#BUT I THINK ABOUT IT ALL THE TIME ??? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

stackthedeck · 7 months

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hi!! I was wondering what happened to your t4t butch dean and trans cas fic?? Im really interested to read it if you still have it! butch dean is WAY to close to my heart. anyways have a nice day! <3

this has been in my ask box for literal months but I've decided to rewatch Supernatural (I'm not well) and I remembered this fic and this ask so... I'll probably never finish the fic or post it on ao3, but I did write this one scene and I like it a lot even though I like to think I'm a better writer now, but I wanna post it.

So for context this is happening in early season 5 where Sam and Dean are separated and also the plan for the fic as a whole was that Cas's complete separation from heaven was also mirrored by her gender journey, so Cas in this doesn't think of himself as a man, but has accepted that people view his vessel as a man and has excepted it. Basically, her egg hasn't cracked yet.

The road has been lonely since Sam left. Good lonely. For the first time in… well ever, Dean’s not playing mom or big sister. She’s just a hunter. A hunter who doesn’t have to look over her shoulder every second to make sure her baby brother isn’t getting maimed or hooked on demon blood. It’s good lonely… kind of.

It’s just that the front seat of the Impala is so empty and no matter how high she cranks the volume, the car just feels so quiet. The road just goes on and on forever. It sucks not having back-up on hunts, but Dean’s capable. According to the angels, she’s too important to die so she’s been pushing her luck lately.

The road hasn’t felt this empty since Dad went missing.

Dean’s pulled from her thoughts by a buzzing in her pocket. She pulls out her phone and sees a familiar number on the screen. The last time Dean ran into Cas, she gave him a burner phone so that they could keep in touch.

“Hello?” She says, phone wedged between his ear and shoulder.

“Dean, it’s Castiel,” Cas’s voice says from the phone, “where are you?”

“On the road.” Dean looks around for a mile marker, but it’s in the dead of night and there are no streetlights. Dean rambles off the interstate road she’s on and takes a wild guess at what mile she’s at. “I can pull off at the next exit if it’s important.”

A woosh of air and a flap of wings reverberate through the car. Dean looks over and Cas is in the passenger seat. “You don’t need to pull off,” Cas says into the phone as he stares at Dean.

Dean huffs and hangs up the phone, shoving it back into her pocket. “Any updates on God?”

“Nothing since the last time I saw you-” Cas sighs and looks out the windshield “-but I’m still looking.”

“If there’s nothing new—” Dean drums her fingers on the steering wheel “—then why are you here?”

Cas does his head tilt and Dean pointedly keeps her eyes on the road. Sure, she finds Cas’s clumsy attempts at expressing emotion cute, but it’s cute like a baby or a puppy. “I sensed that you were lonely.”

Dean raises an eyebrow. “Whatever happened to not perching on my shoulder?”

“Things are different now.” Cas’s words hit Dean’s ears with such certainty and finality, but she doesn’t feel like they’re true. Things are exactly the same. She’s still saving people, hunting things. It’s the family business, just without the family. Okay well, maybe things are different.

Dean does her best to keep her eyes on the road, but the highway is empty at this time of night. It’s so easy to let her eyes drift to the angel in her front seat, silhouetted by moonlight. His face is stone, that typical neutral expression, but Dean can see in his eyes that something is eating at him.

“So sitting here in silence is your grand plan for making me less lonely?”

Cas shifts in his seat, his tie suddenly becoming very interesting. “Can I ask you a personal question, Dean?”

Dean does her best not to sigh. This better not be a chick-flick moment or worse yet, a Christian movie moment. “I thought you already knew everything about me? What with the rebuilding my soul and all.”

“I want to hear it from you.” Cas drops his tie and meets Dean’s eyes.

Dean nods, pursing her lips. “Alright, shoot.”

“How did you decide to…” Cas hesitates “...decide to… not look like the other females of your species?”

