Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author Note: Set either before the Shield's 2014 split up or during some future point when they're back together again ;)

ROOT BY ROOT

There was a thin strip of land behind the safehouse. Dean noticed it right away. While Roman and Seth were working out where to stash their go-bags and Seth's ridiculously extensive t-shirt collection, Dean stayed outside, staring intently at the sparse flowerbeds out back. He ran the soil through his fingers and tamped down some turf with his foot. It was more than doable. His smile was a serrated edge.

That night, when he got into bed, Roman was already a snoring furnace with Seth cuddled up against his chest. But Seth shifted sleepily when Dean stripped off and joined them. Seth murmured pleased noises when Dean curled up behind him, an arm securely around his waist and resting against Roman.

Seth's nose twitched. "Been making mud pies?"

"Why, want a taste?"

Dean pressed his fingers to Seth's mouth, getting a protesting garble of words in response and then powerful teeth. Dean dreamed of soil that night, soil under his feet and hands, rich enough to mold and stain his skin.

Dean hadn't exactly had a lifelong affinity for gardening. He wasn't a Greenpeace sustainable-shit kind of guy and the garden that he'd grown up with had pretty much been all concrete and mud. He'd seen other people's gardens though, some were really boring but he'd seen people grow all kinds of shit. It'd caught his attention as a kid, how houses were pretty much all the same in his neighborhood but gardens weren't. So as a kid, he'd rode his bike around, gazing at what he could see over walls and gates. It'd been something to do, it'd been somewhere to hang out, somewhere to be instead of home. Huh, 'home.'

Anyway, he'd known that those houses were beyond him, just the people stashed inside them were, but the gardens had looked tangible, like he could have squeezed them between his fingers. Almost everybody had a patch of dirt outside their house, right? Dean had tried working on the mud outside of his, but all he'd gotten out of it was disappointment. Like that had been unfamiliar. He'd wanted more, he still did.

He'd thought about gardens sometimes, his imagination sparked when he hadn't been thinking about wrestling, about scratching his way out of there somehow. Now though, he was out, he still had his imagination and he had his own patch of dirt. Seeds were easy to come by. There were books in the library that told Dean what he needed to know. He could work this shit out.

He touched the earth and thought about book illustrations of carrots and potatoes and yams maybe. That sounded tasty. And if a bucketful of root vegetables were thrown at someone, they'd leave a mark. Dean grinned suddenly, dangerous vegetables. Fucking awesome.

"Who're you planning on ending?" Roman asked, shirtless and sweaty after his workout.

Dean's grin became a smirk and he leaned over to lick at Roman's shoulder. Mmm.

"Couple of squashes, maybe a pumpkin."

Roman raised his eyebrows but didn't laugh. Good. He looked at Dean's dirt-encrusted hands and at the wild light that was sparking in Dean's gaze. Roman's eyes darkened in response, fuck. That always made Dean's dick twitch.

"Any requests?" he leered.

Roman barely waited for him to finish, wrapping fingers around Dean's wrist and yanking him closer. He pulled Dean into the sort of kiss that always made Dean's head spin. Holy shit. Dean panted into Roman's mouth, his mind full of the kind of white noise that felt like fucking heaven.

Dean began manhandling Roman towards the lounge, the couch was practically screaming their names. Roman didn't pull away or refuse to do anything until Dean had washed his hands. Ha, Dean knew that Roman liked him dirty. Roman dropped back onto the couch and Dean tumbled down on top of him.

Roman didn't wash away the dirt stains that Dean left on his forearms, temple and jaw. It made Dean hard just to look at them. Roman's grin became the kind of smoldering-shit-eater that made him look even more freakishly gorgeous. Fuck. Seth would know where to find them when he got back. They could reheat dinner.

They didn't spend every night at that safehouse because they were traveling and couldn't always get back there. It wasn't their only safehouse but it was Dean's favorite. He knew that Seth liked it too, because of how close it was to a gym he really liked and Roman didn't hate it either so yeah, Dean was officially calling it the team's favorite. It wasn't home, because in his experience home was never a happy place. But it was theirs. And Dean had the garden.

He scrawled notes in a spiral-bound notepad, muttering to himself as he thumbed through a couple of dogeared texts that'd never made it back to any library.

"I'm looking forward to this," Seth said suddenly, contemplatively.

He was sat behind Dean in the kitchen, leaning back in his chair, his headphones clamped only to one ear and his body swamped by one of Roman's CFL hoodies. He wasn't mocking Dean though, he was smiling just in a little in the corner of his mouth. Dean's expression flickered and then turned back to his notes.

"No flowers?"

Dean scribbled something out. "You mad I don't buy you flowers and shit?"

All four of the legs of Seth's chair hit the floor and his smile became wider. "You never buy me chocolate. Where'd the romance go, huh?"

"You fucked me last night."

Seth snorted but looked nostalgic and heated. "That's something..."

Dean finally glanced over again and flicked a seed packet towards Seth. Seth caught it one-handed and bit gently at a paper corner without missing a beat.

