The last time Cas and I were in a shower together, Cas was wrecked and I couldn't do anything to help him other than just stand there.

      That was over a month ago. It seems like so much time and no time at all has passed. Like we are both five years in the future and five years in the past at the same time.

     Cas has the shower running by the time I step inside the bathroom, has already stripped his pants and is undoing the buttons on his shirt. I stop in the doorway, watching him. Every time I look at Cas it's like seeing him for the first time.

     He makes a show of undressing himself, moving slower. I watch his hands as they fold over each button. His hair was slicked back but now it's loosened so it's starting to fall into his face. I'm looking forward to running shampoo through it, unleashing his curls. I want to tell him to stop wearing it like this. Not because it looks bad. It doesn't. But because I miss his hair. I miss the boy who wore his hair naturally. Because I think he may be more of the boy who wore his hair that way than the boy who wears his hair this way.

     I told Ashley I would say something after Thanksgiving, but I'm feeling the urge to say something now. My arm is hot, pulsing where the wound is. I focus on it because I'm waiting till after Thanksgiving. Because we have a truce.

     His shirt's off now and his chest is clear. Not a bruise in sight. He walks over, says lowly, "You're supposed to be getting undressed." His hands are at the hem of my shirt and he lifts it. I raise my arms into the air, slower on the one that's injured. Cas goes for my jeans next, unbuttoning them. He moves clinically. I wonder what we're doing here. Maybe we really are just showering.

     We're not because after I've stepped out of my bottoms and am standing there naked, I can't help but grab him and pull him to me, kissing him deeply. He puts his hands on my chest, holds them there while he kisses back.

     "No, wait," he says, voice a mumble because our mouths are still close. "We need to shower. You smell like how I imagine Professor Sprout smells."

     "What is with all the Harry Potter references today?" I ask.

     Cas flushes, turning away and moving towards the shower. "I've been rereading the series."

     "Because there are no more books in the world that you haven't read?" I tease, following him into the shower stall. I jump, reaching for the nozzle as I step out from under the water. "Jesus, are you trying to sear your skin?"

     "Hot showers are calming," Cas says. "Also, I'll have you know. Harry Potter is timeless, no matter how problematic JK Rowling is. Separating the art from the artist on this one."

      The water has cooled down a bit. Still hot but I think a good compromise for Cas who apparently likes third degree burns with his showers. I'm almost too fast with the shampoo, grabbing the bottle and squeezing some into my hand before I say, "Turn around."

     Cas hums. "This feels like deja vu." I bring the soap to a lather, massaging his scalp tenderly so that he starts leaning back against me, making sounds that are just short of a purring cat. It feels like Cas carries all his tension in his scalp. "Tip your head back," I say and he does. I smooth the soap down his head, letting the water do the rest.

     "Now you," Cas says opening his eyes. He brushes the water off of his face as he turns around. I turn around for Cas, crouching a bit so he can reach my head. I don't get what Cas seems to get out of it but it's nice having someone wash your hair for you.

     We wash together, lathering each other slowly, a kind of intimacy that isn't sex but could be. All the build up, but none of the release. When all the soap has been washed away, we stand under the water till our skin has pruned. Cas is resting his head on my chest. He's quiet enough that I could be convinced he fell asleep like this.

     Suddenly, he says, "This is nice."

     "Mmm," I murmur in agreement. "We should to go to the bed."

     "To bed or to the bed," Cas whispers.

     "The bed," I say more clearly.

     "That's what I thought you said." He opens the door, and steps out, grabbing a towel. He holds it over his shoulder to me and then grabs the other one. I dry off my hair first, patting down my body. Cas wraps the towel over his shoulders like a cape and cowers in it. "It's freezing out here."

     "Not really. It was just a sauna in there," I say with a laugh.

     Cas takes off out of the bathroom, climbing into bed, towel and all. I follow him out after I've finished drying off. He's sprawled out on the bed, and it's a sight, one that my body can't not respond to. I climb into bed with him, move up his body till I can drop my head and kiss him. He leans upwards, sliding an arm across the back of my shoulders to hold himself up.

     "Cas," I say pulling away. He's looking at me, eyes wide and full of question. "I want to."

     "You do?" he asks.

     "I do."

     He raises an eyebrow. "Can I?"

     I nod. "Yes." I slide onto the bed, lying down beside him. Cas moves over to the edge, sitting up so he can open the drawer on my nightstand and remove lube and a condom. He comes back over, crawling between my legs.

