#like you HAD to go the extra mile to show adam’s message?? like god fuck you /pos. now i’ll never stop thinking about that

[pillsopa]

stopped in my tracks and almost fell to my knees when i remembered that the Only time the font changed in the entirety of trc was when adam sent blue the flowers with the little note….can’t get up…….

#there are so many instances of notes written by characters but they’re just in italics. not adam’s tho. GOD #like you HAD to go the extra mile to show adam’s message?? like god fuck you /pos. now i’ll never stop thinking about that #i know it was written by the sender but i Have to convince myself that that’s his handwriting #adam parrish #blue sargent #trc #the raven cycle

[deathsteel]

This Ain't a Scene Its a Goddamn Drag Race

~Part Two~

Castiel woke up the next morning to the sound of the show's security guys stationed in the hallways changing shifts. He tried to block out the sound of their chit-chatting by burying his face in his pillow, but ultimately failed when they burst into raucous laughter right outside his doorway. With a groan he dragged himself out of bed and towards the bathroom; might as well get a run in before the production staff descended on them so they could film the reaction shots to last night’s elimination.

There wasn’t much about being on a reality show that Castiel would call ‘glamorous’, but filming the practically scripted confessional segments after each elimination and mini-challenge was probably the most degrading thing that Castiel had ever done in his entire life. And he’d once been talked into ripping open bags of trash all over himself during a show by his drag mother. Needless to say, performance art and lying to the public at large were not his favorite activities.

He’d gotten into a huge fight with one of the producers early on about how staged some of the things on the show were and it was probably why he’d been struggling his way up from the bottom since the very first episode. But luckily Gabby was very adamant about preserving what he called “the integrity of the process” and basically ignored the producers when they tried to steer him towards favoring a certain contestant.

That didn’t mean that the host was around all the time so the execs still got their dose of drama to satiate the audience, regardless of whether the rivalries between the queens were genuine or not. In actuality, Castiel liked most of the others, even Luc and Michael at times had been funny when the cameras were off, but he wasn’t about to delude himself into thinking they were best buddies. Not even Balthazar who had quite obviously been flirting with him the night before right in front of Charlie, one of the less anal PAs, who had been assigned to watch them for the evening. And definitely not Kevin who only lived an hour away in Olympia and treated him like the drag mother he’d always wanted.

Not to say it wasn’t tempting, both Balthazar’s lasciviousness and Kevin’s overtures of friendship, but Castiel wasn’t going to be the next Willam or Latrice Royale; being a slut and a saint hadn’t gotten either of those two queens the crown. And that was what all of this was about, right?

He was plagued by these thoughts as he headed down to the hotel’s indoor gym and put a couple of miles behind him on the treadmill, staring at his own reflection in the mirrors that lined the walls because he wasn’t allowed to turn on the T.V. that was mounted in one corner of the room. Castiel honestly would’ve done it just to spite his contract if he could (because he was dying to find out about some gossip that was centered on anyone besides himself) but Hael, one of the show’s interns, was there with him; ‘keeping an eye on him’ while really tapping away at her phone.

If Hael was a man, Castiel would flirt a little, trail his fingers up the inside of a thigh and BAM! He’d have instant access to being able to call his mom or text his sister or god above, check TMZ. He just knew in his gut that Rihanna had done something since he had been locked up in this rhinestone studded prison for the last month.

But Hael was a woman and even though she eyed his biceps when Castiel was doing half-hearted pushups as part of his cooldown, the thought of whoring himself out for five minutes with an iPhone kinda made him nauseous. Or that could’ve been the mini bottles of vodka he’d been slamming back with Raphael, Kev, and Charlie last night as they’d eaten delivered pizza in Kevin’s hotel suite. Balthazar had stuck to nursing a beer, amused by their antics, but otherwise aloof in the way that Castiel thought only took away from the other man’s attractiveness.

Now that his head was pounding from both his workout and his hangover, Castiel understood why the Brit hadn’t indulged like the rest of them. That strategic, wormy, sexy bastard.