"Needs work."

Dean flipped him the finger and wrote in pointedly-obvious letters only store-bought shit for Seth.

So many things were seasonal. Dean didn't want to lose anything to frost or heat. He checked charts and books and swiped Seth's phone to scroll through websites. He drew up something like a plan, more like a memo, and treated the soil until it looked and felt ready. Dean was fucking impatient but he wasn't going to half-ass this shit, he didn't want to grow anything inedible. No fucking way. He was owning this. It was his soil now and he wasn't going to have one of those boring gardens that he'd come across all those years ago. He'd decided then he was going to make something awesome and now he could. It was another fucking victory over 'home' – he was out of there and now he had his own stretch of dirt to work on 'til it looked and tasted good.

Eventually he planted seeds. He used his hands and sweated through his vest, wanting to get it done before lunch. He set up canes for beans and tomatoes and marked trenches and seed spots. He watered them using a dinged-up metal jug. He left a footprint in the corner and took a picture with his phone.

Later on, he stared out the window until Seth shoved a hand down his pants. He covered Seth in dirt marks too.

"Why?"

Roman's voice was quiet but clearly audible. Dean was half-sprawled across him, his hair starting to curl thanks to the heat and recent sweat. That had been some fucking. Seth was laying across Dean and Roman's legs, he looked like he was napping but he was listening, Dean could tell. He didn't call Seth on it yet.

Roman traced a finger across the soil that was still stuck to the back of Dean's hand, punctuating his question. Dean butted his head against Roman's chest and jerked his shoulders up almost in a shrug. What did it matter? Shit was growing now.

"Never had a garden before," he said at last because Roman wouldn't let up until he got an answer and Dean's brain was all fucked-out and awesome.

It was okay talking to Roman anyway because it was Roman. And because Seth was listening. Dean fumbled a hand through Seth's hair and felt Seth press a bristly cheek to his skin. It felt really good. Dean was getting distracted. Roman didn't push him for any more, he just leaned down to kiss Dean, softer now, but lingering, meaningful, like the best kind of punch.

Dean almost said and I want you and Seth to taste it.

When he'd looked at those gardens as a kid and had imagined his own plot, he'd never thought about anyone aside from him enjoying whatever he grew there. It might have been flowers once, maybe. He remembered seeing white flowers with really red mouths, he might have thought about growing those. Then he'd discovered that you could grow stuff to eat so that had become the focus of his gardening thoughts. He'd thought about how fast he might have been able to throw a potato and what kind of damage he could do with his own supply of tomatoes. That was the only kind of sharing he'd actually considered, once he'd stopped thinking about the possibility of growing a hot-dog tree. Now though, now...

"You can have a hot dog," he murmured drowsily.

Seth touched Dean's knee and Roman skated fingers across the dirt on Dean's hand again like he knew what Dean had meant.

When the first tomato was ready, Dean plucked it off the vine without ceremony and immediately bit into it. Fucking sweet. Seth laughed at the look on Dean's face, Dean threw the rest of the tomato at him, pegging him on the cheek. Seth just about caught it.

"Don't you fucking waste that," Dean warned him.

Roman's arm wrapped around him and Seth chomped a bite out of the tomato. Seeds got caught up in his beard, he looked impressed. Dean smiled, fuck yeah. Victory again.

"Better than any store shit, am I right?"

He felt breathless and thought about the radishes he was going to plant. He'd grab a bunch of them for Seth, better than any flower – green leaves and bright pink radishes, hot and peppery on the tongue, a punch and a bite. Seth would get it.

Dean nodded towards a cucumber that was almost ripe. "I am pickling the shit out of that."

He was kneading Roman's arm, Dean noticed absently. Seth was reaching for another tomato so Dean threw a clod of earth at him. It exploded right across Seth's stomach, making him splutter and throw a handful of dirt back. Dean smiled and rubbed the dirt into his skin.

Roman kissed the dirt marks and Dean reached for a couple of pea pods, splitting one open with his thumb. His mind was careening, full of beets, carrots, and sweet potatoes, maybe some corn-on-the-cob, who the fuck knew what the limits were here, right? As if limits meant anything to Dean anyway. And this was only the beginning.

Seth leaned his weight onto Dean, half-draping over his side like a really hot punishment. He stole an unopened pea pod from Dean's hand, Dean snacked on his own handful of peas before laying an open-mouthed kiss on Roman. That way they both got to taste the fruits of Dean's labor in the best way possible. Seth split open the second pod and scratched a hand through the dirt that still decorated his skin. He smeared it in a little further.

Dean cocked an eyebrow to match his mouth and remembered other more nostalgic dirt. Those neighborhood gardens. He'd cut away most other shit from back then or it'd all-too-easily dissolved. He didn't need any of that anymore. He had his own dirt and people to appreciate it.

He felt Roman's hand press against his shoulder, against the dirt marks. Dean focused his eyes on Seth.

"Eat up."

-the end