The Soul Burns Brighter Than The Sun

Chapter 7: Soul Talk

SMUT WARNING!!!!!

Dean doesn't usually wake slowly. Usually it's violent, gasping awake as he wrenches himself from a nightmare, seeing someone he couldn't save, black ooze, or Alasitair's rack. Sometimes, memories of when he was a demon come back, and Dean sees himself killing a civilian with a face he can't remember seeing before.

He feels warm, and his bedsheets tangle around him like soft, pillowy hugs around his legs and midriff. Despite how much he drank last night, Dean feels fine, no headache, and no alcohol sewer in his mouth. In fact, as he lets himself drift in the morning sleepiness, he feels comfortable enough to sleep in, something he doesn't usually do.

Reflexively, he holds on tighter to the pillow pressed against him, and screws his eyes shut against the sun streaming through the window. His bed smells nice, like cinnamon and linen sheets, maybe Tide or Downy laundry detergent. There's something foreign in the smell, and Dean breathes deeply, it's electric, like if static was something you could smell.

He opens his eyes slowly, blinking away the sleep, and seeing a lump of fuzzy black hair under his chin. He blinks again. That lump is Cas wrapped tightly around him, leg slung over Dean's, thick arms holding tightly to Dean's waist, his hands cradling his back– under his shirt.

Dean is immediately awake, and his heart begins racing as he takes stock of the very prominent thing pressed against Dean's thigh. Cas breathes against him, still fast asleep where his head rests on Dean's bicep. He's pressed so close to Dean's chest that through his shirt, Dean feels Cas's lips, his breath sliding across the cotton and giving Dean goosebumps on his skin.

Dean really should move. He really should. He knows that. It's just that Cas doesn't ever look so peaceful, so quiet and content, that Dean doesn't have the heart to shove him off, to make some joke, and never speak about it ever again.

Dean tries to slow his breathing so he doesn't disturb Cas, and his own exhale ruffles Cas's hair a bit. Cas sleeps, and Dean watches him breathe. He should really move, he knows that, but Cas looks... rather beautiful while he's sleeping, like something a pretentious guy in the 1400s would've carved or sculpted.

He always gave Cas shit for doing exactly this, for watching over Dean while he slept. In the early days of the Apocalypse, Dean would wake, and Cas would be standing there over him, staring, staring, staring. Although Dean made fun of him, calling it a fetish he had, he never really believed Cas was creeping on him at the time. He still doesn't think that Cas has a creepy bone in his body, it was likely a fascination with humanity that made Cas like to watch him sleep.

But now that the roles are reversed, Dean's watching over his friend while the angel rests, he kinda... gets it now. Cas doesn't sleep, and Dean can count on a single hand all the times he's seen his buddy passed out. Even now, Cas has to try to sleep in order to. Apparently, his soul allows for a few extra hours of shut eye every once and a while.

Dean weighs his options. He doesn't know what time it is, and he can't move for fear of waking Cas and having to explain, No, no, man, I wasn't just cuddled up next to you all night I was just–just– yeah, that's not an option.

He hears the ticking of a clock, but it's not in a location where he could easily turn his head to read, so he's doomed to listen to it and wonder if Sam's going to barge in on them any time to tell them they've slept in. Sam wouldn't get it either, he'd think there was something rated R going on, that this is something it isn't. After all, they were watching a movie last night, and just happened to fall asleep. Innocent mistake, really. It could happen to anyone. They've fallen asleep watching movies before in the Dean Cave-, sure, they've never woken up like this, but still. Easy misstep.