     "I don't," he says quietly, panicky. "I've never."

     "It's the same thing like with yourself," I say reaching out and taking his hand. I lube two of his fingers. "But opposite."

     "Same but opposite is not the same," he says. "That's different."

     "Don't freak out," I tell him.

     "Telling me not to freak out is a sure-fire way to get me to freak out, Dres. And I'm not freaking out, I'm—."

     "Processing?" I ask, amused.

     "I can do this," he says

     "Will it help if I'm not facing you?"

     "I don't know," he says nervously. "Maybe?"

      I pull my legs into my chest so they aren't on either side of Cas and then shift onto my stomach. Cas wraps a hand around my calf and lifts my leg, moving it beside him so he can crawl between my legs again. He's soft as he presses a hand between my thighs, spreading my legs more for him. I hike one knee upwards because the angle helps.

     He plants a kiss at the base of my neck, right where it splits to my shoulders, then trails kisses down my spine. It's a slow thing, a thoughtful thing, giving me goosebumps.

     The first finger he slips in feels like nothing. It isn't anything I'm not used. Not really fucking around for the last five years have left all avenues open in self exploration. Cas is gentler than I am with myself, easing a second finger alongside the first so that its a sweet stretch, slow and precise. He moves gradually, inches his fingers deeper at a pace that makes me push back, lifting my hips off of the bed. We connect like this and the tip of his fingers brushes across this patch inside me that is hypersensitive. My vision flickers, colors bursting along the inside of my eyelids because my eyes are squeezed shut. I groan into the crook of my elbow.

     Cas leans down, hovering over my back. His fingers have slid outwards but not completely. "Is this good?" he asks, whispering into my ear.

      "Uh huh," I say.

     "I'm losing my mind, a little, I think," Cas says lowly.

     "You should fuck me then," I say, sounding destroyed. Because I am. "Before you completely lose it."

      I maybe sound a bit too eager, but I can't repress that now. The idea of Cas inside me feels exactly like the last thing I need. Like the thing that will complete me, bring me back to full circle. Feels like everything in my life has been leading up to this one moment.

     Cas is breathing loudly and its all I can hear. He's removed his fingers and he's moved so that I don't feel any point of contact with him. He says suddenly, "I don't think I can this way."

     I'm on a thin edge here, have to take a deep breath as I respond, "Like this as in?"

     "Can we switch positions?"

     I push myself over onto my back. Cas is wrecked, his chest flushed, the color moving down to the tops of his thighs. He's hard and he's leaking, holding the condom in his hand like it's a lifeline, the thing that's keeping him grounded to this moment. I think he may be the thing keeping me grounded to this moment.

     I sit up, taking the condom from him, opening it before I roll it on. He fucks up into my hand as I do. I know he'll be good at this, he just needs direction.

     "Come here," I say tugging on his arm so he can slide up the bed towards the headboard. "Face me." Cas always takes direction well, moving the way I want him to silently. "How's this?" I say as I climb into his lap.

     He swallows, tipping his head back to look up at me so that his neck is bared to me. I remind myself that we're going to be among all of his family tomorrow. It's the only thing stopping me from marking his neck, making it known that even if he isn't mine, not on paper, he's mine on everything else.

     I cradle his head in my heads, dipping forwards to kiss him. He darts his tongue into my mouth, the sounds he's making vibrating against my teeth. I reach down between us, lining him up before I arch into him and sink down slowly.

     "Oh," Cas says and his eyes get wide. He's peering directly into mine. I hold his gaze as I rock down. He moans, repressing the sound as he bites his lip. I reach behind him for the headboard, holding on as I move.

     Our foreheads are touching and Cas is breathing into my mouth, his lips parted, making a concentrated look on his face. He's too focused. He wants to be perfect. And it is because it's him.

     I kiss him quickly, but he's slow to respond like he's forgotten how kissing works. I smile, sliding my mouth down to his jaw, biting at his skin. I hold back because I really don't want to complicate things with hickeys. Not until I can. Not until I can back up what we're doing with, "Yes, we're together. Yes, we're dating."

     Cas tilts his head, pulling it back enough that I can't get at his neck anymore. He's breathing heavily, his cheeks red. "It's too much," he says. "I'm gonna die."

     I laugh quietly. "Good."

