When God gave him permission to marry Castiel, Dean wasn't entirely sure what he'd been expecting. It had become abundantly clear from the start that one of those romantic Hallmark-moment proposals was never going to happen, and every time he went ahead and tried anyways ended in disaster.

Though he would never admit it, the thought of giving up had crossed his mind. Not permanently, of course, but it had occurred to him that maybe with all the crap going on in the world, now probably wasn't the best time for a wedding. Luckily, these moments of doubt would only last a couple hours at the most, and then he would be back to his planning.

As coincidence would have it, when the moment finally came, all Dean's meticulous planning went right out the window. Crowley had sent some of his demon mooks to pay Cas and the Winchesters a visit, but in their excitement at having been chosen for such an important job, the demons had forgotten why they were sent in the first place. One thing led to another, and the demons decided their best course of action was to attack.

Big mistake on their part.

The demons weren't much of a challenge, but the cramped alleyway made things a bit more difficult than they should have been. After the first few demons caught Ruby's knife through their throats, most of the others were smart enough to run. The last one, however, somehow managed to get the sword out from Cas' hand and quickly drove it through the angel's shoulder.

Dean looked up just in time to see the bright flash of light, and he felt his stomach drop like a stone. His heart pounded frantically as he tugged Ruby's knife from the corpse in front of him, then made a beeline for where Cas lay. "Sammy, get the car!" he shouted. The demon was dead, without a doubt. In Dean's experience, anything that had its facial orifices reduced to smoking craters was usually dead. Cas, he noted with a sigh of relief, was still very much alive despite being shishkabobed with his own blade. Wrapping his fingers around the blade protruding from Cas' shoulder, he asked softly, "Cas, you okay?"

"Ow," Cas replied dully, and Dean couldn't help grinning.

"Don't do that," Dean said with a relieved laugh, quickly tugging the blade out and tossing it to the ground. "You're scaring the years off of me. I'm gonna get gray hair! My balls're gonna be hanging down to my knees before I'm forty! Do you really want that on your conscience, Cas?"

Though Cas hadn't quite mastered the fine art of rolling his eyes, he made a concerned effort. "I'm so sorry," he said, voice dripping in sarcasm. "I just find the sensation of being stabbed with my own blade so pleasurable; I don't think I can stop."

Dean had intended to reply with a witty comment about scheduling an intervention, followed by an S&M joke, but what actually came out of his mouth was completely different. "Marry me," he said simply.

For a moment, Cas looked confused. "What?"

"You heard me," Dean said, feeling the anxiety from the past weeks melting away the more he spoke, and he quickly fumbled for the ring in his pocket. "Castiel, will you marry me?"

Cas' mouth hung open slightly. "Are you serious, Dean?" he asked, glancing sidelong at the slowly-healing hole in his shoulder.

"Look at me and tell me I'm not serious."

With a long-suffering sigh, and still half-expecting a punchline in all of it, Cas looked into Dean's eyes, and then past them into his mind. All the usual things were there—pies of all flavors, thousands of sigils and wards, an unidentifiable 80's rock song playing in the distance, what looked like photos of his mother, father and Sam littering the floor, and a stripper in a cowgirl hat with a pistol stuffed into her bikini top.

All of them were dripping with blood, but that was to be expected. Things always got a bit… messy in Dean's mind after a fight. What Cas hadn't expected, however, was the echoing voice. Dean's voice, specifically.

Our Father who… ain't in Heaven…

I'm not done with this douchebag yet. He needs to give me some sort of sign!

I just... wanna make him happy, you know?

You're not gonna smite me if I ask Cas to marry me?

"I don't understand," Cas said after a minute, and Dean's face fell.

"What's not to understand?" he asked, feeling the panic rise in his throat. "I'm trying to say that I lo—"

Cas shook his head. "That's not what I'm talking about," he said. "You spoke to God."

"Huh?" Dean blinked. "Well, yeah, kinda," he admitted. "Not like I actually heard his voice or anything. Or at least, I hope I didn't. How bad would that be if God sounded like Nicki Minaj?"

"Who?" Cas asked, looking even more confused than before.

"No one, never mind. What were you getting at?"

Cas frowned. "You called God a douchebag."

Dean winced. He'd forgotten about that. "Well, to be fair, God called me a stupid hoe, so I think we're even. Besides," he continued. "I apologized for that. I just… you know. I thought getting your dad's permission before asking to marry you was… I dunno. Romantic? Or something like that."

"But he answered you," Cas said, a note of awe evident in his voice.

"Yeah, he did. So whaddya say, Cas?" he repeated. "Will you marry me?"

Cas tilted his head slightly. "Of course I will," he said, as though nothing could be more obvious. "But what else did—"

"Shhh," Dean interrupted, shushing Cas by pressing two fingers to his lips. "Don't spoil the moment."

Cas made an irritated noise in the back of his throat. "I will have more questions for you later, Dean."

"Yeah, I bet you will." Before Cas could say anything else, Dean grabbed him by the nape of his neck and pulled him into a kiss.