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Chris stopped in the doorway. Light spilled around him from the hall, casting him in silhouette and illuminating Dean sprawled across their bed. Even though Dean now had a key to the house, Chris was still astonished and gratified that Dean felt comfortable enough to spend the night after he got out of work and before Chris got home.
Dean rolled over, grimacing at the light.
“’Smorning yet?” he mumbled.
“More or less. I just got off-shift.” Chris loosened his tie, shutting the door behind him. Pale gold light filtered through the curtains, heralding the start of day.
“Busy night?” Dean asked, sounding tired, but more alert.
“Not very. I slept some.” Chris undressed as he spoke, laying his clothes neatly over a chair, in contrast to Dean’s, which were strewn in a trail up to his side of the bed.
“Come to bed anyway.” Dean’s eyes fixed in sleepy hunger on Chris.
Chris slid under the sheet, running a large, clever hand up Dean’s back. Dean murmured and shivered under his touch.
Chris’s hand stopped at a puckered, roundish scar above Dean’s shoulder blade. Should he ask about Dean’s scars this time? Could he?
“Bullet wound, as I’m sure you could guess.” Dean’s voice was wry and muffled in his pillow.
Chris leaned over and planted a soft, feathery kiss on the spot. Dean shivered again.
Chris swept his thumbs down Dean’s spine to the dimples above his ass, and downward, to a patch of starlike scars on Dean’s left asscheek.
“Sliding down a hill of dry grass. There was a board with nails under the grass.”
“Did you get a tetanus shot?”
Dean snorted.
“Yes, Doctor Nicholson, I got a tetanus shot.”
“Good.” Chris bent down and again anointed the spot with a gentle kiss. Goosebumps rippled across Dean’s skin.
“Dude, are you kissing my owies?” Dean’s voice was hushed and edged with scorn.
“Dude, did you just call me dude?” Chris replied, scratching his fingernails through the soft hair on the backs of Dean’s thighs and calves. He rediscovered the barbed, ropy scar wrapped around one calf; its shape resembled the pattern of a peacock feather.
“Is this from a jellyfish?”
Dean snorted again.
“Jellyfish aren’t the only things with tentacles, Chris.”
“I know. I’ve watched anime,” Chris replied with affronted dignity.
“You,” Dean rolled over, “are a nerd. The coast of Texas is a far freaking cry from Innsmouth, but that just won’t stop some assholes.”
Chris sat back on his heels.
“You fought an Elder God?” he asked in amazement.
“No, just some Night Gaunts. They were plenty vicious, though.”
Chris lay down next to Dean, who rolled on his side, fitting himself against Chris’s body. Chris took Dean’s face in his, feeling the planes and angles, the depths and darkness of Dean’s gaze.
“Do you remember where all of your scars came from?” Chris asked gently.
Dean looked thoughtful.
“Most of ‘em, yeah. The really big ones. The other ones, like on my hands, are too small and there are too many to remember where they all came from.”
“Will you tell me about them?” Chris’s thumbs stroked under Dean’s cheekbones and Dean closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them again, he gave Chris a sardonic, cockeyed grin.
“If I do, will you kiss them all better?”
“Each and every one.” Chris didn’t smile back.
“You really are the girl in this relationship,” Dean mocked.
“I’m sure you’ve noticed that I’m emphatically not a girl.” Chris smiled. Dean shook his head, grinning.
“I’ll tell you about my scars if you’ll tell me about yours,” Dean said.
“Dean, I don’t have any scars worth talking about.”
“Yes, you do.” Dean clasped his arms around Chris’s waist. “Just because I can’t see the really big ones doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”
Chris drew back a little, considering Dean’s assertion. He knew he shouldn’t be surprised by Dean’s flashes of insight, and yet he was. Surprised -- and moved.
Dean’s gaze was tender and protective and Chris looked down, swallowing hard.
“If I do,” he said, looking up, “will you kiss them all better?”
Dean’s hands cupped Chris’s face, mirroring Chris’s on Dean’s, and drew him in for a kiss. When it ended, he whispered in Chris’s ear.
“Each and every one.”