#this is the time dean DIDN'T get away with it but how many presents or things frome `john` had dean done throughout the years? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

anundyingfidelity · 2 months

Text

I'M A RUIN — Soldier Boy/Ben (Part IV)

Series summary: After the events of the Seven Tower, you present Grace Mallory a new secret project you're working on already to develop a cure to Compound V. The only problem? You need Soldier Boy for that.

Pairing: Soldier Boy/Ben x female reader.

Word count: 2.8k.

Warnings for series: set after S3 (spoilers), some OOC!Ben, some depressed!Ben, angst, hurt/comfort, eventual smut, slow-burn, language, PTSD, reader has Compound V (she's no Vought supe tho), Soldier Boy being an usual asshole, reader is a fucking liar.

Warnings on this chapter: Reader's parents are fucking irresponsible and disgusting people, mentions of a dead parent, Homelander!!!! (he's a fucking warning), sexual assault (touching, kissing, etc.) and some after thoughts, you know the usual questionable stuff on TB universe, Ben's point of view and presence=red flag.

Notes: more about reader's past in here! And just want to add that this is how i imagine her suit on this chapter. I'm also using a lot of inspo from Sue Storm of the Fantastic Four because I love her, so yeah. And thanks so much for reading it means a lot to me! ^^

this fic tags: @k-slla @syrma-sensei @mostlymarvelgirl @cheynovak @drasticemotions @blacknoirr @deans-spinster-witch

☕ if you like my writing, support me with a ko-fi !

get yourself in the taglist!

GEN MASTERLIST! — SERIES MASTERLIST!

Part IV: Countdown

2009

"Spectrum, turn around, please," the lady on the other side of the camera ordered.

You did as she told, turning slowly and showing a complete view of your suit. Made of unstable molecules, the suit was your best creation at the time. It was all white with black details, and finally you had something covering your whole body that'd turn invisible when you commanded. Your boots were the same, specially built to disappear and blend with your powers when needed.

"Great, show us what you can do," the woman said.

You nodded, your heart beating so hard on your chest. You didn't want to fuck it up. Not for your mother. She was the main reason why you were there in the first place. You took a deep breath, with eyes closed you raised your palms at your chest level and created a force field around your figure. The force fields you learnt to make over the years of self training were like gigantic bubbles that allowed you to float around if you said so, and they protected you or anyone or anything they were covering.

The camera, the couch, the table, and any single thing you found in the room were now surrounded by the fields, lifting them up a couple of feet from the surface. And once you thought it was enough, they landed slowly on their place, the fields vanished just like the one around yourself. Though the lady on the other side didn't seem amused or surprised.

"I also turn invisible," you said for the first time after your personal presentation was over.

"Go on," she plainly answered.

And within seconds, you slowly disappeared from her sight. The fabric of the suit faded away.

"I created this special costume to turn invisible without, you know, being naked," you commented.

Still, there was no clear answer on the face of the woman. She was just busy taking notes and filming your audition with the steady camera on the table. She said nothing, her eyes glued to her writing. Disappointed, you made yourself visible again.

"That's impressive!"

You gasped. It was that voice you heard so many times on TV. His steps came closer and he stopped by your side with a smile on his face.

"Homelander," the woman called with a wide, fake grin. "You weren't supposed to be in here."

"Just passing by, wanted to say hi. I'm really amazed by you, darling."

You tried to smile the best you could. But you were so tense and flustered now that he was in front of you. Your childhood hero, coming to see you at your audition. Even before you got a clear response from Vought. It felt like a dream. Any child had dreamt of it at some point.

You grew up with him and the Seven. He was one of the reasons you forgot every single problem and responsibility your dysfunctional, selfish family put you through from a young age. To them, you were just a doll to play with and show off. The perfect daughter. But seeing the Seven was totally different. You wanted to be like them. Too sad this part was also linked to your mother and her self-centered shit. If only...

"Thank you," you barely answered with a soft voice, looking down on your boots.

"I've been out there, hesitating if I should come in, since you created those force fields. Wow!" he praised, making you chuckle. "You left the door open on purpose, didn't you two?"

All you could do was chuckle again, you felt your cheeks burning at his banter. He smiled along with you before turning his eyes to the lady.

"Hey, Greta. Can you leave us alone for a moment?"

"But I have to-"

Homelander chuckled, cutting her words. "Absolutely no, I can continue for you. Remember?"

Greta, as he called her, swallowed thickly and her eyes switched between you and the supe. "Sure, sir."

She lifted herself up from the chair, took her things and went out. You noticed the camera was still in place, that meant it was still rolling.

Once the door closed. "So..." he began, walking a circle around you. "How'd you create this... costume of yours?"

"Well, I like science," you nervously smiled, playing with your glove-covered hands. He passed by your face this time and paced around one more time. "It took me a while to figure out how but I did something with the molecules, created my own patent of the matter and did this complete costume."

Homelander stopped at your back. He hummed. "Smart. Tell me..."

His pause made you answer what he was looking for. "Spectrum."

"Spectrum, why do you want to be part of the Seven so bad?"

Homelander dragged your alias with a dark voice, one that replaced the long warm and welcoming tone he had with you at first. You licked your lips, anxious and out of words. Once behind your figure, he angled himself so close to one of your ears that you felt his hot breath on your skin.

"So? I know you have something to say, dear."

"I- I just want to help others... Do what you guys do..."

The next thing you felt was the supe's strong body pressing on your ass. You gasped loudly as his hands grabbed the sides of your hips forcing you to fall back against his chest.

"Go on," Homelander whispered.

One of his hands roamed over your stomach slowly, right under your breasts, and you were absolutely caged on his grip. You took deep breaths, closing your eyes as he touched you over the suit.

"I- I know science, I told you. Also I can help the team w-with new inventions of my own... Create technology t-to fight very bad threats," you stuttered.

"Mmmh, yeah, I like the sound of that," Homelander chuckled against your neck, his lips tracing soft and unwanted kisses on your skin.

"Please- ah!"