Dean laughs. If Cas had asked her that a month ago, she’d assume he was trying to get her to grow her hair out and start wearing pink. But she trusts Cas, trusts that he likes that humans don’t perfectly line up with God’s vision. “You mean, why am I a lesbian?”

“No, I understand that,” Cas says, “women are very pleasing to look at.”

Dean smiles. She’s surprised that the strip club incident didn’t turn Cas off of women or just humans in general.

“So, why am I butch?”

Cas nods. “Yes, I believe that is the term.”

“I don’t know, I just am.” Dean drums her fingers against the steering wheel. “Sam took a gender studies course when he went off to college, he probably gets this stuff more than I do.”

“Well, I want to hear it from you.”

Dean sighs and rubs at the back of her head. “I don’t know, I guess Dad was a real traditional guy. From what I remember, Mom cooked and cleaned, took care of me and Sammy and Dad went to work. I don’t remember much of Mom, but I remember being in the kitchen with her and her handing me baby Sammy to hold while she was busy. I didn’t mind those things because I was with her, you know?”

Dean stares through the windshield, watching the landscape blur as the car speeds past. “And then Mom died and Dad still went to work. And suddenly it was just me and baby Sam alone in motel rooms for days. I think Dad was so caught up in his revenge that he forgot that Sam and I needed a dad and a mom. So I started cooking and looking after Sam because if I didn’t we’d starve.”

Dean can feel the words spilling out of her like a busted dam. She’s never told anyone any of this, but now that she is, she can’t stop.

“I think Dad expected me to be the new mom. He’d come back to the motel rooms from hunts or from bars and be furious if there wasn’t something to eat. And it’s not like he ever went grocery shopping. He’d just leave a credit card—that barely ever worked by the way—or cash and expect me to figure it out! I couldn’t stand that he treated me like his little wife. Then, Sam started looking at me like I was his mom and not his big sister.

“It didn’t help that I looked like Mom. I have her eyes, you know. And when I was younger I had long curly blonde hair. Sam liked to brush it, which was good because I didn’t. I think it was soothing for him or something, but that’s probably why he keeps his hair long now.”

Dean’s rambling. She knows she is and she’s doing it on purpose because she doesn’t want to say what comes next. Cas’s eyes are fixed on her, but Dean’s not taking her eyes off the road. She could stop talking, change the subject, or give an easy answer. But if she doesn’t tell Cas right now, she’ll never tell anyone. And it’ll just keep festering and rotting inside of her.

“Dad would run his hands through my hair and tell me how pretty I was when he was drunk. It creeped me out, always made my skin crawl. He never… you know… did anything. He’d look at me the same way he looked at old pictures of Mom. I know it’s not true, or at least I don’t believe it’s true, but I feel like he only saw Mom when he looked at me. I wasn’t his daughter, I was the ghost of his dead wife. A ghost that he couldn’t salt and burn.

“And he treated me like I was going to go up in flames like Mom. For god’s sake, Sam learned to shoot a gun before I did! Dad wouldn’t take me on hunts, wouldn’t train me because if I was alive he could pretend she was too. One day I couldn’t take it anymore. I stole Dad’s clippers and buzzed my head.

“And boy, was Dad mad.” Dean winces, squeezing the steering wheel until her knuckles turn white. “He was really mad. But suddenly, he didn’t care if I went up in flames. He put a gun in my hands and took me on hunts. And it felt amazing.”

Dean smiles at the memory of the first time Dad clapped her on the back and bought her a slice of pie after a successful hunt. She can still feel that warm swell of pride after her first ghost, first vampire, first demon.

“My hair started growing out and it looked bad, like so bad. But Dad started hiding his clippers so I just had to let it grow out. Then one day he dropped me and Sam off at Bobby’s place and he took one look at me and gave me my first crew cut.”

Dean looks at herself in the rearview mirror. It’s kind of embarrassing that she’s had the same haircut since she was fifteen, but if it ain’t broke. “I remember looking at myself in the mirror and thinking, that’s me. I didn’t look like Mom anymore, I was just me for the first time.”

