Falling Leaves and Other Things
Suptober 2021 day 7: young at heart
Also on AO3
Castiel may miss a lot of things, but he didn’t miss this.
The way Dean looked at the pile of leaves outside the witness’s house. Wistfully. Fondly. He didn’t miss the tiny headshake, or the way Dean dropped into his standard dour face as he strolled past.
He may miss a lot of things, but he knows Dean. He knows Dean’s childhood wasn’t typical, and that he didn’t get to do a lot of the things most children get to do.
Like jump in a giant pile of multi-colored, bone-dry leaves.
Maybe it was time to start rectifying certain wrongs.
~
“You can’t be serious, Cas. It’s 3 am. I’m going to bed. I don’t care if there’s a hoard of naked faeries in the woods. I need sleep.”
Dean bent over, reaching for the laces on his boots.
Cas extended a hand to stop him. As if that ever worked. “Don’t.” It worked. Cas breathed out a very angelic sigh. “It’ll be worth it. I promise.”
Dean looked up at him with a squint, the angle highlighting the lines of his jaw and cheekbones. Cas tamped down on the feelings such beauty often stirred in him.
“Naked nymphs?” Dean ventured.
Cas sighed. “There will be no nudity.”
Dean stood up, his back popping as he stretched. “That’s a shame. Nudity improves everything.” He grabbed his jacket off the back of the chair.
Cas resisted a second sigh. He should be used to Dean’s hedonistic ways by now, and the obsession with naked, lewd, hedonistic women. But he wasn’t. It grated. Every single time. So perhaps he sounded a little annoyed when he said, “I suppose I could strip if that’s what you really want.”
Dean stumbled on his way to the door. Cas couldn’t see his face. Oh, how he wished he could see Dean’s face. Dean wore every emotion, every thought, in the lines of his eyes and tilt of his lips.
Perhaps Cas would never know what had caused Dean to hesitate, for they continued to the exit without another word.
~
“That’s a big pile of leaves,” Dean finally said. He’d been staring at the pile Cas had spent the evening raking together, deep in the forest behind the bunker. Cas’d had no idea a pile of leaves could render one so mute.
“Is it not big enough?” He absolutely did not shuffle his feet anxiously.
“For what? A bonfire? Ritual sacrifice?”
“To jump in.”
Moonlight cascaded over Dean’s cheekbones and kissed his eyelashes as he blinked. “You can’t be serious.”
“That’s the second time you’ve said that to me tonight. How often have you known me to not be serious?”
“Good point.” Dean shook his head. “I’m in my 40s, Cas. I’d probably break my back jumping into that.”
“Fortunately, you have a guardian angel watching over you.” This was going to take more convincing than he’d anticipated. He stepped forward and put a hand on Dean’s arm. “I know you want to. I’m the only one who’ll ever know. Have fun, Dean. You deserve it.”
Dean stared into his eyes for an uncomfortably long beat. But it was more than Cas would ever get, so he refused to break the gaze.
It ended when Dean’s focus slid to Cas’s hand on his arm. “Alright, but only on one condition.”
“What’s that?”
“You first.”
Cas was an angel. He was fast. He’ll never understand how Dean can move faster than him. One moment he was having a conversation with a friend, and the next he was tumbling like a tree branch into a mountain of leaves.
Laughter filled the air and warmed Cas’s heart. He righted himself just in time to see Dean jump, knees tucked under, and land with a strangely satisfying leafy crunch next to him.
Cas chuckled. Dean grabbed a handful of leaves and tossed them in his face, so Cas retaliated in kind, and pretty soon they were ruffling through the pile, throwing leaves, and giggling like children. It was a fight no one cared about winning, a dance no one was watching.
Is this what fun felt like?
He reached for another hunk, and suddenly Dean’s hand was on that wrist, holding it back. Cas turned, ready to ask a question he hadn’t formed yet, but Dean was right there, right in his face, looking intense and full of…
Cas’s gasp was swallowed by lips.
The leaves trickled out of his fingers.
He was frozen, stunned, scared.
He was…
Letting Dean think he didn’t want this.
With a growl, he wrenched his wrist free and grasped Dean by the back of the head, angling the kiss into something deeper.
He had no idea how long the kiss lasted, because however long it was, it wasn’t long enough.
Dean rested his forehead against Cas’s own as he caught his breath. “Been wanting to do that for a long time.”
Huh. So maybe Cas couldn’t read everything in Dean’s face. “I had no idea.”
“So this wasn’t a sexy midnight seduction?” Dean asked, voice teasing.
“It’s not midnight.”
Dean laughed and kissed him again. “Now,” he said when they broke apart. “Someone promised me they would get naked.”
Cas grinned.
Yes, this was definitely what fun was supposed to feel like.
Fun, and something more, something bigger, too.
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