He harshly pushed you against his groin. Your breath caught in your throat at the feel of his crotch. This wasn't what you thought it was. This was not what your mother signed you up for.

"Tell me, did your father know how much of a fucking slut you are?" Homelander hissed, his hand cupping your covered breast.

Something inside you emerged at his question. His touch was disgusting and it was making you sick and the mention of your father, your dead father, made it even worse.

"What do you know about him?" you asked in a dark whisper, still planning your next move.

Deep inside, you were scared of Homelander, it was a new face he had yet to show to the world.

"Just the basics, honey," he said plainly, forcing you to walk with a grip on your arm. The supe sat on the couch and pushed you to his lap. "He was quite the rich man, Edgar knew you'd be a great deal to the company, well, your money of course."

You let out a gasp. "What?"

"Honey, he was one of our most valuable shareholders," he playfully answered, his hands cupping your cheeks.

And it clicked. Your mother supported your dream just because she'd still be getting profits from Vought. The firm was now under her name, and she needed something more to strengthen the relationship between Vought and your father's inheritance. The fucking witch. And then, your father. He was the one financing this piece of shit sitting between your legs. Were all supes like this behind their masks? If so, fucking crap. Everything you believed in was bullshit. A circus. And they clowned you so well. And above all, the sickening man that had been touching you without your permission the past endless minutes...

"Oh, poor thing, you didn't know," Homelander's intense blue eyes widened when he immediately noticed your confused, blank face.

Your eyes filled with tears and still, you refused to cry in front of the asshole you once admired.

"Don't worry, I'll take care of you here with us," he smirked. His fingers on your neck, feeling your pulse. You closed your eyes so hard, your nose wrinkled and you held back a sob when his hand added pressure around your collar. He leaned closer, his lips finding yours in a sloppy kiss as you tried to resist his touch. "So fucking useful," Homelander whispered against your lips. He gave you that mischievous grin of his. You shivered. "I can't wait to ruin you. Every single inch of you."

The same past memory of Homelander haunted you the next day. The way you found out about your father's business with Vought and how the supes showed their real faces was the main reason you were here now.

You remembered you had to hit Homelander as hard as you could to escape from him and use your force field to protect yourself before running away and leaving the tower, fully invisible. Not that it was a great help since Homelander had a lot of abilities with his vision, and he could hear the beating of your heart miles away, but for you, it was worth the try. It was a surprise he didn't follow you that day. Instead, Vought got a new deal with your mother for the budget and you hated that. You cut all communication with what was left of your family after that day, knowing it could've been so much worse.

Homelander and Vought, however, were after you now. And he was a difficult face to forget. Not only because he was faking everything from the public but because Vought was after your father's money. And deciding to step away from all the illegal stuff they did, you left for college. Science was always a part of you and it's what got you here, under Grace Mallory and the CIA, doing different jobs you were not so proud of, but now, you were looking for a cure. It was all that mattered those days, until you found out that your mother had been experimented on during her pregnancy. A fucking lie. That's what your life was. That's why she cheered you to go to that stupid audition and fell into the hands of that monster at twenty-three years old.

The thought of your father supporting the horrid things Vought and the Seven did for decades was unbearable, and since Homelander's visit the night before caused those memories and nightmares to be back. It took a great effort to get out of bed and come to work that day. You'd make sure to compensate yourself for it later. But now, you were in a hurry to your daily session with Soldier Boy. You saved your phone in the pocket of your trousers after checking the time as you walked down the aisle, grabbing tightly the report of your patient with your other hand. Well, thirty minutes late wasn't nothing.

"Doctor!" you heard a female voice running towards you in the halls that made you turn on your heels. It was your young assistant.

"Hey, Bianca. What's wrong?" you asked as you noticed she was a little out of breath.

"We ran another test. The supe survived," she blurted, handing you a tablet that you didn't take. Sometimes the change in the results was minimal.

"That's great. Any significant improvements?"

"Well, just minimal effects. Right now some fever, fatigue, dehydration, and uhm, low pulse."

You sighed after another illusion. "Right. I don't think those are minimal effects, Bianca. Please check our patient and see how the powers are working. Run blood tests, all tests you can and then you can provide me the results. I'm a little busy right now."

She nodded with a shy smile, looking around subtly. "Sure."

You smiled back as best as you could. "Anything else?"

"No, it's just- I see you go this way a lot," Bianca pointed to the direction you were heading with her gaze. "That's Soldier Boy, isn't he?"

Your brows furrowed. "Why you ask?"

"Nothing, well, my grandpa used to talk about him all the time," she giggled. "I was just curious, sorry."

"No problem. I get it. But I really have to go, please make sure those results are on my desk by the end of the day," you ordered kindly.

"I will."

"Thanks, Bianca."

With that, you gave a last smile and began your walk again away from her, slower than before. For some reason something was off since you entered the building. It felt different. Totally weird. For the record, since Homelander threatened to have your head off, you paid twice the attention to your surroundings and the people around. You didn't know if there was something big planning right now in front of your nose. You just walked a couple of feet when you felt someone following behind, that was probably watching over you. In a swift movement, you turned on your heels but no one was there. The aisle was empty.

Bianca was already gone and almost no one would wander on this wing of the building, for obvious reasons. With caution you resumed your steps, telling yourself that you were not going insane.

"Robert Singer and I have been hard at work bridging the divide between the human and Superhuman communities. I've seen that divide firsthand in my three years running the FBSA—"

Ben scoffed, taking the TV controller to turn the screen off. "Bullshit."

He stood in the middle of the room with nothing but a towel hanging down his hips after taking a shower, taking the last smoke of his blunt. He grew tired of waiting for you, so he just took a shower and now, everything on the fucking channels was the stupid campaign by Victoria Neuman being supported by Vought and the fucking brat he was supposed to call his son.

With a deep breath, he finished the weed and threw the remains on the ashtray over the new coffee table. His mind started to wander away, realizing he had been a little calm the last couple of days after he almost blew up the fucking place to the ground. Inside, Ben knew your words and actions were a lot of help for the small sense of serenity that started to grow within his chest after that moment. Absolutely that was something he wouldn't admit, ever. But if he was to say, he was actually relieved.