     I pick up my pace, riding him so that he sinks as he deep as he's going to get. He's filling me everywhere. It's a feeling I don't recognize, have never felt before. And Cas is making these sounds, unabashed, these ridiculous moans that I cannot imagine not hearing them for the rest of my life. And that's the kind of thought that strikes low, unexpected that I get this sizzling pain in the back of my throat. I have to close my eyes against it, tipping my head back so I can breathe.

     I don't want this to end. Any of it.

     I want to be here, looking at him, seeing the way his eyes jump with the pleasure, the way he reddens his lips as he bites them.

     Unexpectedly, Cas reaches out, touching my hips, hands sliding down my thighs like this is new territory, a body he doesn't know. He feels his way along my sides to the small of my back before he shifts his hands down and cups my ass, pulling me closer. It's leverage he's looking for and now that he's got it, he thrusts upwards, hitting that spot that makes me see white, grazing it with absolutely no grace, punching noises out of me. I'm panting in sync with his thrusts.

     Maybe this is all I get. All we'll ever have is this, here, the moments that have occurred in this bed, the first and the lasts. I think of that movie, where Rick tells Isa they'll always have Paris. Cas and I will always have Weston's.

     Cas says, "I'm not going to last."

     "Then don't," I barely manage to get out because my breath is choked up in me and I want to tell him something and I can't tell him something.

     Cas clenches his eyes shut and it's not what I want.

     I tip his head up, leaning down so I can lick his bottom lip, then the top, and then the tip of his nose.

     "Cas," I say and he open his eyes, holding my gaze as he finishes, touching a place inside me I don't think I'll ever be able to ignore again. I follow seconds after, absolutely spent that it's a struggle to hold my weight up. I drop my head on his shoulder, trying to get my breath back. Cas rubs circles into my back, his own breath ragged.

     "Do you think we could sleep like this?" he asks, breaking the silence.

     "I think we could try but it'd likely be unsuccessful."

     "But I'm paralyzed."

     I laugh, quietly, and he's laughing, too, the sound muffled in my neck.

     I know that I need to move. But I also need to stay right here a little bit longer.

     Eventually, I slide out of Cas's lap. He whines when I do. I take the condom off of him tenderly, bringing it with me into the bathroom.

     He calls out to me, "Don't think I don't know you're only up because you want to do your skincare. We totally could've slept like this."

     "Not all of us are twenty-five with an endless supply of collagen," I call back as I run the tap water and, rightfully, start prepping for bed.

     "Because you're so old and collagen is becoming scarce," Cas says when I return to the bedroom. He's moved down the bed, commandeering his side. I get in beside him, reaching up to turn the light off on the nightstand.

     Without saying anything, Cas turns on his side and scoots backwards enough that it's not really a question of what he wants. I turn on my side sliding closer so that I can hook my arm over him and across his chest.

     "Can you hear that?" he asks quietly.

     "Hear what?"

     "Me, processing," Cas responds.

     I laugh quietly. "It's not very loud."

     "That's because my brains still scrambled."

     I hesitate before asking, "What are we processing?"

     "Oh, you know, just the casual fact that you've taken both my virginities."

     I make a sound. "You can't have multiple virginities. And, anyway, virginity is a construct."

     Cas scoffs. "For an oldie, you've got very progressive views. Virginities. Firsts. Whatever you want to call it, you've got them. Around Thanksgiving five years ago, too. That's kinda weird."

     I don't know what to say. Cas and I never really talked about it being his first time. It was a quiet thing. I think I always had an idea but virginity is one of those things I just never really bought into the way society wanted us to.

     "You fell asleep," I say suddenly, the events coming to mind like an old photograph, fuzzy at first but the more I focus, the details get sharper.

     He laughs, shaking against my chest. "Oh my god, I remember. I was so nervous and I had that wine. You were such a tease, drew that whole thing out."

     "I wanted it to be good," I say, defending myself though my tone is light.

     "It was," he says. "Its always good." He clears his throat and then says quietly, "It's not like this with other people."

     "No?" I say and regret it immediately. It's an ego question, makes me feel like I'm fishing.

     Cas shakes his head. "You — is it for you?"

     When I don't answer, Cas turns over, his eyes darting along my face. I say finally, "There aren't other people."

     He raises an eyebrow. "There haven't been?" I shake my head. Cas goes, "You should've sent the letters."

     I reach out, touching his chin. "I know."