Archive of Our Own

Dean scraped the last of the lasagne onto Sam’s plate, leaving the dried-up residue in its dish to clean later. He glanced up, wiping his hands together before sucking tomato paste off a thumb. “Hey, Cas,” he said, seeing the other man drag his feet into the bunker’s main hall.

“Hello,” Castiel said, eyes down. He moved sheepishly, but Dean didn’t think much of it; Castiel had been sheepish to the max ever since he’d fallen from Heaven.

Dean suffered a double-take, however, when he realised why Castiel was acting sheepish. “Are those my pyjamas?”

Sam sniffed and looked up from the book he was reading, fork poised mid-air, lasagne temporarily forgotten. “Huh.”

Dean narrowed his eyes as Castiel came forward, hands clasped around his upper arms, shuffling his bare feet on the slick marble. His torso was covered by one of Dean’s tight white workout shirts, and on his lower half, he wore a pair of Dean’s blue striped jammies. The tassels swayed and caught on each other, and Dean gulped, quickly looking away from Castiel’s crotch.

“I had a shower,” Castiel said, tiredly. “I needed something to put on afterwards.”

“What happened to the clothes we bought you?” Sam asked, chewing his food.

“I forgot to bring them into the bathroom.”

Dean scraped his chair back and sat opposite his brother, sticking a fork into his lasagne bowl with one hand, and with the other, he shoved the unclaimed bowl down the table so Castiel would sit to eat. Kevin sat quietly to read beside Sam, ignoring everything, including his lasagne.

“What were Dean’s pyjamas doing in the bathroom?” Sam asked, squinting.

“I left them there,” Dean said, gaze set on his food so he didn’t have to make eye contact.

Sam was still giving Dean a discerning look, Dean could tell without seeing it. “You wear pyjamas?”

Dean scoffed. “Well, I figure I’m too old to sleep naked. Only on special occasions.”

“Yeah,” Sam said, slowly, “but you - I don’t know. On hunts, you crash in your regular clothes.”

Dean shrugged, picking at the top layer of his lasagne with a fork prong. Nice and crispy, he was proud of himself for doing it right first time.

“So, what,” Sam went on, “you’re into bedspreads and comforters now, is that it?”

Dean’s nostrils flared, because yeah, actually, he was. And he didn’t much like the laughing tone in Sam’s voice.

Dean was in the midst of scouring for a response, when he noticed that Castiel hadn’t sat down yet, and his arms were still folded up over his chest. He peered down at the table long enough that Dean put his fork aside to properly look at him.

“What’s up with you, Cas?” Dean asked, trying to translate the frown on Castiel’s face into something specific that he could deal with systematically.

“Nothing,” Castiel bit out.

Dean gave Cas another once-over, taking in exactly how tight that t-shirt was on him. He had more muscle than Dean himself, and that was saying something. And not only that; every time Dean saw Castiel wearing anything less than a full suit-and-trenchcoat combo, it surprised him. Seeing him in such a state of undress was no less unsettling now, but Dean couldn’t deny it to himself: he liked it.

“You not want any lasagne?” Dean tried, poking the bowl a bit closer to Castiel. The ceramic clanked on the wood of the table, dislodging the fork that rested on its rim.

“I do,” Castiel said, expression softening. “It... smells nice.”

Dean smiled. Cas was still getting used to this whole sensory input thing. Humans were so sensitive, apparently. Things hurt, and things felt nice, and Castiel was new to it all. Dean was still curious as to what Cas had been feeling prior to his fall. What would it have felt like to have a gouge in the side of his ribs and not feel it?

“Then sit,” Dean said, standing up and rolling his eyes as he pulled back the nearest chair for Cas. Kevin glanced up, pulled his giant book closer to himself, and only then noticed his meal steaming in front of him. Without a word, he dug in.

“I don’t want to sit.”

Dean stood holding the back of the chair, feeling a bit stupid just waiting. “Why?”

Castiel’s eyes flickered up, met Dean’s, then fell away again, staring at the empty baking dish. “I cut myself shaving.”

Dean immediately glanced across Castiel’s stubbled jaw, looking for a cut, before he registered that firstly, Castiel had not shaved his face today, and secondly, a cut on his face would not prevent him from sitting down, and that led to his third thought: what the hell was he shaving?!

Dean’s eye drew down, and he couldn’t help that his gaze landed on Castiel’s groin for the second time in two minutes. He kind of froze with his eyes there, because his brain shut off, and he was just staring, and thinking - but at the same time, not really thinking at all.