Taking a look around, his place was not that big of a mess. You were certainly used to his clothes around the floor and the sofas, so it wasn't really important. What he found annoying though was you pushing him to read the stupid books and write down his feelings. He wasn't going to do that. If you were there to medicate him, so be it. He wondered why you took so long to do it. Probably he should be stoned enough to not feel anything. That was fucking better.

Just as he started to go over his mental plan to get the hell out of your prison, the door opened. He smirked at your sight. As always, an useless armed man standing behind your figure. You dispatched the guard and stepped inside Soldier Boy's place, the door closing with a loud sound.

You stopped your tracks just a few steps away from him. He noticed your eyes tracing his half bare body in a quick motion, before turning to his face with an arrogant smirk on your lips.

"See something you like, sweetheart?" Ben teased.

With a light chuckle, you held your head high. "Don't be delusional, it's just basic instinct."

"Believe me, I fucking know that," he snarked, taking over your figure with his green eyes the same way you did before. "Basic instinct."

You rolled your eyes. "So," you sat down in your usual place to start the session, making a pile of three of his shirts in the empty space. "Make yourself decent and then we can continue."

Ben took some sweatpants and a shirt from the floor and started to dress himself in front of you, without much care. He smirked as you turned away your gaze to focus on the report lying on your lap.

"You're late," he remarked, taking his own seat once he was done with his clothes.

"Yeah, I had some things to do," you mumbled going through the pages. "But I see we can start now."

He took a deep breath, staring into the distance. "Don't make it boring."

You grimaced, looking back at him. "Can't promise that."

Ben sensed a playfulness coming from you. Could it be that, after recieving your comforting words, he was seeing another side of you? Like the side that would actually trust him, because you still arrived. You were sitting in front of him. You were with him, in the same fucking room where the sun was far from getting. Yeah, you were there but he was too full of ego to bring his walls down again. He wanted to convince himself he wasn't vulnerable. He knew he was more than that. He was Soldier Boy, the man who had to stop Homelander and his fucking kid.

He smirked. "Well, sugar, I can ask you to try."

#soldier boy x reader #soldier boy x you #soldier boy x female reader #soldier boy imagine #soldier boy fanfiction #the boys amazon fanfiction #the boys series #the boys tv #jensen ackles fanfiction #soldier boy/ben

102 notes · View notes

all-alone-he-turns-to-stone · 3 months

Text

Crazy, Stupid, Love

Dean Winchester Masterlist

Summary: When Dean has to work at a café to learn infos on a hunt, he thinks it's the worst. Until he meets her. At first, she's only kind of an annoying coworker. But an unfortunate event brings them closer, and Dean starts feeling things for her. If it's love, he doesn't know. But for the first time, he starts wondering how it would feel to have a normal life. A normal job. And a normal relationship. But first, he needs to get her revenge against that shitty boss.

Note: this happens in the begining of season one

Word Count: 9k

Pairing: Dean x F!Reader

Content Warning: Toxic work place, rude customer, humiliation, bullying, swearing

Squares: Humiliation for @hurtcomfort-bingo,/ Revenge for @jacklesversebingo

A/n: I'm gonna be honest, at first, I didn't want to post this fic. When I saw the attention the last few fics I took so much time to write got, it made me sad... But then I remembered how much fun I had with this one, so decided to post it in case someone else has the same fun reading it. ALSO! This was for @eevvvaa writing challenge! I picked the movie Crazy Stupid Love but actually used the quotes! They will be in bold in the text. Happy reading!

Usually, this situation would have upset him. After all, he was stuck here 8 hours per day, 5 days per week and always finished too late to go to the nearest bar afterwards. It also wasn’t the best first real job to have, as it was lame, boring, and always the same thing. But working at a café also had its advantages.

Like the beautiful barista that he had the chance to see on his first day. She was leaving, as she was only working mornings, and he was working evenings, but Dean couldn’t detach his eyes from her. Beautiful body, hair immaculate even after 8 hours of wearing a net, skin tanned to perfection.

“Oh great, another one.”

That wasn’t the girl he was talking about. No, the girl that just spoke was Y/n. At first glance, she looked like the manager. With the most seniority in here, she knew how things were done and how to do them quickly. But she was no boss. To make her agree to be his trainer and show him the basics, the real boss had to insist a lot. He didn’t know all the details, though, but she ended up accepting.

It was for a hunt. Otherwise, Dean would never be here. Sam said there was something weird in the neighborhood, and that the best way to discover what was going on was to talk with the community. And the best place to have conversations with people that didn’t want to talk with the police was of course at the local café. All the rumors and crispy details of the town were floating in there. The reason why it wasn’t Sam doing the whole barista thing was as simple as upsetting.

“Dean, you have all the charm. People- ladies- will open up to you like blooming flowers in the spring.”

Ugh.

Back to the present, Dean ignored Y/n’s comment and tilted his head to the side, still eyeing the morning employee that was leaving. “What do I have to do to get on the morning shift?”

A groan of annoyance resonated behind him. His smile fell. He was stuck with her for a while, as they were both working evening shifts.

Alone together.

There were 60 seconds in one minute. And 60 minutes in one hour. A shift lasted 8 hours here. That was way too many seconds to spend doing nothing but wait to leave.

All that was in his head was the hot chick he kept seeing since he started working here. After only bumping into her these past 2 weeks, Dean finally decided to ask her on a date. And since he was Dean Winchester, no one could tell him no. And the same day, after his shift, he would meet her in front of the pizza place that was two blocks away.

And he couldn’t stop looking at the clock, head in his hand, hoping that staring at it would make the time go faster.

“I asked for a hot caramel latte with almond milk and no foam, what the hell is this?!”

It was near the end. In 15 minutes, the shop would be closed and then it was cleaning time. Weeping the floor, throwing away the remaining food that was not sold, washing the dishes, etc. That was always his favorite part, because even if Y/n was a pain in the ass as his supervisor, she was chill and allowed him to choose the radio station while they cleaned and he could leave once his part was done.

