once & done: destiel one shots

Cas and Sam are assholes

Summary: Dean's convinced the bunker is haunted (again), Cas can't manage to stay in bed for more than two hours, and Dean's coming down with a cold. Great.

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It starts around four in the morning: a distinct scratching sound from the vicinity of the closet. Not nails-on-a-chalkboard type scratching—it's not grating—just an impatient scritch scritch scritch, kinda like the way it sounds when he's itching his own scalp, only louder.

The scratches come in sets of three. At first, Dean thinks he imagined it—one of those freaky dreams that follows you out like an STD—but there it is again (scritch scritch scritch) and again a few seconds later. He's been woken up by countless weird noises over the years, hazard of the job, and he's ready to write this one off as a tree branch on the roof or an animal on the other side of his motel door, when he remembers that they're underground, buffered by a gauntlet of enchantments. It's not possible that what he's hearing is something off the standard nighttime soundtrack. He pushes up on an elbow and squints into the dark, listening.

Nothing. Maybe something just got into the HVAC system and is rattling around. He rolls over to ask Cas if he heard anything, but dude's outta bed already. He doesn't sleep more than a couple hours a night, then grinds his eyes open with coffee and is generally bitchy until he's sucked down three cups. After that, he's just petulant. Freaking dork. Sammy's talked about upgrading to an espresso machine, so Dean mentioned thatsomeone needs to upgrade his damned bedtime. He stretches into Cas's half of the bed. The sheets are cold; he's been up for a while.

The noise, whatever it was, has stopped. Dean yawns and rubs at his face and wonders if he's hearing things.

A rattle signals the door opening. It creaks closed under its own weight as Cas climbs back into bed, fits himself along Dean's side, and sighs contentedly. Dean fists Cas's shirt, mouths the hollow of his throat. He nudges his head between Cas's neck and shoulder and leaves it there.

Cas smells good, sleepy and warm, and maybe this qualifies as cuddling, but Dean's decided that's permitted before 8am. Besides, Cas has never been big on personal space, and these sessions usually end with orgasms, anyway.

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The noise is back a few hours later, when it's properly morning and Dean's actually considering getting up. It's definitely scratching, but now there's another layer to it, like someone dashing back and forth across a room. The origin has moved, sounds more like it's coming from inside the wall than the closet, and Dean considers the pain in the balls it'd be to get an exterminator in here. The pattern is too regular to be ambient household noise, but it's not Cas and it's definitely not Sam—doesn't sound heavy enough. Maybe Sammy's just got his TV turned up loud.

Cas is already back out of bed, earlier than usual—he likes to be there when Dean wakes up—which leaves Dean's cell phone as his only witness. He's not sure the sound's loud enough for his phone's mic to pick it up. He fumbles it and presses his thumb to the red record button anyway, shoves the phone at Sammy across the breakfast table.

"What is this?" Sam asks, one eye open to a slit, mouth sealed around his coffee.

"Shut up and listen," Dean orders and wonders how much rock salt they've got on hand.

Sam looks unimpressed. "I don't hear anything," he says.

Dean sighs and sets the phone down and goes to make toast. Cas shows his feathers a few minutes later, freshly showered and stony faced, just in time to hear Sam say, "So get this" and ramble about a suspicious death about an hour outside Omaha. Cas falls into the chair next to Dean and gropes a coffee mug.