A/N: First of all, I'm sorry for the long update. I have a busy life and that kinda got in the way. My apologies. Ironically enough, this was the first chapter I ever wrote for this story, but I decided to save it for later. You'll see why.

Second, this is also doubling as my FroggyClan writing contest entry for our Fluff competition.

In truth, Castiel had always wanted to hear these words, but now, when he did, they didn't seem right at all.

Dean had been drinking again. Cas could smell it, as soon as he teleported into the room. The slightly acrid, cloying scent of booze mixed with sweat filled the air. Dean lay sprawled on the couch, head buried in the crook of his arm, fingers tightly wrapped around a bottle of beer.

"Dean?" the angel asked, touching Dean's shoulder warily.

Dean's head lifted, and his eyes were clouded and distant. For a moment, Dean didn't register that Cas was even there. When he did, his face broke into a large smile and he murmured, "Cas…." with the elation and simpleness of someone who was very, very drunk.

"Dean, what happened?" Cas asked him, gently. Dean drank a lot, on a regular basis. Which meant that it took a lot of alcohol for him to even feel tipsy. Of course, if he was this drunk… something was wrong, something had caused him to bury himself in alcohol.

Dean sighed. He snuggled deeper into the couch, and let his eyes flutter closed. "I drank too much," he slurred tiredly. "Go 'way, Cas."

With a rustling of fabric, Cas sat on the couch near Dean's feet. Dean didn't say a word, but Cas was okay with that. Dean would spill, eventually.

Cas was right.

"It's just… today's my birthday, and I wasn't- wasn't feeling like partyin'." Dean sighed again, much more soulfully than the first time. He seemed to take comfort from Cas's presence, solid and warm and there.

"Today's your birthday?" Cas repeated. He didn't really understand the idea behind birthdays, but he understood that they were marked days and celebrated by humans.

"Yep. January 24th, 1979." Dean seemed disappointed, somehow, although of what, Cas couldn't know.

"Happy birthday," Cas said, only slightly dryly. Dean was drunk, very drunk. He wouldn't notice.

He may have not noticed the sarcasm, but there was obviously something on his mind. He sat up, dropping the empty beer bottle unceremoniously onto the ground.

"Hey, Cas?" Dean started. His eyes cleared a little, but they were still the same vacant, cloudy green as before.

"Mmm?"

"Can I ask you something?"

"Yes?"

"Have you ever… loved anyone? I mean, like, how Sam loved Jess or like… you know, how married people love each other?" Dean's eyes were wide, he was sincere. Drunk or not, he apparently really wanted to know.

"I don't think so, Dean," Cas answered. "I mean, I haven't- I've- I've never loved anyone, not really." I've never loved anyone but you, he thought, but held his tongue. Someday, someday he would tell Dean, but not today. Not today, when Dean looked as though he was barely keeping himself up, when it was his birthday and he was so drunk he didn't realize what he was saying.

"I did, once," Dean said. "I mean, yeah, Lisa, but I didn't- like, I wouldn't have gotten married. She was like, a really close friend. But when I was, I dunno, around 24, there was this girl named Cassie."

Cas didn't know about Cassie. Didn't know anything about her, and he was intrigued, and maybe a little bit hopeful. The only girl Dean ever truly loved had a name very similar to his own, apparently.

"She was beautiful, and really smart, and she was funny and witty and absolutely perfect. But I told her about the family business and she left me." He grinned a little, a small, rueful smile. "Prob'ly wouldn't have worked out anyway. But still, she was the first person, not family, I ever loved."

"Do you still love her?" Cas asked. Because that smile said he'd gotten over it, but his words, his words said otherwise.

"Not anymore," Dean said, with a frown directed at Cas.

The frown confused him. Why, what had caused it?

Dean quieted down for a second. "I really, really want to hate you, you know, Cas?"

Huh. Odd subject change. But Dean, being Dean, needed no explanation. "I really do. You keep trying to do the right thing, and that's great, but people die when you do and that's not so great. And you always, always leave me. Every damn time. You always come back but I know someday you won't and that scares the shit out of me." Dean looked down, at his lap, at his hands folded in front of him.

Cas, for one, didn't really know what that meant. He suspected, but… "Why?" he asked, gently, softly, scooting close enough to Dean so that he could smell the alcohol coming off his breath.

Dean didn't seem bothered by the breaching of his personal space. "Because, you asshole, I love you."

And if Cas had gone into this conversation expecting anything, this sure as hell wasn't it. His mouth opened, in shock, and he said, "W-what?"

Dean looked at him, looked at him sideways, with an expression that was surprised. Apparently, the fact that Cas hadn't known came as a shock to Dean. "Yeah, I thought- I thought you'd figured it out. I thought you kept leaving me because you didn't- didn't-" Then, his eyes, those stupid, beautiful eyes, filled with tears and Dean said, "But you kept coming back and let me hope, and then you did something, with Meg or April and I told myself there was no point in trying but then you would do something or say something and I let myself hope… Stupid. Can you believe it?" He stared up at his angel, eyes wide.

Cas's heart thumped in his chest. Dean, the Righteous Man... could it be that Cas's feelings were reciprocated after all?

"Dean, I-" Cas began, trying to offer some sort of explanation, but Dean cut him off.

"No. That's okay. You don't need to explain yourself to me. I mean, look, I'm just some high school dropout that can't even handle the emotional stress of his own fucking birthday."

"No, Dean, listen-"

"Cas, don't." Dean slumped back down onto the couch, hiding his face from the angel. "Please, just leave me alone."

Cas relented, for a few minutes. He did not leave, but he didn't speak either, and eventually, Dean's breathing evened out and Cas was sure he had fallen asleep.

It was that action, the darkness in the room and Dean's closed eyes, that gave Cas the courage to do what he did next. Dean's face was turned away from him, a pained expression on his face, but Cas elected to ignore that for the time being and gently, chastely, he pressed a kiss into Dean's slack lips. He tasted like beer and blood, but Cas didn't regret the action at all.

"I love you too," Cas explained, in a low, gravelly whisper he hadn't really intended anyone to hear. "You idiot."

When he looked at Dean's closed eyes, he found instead green, green eyes meeting his own. They were wide, surprised, and almost painfully tentative and hopeful. "Really?" Dean asked, not even bothering to conceal the desperation in his voice.

Cas couldn't help it. He smiled, then laid one hand on Dean's shoulder, on the skin where the handprint scar he'd left so long ago used to be. "Really."