At first, the voice didn’t alert him, and Dean kept on making himself busy with cleaning tables that didn’t need it. But then, something broke, the sound heavy of meaning, and he was on alert. Every fiber of his body was on and he turned to the source of the sound.

Right at the counter, there was a man with his back to him. Without seeing his face, Dean knew he was angry. Pissed, even. At his feet, a broken cup, porcelain in pieces covered the floor soaked in coffee. Two steps allowed Dean to know what the man was looking at, and when he saw her…

He immediately rushed without thinking.

“I’m gonna ask you to leave, sir,” Dean put his hand on the customer’s shoulder, which made him jump. The man turned to him and aggressively stepped back.

“Don’t touch me,” the man hissed. “You’re working here, huh?” He looked up and down at Dean, noticing the apron of the café he was wearing. “Must be the manager here. Well, your employee here is worthless, you should be careful who you hire, for fuck sake!”

At that, Dean couldn’t help but wince. That was unnecessary rude to say. He glanced at Y/n again and felt his heartbeat with pain. Her head was down, probably to hide tears. That was probably not the first time she had to serve asshole customers, but it was the first time Dean noticed it. Working in customer service was not easy at all, you had to be strong to endure all of that everyday.

He only knew Y/n for about two weeks, but he already knew a lot about her. She was calm. Kind. She cared about doing her job right. Yeah, she was a bit bossy and used every opportunity to send subtle little insults towards Dean just enough to annoy him, like how he couldn’t even do a coffee, in this economy? But it was never mean and he liked that side of her that didn’t let people step on her toes. But right now, in front of that man? She was small. She wanted to hide. It wasn’t the Y/n he knew.

“I’m not the boss,” Dean answered finally, placing his gaze back on the man. “But we’re closed, so I’m gonna ask you to leave.”

The rude customer was the last one in the café, so it wasn’t like he was breaking any rules. And he was Dean Winchester. He made the rules.

Red seemed to eat at the man’s face so much he was angry. “Not before I get what I fucking paid for!” He started yelling. Dean didn’t mind being screamed at, he was used to it with his dad, how sad it sounded. But when the man turned to Y/n to yell at her, Dean couldn’t hold himself back. “You useless cunt!”

“I said, out!” Dean grabbed the customer by the neck and quickly sent him backwards. His legs met the table right behind him, but it wasn’t enough to make him understand. The man lunged forward in an attempt to hit Dean, but he didn’t know.

Dean was waiting for it.

The fist missed, and the man stumbled into the void and collapsed on the floor like a clown.

“This isn’t over,” the man growled and got up. Sure he would strike again, Dean was ready to fight. But this time, the fist didn’t miss. The pain came later, a few seconds after the hunter realized he got hit in the face. Fortunately for his ego, Dean managed to stay on his feet and not fall pathetically on the floor.

He reached for the wound.

It was right near his left eye, it would bruise for sure.

With deadly flames in his green eyes, he looked at his target.

“Oh, you’re dead.”

The rest happened quickly.

Dean decided he wouldn’t hold back anymore. As his head throbbed with ache and anger, he was about to hit with everything he got. But at the last moment, something interrupted him. A body, warm, soft, encircling his own, stopped him from moving.

“Please stop…”

Her voice woke him up completely. Shaking, she put herself between the two men to stop the fight even if she was scared.

The man took the opportunity to run away, the bell chiming behind him as the door closed violently.

A long silence followed the departure of the aggressive customer. A couple of seconds passed, then minutes, before she realized there was no silence actually. Things were happening around her, words were spoken, and the only person besides her was running around locking doors and closing blinds, cursing every word he could think of at the moment.

Her hearing was nothing but a shrill sound, almost painful, like she was deaf. It took another minute and him calling her name for her to come back to the present.

"You okay? He didn't hurt you?" Dean was kneeling in front of her. She finally noticed she was sitting down on a chair. Shaking her head, she tapped her hands in her face to finish waking herself up from her slumber.

"You're hurt and you ask me if I'm okay?" She stood up as she spoke, Dean doing the same. Then she seemed to disappear in the backstore to come back with a bag of frozen vegetables they used for the soup. "Sit down," she instructed.

Dean would have been impressed by her capacity to focus after such an event, especially with how she was a couple of seconds ago, but he knew better. She wouldn't meet his gaze, her head was down, and when he glanced at her hands, it was to see them shake.

"Y/n-"

"Oh, come on, sit down, your masculinity won't suffer too much, I just want to check," she rolled her eyes and almost pushed him to the chair. Dean let himself be moved around with a smirk. That was the Y/n he knew. "There, it's not that bad, huh?"

"It's no big deal," he tried to convince her, after all, as a hunter, he got hurt more than once before and healed perfectly fine. But when he saw her, he understood. And he let himself be checked by her only for her. To reassure her it was nothing, it was fine, it would bruise into a black eye and nothing else.

"Okay, it's not that bad," she sighed in relief as she said that.

"Told you," Dean snickered with a smile. "Ouch!"

The frozen bag was now on his bruise and Y/n was turning her back to him. His first instinct was to ask her if she was okay, check on her, after all, she seemed pretty shaken up, but he knew she needed time, that was all.

"We should call the police," Dean ended up saying. Usually, he would never propose that, but the customer was human. A monster in some sort, but completely human, so the police could take care of it.

"No!" She turned harshly towards Dean, surprising him.

"Why not?"

Pacing back and forth, Y/n seemed to get lost in her thoughts. "It's not necessary, I doubt the customer will come back, and it would put the cafe in a bad spot, we would lose customers and…"

Again, Dean knew. Y/n was a good employee, she loved doing her job right, but she hated the place, hated the menu and the disgusting coffee served here, and hated the management. But they were the ones giving her her salary at the end of the month, so she couldn't disappoint them.

"I can deal with the boss," Dean said, standing up, the bag still on his eye.

