moose-dean-burger-lover @theninthdutchessofhell @madronasky @famouspsychicpizzabandit @multifandomdisorder @arcticfox007 @improvedpeanut @castiel-is-a-cat @harmonyhelms @thetrueliesofafangirl @dean-you-assbutt-cas-loves-you @theangelwiththewormstache @confusedisaster @welcome-to-crowleys-hellhole @celestialcastiel

let me know if you’d like to be added or removed from the tag list :)

#missed all the drama about the 15x20 script bc i was writing this last night #finale who?#dean and cas are alive and thriving #destiel fic #cw anxiety #expectingtofly writes #fluff

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