Crotch.

Castiel was looking at him, and the moment Dean noticed that, Dean looked back at him, pretending he didn’t have the start of a blush on his neck or his cheeks or a fluttery feeling in his chest, or a dry mouth, and possibly even the beginnings of a faint erection.

Castiel stared back at Dean with bland words in his eyes: Yes, Dean, I shaved my crotch.

Dean gaped on nothing slowly turning his head. “S-oooo...”

“It won’t stop bleeding,” Castiel said at last, turning his head away, tightening his crossed arms.

Sam made a noise, and Dean swerved around to glare at him. He felt like Sam had no place in this conversation, despite him sitting right there.

Sam wore a background smirk, meeting Dean’s eyes before looking over to Castiel. “Have you dressed it?”

Dean chuckled. “Oh, sure, get the first aid kit and call the medic, the angel had a razor mishap.”

“Dean.” Castiel shot him a cold stare. With his jaw set, he turned to Sam. “I used bathroom tissue. Where is the... first aid kit?”

If that wasn’t a shit-eating grin on Sam’s face, Dean figured he might have to redefine his definition of a shit-eating grin. For that matter, he barely knew what its proper definition was. It sounded gross, and he sneered, but less about the phrase than because Sam stood up to go and fetch the kit.

Kevin pushed his empty bowl away and lifted his book up to cover his face, so he was no longer part of this situation in any way at all.

Castiel walked with a shuffle.

Dean followed, abandoning his food. He wasn’t really thinking about why he was following, but it was probably something to do with the fact that Castiel shaved his frickin’ balls and now he was bleeding. Dean wasn’t sure if protective instinct covered this sort of thing. Sure, he could roll with that. He was protective of Castiel’s bollocks, to some degree.

Dean was smiling, and he didn’t feel like stopping.

“Here,” Sam said, putting a green plastic box in Castiel’s hands. “There’s gauze and scissors and tape and things. Maybe a band-aid wouldn’t be... um.”

Sam wafted a dismissive hand, giving Dean a ‘you deal with this’ face. Then he left, leaving a wake of silence behind him.

Castiel stood in the kitchen beside Dean, holding the box, looking at the pot in which Dean had concocted his homemade pasta sauce.

“Well?” Dean said, tucking his hands into his jeans pockets.

Castiel hummed and looked at the box. “I should do this in private.”

Dean smirked, mind inundated with the image of Castiel dropping his drawers right here in the kitchen and showing Dean his battle wound. He sobered at the very second he felt a pang of longing, both in his pants and in his chest.

He parted his lips to speak, but Castiel was already passing him by. He smelled like Dean’s soap, and Dean even detected his own scent, because it was all over the pyjamas he’d slept in.

Maybe he was imagining that. But it was a nice thought, his scent being all over Cas.

He sighed, rolling his hands into fists, clenching them before letting them go and moving to return to his lunch.

His eye tracked Castiel’s figure as he climbed the giant spiral staircase at the side of the hall, green box swinging from a hand, legs shifting uncomfortably as he ascended.

Dean sat down, grabbing his fork with more force than was necessary.

“So?” Sam said.

“So what,” Dean responded, cramming an entire pasta layer into his mouth, cracking it, causing half to topple back into his bowl. It was only lukewarm now.

Sam didn’t seem to have any pertinent addition, so he shrugged. Dean glanced at him, gritting his teeth as he saw Sam staring back, like he was waiting for Dean to confess.

Dean shook his head and started eating with renewed purpose, actually working on putting food into his mouth this time. He wasn’t going to tell Sam anything, not about how tingly seeing Cas in his clothes made him feel, nor that he really, really wanted to know more about how and why Castiel was shaving his privates.

Nor would he tell Sam about the pyjamas.

Kevin finished his giant tome, and picked up another one. Dean had learned early on not to disturb him with anything other than food if he wanted to see results. Right now he wasn’t sure what Kevin was working on, but it might be related to the situation where they currently had Crowley under lock and key in their dungeon.

They had a dungeon. God, Dean was never getting over that.

Sam finished his food and started clearing the table, clattering his bowl on top of Kevin’s, then hovering his hand near Dean while he scooped up the last of the mince and consumed it. Once done, he passed Sam his bowl, flattening his lips in silent thanks as Sam carried everything back to the kitchen. He would wash everything up, because Dean had cooked. It was technically Cas’ turn to do the washing, but he was... indisposed.