In front of him, Y/n sadly shook her head. "It won't be necessary." She pointed at one corner of the cafe. Then another. "There's cameras around, and he loves to watch. Loves to tell us everything we do wrong. He probably already knows it happened. We'll see tomorrow, I guess," she sighed. Then, like a thought crossed through her head, she lifted her head completely and crossed gaze with Dean. "Your date! You're gonna be late!"

Dean wanted to laugh. So badly. Of course, he talked to her about it. Kristina, their coworker from the morning shift and Dean's date, was waiting for him. But after what happened, it completely got out of his head. Smiling, he shook his head and placed the bag of defrosting vegetables on the table beside him.

"I'll call her, say something came up. She'll understand."

Y/n cringed, biting her lips and frowning. "I don't think she cares enough to understand. But you're cute and sexy so maybe she'll forgive your ass."

Immediately after saying those words, Y/n became a puddle of embarrassment. Her body flushed with the realization of what she just admitted.

"Really?" Dean would not let that go. "You think I'm the perfect combination of sexy and cute ?"

"Shut up," she murmured between her teeth, grabbing the nearest thing, the cloth he was using to clean the tables, to throw it at him. "Get out of here your shift is over."

"Yeah," Dean surprised himself by what he said next. "But I won't let you walk back home alone. Consider me your cute and sexy bodyguard," he laughed at her reaction, but it was nothing compared to the sound leaving his mouth when he received another cloth on the head. "Hey, this one was wet"

"Oops!"

The next day started pretty badly. After a complicated night with barely any sleep and lots of nightmares, Y/n got up early to get ready. Even if her shift started at 3pm, she knew the phone would ring and the ruthless voice of her boss would order her to come in to talk.

About what happened.

It was not even noon when it happened. She was at her third coffee, so she had energy even if she felt dead inside. Since she was already dressed, all she had to do was grab her stuff and head to the cafe. Like usual, she had to walk since she didn't have enough savings to buy a car.

The weather was quite nice, compared to how gloomy she was feeling. It was warm and sunny outside. Y/n barely made a step out, locking her door, that a loud engine startled her. The sun was reflecting strongly on the hood, blinding her as she walked with caution towards it, and for a moment she thought maybe it was the customer that found her and came to finish what he started. Fortunately she recognized the car quickly, as it was the same car that drove her home last night.

A 67 chevy impala.

It was even more beautiful than when she saw it yesterday.

The drive to the cafe was quiet, apart from the chichats. How are you? Do you feel better? So, did he call you too? Usually, Y/n would have commented on something random just to annoy Dean, but when he turned his head towards her at a red light to ask her a question, she saw the bruise around his eyes, reminding her of the night before and how everything was her fault. If only she hadn't messed up the order…

Once parked in front of the cafe, Dean stopped the engine to turn to Y/n. "Hey," he said in a calm and steady voice. "Whatever happens there, it was neither our fault."

"I appreciate it, Dean, but it was. I was in charge, even though I told the boss more than once that I didn't want to be, so what happens on my shift is my fault." Without leaving him time to answer, she opened the door and left the car to enter the cafe.

The moment she stepped inside, a loud silence echoed around her. Every employee stopped chatting to stare at her, the customers mimicking their actions, wondering what was so much more interesting than getting their order right and fast.

Y/n hated that. The attention. The eyes on her. The silence. Her body started shaking, both with anger and humiliation, the tears almost painful to hold back. But then, as she was about to step towards the boss' office, a warmth settled on her shoulder, stopping the tremors at once. And a voice she was starting to grow fond of whispered near her ear.

"Ignore them. They don't matter right now."

With Dean, she felt safe. Strong. Like she could do everything and never feel afraid anymore. That was until they were sitting in the office in front of the boss.

“Y/n, I am wildly disappointed with you. What you did was beyond unprofessional, and I can’t believe I have to do this. You’re suspended.”

It was nothing less than what she expected from her boss. Since working there, she had done everything to stay in his good graces, sometimes doing other people's jobs to compensate. Everything to keep the restaurant clean and to continue serving fresh food every day. It wasn't Kristina who would write down expiration dates on perishable products, or place the new arrival of breads behind the ones already there to prevent the oldest ones from remaining at the bottom of the shelf, covered in mold. If this place passed the health inspection every year, it was thanks to Y/n’s efforts, efforts that no one had ever noticed or considered.

It was probably better that way.

Head bowed, Y/n took a harsh breath and opened her mouth to apologize and admit her boss was right. However, the words could not come out of her mouth fast enough, because someone else was already speaking.

“This is bullshit,” Dean exclaimed. A quick glance in his direction, and Y/n could see his hands forming fists on his thighs. “Y/n did everything perfectly, it’s not her fault if customers don’t respect anything, not even themselves!”

“Dean, I think you're new here,” the boss replied with a calmness that didn't mean anything good. Y/n tried to draw Dean's attention to her to signal him to shut up, that it was nothing, that she could survive a week suspended, but the young man paid her no mind. And one look at his face showed her the same anger she had seen in him the previous evening, when he had decided to defend himself against the customer. “I watched the surveillance cameras carefully. Your reactions with this client, although undoubtedly intended to be heroic, were completely unacceptable. The next time you make a mistake, you will suffer the same fate as Y/n. For now, take your day, see you on Monday, Dean.”

"That's all?!" This time, Dean stood up as he spoke. “Y/n gets suspended, and I only get a warning and a day off? What the f-”

“Thank you,” Y/n quickly cut him off, grabbing his arm firmly to silence him. Strangely, like the day before, her intervention seemed to calm Dean down very quickly. “See you next week.”

As she was about to leave, her hand still holding Dean's wrist to drag him out of the office, a voice called out to her.

"Two weeks. See you in two weeks.”

It took a lot of control for her to say nothing. The inside of her cheek hurt from how hard she bit it, dragging Dean out of the office and then out of the restaurant. It was only once outside, far from prying ears and vulture eyes, that she was finally able to breathe.

“FUCKING BULLSHIT! FUCK YOU!” Suddenly came out of her mouth. If Dean still had any anger at that moment, it suddenly vanished when he heard so many curses coming out with so much anger from the usually calm Y/n. “Oh. It feels better."

