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Dean knew he didn't have a lot to offer.
He was a recovering alcoholic with complex PTSD and a shit ton of daddy issues which he'd taken out on his own pseudo-kid. He was angry and selfish and destructive. He had a mom he loved but didn't like, a brother he'd pushed away time and time again, a dog that stayed with him only because it didn't know any better, didn't know him.
And he had Cas.
Inexplicably, somehow he had Cas.
Cas who though he was kind and brave. Cas who thought he was the blueprint of humanity and everything it should be loved for. Cas who fought wars and killed his family for one measly little mud-monkey. Cas who loved him.
So, no, he didn't have a lot to offer. No, he couldn't do big, fancy promises, couldn't even make the most basic ones, but he had Cas and Cas absolutely had him, warts and all.
He'd been Cas's from the very beginning. He'd never known what it was like to not belong from the second Cas walked into that barn and declared himself an angel of the Lord.
Most of his life he'd spent drunk and lonely and pissed off, drifting. He was his dad's boy in the same way that a wing is its bird's, beating and fighting and working, a limb, an extension, not a thing in its own right, not unless the bird is dead.
And then Cas appeared.
He was a different kind of bird's wing for a while, an angel's wing, all the angels' wing. And then he drifted again — no, not drifted. He was tugged. He was tugged and pulled kicking and screaming into a warm and loving embrace and he knew not how to stop fighting, not even for a second, so he kept abusing the wings that enveloped him, punching and tearing away feathers, until he was so tired that all he could do was stop and accept and learn how to be a fully fledged bird of his own.
Not a wing but an equal. Someone who shared a nest.
Maybe none of that made any sense, maybe he was crazy, but that was how he felt.
"There's one problem with your analogy," Cas said, smiling in a way that meant he was only teasing. "I'm not a bird."
Dean wrinkled his nose, shifting so that he could look at Cas from where they both lay on their bed. "Sure you are. You've got wings."
"Bees have wings," Cas replied. "They're not birds."
"Yeah but you have feathers and shit. Bird."
Cas rolled his eyes. "I cannot even begin to describe all the things wrong with that sentence but I'll start with the fact that I don't have feathers."
Dean pulled a face. "Sure you do. I've seen them."
Cas shook his head. "What you've seen is an approximation of my true form, an adaptation designed so as not to burn your eyes out. In reality, I have six wings and none of them have feathers. They are made of grace and truth and the blood of infinite warriors."
Dean was slightly in awe, as he always was when Cas talked about his true form, the one that was bigger or about as big as the Chrysler Building. He was immeasurably disappointed that he would never be able to see it, except perhaps in death. He'd have liked to see all of Cas's eyes, kiss his many heads, touch his many wings. It was a cruel twist of fate that he couldn't.
Incredibly unfair, really.
"Besides," Cas continued, "you have an unbelievable amount to give, Dean. You give like you have nothing to lose by it. I've never known a man so selfless."
"Yadda, yadda, most loving man on Earth," Dean said. "Yeah, I heard your speech the first time, buddy."
"Then why do you still act as though you didn't listen? Do I have to sacrifice myself again and make a whole other speech—"
"Don't you dare," Dean interrupted. "No more sacrificing."
"Really? Because your self worth is looking like it's being 'hung out to dry'."
He did the air quotes and Dean grinned.
"You're such a dork," he said.
Cas frowned. "A dork is also the term for a whale's penis."
"I love it when you talk dirty to me."
Cas grabbed the pillow underneath his head and threw it at Dean's face. Dean caught it and hugged it to his chest, laughing.
"I mean it when I say you're more than worthy of love," Cas said seriously. "You say you can't offer me a lot but you've offered me more than I ever thought possible."
"That's your lack of self worth talking," Dean pointed out. "'The one thing I want is the one thing I know I can't have'. Bullshit."
"I thought I knew."
"You didn't think. I was clearly like an imprinted duckling around you."
"You're really leaning into this bird analogy when I've already told you I'm not a bird, and neither are you for that matter."
Dean grinned. "I could be. I could have been hiding it from you."
"Dean, I rebuilt you atom by atom. I have known you for twelve years. I have fought by your side for what have been the best years of my immortal life. I know you. I know you as the brash, gold-hearted, saint of an annoying man that you are. You're not a duck."
"That might be one of the most romantic things anyone's ever said to me."
"Your bar is in hell."
"Literally. Rowena's playing limbo with it right now."
"I don't appreciate your jokes right now."
"You love my jokes. You love me."
Cas's smile softened even further. "I do."
"Yeah, yeah, I love you too, you sap."
Dean would never tire of saying that. Hearing it was amazing, otherworldly, really, but saying it was a million times better because he got to see the crinkles in Cas's face and the gum behind his teeth and the laughter in his throat.
He got to feel the love radiating off Cas, the joy.
It was wonderful.
"There might not be a lot I can offer you, Cas," Dean said, hushing the angel's protests, "but I can offer you whatever I can give forever."
"Not a lot," Cas repeated, almost incredulously, "just forever? As if that's nothing?"
Dean leaned forward and kissed Cas gently. Maybe it was nothing in the grand scheme of things. Maybe there would be opportunities to give more, to be more, but now, in the quiet of their room, smiling at each other and so sickeningly in love that Dean could barely breathe, it was all he could think to offer.
"Not a lot," Dean said back. "Just forever."