Dean fluttered his eyes closed, and as he digested his food, he digested the thoughts he’d been tamping down on all through his meal.

Cas was good with an angel blade - he was good with knives of all sorts, for that matter. He could chop onions without shedding a tear, and Dean would swear on his life that that was a leftover angel thing. Dean couldn’t chop onions without pouring a miniature Niagara Falls out of his eyes, and, to be perfectly honest, onions made kitchen time into a good excuse to deal with all his unhappy feelings. Nobody could tell if some of the onion tears were sad tears.

His thoughts rounded on their track and returned to the station: Cas was good with knives, so he ought to have been good with a razor, too. For fuck’s sake, if he could carve a perfect angel-banishing sigil on his goddamn chest with a goddamn X-Acto knife then he could keep a good control over a cheap Wilkinson.

Dean licked his lips, checking that Kevin was still bookworming away before he indulged a subsequent thought: Cas. Cas with his legs apart and his head ducked down, a frown on his face as the hot water of the shower cascaded around him, drooling off his elbows and down his legs. Concentration on his face, looking carefully at his genitals. Shaving them.

Dean frowned and gave a silent gasp at once, shifting in his seat. His thoughts and his particular enjoyment of said thoughts was either arousing or deeply concerning for him. Quite possibly both.

Definitely both.

He wasn’t ready to deal with this shit yet. Sure, he knew perfectly well that Cas was a) the best and worst thing that ever happened to him, b) hot as hell. His reasoning for b) was, in fact, a). If Dean wasn’t fully aware how much he felt for the little shit, he wouldn’t find him so hot. It was when Cas made him laugh and simultaneously want to kill him that created the desire to fuck him.

That was what Dean kept telling himself, in any case.

He knew it was all bullshit. He’d sat down some time ago and considered everything that was howling like a prairie dog in his head, and the conclusion he came to was that the fact he was in love with Cas had nothing to do with the fact he sometimes liked men. But he wasn’t returning to that thought any time soon, even though it was there, even though it was part of him.

Awareness of the attraction bothered him as much as it made him feel more comfortable.

Humans weren’t just sensitive. They were complicated, and it was really fucking nasty to be one.

As much as having been a vampire that one time had made Dean nauseous, it had given him a clarity that humans had mastered millennia ago: primary instinct, the instinct to feed oneself. Humans had evolved past that, began wanting other things - houses, regular jobs, children, gourmet food, a day off once in a while where nobody had to kill any demons, maybe watch some TV and whack off to a screencap of Dr. Sexy taking his boots off.

Uh.

But, yes, instinct.

Dean had liked that part of being a vampire. Knowing what he wanted.

Right now he knew he wanted things, knew he wanted Cas, but in what way or what capacity, he had no idea. It would take him months, maybe years, to figure it out. A lot had happened in the five years he’d known Cas, a lot had changed. And there was still so much more to find out, both about Cas, and about himself.

Living here in this bunker had provided some clarity to those discoveries: Dean liked pyjamas. He liked going to sleep wearing something specifically designed for sleeping in. The only other items he owned that he specifically used for the purpose they were made for were his guns and his car. Respectively, for killing things, and for driving away when it was time to move on.

This bunker was where they drove back to. Every time.

Dean smiled, because the thought of having a home? Yeah, that made him feel good. Not just having a home in existence, but actually going back to it, having a place―

“Dean?”

Dean looked up at the same time as Kevin did. Castiel’s voice bounced off the bookshelves and the far-away wall sconces, and Dean looked around to see where he was.

“Up here,” Castiel called. Dean looked up, seeing Castiel poking his head out of his bedroom door, off the open-sided hallway at the top of the stairs.

“Hey, buddy, what’s up?”

Castiel pulled back a little, practically hiding behind his door. He emerged again, licking his lips. “I need some help.”

Dean grinned, amused. “Yeah, right.”

Castiel pulled the door open some more. “Really.”

Dean’s grin quirked. “C’mon, man,” he projected, tossing his voice across the massive hall. “You’re a grown man, you can figure out how to use a bit of gauze tape.”

Castiel’s dull expression was visible even from where Dean sat. He stayed quiet.

Dean kicked his foot, sinking back into his chair to stare at Castiel.

“Dean,” Castiel said, after a long moment. There was no insistence or tone in the name, he just... said it.