Having never seen her like this, it took several seconds for Dean to compose himself. Large green eyes were fixed on her, wide, shocked, even, until a good hit on the arm woke him up completely. "Ouch!" He rubbed his arm as if it hurt even though her fist had barely tickled him.

“What the fuck was that, seriously?! Talk to the boss like that? You’re born stupid or you’re just too dumb to think, fuck, Dean!”

Still as surprised and shocked, Dean didn't respond immediately. Y/n was angry. More, even. Beyond pissed. Which was completely normal under the circumstances, except Y/n wasn't normally angry. She could get upset, complain about the system, the management, the customers, or how she was the only one doing all the little things that made the café special and comfortable, but she was never angry.

“I couldn’t let him talk to you that way, I just couldn’t,” Dean explained calmly. It was quite rare for him to be the calm one in a heated argument. But in this case, he knew he had to keep his own rage to himself, she didn't need more anger. She needed to speak, to expel this emotion out of her like a demon that needed to be exorcized.

“Well, that was fucking stupid,” she pointed at him, her gaze meeting his. This surprised him again. Y/n was shy, although she was a good leader, and he noticed she had trouble looking people in the eye for several seconds. She always ended up looking away, and he knew it wasn't because she was dishonest, but rather that she was afraid of the judgment in the eyes of others. So that she was yelling at him while staring right at him… That surprised Dean again and made him speechless.

For a few seconds, he forgot that he was being told off by a girl for defending her, and lost himself in the contemplation of her magnificent orbs. Since he had known her, he had never really seen them, or bothered to look at them.

And her eyes were beautiful, even filled with anger.

Probably noticing the eye contact was getting considerably long, Y/n finally broke the almost trance-like effect to gaze elsewhere.

“Have you had it long?”

She was still not looking at him. "What?"

“The uncontrollable need to save the damsel in distress.” The corner of her lips lifted up in a smirk.

“I-” He couldn’t tell her that this was actually his life. Saving the woman and the orphan, killing the monsters, it was so ingrained in his life that it was part of him.

“Come on,” she muttered, still not meeting his gaze, gesturing to him to follow her.

"Come on… Where?" It was the longest conversation he'd had with her, and it was only because she was angry, he remembered. He was here for a hunt, he had to learn more about the people of the town. Concentration and focus were required, but yet... This side of Y/n, her confidence, how she wasn't afraid to yell at him like that, when she was normally so gentle...

He liked that side of her. Not that he disliked the rest, it was just-

“I think you have tonight off, and I, well, the next two weeks.” Starting to walk towards the impala, she then stopped and turned her head just enough to look over her shoulder at him. “I’m going to help you rediscover your manhood. Do you have any idea where you could have lost it?”

A big smile stretched Dean's lips. This was the Y/n he knew. “Probably over there,” he pointed to the horizon. “Near the pizzeria. You hungry?”

The pizza was the most delicious thing that had passed Y/n's lips in a long time. Very greasy and dripping with cheese, the junk food was simply good after such a catastrophic day. And sharing this moment with his colleague, accomplice, even, and perhaps friend- if he wanted to- was the icing on the cake.

Her heart always beat a beat and a half faster when he was near her. And although she tried not to like him, not to get attached to what was clearly a bad boy who preferred girls like Kristina, who just hung out with her because he had free time… She simply couldn't deny it anymore. What her heart desired was starting to win over what reason screamed at her.

Don't fall in love.

And yet, as that evening at the pizzeria after her suspension turned into an almost daily routine, her heart prevailed. The crush she immediately had for the young man with emerald eyes and cheeks covered in a milky way of little freckles was slowly transforming into something deeper.

A week had passed since her suspension, it was Saturday again, and as usual, Y/n and Dean found themselves at the pizzeria. The owner himself now came to take their order, even though he already knew what the two wanted since they always ordered the same thing. Everything was going exactly as usual, Dean recounting his day at work, how slowly everything was going downhill without her.

“I worked with a new guy, and son of a bitch, I’ve never seen someone take their time so much. It’s like he did it on purpose,” Dean sipped his drink. Y/n’s gaze followed the movement of the Adam’s apple rising and falling as he swallowed. She was barely concentrating on what he was saying. “We had two complaints that the sandwich bread had mold, but the person in the kitchen didn't get in trouble for it. It’s like the boss knows that no matter the wait time, the quality of the food, or the attitude of the employees, the cafe will always make money since it’s the only one in town,” Dean let out a little laugh which only spread the butterflies in Y/n’s stomach. “Let me tell you that over the past week, some regulars have stopped coming. Oh, and many have asked where you’ve been.”

“It’s not surprising,” she finally answered after a few seconds of silence where only the chewing of Dean devouring his pizza could be heard. On the table, near the windows, the dessert was already there, two slices of pie that the owner had reserved for them knowing they were coming. Her gaze fell on the dessert as she spoke although she really wanted to look him in the eyes. Admiring the perfect color of his orbs, admiring how everything was perfect about him. It was so difficult. “What’s surprising is that the health inspection hasn’t closed this place yet.”

These words hung in the air for a moment, accompanied by silence. Finally glancing over at Dean, she found that he had stopped eating mid-bite, staring blankly at her. It was almost as if Y/n could see the gears moving in his mind.

“Yet.” That was all he said next, taking the time to finish his bite before continuing. "I have an idea."

“I could figure that much,” she laughed as she took her drink, anything to occupy her hands and look normal in his presence. Luckily he couldn't hear her heart thumping against her ribcage.

“We're going to avenge you,” he pointed ahead, at her, and that was enough for her eyes to move from his finger to his eyes. She managed to hold his gaze for several long seconds which seemed to her like hours of torture. "You'll see."

"See what? Oh, how cute,” a voice broke the bubble Y/n and Dean were in. She hadn't heard that voice in a week, and it had been the best thing her suspension had given her, except for all the time she'd spent with Dean since.

