Here With You | ✔

CHAPTER THREE; part one

February 2020 (pre-covid)

Dresden Gibson

     "Let's go away one weekend," I say to Cas over dinner. He looks tired, and he's doing paperwork on his laptop as he spoons soup into his mouth. It's February, and it's frigid, so soup. Cas doesn't always work at dinner — actually he really never works at dinner — but he brings work home a lot. He says he's got to do it either way, and he can stay at work or have eye candy while he does his charts. I'm eye candy, evidently.

      He's rubbing at his eyebrow, which means he's about to get a headache. "Cas," I say, and he looks over at me like he's just now hearing me. "What do you think? A weekend away?"

      "A weekend away where and when?" he asks as he pushes his glasses up his nose.

     "In two weeks," I answer evenly. "I know a place."

      "You know a place? That sounds like a ditch the body place."

      "You got me," I deadpan. "Drag you to the middle of nowhere and bury you where nobody would ever think to look."

     "Have you learned nothing from our How to Get Away with Murder binge? You need to burn my body. No body, no crime." He rolls his eyes over-dramatically and then glances back at his computer. "It has been so freaking busy in the ER lately. I am in desperate need of a break. I will literally put my PTO in now. What days?"

     I aim for casual when I answer, "Thirteenth to the sixteenth."

      "Thirteenth to theeee," Cas repeats as he clicks at his computer. "Wait a minute. Wait a gosh darn minute. That is Valentine's Day weekend."

      "Oh, is that Valentine's Day? I had no idea," I say.

      Cas pins me down with a questioning stare. "What are you planning?"

      I shrug noncommittally. "I'm not planning anything."

      I've started walking away and flinch at the screech of the bar stool grating against the floor as Cas hops to his feet. He runs over, tackling me from behind so that I nearly go down. "What is this?" I call out, leveraging myself with a hand on the back of the couch.

      Cas has his arms flung over my shoulders and the weight of him is on my back. "Tell me what you're planning," he demands.

      "I'm not planning anything," I respond calmly. "You're going to bring us down if you don't stop squirming."

     He reaches across my chest and pinches my nipple through my shirt. He's careful because of the piercing but it still hurts. "Ow, Cas, what are you doing?"

      "Tell me," he whines. "This is so unfair. I literally never see your surprises coming."

      "That's the point of a surprise, isn't it?" I ask.

      "Tell me what the surprise is," he repeats.

      "There isn't a surprise. I just want to go away with you."

      "To an undisclosed location. On Valentine's Day. Right."

      "Well, yeah it sounds suspect when you say it like that — can you please stop pinching my nipple now?"

      Cas laughs into my ear but doesn't stop. "Why? Is it turning you on?"

      "You got me," I muse taking a few steps forward before I turn and dump Cas onto the couch. I slump beside him and he wastes no time sliding his head into my lap, looking up at me.