Dean felt inclined to go to him, a feeling that had nothing to do with the supposition that Castiel might even be naked behind that door.

“Please,” Castiel said.

Dean stood up. He glanced at Kevin, who was giving him a purse-lipped look, like he knew everything Dean had been thinking about recently.

“What?” Dean shrugged, traipsing away from the table. “He asked nicely.”

Kevin bit his cheek and pretended to return to his book. Even when Dean turned and trotted up the stairs, he could feel Kevin’s eyes on his back.

Dean puffed a breath as he reached the top landing. Castiel’s head was resting on the door frame, blue eyes looking at Dean in a slow way.

“So what’s up?” Dean asked, sauntering to stand where a doormat would be, if Castiel had had a doormat. Dean ought to get him a doormat. Or something homely. Maybe a hanging basket of flowers. Maybe just flowers.

Castiel ducked behind the door, then opened it. Dean entered, hand on the door handle as he turned to close it behind him.

Castiel’s room was laid out exactly the same as Dean’s was, sans the decorations. Double bed on the left, tatty-looking chest of drawers on the right, no windows. His bedspread was folded back, save the place where he’d flattened it down to sit on the foot of it. The first-aid kit was open, gauze trailing out of it like it had tried to roll away.

Castiel was still dressed, holding onto his - Dean’s - pyjama bottoms, tassels curled around nervous fingers. Dean had never known Castiel to be nervous, not enough to fiddle.

Castiel stood at the foot of the bed, looking at Dean with quiet pleading in his eyes. “It still won’t stop bleeding.”

Dean opened his mouth, then closed it, before opening it again to ask, “Seriously, man, did you pad it with something?”

“I did.” Castiel looked down, pulling the pants forward off his front and peering at himself. Dean rushed with sensation at seeing that, a reaction he could not and never would explain. “But it’s still bleeding.”

Dean sighed. Cas was new to this, Dean had to remind himself of that. He’d never had a papercut before, or a bruised knee, or any physical injury that poured blood and didn’t heal upon a thought.

Dean couldn’t ask to see this one, though, and he couldn’t dress it himself, given the place it was situated. He was stuck instead saying, “All right, uh, have you wiped the area down? Put pressure on it, it’ll stop eventually.”

He shrugged when Castiel nodded noncommittally. “There’s a first aid manual in that box,” Dean added, gesturing to the doorstop of pages tucked underneath the whiskey flask. “You oughta read up, given you can’t do the instant heal-all forehead pokes any more.”

“Yes,” Castiel said. “I will.”

“All right then,” Dean said, putting his hands in his pockets and rocking on the balls of his feet; the heels of his boots never left the carpet.

“Dean,” Castiel said again.

Dean liked how often Castiel said his name.

“What,” Dean said.

“I can’t reach it,” Castiel said.

Dean licked his lips. “Uh.”

Castiel swallowed. “It... It’s there and I can feel it, and it stings, and it bleeds on my fingers when I touch it, but I can’t work out where it is exactly.”

This was wigging Dean out to the extreme. Some part of him was like, get the fuck out of this room before you do something you regret, and the rest of him was all, you are not going to sleep tonight.

“Try a mirror,” Dean said.

Castiel met his eye and held it. “I don’t have a mirror small enough.”

“Put your leg up on the sink or something.”

“It hurts when I move my legs.”

“So climb on a chair.”

“Dean.”

“Cas.”

Castiel’s jaw tightened, and Dean considered that if he was going to leave, he’d better do it right now, because he knew the question Castiel was about to ask before he asked it.

“Dean, would you look at it for me?”

Too late.

Dean’s heart was in his throat, as were all his sensible words, as he replied, “Uh. Sh- Sure. Okay.” He nodded, gulping. “Whatever.”

Not a big deal. Not a big deal. Not a big deal. He was just a friend and Dean was just a guy looking at another guy’s bleeding injury, nothing big-dealish about this at all.

Bullcrap.

Oh-fuck-he’s-taking-off-his-clothes.

Castiel only pulled down the pyjamas to his hip, fingers lifting the low hem of the tight white shirt, revealing the smart V of his hips. Dean wanted to lick them, and fuck, he wanted those drawstrings to slip lower.

Dean stared at where Castiel held tight, not moving any further. His eyes shot back to Castiel’s face, seeing him soft-eyed, lips parted only in the centre of his straight-lined mouth.