“Kristina,” Y/n muttered under her breath, her eyes immediately going to her pizza. A weight seemed to settle on her chest, pressing down hard with its gigantic pressure.

“Hey,” Dean greeted her, and the pressure thumped harder against her heart. “How you doing, Kristina?”

His tone was kind. Friendly. Sweet. Just like he was with Y/n. But with a bonus, he was flirty.

Obviously.

She was not special.

“Oh, I'm doing well, much better,” she laughed. “Especially since Y/n isn’t at the café anymore. No one is ordering us around anymore, right, Dean?”

Out of the corner of her eye, Y/n could see movement. Raising her head just enough to have her in her sight without looking directly at her, she could see her hand on Dean's shoulder. Besides, she wasn't alone. Two other girls from the cafe were standing with her. Without looking at them, Y/n knew. She felt their gaze on her, burning, like vultures around prey.

“I actually liked working with Y/n,” Dean replied as calmly as ever. His words created a spark of hope in Y/n who this time looked directly at Dean. “It’s not as fun without her,” he continued.

“Oh,” Kristina laughed, and her two henchmen followed suit. “I know you want to stay in her good graces by saying all this,” she leaned towards him to whisper in his ear, but made no effort to lower her voice. “But you don’t need to. I think she's going to get fired. The customer came back to file a complaint against her.”

"What?" Dean leaned back slightly to get a better look at Kristina. Now he had his face so close to hers that only one movement was necessary to kiss her. And he had a perfect view into her cleavage. “But…” He turned his head towards the girl sitting in front of him, obviously not understanding why she was being fired and not him.

“You don’t have to lick her boots anymore,” Kristina put a hand on her hip. “I know she’s in love with you, but at this point, it’s pity, right? Spending time with her… Poor little thing. No friends. No boyfriend. Only feelings for those who don’t love her. Just like last time, always falling for the new guy.”

Her face was burning. Y/n was seething, with anger, with sadness, with humiliation. And the worst, the worst was Dean's expression. His gaze, which he constantly fixed on her, seeking to meet her gaze, wanting so much for her to grant him one look, was now stuck in emptiness. And a look of pure confusion made him frown.

Dean refused to look at her anymore.

It was too much.

“Ew, friends to friends,” Kristina added, as if the stabs she had already thrown didn’t hurt enough already. “Ew.”

Standing abruptly, Y/n slammed her hands on the table. Head bowed, her hair cascaded in front of her face, trying as best as they could to hide the tears that welled up in her eyes and inevitably rolled down her cheeks. A ton of insults raced through her mind, but they all got stuck in her throat with this lump growing and growing, until finally, the tears flowed.

One.

Two.

One fell silently onto the table. The other, on her plate, right next to the barely eaten slice of pizza.

Before the third tear fell, Y/n was already out of the restaurant and walking as quickly as she could towards her house. The tears continued to flow without her being able to stop them, but she remained silent. If she could control one thing tonight, it would be her voice. No sound would come out of her mouth until she was alone, at home, in her bed. Only there, she would let herself scream all this pain into her pillow.

No one tried to catch her.

“Good news,” Sam announced before his brother had even closed the door. “Get this. There was no monster from the beginning. It was actually kids who created the whole thing to attract attention. You don’t have to play barista anymore.”

"Oh."

Looking up from his laptop, Sam fixed his gaze on Dean. The door closed slowly and he took off his coat just as slowly and placed it on his bed. The motel was shabby, like all the others, and usually, Dean would never place his precious leather coat on those blankets which he called "the most disgusting object the universe has known." He'd cleaned the covers several times to be sure, but the comforter had kept this unnatural color, so he still didn't trust it.

“Dean.”

“I'm going to take a shower,” his brother grumbled as he headed towards the bathroom, completely ignoring what Sam had just said.

“Okay, but-” the door slammed. “Okay.”

Sam waited for Dean to finish his shower for almost an hour. The only reason Dean Winchester would take such a long shower would be the fantastic water pressure, but having used this bathroom for over 3 weeks, Sam knew that really wasn't the case.

Finally, Dean came out.

“Are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Sam closed his laptop to put his full attention on his brother. The latter sat at the end of his bed, dressed with fresh clothes, his towel on his shoulder to catch the droplets falling from his hair.

“Have you ever dreamed of a normal life?” Dean answered his question with another question. At this, Sam rolled his eyes.

“I had a normal life before, remember? Before you picked me up to find Dad?”

Dean made a sound that was a mix of a sigh of guilt and a grunt of frustration, probably directed at himself. "I know but…"

“I can't believe it,” Sam stood up at the revelation. “You like working there.”

“Nah,” Dean slapped the air like he was chasing away the stupid idea. “Actually, yeah, but not anymore. Working in customer service is horrible.”

“I feel like there's a but,” Sam went to sit next to his brother on the bed.

“But,” Dean took a deep breath. "There is a girl."

Sam sighed. Obviously it was about a girl. “Have you slept with her yet? Because if you want to stay here for a one night stand, I swear-”

“She’s in love with me.”

Sam turned his whole body towards his brother, his eyes wide. "Oh."

"Oh."

“Do you like her back?”

At this question, Dean's face disappeared under his large hands. “I don’t know,” his voice sounded muffled by his palms.

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

"I don't know!" Dean exclaimed, removing his hands at the same time. It was his turn to avoid looking at someone, staring at the void instead. “I don’t know what it is to love. How to love. If it’s love. It was never explained to me, you know, it wasn’t dad who would tell me how to know if I love someone.”

A silence followed his words, but not for long.

“With Jess…” Sam began slowly, as if the words he was about to say were poisonous snakes that could bite him at any moment. “It was simple. I felt good with her. She felt good with me. And together, we were good.”

“Okay,” Dean listened intently, as if the answers he was looking for were on his brother's lips.

“Do you like spending time with her?” He then asked.

Dean didn't even think for a second. "Oh yeah."

“When you're not with her, what do you do? You think about her, right?”

This time, Dean took a moment before answering. “Well, I worked at the cafe, so obviously I was thinking about her, since she wasn’t there but she used to. And then, when I finished work, I would go see her and we would order food or go to the pizzeria.”