Dean feels wetness on her cheek and realizes that she’s crying. They’re not tears of sadness but of relief. Man, it feels so good to get all that off her chest. But still, she always ends up crying around Cas and she really can’t make a habit out of this.

“Thank you for telling me that, Dean.” Cas’s eyes aren’t trained on Dean but on his own reflection in the windshield. “I suppose I just have one more question.”

Dean shakes her head but smiles. Might as well continue this chick-flick moment. “Go ahead.”

“How does Dorothy shorten to Dean?” Cas tilts his head. “I’m unfamiliar with the nuances of human languages.”

Dean laughs at that, a good hard laugh that echoes through the car. “It doesn’t, not really.” Dean claps a hand on Cas’s shoulder, unable to stop grinning. “Sam was a little shit when I buzzed my head and he called me random boy names to get under my skin. I always liked those old cowboy movies so, whenever we’d play cowboys, Sam called me James Dean. The joke stuck and now I’m just Dean.”

“Huh,” Cas says, “you’ll have to show me those movies sometime. I’ve never seen a movie.”

“I’ll hold you to that, Cas,” Dean says, “we’ll have a girls’ night, paint our nails and watch cowboy movies.”

He’s joking but Cas doesn’t get jokes. “I would like to do this girls' night with you.” That’s a hint of an excited smile on Cas’s face and it makes Dean’s heart flutter. In the same way that puppies or babies make her heart flutter, of course.

“It’s getting late,” Cas says, turning towards Dean, “you should stop and get some rest.”

Dean shakes her head and sighs. It is late, really late, and she’d kill for a bed right now. “Wish I could Cas, but there aren’t exactly a lot of motels around.”

Cas frowns, furrowing his eyebrows. “I could drive,” he says after a moment of thinking, “and you can sleep in the backseat.”

Dean cocks an eyebrow. “You ever driven before?”

“No,” Cas says, “but I’m an angel of the lord, it can’t be that hard.”

“Tell you what,” Dean chuckles, “you give me an angel blade, and I’ll let you drive.”

“Dean, we’ve talked about this.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

…

When God created the angels he named them. Each name was unique and divine, but it also gave God power over the angels. The angels did not have the power to create, to choose so they took the names with gratitude. When Lucifer rebelled, he took new names: Satan, Morning Star, The Evil One, and many others. Castiel has not rebelled against God, just against heaven. When he finds God all will be set right. Castiel is keeping his name as a promise. He has not fallen…just questioning.

Castiel may see the importance of names, but the Winchesters do not. Sam is not Samuel, the name his mother gave him to honor his grandfather, he’s Sam or Sammy, or a million other strange words that Dean hurls at him. Dean is not Dorthy, the name her father gave her to honor her grandmother, she’s Dean. Cas is not Castiel anymore, he’s Cas and so much more.

Dean’s been calling Castiel Cas since their second meeting, it’s just a shortened version of his name; it’s not a big deal. But then… Cas is sitting in a diner with the Winchesters late one night, trying to track down the horsemen. The siblings are eating burgers and Cas has one in front of him too. He doesn’t need to eat, he's an angel, but he’s curious. He’s curious about a lot of things lately.

“Pass the ketchup, Cassie,” Dean says through a mouthful of food.

“What?” Cas looks up from contemplating his burger to stare at Dean.

“I said pass the ketchup?” Dean frowns, but then just reaches across Cas’s chest to grab the bottle at the end of the table. “Never mind, I got it.”

“No-” Cas swallows nervously “-I mean what did you call me?”

Dean and Sam put down their food and exchange glances. “...Cassie?” Dean says slowly.

Cas still doesn’t understand facial expressions. Humans read so far into a tiny movement of facial muscles. So he keeps his face very still. When Castiel was just a fledgling, Gabriel, Balthazar, and the other older angels would call him Cassie. Fledglings weren’t ready for the full responsibility of their names, so it made sense. But Gabriel continued to call him that well into his adulthood. It was sweet, made Cas feel seen and seen by someone so powerful and important as an archangel. And then Lucifer fell and angels got much more serious about names.