“Perhaps I should sit,” Castiel murmured, breaking eye contact and looking around himself before slowly and gingerly lowering himself to the foot of the bed. He screwed up his face in discomfort, tightening lines around his droopy puppydog eyes.

Dean stepped forward, fingertips rubbing against each other inside the pockets of his jeans.

The two of them had been through Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, and all the worst parts of Earth together, both in the past and future, and somehow, the here-and-now between them involved Dean standing there denying to himself that he was half-hard because Castiel was bleeding in his naughty place.

This was not happening.

Except it was.

Castiel spread his legs a little way, and his muscular thighs strained creases into the thin blue cotton at the seams. Dean hadn’t said a word about Cas borrowing his clothes without asking, but that was because he liked it so much. If he was enjoying this any less, he’d draw attention to the fact, but as of yet he couldn’t find a single thing wrong with this picture.

But then, he found it.

“Holy crap, Cas―” Dean lurched forward, falling to his knees to take the band of the pyjamas from Castiel’s hand, tugging it outward. “Shit, how the hell did you get it so bad?”

Castiel shrugged, like the pooling smears of blood that had run down his thigh and left dark red stains on the cotton were trivial, and not nearly as life-threatening as they looked.

Padded gauze and tape had been used to stick cotton wool all over everything, and Dean couldn’t tell where the injury was located, let alone how bad it really was. The blood was everywhere, and on everything. He reprimanded himself for being so concerned about the pert little bulge of Castiel’s crotch that he’d completely missed the red streaks and scarlet flowers that were blooming through Castiel’s tighty-whiteys.

“Fuck. Take these off,” Dean said, tapping the sides of Castiel’s hips with his fingers, indicating his underwear. “Not - uh, just.... Not too much. Enough for me to see what’s happening under there, not - not so I see everything. I don’t need to―”

“It’s okay, Dean,” Castiel cut over him. “You don’t require a full display.” He was smiling that twinkly-eyed smile of his. Dean grinned as he leaned sideways, moving so Cas had enough room to wiggle his underwear down, legs straightening.

Dean tried not to look, he really did. If Cas asked, he was assessing the damage. Blood drew the eye, as he well knew. But so did penises. Or, at least, they drew Dean’s eye.

And oh god, he was on his knees. He was on his knees in Castiel’s bedroom and Cas was stripping and Dean was almost hard and he felt want―

Castiel’s hands hovered over his member, hiding it from Dean, even though the pyjamas still covered it. Dean saw Castiel set his lower lip under his teeth, subtly batting his lashes as he actually, properly blushed.

This was literally happening.

Dean was not processing this at full speed.

“Uh-huh,” Dean breathed out, shuffling forward on his knees, wetting his lips, eyes down. “Okay, let’s see.”

“M-maybe I should have a doctor look at it instead,” Castiel whispered.

Dean paused with his hands on the band of Castiel’s loosened underwear. He looked up. “Yeah. Yeah―” he moved his hands away, “we can do that.”

He was not disappointed. Not even a little. Nope.

“Dean―”

Dean paused for a second time, waiting for Castiel to speak.

Cas shook his head, not quite meeting Dean’s eyes. “I was an angel of the Lord,” he said, flatly, and somewhat sarcastically. “I had no need for a doctor.”

Dean scoffed. Cas was stalling, and that translated as an invitation to continue. Dean smiled. “Yeah. But you’re not, now.”

He peered at the fresh drip of blood that darkened a spot on the bed cover. “Dude, you’re falling apart. How much did you skim off?”

Castiel shrugged, and Dean moved forward to put his fingers inside his underwear.

Castiel’s breath hitched as Dean’s fingertips slid down, pressing minute pale dents into the skin of his hip that faded instantly. Oh, he was sleek, and warm, and that desire to lick hadn’t gone away.

Cas hadn’t been kidding about the shaving thing, either. His happy trail was nonexistent, and Dean’s fingers could feel the tiny barely-there stubble on his skin. It seemed raw, and Dean considered that if Jimmy never shaved down there, then this was Castiel’s first time.

First... time...

Fuck.

Dean pulled the cloth down far enough that the base of Castiel’s penis became visible. It was fat and dark, and Dean wanted to touch it. But he couldn’t. He wasn’t even supposed to be looking at it.

Lips shivering, Dean followed the smear of wet blood, pulling away muslin gauze and toilet paper as he traced the injury.

Castiel’s scrotum was wrinkled and soft - and covered in a layer of blood, but that seemed secondary to everything else Dean saw and felt. He could smell it, too. He could smell the blood, and he could smell Castiel’s genitals. Musky. Mouth-wateringly male.