By the time Castiel had made it back to his room, he could see a room service tray being delivered to Luc’s room and another on the floor already outside of Balthazar’s, so at least the other queens were up and about. They’d probably have to leave soon to go back to the studio and Castiel resigned himself to a fast shower and a shave instead of the long, leisurely one he’d intended to jerk off in.

Whatever, he’d just do it later.

Today they’d just be shooting reaction scenes based on last night’s elimination and doing the mini-challenge which wasn’t exhausting, but they never knew what the mini-challenge was going to be so you definitely had to have your wits about you. Castiel definitely did not have much of anything about him at the moment, but he planned on phoning it in for the mini-challenge since it wasn’t likely to affect him too much if he lost whatever little advantage the win would get him.

By the time he had finished changing into a well-loved pair of dark wash jeans and a faded black polo shirt and popped his medication, Castiel was already exhausted. So when one of the PAs pounded on his door and called a ten minute warning for him to be ready or else, Castiel just sighed at the dark circles under his eyes and his messy unstyled hair before shrugging and snagging some sunglasses and a baseball cap out of his suitcase and heading out the door with his shoes untied.

Castiel rode in sullen silence with Luc again mostly because he was the last one to make it downstairs to the waiting towncars, but also because he was the only one of the queens who could stand Luc’s morning routine of picking at his fingernails and muttering obscenities under his breath.

As soon as all of the queens were herded into the studio, wardrobe descended on them like a plague of locusts; tugging at their street clothes and strapping mics around their waists until all of the queens were dressed in their ‘confessional outfits’.

When Castiel had finally gotten the official word that he had been chosen as one Drag Race’s contestants, he had been mailed a two inch thick envelope containing a contact that Castiel had signed without even reading, a list of “suggested” items that he needed to bring for the challenges, and instructions to bring at least two to three weeks of casual clothing to include one outfit that would be used for filming purposes.

At the time Castiel hadn’t known that he was going to be parted from his favorite blue cardigan for literal months, not even allowed to take it back to the hotel with him because the wardrobe crew was scared he would spill something on it that they couldn’t get out. If he had, he would have just let them film him in one of his thrift store t-shirts and cut offs. But now he had to wear his most beloved, comfy cardigan along with a grey button down and skinny jeans two to three times a week, every week, to record his thoughts about the competition’s goings-ons.

The wardrobe crew didn't ever mess with his hair and they mostly didn’t bother putting makeup on any of them unless they looked REALLY rough, but most importantly, the outfits never ever changed. Today, Castiel got some concealer for the bags under his eyes and blush for the pallor that had settled over him due to his hangover.

It took Kevin an embarrassingly long time to understand that the reason behind wearing the same outfit for every confessional was because the producers wanted to splice footage from different days together so that they could create drama by taking things out of context. Castiel had no illusions about the fact that he probably looked like an asshole to most of America right now based on some of the things he had said during confessionals. A witty asshole with a penchant for lighting-fast one liners, but a dick nonetheless.

Castiel was still rubbing the sleep out of his eyes as they set up the footage for him from the last few days, everything from the main challenge to the elimination runway to the behind the scenes or “Untucked” bits where they forced watered-down cocktails into the queens’ hands and then had them be gossipy bitches or start catfights. If the producers were feeling particularly sadistic they would get one of the contestant's homophobic family members to record a heartfelt, ‘private’ message that would then be played in front of everyone.

It was voyeuristic in probably the worst possible way and Castiel had decided that he would sooner get his wig snatched off by being shady than cry off his makeup if they managed to get his estranged father to apologize for calling Castiel a ‘fucking f*ggot’ when he was ten and had caught him with purple nail polish on after having a friend over to play.

He usually just read people during the Untucked segments and so far that’s what he had been doing during the confessionals as well; the camera girls seemed to think he was funny and the producers hadn’t caught on that the Drag Race version of Holly Cummunion was a sarcastic, shady act so he’d keep it up until Gabby or someone else called him on his shit. This week though, he had been uncharacteristically honest- probably because he was tired.

