A/N: A completely unplanned little thing, but after watching the sit down interview Roman and Dean did with Michael Cole, I couldn't resist doing a little something in relation to it.

"Dean is just...a little off right? You see that I mean..."

Dean scowled as Michael Cole's words flashed through his head again. It had been a few days since that sit down interview, but they were still bothering the shit out of him. He didn't know why he was letting it. It wasn't like this hadn't been happening for ages. Cole, Lawler, JBL - every one of them liked to paint him as some frothing at the mouth nutcase. He usually just ignored it. They were idiots anyway. But sometimes he couldn't shut it out. It was hard to when it was plastered absolutely everywhere. Half his t-shirts had to do with calling him crazy. Fans held up "Ambrose Asylum" signs at every show they went to. The other wrestlers even looked at him that way. They had since his feud with Seth last summer. Maybe he had gone a little off the rails emotionally there, but how could anyone blame him? Seth had taken everything they had built and ripped it all away. Seth had played him and Dean had wanted to make him hurt just half as much as he had been hurting. That didn't make him crazy.

He rubbed his hand across his collarbone, fingers absently tapping against it. He was slouched down in the passenger seat of the car while Roman drove. They were heading to the next town, and hadn't spoken for the past hundred miles. Or maybe Roman had and Dean just hadn't heard him. He was too stuck in his own world to really hear anything but his own thoughts. He tried to shake them off, but Cole's words repeated themselves in his head. The way he had said it...he had just been begging Roman to agree with him. He had been trying to goad Roman into mocking him. Maybe that was the thing that was bothering him the most. The asshole had actually been trying to turn Roman against him too. Roman, one of the only good things he had in his life. His best friend. His partner in crime. His fucking everything. He was pretty much the only one backstage that didn't look at him like he was a bomb that was about to go off. He didn't make fun of him for not being able to stand or sit still for long periods of time. He took the whirlwind that was his emotions in stride. He didn't treat him like an idiot who couldn't form a mildly complex thought. He treated him like a person, not a thing that needed to be locked away.

"Alright, who are you and what did you do with my Dean?" Roman's question was the first thing to finally register in Dean's brain.

"Huh?" Dean blinked and turned to look at him.

"Come on. You haven't said shit in forever. You haven't tried to kill my eardrums with your singing. What gives?"

"I have a beautiful voice mother fucker."

"Maybe compared to Jillian Hall, but I'm living in a world with actual standards."

"Oh fuck you!" Dean reached over and punched him on the arm. "You just wait cocksucker. You think I'm bad now? Wait till I'm bad on purpose. Then you're gonna be real sorry."

Roman grinned, clearly happy to get the threat. The grin didn't last long though, as Dean quickly fell silent again. Roman sighed and took one hand off the wheel so he could reach over and grab Dean's shoulder. "Come on. What is it?"

Dean chewed on his lower lip, contemplating on whether to answer or not. He knew he could tell Roman anything, but he still felt stupid for letting this get to him.

"Dean?" Roman looked ready to pull over so they could have this conversation. Dean needed to just talk. Being stopped on a rather creepy looking highway in the middle of the night was not on his list of shit to do.

"That shit that Cole said...it just...I dunno. It's fucking bothering me." Dean just sort of shrugged, trying to play it off casually. "Like, it's stupid. He's stupid. But like...he just expected you to fucking go along with it. Like everyone else."

Roman's expression darkened. "Yeah. I know he did." Grey eyes blazed as he jaw tightened. "He's lucky I didn't knock his ass out of that chair."

Dean wished he would have. He would have paid good money to see that. "Think he believed you?"

"I don't give a shit if he believed me." Roman gave Dean's shoulder a squeeze. "I care if you believe me."

Dean went quiet again. He wanted to believe it. But his head was still fucked up, leaving him silent. He started to look away when Roman swerved and pulled over on the side of the road. "Ro what -"

Roman took his hand off his shoulder long enough to put the car in park. "Come here."

"No dude, fucking drive." Dean eyed their surroundings nervously. "This is how fucking horror movies start."

"Ain't no horror movie happening on my watch," Roman grunted as he unbuckled his seat belt.

Dean snorted. "That's what they all say. And then they wind up dead and -" The rest of his sentence was silenced by Roman leaning over and kissing him. He immediately responded, lips parting to allow Roman's tongue to slide in his mouth, his fingers grabbing at Roman's shirt and holding him in place. Roman's hands were on either side of his face, keeping his head still as he deepened the kiss. His world started to spin, but it was okay. He couldn't really breathe, but it was still okay. It was Roman, who made shit okay without having to do much of anything. He didn't understand how Roman had that power. He tried to think of a reason, but nothing ever came to him beyond Roman secretly being a witch or something. Which was perfectly okay with him. He didn't judge on that sort of thing.

Roman finally broke the kiss, pulling back just a little bit so he could look Dean in the eyes. "You're just right," he said quietly. "It's like I told him. You're just right to me. You hear me?"

Dean's lips twitched. He would have nodded if Roman's grip on his head wasn't so tight. "Yeah. I hear ya." He reluctantly reached up and moved Roman's hands off of him. "Now get us out of here before we get killed by some asshole with an ax."

Roman rolled his eyes, but moved back into his seat just the same. "Fine. But you best be talking or singing now. No more of this silence bullshit."

Dean smirked. "I think I can handle that."