Dean was so fucking hard in his jeans that it hurt. He hadn’t even been touched, and being thirty-something, that was quite a feat. They did say the brain was the most powerful sex organ, but he’d never believed it more than he would have believed it now, had he been thinking about anything other than Cas-cock-blood.

“Here,” Dean said, letting out a caught breath. He lifted Castiel’s scrotum up, saggy and hot in his cupped fingers. “Here, it’s behind here.”

He poked it with a gentle fingertip, and Castiel gasped. “Sorry,” Dean grimaced. “Gotta hurt, huh.”

“Yes,” Castiel whispered.

Dean tucked his lower lip between his teeth, frowning as he lowered his head, attempting to find the exact location of the cut. He could mostly tell where the warm red liquid was oozing from, but either it was a cataclysmically terrible injury, or it was just bleeding a lot more than it should.

“Maybe,” Dean started. “Maybe it’s not clotting because you’re a new human?”

Castiel leaned back a short way, resting on his hands. “Maybe I’m sick.”

Dean grinned, shaking his head. “You’re not sick.” He tugged the remaining blood-soaked padding out of Castiel’s underwear and tossed it to the carpet, still feeling around between Castiel’s legs.

Castiel’s legs splayed as he squirmed, and Dean didn’t miss the moment his eyes fell shut, head tipping back.

Castiel whimpered, hips juddering, one of his thighs lifting slowly before setting back down. He got ahold of himself and leaned forward again, one hand grasping tightly to his hairy thigh. Dean glanced up from the ball sack in his hand to see Castiel looking down at him, dark-eyed.

“Hurt?” Dean asked.

Castiel swallowed hard. He let out a shaky breath, and Dean avoided the thought that he looked aroused. He couldn’t be aroused, he was bleeding. Dean was playing doctor, and he wasn’t in any position to give Cas head. Figuratively, that is.

“Yes, it does hurt,” Castiel said, quietly.

“Hold still, and just relax. I’ve got you.”

Castiel nodded, and swallowed again. Dean watched his Adam’s apple bob. Then he looked down, returning his focus to the redness that was making his fingers slick. Castiel adjusted his position, thrusting a hand under one thigh to hold it up so Dean could see under him.

Dean gulped hard enough that he made his ears pop. He could see Castiel’s perineum now, the valley of crinkled skin hairless above the tops of his thighs. Blood made thin patches here and there, ingrained between his parted legs.

Dean forced his attention on the blood alone, blocking out the sensations of Castiel’s twitching skin, the slide of it, the way his balls dangled on the back of Dean’s hand. So soft.

He found the cut at last, fingers coming away dark red, a line of thick blood trailing his once-pale fingers. “Gotcha,” he muttered. “It’s just a tiny nick behind your balls.”

He blushed. God, what the fuck was he even doing right now? Sam must never know about this. Ever.

“Thank you, Dean,” Castiel sighed, starting to lower his thigh.

“Whoa,” Dean snapped, grabbing Castiel’s leg before he squashed Dean’s hand under it. “You’re not gonna let me dress it?”

“I know where it is now, I can do it.”

Dean mouthed on nothing for a moment. So... this wasn’t some excuse to let him get intimate with his best friend? Finding the cut was really all he was here to do?

That disappointment returned in leaps and bounds as Dean began to remove his hands.

“Although,” Castiel said, “since you’re already here―”

“Yeah,” Dean chirped. “I mean, I’m right here, and I’m already covered in blood, and I can see what I’m doing and all. It’s easy, man. I’ll tape you up.” He raised a smile, pleased that Castiel returned one the same.

“Thank you.”

“Thank me when I’m done,” Dean replied, grabbing for the first aid kit and pulling out a moist towelette to wipe the blood from his hands.

“All right, lean back again,” he said, poking splayed fingers at Castiel’s hip. “I’ll clean you up first.”

Castiel sighed as he spread his legs once more, hand under one thigh. As Dean began to stroke away the slippery patches of copper-scented blood, his mind touched on how alike this was to a parent wiping their baby clean. Except Cas wasn’t a baby, no matter how freshly-human he was. He liked to act clueless, but Dean saw through it. Cas was millenia old, and he knew plenty.

Castiel’s cock twitched.

Dean didn’t look up, no way. He kept wiping without pause, fingers dipping into the crevasse behind Cas’ scrotum. He pretended nothing happened.

