Dog Days

Playtime Takes On a Whole New Meaning

"Come on girl, let's go down to the beach." Dean clicked his tongue and smiled as the sound of nails scraping across the floors reached him as his dog Sugar came running. She slid to a stop just short of slamming into his legs and looked up excitedly. Her entire body was wagging and it made him chuckle.

"Someone's eager to go out for a walk, huh." He clipped her leash on and opened the front door. Her excitement immediately calmed as she waited patiently for him to close and lock the door before they started down the steps. They lived close enough to the beach that it was a quick walk. He had tennis balls stuffed in his pockets, ready to go play a game of catch with his favorite girl.

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Dean frowned as he looked around. This particular stretch of beach used to be beautiful. Clear water, clean sand, but now there was litter everywhere. Just last week Sugar had gone digging and come up with someone's discarded lunch. The smell of it alone had made him want to vomit as he wrestled it away from his dog and tossed it in the nearest garbage can. He could see plastic bottles and even some glass ones sticking up. After unleashing his dog and tossing one of the tennis balls he went about gathering up all of the bottles that he saw. Each time Sugar came back with the ball he would throw it again, then return to his meager clean up mission.

"Glad to see I'm not the only one that does this."

Dean spun around at the sound of another voice, nearly dropping the bottles in his arms. There was a man standing there, the breeze coming off the water ruffling his dark hair. The guy was freaking hot but Dean wasn't going to let on that he thought that. It had gotten him in trouble before, flirting with guys he found out later were straight.

"It's disgusting. I don't want my dog getting hurt because she stepped on something or ate something."

The man squinted against the sun shining in his eyes and looked out across the beach. "That's your dog?"

Dean turned to look at where Sugar was running along the edge of the water.

"Yep. She loves coming here."

"So does my dog. Is yours fixed? Dexter is, so that you know. He can't get her pregnant." The man pointed down and Dean followed his hand down to a small Boston Terrier sitting at his feet. He almost wanted to laugh, the dog was so freaking cute.

"Oh, he's adorable. And yeah, Sugar's fixed. She likes other dogs too." Dean said. The man smiled and bent down to unclip his dog's leash.

"Go on, go play." He said softly. The dog took off towards the water, and towards Sugar. When he stood back up he smiled at Dean. "I'll help."

"Thanks. I'm Dean, by the way."

"Castiel, but you can call me Cas."

They began working together to clean up the garbage which, to Dean's dismay, he realized was mostly washing up from the ocean.

"So, Sugar, is she a white shepherd?" Cas asked. Dean nodded.

"She was a gift from my parents when I got my own house. They didn't want me living alone. My brother has her brother Titus. We used get them together sometimes to play, before they moved away."

"Dexter was a rescue. He came from a puppy mill that was raided. His mother was nearly dead and trying to nurse four hungry pups that were starving because she couldn't produce enough milk for them. They were all sick with skin diseases, worms, and severely malnourished. Dexter was the only puppy to survive. His growth was stunted due to malnourishment but he got healthy. My sister works at the shelter he came into and thought he'd be a perfect fit with me. I live alone in an apartment a few blocks away and I'd been thinking of getting a dog for a while by that point. I went down and met him and, well, it was love at first sight." Cas chuckled. "The vet says his health is good but there are issues that resulted from his rough start to life, so he's not expected to live the average lifespan of a Boston. I want to make every day he does have as wonderful as possible. Since he came to live with me his favorite place in the world is this beach."