why he, a harmless necessary cat
Title: why he, a harmless necessary cat
Wordcount: 800w
Summary: Sam and Dean compromise by getting a cat.
A/N: de_nugis, you are great. title from The Merchant of Venice, ignoring all context. And I feel honored to once again have collaborated with lightthesparks (art at the bottom!)
"Fine. If you're not willing to settle down, you're getting me a cat."
Dean gripped the steering wheel, gearing up for a fight. But then he made the tragic mistake of looking over at Sam, really looking at how Sam's mouth was all screwed up, and when he looked back at the road he felt a mirroring tug at his mouth. And then he looked back long enough to catch the series of disappointed looks Sam was casting at every house in suburbia as they cruised by, and Dean had a flash of them renting a house on fake credit. He could easily picture coffee in the morning and Sam wandering around in a towel. But it would mean them grounded in place, and he felt his stomach drop out at the thought, back onto the road, the car's wheels skidding over it so that it spun off into a ditch somewhere.
"Whatever," was all he ended up saying aloud.
Sam snorted and rested his head against the window, looking approximately fourteen years old. Dean wanted to give him absolutely everything. It was a problem.
After three blocks of silence, he smacked the steering wheel softly and looked in the rearview mirror and looked at the rain on the windshield and finally said, "Fine. We'll get you a damn cat. As long as it doesn't scratch up the upholstery. And we're still hunting, that doesn't change."
"Fine," Sam said, frowning.
Dean glared over at him, meanly like he'd won, because he had. "Fine."
The first thing Lucifer did was tear up the upholstery in the back seat. Dean heard the scratch-ripping sound as they were leaving town.
"What'd I tell you?" he said, car swerving through a yellow light. "Hold on to him!"
Sam shrugged, entirely unmoved. "I've been holding him all day. He needs his space."
"Sam."
"Dean."
"Cat, get up here," Dean said, reaching an arm back.
"Think he killed all his victims with his mind?" Sam asked a couple days later around a mouthful of spinach, looking over a case file.
"Mm," Dean said. He was enjoying the best grilled cheese of his life. Fried onions were cascading out of it onto the sandwich wrapper. "He's totally telekinetic," he said. "You saw what he did with the lamppost thing. So yeah, he probably killed them with his mind."
"Cool," Sam said. He paused. "I mean not cool that- you know what I mean."
He tugged a paper out from under the cat who was currently rolling around on the table between them, rumpling everything. Sam opened up a can of tuna and put it on the windowsill and then the cat was off like a flash.
"Hey," Dean asked. "How come he gets to eat tuna and shit?"
Sam went back to reading. "Dude, would you want to eat cat food?"
Dean shrugged. "Fair point."
"I don't get it," Dean said two weeks later, rubbing his forearms dry with a towel and watching Sam splash water over the motel sink to clean off the rugaru blood.
"Get what?"
"It's just one more thing to try to keep alive."
"Dean," Sam said.
A month after he had idled by the register while Sam squinted into cat cages at the pound, Dean woke up to yellow eyes, an inch from his face.
"AALKJFGLKSGHLKJDHGDF," he said, and tried to roll away but there were claws digging into his chest. He experienced a moment of excruciating pain that threw him back to every monster that had tried to drag him to hell, and then the hellhounds that had eventually succeeded, before he realized it was obviously the cat kneading into his chest.
But it was too late. Sam was on his bed, clamping a hand over his mouth so that Dean stopped yelling like he was being murdered at 3AM in the grungiest motel they'd ever stayed in. Dean struggled to sit up, feeling betrayed by the cat and pissed about being woken up when he'd been having a nice dream about Sam in bed with him, even if, yeah, the little fucker had gotten Sam into bed with him technically, but-
"Don't freak him out," Sam said, prying the cat off of Dean, unhooking each sharp claw from the front of Dean's t-shirt.
Dean glared. "Gee, thanks, Sam."
"I was talking to the cat," Sam said, draping Lucifer over his leg and giving it a scratch under the chin.
"Oh," Dean said. Sam looked adorable and sleep rumpled in his white t-shirt and Dean's boxers, and Dean's pulse was slowing, Sam this close and warm in the middle of the night. He felt too tired and still caught in a dream to resist rolling his eyes when Sam smiled at him.
He thought about whether or not he had grounds to remain annoyed, thought maybe he didn't. Finally, he reached out a hand to pet the cat, too.