Castiel’s cock, however, had other ideas.

Dean held his breath as out of the corner of his eye, he saw Castiel’s penis lifting from its place against his other thigh. It had been perky enough before, but right now, it was defying gravity. The blue cloth of the pyjamas he wore clung to it, so Dean couldn’t see the detail, but it was hard to miss the obvious rise, the shape puffing up like one of those inflatable water floats.

Castiel screwed a hand in the pyjama cloth, his breath shaking. He was trying to hide this development, but Dean had already seen it, and given the size and girth and monumental obviousness of it, it was beyond too late.

“It’s okay,” Dean said, eyes still on the second towelette he’d used, still wiping at the lines of blood between Castiel’s legs. He just felt like he needed to say something, either to himself or to Cas, perhaps both. “It’s okay, it’s natural.”

Castiel gave a short, trembling laugh. “Yeah.”

Dean nodded. “Don’t worry about it.” That boner wasn’t for him, anyway. It wasn’t like Dean’s erection, hard because Cas was in front of him. Castiel’s boner was just because of the touching; reactive.

Both of them were in the same room, both with an erection - and despite how awesome that should have been, Dean felt sad. This wasn’t the right time, not for him, not for Cas. While this was sensual, it had no right to become sexual. Dean didn’t want to ruin whatever they had between them.

Castiel shifted, tugging at the thin blue cloth. As Dean tossed the towelette to the floor and went to get fresh gauze and cotton wool, Castiel removed his hand from in front of his crotch.

Dean looked at the rise, seeing how it strained at the pyjamas. The picture seemed either comical or artistic, but given there was nothing to be done about it, he let out a breath and ignored it.

He set a puff of cotton wool to the cut to absorb the blood that had escaped since he’d cleaned it up. He grinned, nosing towards Castiel’s erection, then glancing up to meet his guilty eyes. “At least it gets it out of the way, right? More room to work?”

Castiel smiled carefully. “Yes.”

Dean smiled back, trying to reassure him.

Castiel blinked a few times, watching Dean sit there, putting pressure on the softest skin he’d ever touched in his life. Even the shade of fine bristles did nothing to dull quite how velveteen Castiel’s balls felt on his fingers.

“So, uh,” Dean began, glancing at the cotton before grabbing some more, ready to stick it down, “what were you even doing, shaving all... this?” He fluttered a hand at Castiel’s groin, then grabbed the gauze tape.

“I... I heard,” Castiel said, apparently struggling to find words. “I read somewhere. That hairless genitals are somehow more appealing.”

“Uh-huh,” Dean smirked, chucking away the cotton balls because they’d already turned red. “It’s a personal preference thing. Me,” he shrugged, “I like my ladies however they like themselves.”

Castiel blinked. “What about you?”

“What about me what?”

“Do you shave?”

Dean’s brain fritzed for a second, then gave him a laugh to fill the sudden silence. “Wow. Personal question much?”

Castiel squinted.

Dean shook his head, beaming. “I ain’t telling.”

Castiel inclined his head, accepting that response.

Well, Dean thought, it wasn’t so much withholding as it was something for him to know and for Cas to find out.

The bleeding had slowed, but it certainly wasn’t going to heal very well. “Hold this,” Dean instructed, taking Castiel’s hand and guiding it to press the fresh cotton in place, while Dean reached for the gauze tape again and pulled out an appropriate amount, breaking it with his teeth.

“So, about this so-called ‘appeal’,” Dean muttered, briefly catching Castiel’s eye as he fingered the sticky side of the tape. “You do realise that nobody’s gonna see your junk but you, right?”

Castiel lifted a shoulder. Unabashedly, he corrected, “I think the article in question was intended for a more personable audience. Those with partners.”

Dean’s heart leapt as Castiel met his eye to add, “Sexual partners, I mean.”

Dean nodded hastily, fiddling with the tape some more, trying to edge around the pyjamas as well as Castiel's hands and his perfectly firm erection to tape down the new padding. “But who’re you gonna, um.” He secured the cotton wool, letting Castiel withdraw his fingers. The dressing wouldn’t hold, nor would be it be painless to pull off, nor would it remain undrenched for long. It was pretty pathetic, really. “Um. Who did you want to impress?”

“Nobody,” Castiel sighed, shifting his hips to adjust to the new attachment.