He even complimented Luc’s runway outfit for Christ’s sakes so he must have been feeling extra charitable.

The only good thing about filming the confessional scenes was that nothing else was being filmed at the same time. It meant that at least three of the queens could be filmed doing confessionals all at once because it’s not like the cameras were busy filming anything else. With so few queens left they finished filming everything by lunchtime and after a quick change back to their street clothes and a stop by craft services the queens were scattered casually around the workroom by the production assistants and then left to wait until Gabby showed up.

One time the host had arrived an hour late with Starbucks and a hickey the size of a mid-sized principality on the underside of his jaw. The queens had shared amused looks before going on to do the funnest mini-challenge of the season so far; a matching game that used the butts of the Pit Crew as cards. Castiel suspected that he hadn’t been the only queen flustered by the glistening abs and generous bulges of the Pit Crew in their speedos, but for the sake of Sam and Zeke (Gabby’s two regular Pit Crew men who’d, of course, participated in the challenge as well) Castiel had tried his best not to ogle too much even though he was going through the driest, dry spell of the century.

After being allowed back into his comfy polo and jeans by wardrobe, Castiel let himself be placed at one of the workroom tables with Raphael who was filing his fingernails in the most bored way possible. Castiel kept his sunglasses hooked into the collar of his shirt just in case the studio lights made his already throbbing head any worse, but after glancing in a mirror he decided his hair was fucked no matter what he did so he discarded his ball cap on top of his makeup case and let it be free.

The production assistants were distracted by last minute adjustments so Castiel snuck a glance at Charlie, who was coaxing Kevin and Luc into sharing a mirror since they were both plucking their eyebrows, before he quickly fetched one of his styling heads; the one sporting the ratted up platinum blonde wig that Castiel had styled for the white-trash chic challenge a couple weeks before. He planned on using whatever downtime he had to finally brush the snarls out so he could use it again for something else.

“Alright guys, everyone good?” Charlie asked, doing a thumbs up around the room as she tugged the headphones that she usually wore while filming back onto her ears. “Great, Gabe should be here in five so you all know the drill. Chat, look busy, just act natural.”

Raphael let out a derisive little scoff under his breath but otherwise continued shaping his fingernails and acting like Castiel didn’t exist. But that was pretty natural so Castiel didn’t bother questioning it, instead choosing to joke loudly with Balthazar from across the room about what the upcoming challenge could possibly be.

“Maybe Gabby’s interested in checking out the tightness of our tuck,” Balthazar quipped, winking in Kevin’s direction when the younger queen started giggling.

“Oh, well bless Connie for leaving then,” Castiel replied, referring to another queen, Connie Lingus, who had bowed out of the competition due to medical issues. “That girl had the meatiest tuck I’d ever seen.”

“Well, did you ever see her dragged down?” Raphael interjected, still focused on his nails. “Gave the phrase ‘hung like a horse’ a whole new meaning, baby.”

“I think Gabby has more important things to worry about than our tucks,” Luc drawled in a bored, disinterested kinda way.

He was making conversation to get air time and all the assembled queens knew it; Castiel just barely restrained himself from rolling his eyes and that was only because there was a cameraman hovering at his elbow as he brushed out his wig.

“Hells yea she does,” Kevin piped leaning back from the mirror to smooth down both of his eyebrows with a critical gaze on his reflection. “Like check out the tightness of the Pit Crew! Can I get an ay-men!?”

All the girls let out an ay-men, some less enthusiastically than others, but it happened to coincide perfectly with the now tell-tale sign of Gabby’s impending arrival. Well, it probably wasn't a coincidence, nothing about TV ever was.

‘Ooooh, gurl!’ The hidden speakers in the workroom blared to life with the sign for Gabby’s message that would contain a hint about the upcoming elimination challenge. ‘You’ve got she-male!’

#fic writing #destiel fanfiction #spn fanfiction #rpdr au #gd drag race