“It’s like Sammy,” Dean says, awkwardly bumping her shoulder into Cas, “are you good with that?”

Cas looks between Dean and Sam, unsure of what to say. He’s created tension, he can feel it, but he’s not sure how to fix it.

“Hey don’t worry about it, Cas,” Sam says a little too loudly, “you’re a grown man and it’s weird to be called something like Cassie or Sammy.” He shoots a tight-lipped frown at Dean.

“Bitch.” Dean reaches across the table to steal fries off Sam’s plate.

“Jerk!” Sam attempts to swat Dean’s hand away, but misses and Dean ends up trying to stick her tongue out at Sam and eat fries at the same time.

“I’m not a man, I’m an angel,” Cas says, looking toward Sam. “But, it’s fine,” he says, mostly to prevent any more petty squabbling. The nickname is a sign of sibling affection, both in heaven and on earth. It doesn’t matter that the way Dean said it makes his heart race and his mind reel. “Cassie is fine.”

“Well, Cassie-” Dean smiles at him “-are you going to eat that?” She doesn’t wait for a response, just snatches the burger off his plate.

And the things Dean calls him only got worse from there.

…

When Cas first met Dean, she accused him of being a “prince charming” and at the time Cas wasn’t sure what that meant, but he’s starting to get the picture. Something about saving someone only to be rewarded with a relationship. That’s not Cas.

He’s in the far corners of the globe looking for God, when he hears Dean’s voice. It’s a quiet voice in his head, but it is powerful and desperate. A prayer. Cas is close to God, he can feel it. If he just keeps going a little longer, he’ll finally make it. But Dean’s voice is in the back of his mind, calling, pleading.

Cas flies to Dean without another second of hesitation. As he gets closer, the details of the situation flood into his mind in an instant. From a human perspective, Dean and Sam are in the basement of an abandoned mansion, surrounded by people, baring gruesome smiles with knives and fists drawn. From Cas’s perspective, Dean and Sam’s souls shine in a haze of demon smog. Dean’s the brightest, familiar in it’s golden hue.

“Cas, we could use some angel mojo down hear!” Dean shouts, voice thick with blood. “...Please!”

The demons laugh like in a chorus of gnashing teeth. One steps forward, kicking Sam—who’s barely clinging to consciousness on the floor—as he moves to grab the front of Dean’s shirt.

“Scream all you like, little girl,” the demon whispers, his breath hot against Dean’s face. “The angels don’t take calls from the likes of you.”

Cas appears suddenly, hand on the demon’s head, smiting the creature inside its meat suit. Dean actually smiles when she sees him, not even looking at the shell of the demon that falls to the floor.

“You came,” She says, unaware that it holds the same power as a prayer.

Another round of hideous laughter comes from the gaggle of demons. “Oh, how the mighty fall,” another demon cackles.

Cas’s stomach drops. He’s not fallen, he’s still doing God’s will. How can protecting Dean not be his purpose?

“Dean Winchester,” the demon continues, “damsel in distress waiting for a prince to save her.”

Dean, despite three broken ribs, a twisted ankle, and several lost liters of blood, sprints at the demon, burying the knife in his chest. She moves to attack the next closest one, limping as the adrenaline wanes. Even so, she’s a machine and Cas watches her with aw.

“Cas,” Dean shouts, “a little help here!”

Cas bolts into action, smiting demons almost as fast as Dean can stab them. Once they’ve killed all the demons, Cas stands with his arms pressed to his side, watching Dean pull her knife from the final demon’s throat.

“I’m sorry,” Cas says.

Dean places a hand on her chest, cradling her broken ribs. “For what? You totally saved our asses there.”