“Hm.” Dean looked over the white dressing, then used that as a pretence as his eyes grazed the bead of pre-come that was sitting at the top of Castiel’s cock, darkening one blue stripe of the pyjamas. Simply seeing it there made Dean achey in ways he’d never really known before. He had great mental and physical restraint, he’d give himself that much.

“But,” Castiel said.

Dean lingered, not quite prepared to stand up yet, not least because Castiel would see his boner.

Castiel pressed his lips together, then looked at his crotch. Then he looked at Dean. “Do you like it?”

Dean’s mouth slowly fell open.

Did Cas really just ask him if he liked his genitals?

No matter which way Dean cut those cards, that was what the question came down to. Cas... was asking... if Dean... liked his junk.

A breath tumbled out of Dean. There was no possible way he would answer that question dishonestly.

So he looked Castiel in the eye, then he blatantly looked at his shaved skin, then his thick, straining cock, in all its accidental and reactive twitchy glory. He smiled, because yeah, he liked it, and he wasn’t breathing because he was too excited, and he was soaring with near-enough nirvanic sensation because Cas had let him look.

He met Castiel’s eye and, very slowly, he nodded.

Castiel seemed to deflate. He closed his eyes, and Dean felt everything halt in that moment, because right then, Castiel moved his hand, fingers curling on the bunched-up pyjamas, and he pulled them down completely.

His cock was - well, it was a cock. It looked like the pictures on the internet that Dean pretended he wasn’t looking at when he was. It was a darker, fuller colour than Castiel’s chest, pinker towards the tip, with wrinkled skin like a hood around its head. The slit through the tip was longer and wider than Dean’s own, and a few faint veins stood out down its whole fat length.

And oh, was it thick. Dean wanted to ride that fucking thing. He crumbled inside at that thought, because he’d never once, ever, had such a strong inclination to actually do so.

His hand was reaching out to touch before he could stop it; he moved on instinct, the instinct to satisfy his need. He wanted to pull back as much as he wanted to keep reaching, and this moment came so slowly to him - he couldn’t be sure if he was moving slowly or his brain was processing every sensation and thought slower than it ought to.

When his fingertips were around the middle of the hot, plush member, awareness of what he was doing caught up, flooding into him all at once.

And, the thing was, even though he could see his hand tentatively touching what was in front of him, having been offered it - he took what he was given, but in an equal amount, he did not take.

He pulled the length up and down a few times with his fingers, not grasping it fully, watching how the thin layer of skin shifted on the meat of it, almost covering over the head.

His thumb felt the ridge under that skin, the hard edge that was most sensitive part on himself. This had to feel good for Cas, it was his first time being touched like this. Dean hoped he was doing it right.

Castiel breathed out on a whimper. Hearing that sound of enjoyment broke the spell, and Dean pulled away.

He did not take.

“You―” Dean stumbled to his feet, legs shaking. “You sh- should probably, uh, change that gauze and stuff, in... in a bit. Um.” He gulped hard, tossing a hand over his shoulder and rubbing at the back of his head until he remembered he was covered in blood and stopped immediately. He pointed at the door, taking a backward step towards it. “I’m gonna.”

Castiel covered himself up, swallowing twice before breaking his lips apart and grating out an affirming, “Yes. Yes, of course. Thank you.”

“Thank you―”

“For helping me,” Castiel said, eyes down, grappling with his pyjamas to hide his arousal properly. “And for―”

“Yeah,” Dean breathed. He put his hand on the door handle, nodding. “Yeah, it’s all good. It’s cool. Like... yeah. Thanks.”

Thanks for letting Dean touch another man’s cock for the first time, for not letting it be a bad experience. For letting him leave before he went too far, too soon. Thanks for being around when he wanted to try this. Thanks for everything.

Dean pulled the door open, stepping halfway out into the hall. He paused, hearing Castiel call, “Dean...”

Dean met his eye across the room, and Castiel’s shoulders slumped. “If you ever... need...”

Dean nodded. He knew.

Castiel smiled, and leaned back on his hands. Dean’s eyes lingered for a few seconds, taking in how Castiel looked right now: relaxed, clean, fully dressed - but naked underneath those clothes. Wearing Dean’s clothes. Erect. Screw it being about the touches - that boner was all for Dean.

Dean smiled at Castiel, nodding a final time. He flushed with warmth as Castiel smiled back, and then Dean closed the door between them.

Dean stood alone in the place where the doormat should be.

Hell, he thought. Cas is gonna need that dressing changed.

He was totally up for that.