“I do not wish to belittle you,” Cas says, “what that demon said, if I ever—”

“Can it, princess,” Dean says, “it wouldn’t be the first time a demon tried to get under my skin.”

Cas nods then steps forward with his hand raised to heal Dean. She nods back and that’s all the permission he needs to press his fingers to her forehead, healing her instantly.

Sam groans from the floor.

Dean jumps away from Cas, staring at her brother. “Umm, maybe take care of him too.”

“Yes, please,” Sam gasps, weakly wiping blood from his mouth.

Cas leans down, healing Sam as well. Sam stumbles to his feet, glaring at Cas.

“Did you seriously heal her first?” Sam scoffs. “After she called you princess?”

“I did not!” Dean says.

“You totally did,” Sam says. “Cas, you’re just going to take that?”

Cas cast his eyes downward. He didn’t take any insult from it, but it seems he should have. “I am still unaware of human social rules, but Dean has made it clear that I am not to be her prince charming.”

“Yeah don’t be friggin’ sexist, Sammy.” Dean walks over, swinging an arm around Cas’s shoulder. “Cas is our princess in shining armor.”

“I believe I am wearing a trench coat.”

After the incident, Dean teases Cas by calling him princess. It’s just another nickname that makes its way into the many the Winchesters use for him. For the first month, Sam tries to get Dean to cut it out, but eventually, he gives up. Cas thought that Dean would drop it once it no longer annoyed her brother. It’s only when he has this thought does he realizes he doesn’t want her to stop.

But she never does.

…

“Hey, angel,” Dean greets, shoving his shoulder the same way he shoves Sam.

“I don’t understand,” Cas says, “I do not call you human.”

“She’s flirting with you,” Sam shouts from over the impala.

“Bitch,” Dean shouts back.

“Jerk.”

Cas looks down at his vessel. He doesn’t like it being called angel, there is nothing divine about this meat suit—as Dean so often calls it—it simply carries his grace while he’s on earth.

“Cas? Earth to Cas? Cas?”

Cas startles, looking up to realize he had tuned out another Winchester argument. “What?”

“You don’t mind when I call you angel, right?” Dean says with a smirk. “You think I’m funny right?”

Cas stares into Dean’s eyes, swallowing thickly. A part of him knows—no, hopes that Dean does not see his body as him. Perhaps she knows better than anyone that what body one happens to inhabit does not define them.

“I don’t mind your nicknames, Dean,” Cas says, “but I do not find them funny.”

…

“Dean, I feel ridiculous,” Cas says through the door.

Dean waits in the hallway outside of Cas’s room.

“No you don’t,” she says, “you’re just worried I’ll think you like ridiculous.”

“What’s the difference?”

Dean chuckles at that, shaking her head.

“How do you feel, Cas?”

The door opens and Cas steps out.

“...I feel good,” she says.

She’s dressed much the same way she did when she thought she had to present her vessel as a man. But now with all the angels locked in heaven and Cas is very human, her body isn’t a vessel. It’s her. They’ve traded the slacks for a pencil skirt and nylon tights and replaced the shirt and tie with a white blouse. She’s been growing her hair out since she turned human, mostly by accident, it’s still not as long as she’d like it, but it will be. Dean’s been helping her get a smooth shave every morning and showing her what lotions to use to keep her skin soft. But Dean was never great at being a girl, so what perfume and makeup to use has been left to Google. They’re working on getting her on HRT, but it’s not like they have insurance. They have also considered a couple of spells too.

And she’s still wearing the same trench coat.

“How do I look?” Cas asks.

Dean steps forward, taking her hands in hers. She plants a kiss on her lips, soft and sweet with lipgloss.

“Like a baby in a trench coat,” Dean says, “my baby.”

#asks #not tagging this because i don't want to get bullied by the spn fandom again #for context this is part of a complete rewrite of spn with dean as an afab butch and cas as a trans woman #so like that last part makes sense in context #season 9 is when her egg finally cracks #it's a long fic that i haven't even finished yet and never will #but i think about it all the time

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