“Okay, and then?”

"And then what?" Dean finally looked his brother in the eye. He still had questions, still doubts, confusion, but that was completely normal. A soft, understanding smile stretched Sam's lips.

“What are you thinking about right now?”

“Oh, how I want to punch that shitty boss in the face,” Dean clenched his fist to mimic his words. “I never hit women, but that girl, Kristina, humiliated Y/n terribly earlier. And I reacted too late, she was gone and-”

He stopped speaking suddenly, as if enlightenment had finally reached his mind.

"And?"

“I have to join Y/n, apologize, I-”

“Dean.”

Stopping just as he was getting up and putting his coat back on, the green eyed man turned to his brother.

“If you're in love, I can't tell you, Dean. But I can confirm that you like her. But for tonight, let her breathe, these feelings are new for the both of you.”

At these words, Dean collapsed on the bed. “Oh, you’re probably right. I don't want to rush her, you know, she's so shy, but at the same time, so... Fierce. She's the perfect balance of sweet and spicy. And I let her down.”

To that, Sam didn't know what to answer. He knew that feeling, the one of having abandoned the person you love. That's how he felt ever since he lost Jess.

“I'm sure you'll figure out how to make amends,” Sam placed a comforting hand on his shoulder.

“Actually… I think I already know,” Dean turned his head towards him, green eyes meeting amber ones. Green eyes sparkling with a new resolution, probably very wicked. “And you, my dear brother, will be able to help me.”

Turned out, losing another employee during the busiest time of the year was a sufficient reason to terminate a suspension preemptively. And although, clearly, this did not seem to make certain employees happy and even less the boss who hated coming back on his decisions, Y/n was able to return to work after barely a week of forced leave. And also, strangely, the customer’s complaint seemed to have vanished from existence. Or maybe it was another lie that Kristina came up with to hurt Y/n.

And what a surprise when she arrived and saw the place.

It was depressing. Everything was messy and upside down, unopened boxes that needed to be refrigerated were lying around everywhere, and other products that needed to stay at room temperature, like syrups, ended up in the freezer. No rotation had been made, and it was with sadness that she had to note all the food they lost and throw everything away. It took her a long time, long enough for someone she despised to come and tell her how to do her job.

"What are you doing? Customers are waiting! Have you forgotten how to work?”

After making this more than derogatory comment, Kristina returned to her favorite position, the one that required the least effort.

Her heart was heavy. Filled and at the same time, empty. Since the last time with Dean at the pizzeria, she hadn't received any news. No call. No text. No, her heart wasn't big with heaviness, it was broken. Split. And now that she had returned to the café, she learned he no longer worked there.

Good for him, she thought as she put away one last box before heading towards the front of the café to deal with the customers. At least he was out of this hell. It was maybe better that way.

“Sorry for the wait, what can I get you?” The usual words were so ingrained in her that they came out of her mouth as soon as she was behind the cash register, without even looking at the customer.

“I would like you to give me the chance to talk to you,” a familiar voice said in front of her. That voice, low, hoarse, and so perfect. She had started to get used to hearing it almost every day. But this time, it forged yet another crack on her heart.

“Dean,” even saying his name was painful. The pain of a lost friendship and crushed hope. The pain of a humiliated moment, a bad memory where he had sat there in silence while she was being crushed as an inactive witness.

“Y/n. There’s no word to express how sorry I am for-”

An apology, of course, wasn't exactly what she wanted, but it was more than she had expected. He was there, in the flesh, in front of her. So, for once and although it was difficult because looking at him would hurt her even more, Y/n raised her head and stared into his sad gaze. Ready and open to hear what he had to say.

There was a sadness almost identical to her own in his beautiful green eyes. Guilt, regrets, he seemed sincere-

“Dean! I thought you had left the ship,” Kristina suddenly entered Y/n’s bubble, who didn’t waste a moment to move to the side. It wasn't unknown that Y/n didn't like being touched or having someone in her bubble, and Kristina knew it, so she did it on purpose. All the time.

“Excuse me, but I was talking with Y/n,” Dean replied in a neutral voice, almost annoyed, even.

“Oh, sure, you want to feel better about last time, but you don't have to,” Kristina continued, crossing her arms over her large chest.

Dean rolled his eyes and shifted his attention to Y/n. “I’m serious, Y/n. Come with me, I need to talk to you. And they don’t deserve you.”

Y/n's mouth opened, then closed, tears welling up in her eyes at an uncontrollable speed.

“Seriously, Dean, don’t you see how pathe-”

“Kristina, shut the fuck up. You’re bothering us.”

This really didn't please the girl who made an offended sound, threw an unimportant insult, and left without another word.

Once finally alone again, Dean was ready. Ready to tell the beautiful barista in front of him everything that was on his heart, even if he didn't really know exactly what it was himself. He had some in the past, girlfriends, one night stands, crushes on the most beautiful and popular girls in school, but that wasn't the same thing. He felt an attachment to Y/n, a different feeling that he couldn't describe. If it was love, he didn't know. But he knew he didn't want to lose her.

“It's a little too late to come to my defense,” her voice said instead of his. Taken by surprise, Dean's mouth opened then closed, like a fish looking flabbergasted. “Although I really enjoyed seeing someone tell her to fuck off for once,” the shadow of a smile drew on her face for a second, but quickly faded away. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have a lot of work-”

“Wait,” Dean found his voice just in time.

“I don’t have time, Dean,” Y/n turned her back on him, giving him one last eye contact above her shoulder. Her eyes were filled with sadness and seeing her like that physically hurt him.

“On the contrary,” Dean insisted, a smile tugging at his lips as he knew the plan was going like clockwork. “You will soon have plenty of time.”

Seeing the obvious confusion spread across her face, Dean jerked his head towards the boss's office. This caught the attention of not only Y/n but also the other employees, because at the same time, voices were heard coming from that direction. Loud voices, displeased, and then the door opened.

“I am very disappointed with the state of this place. It's deplorable. I’m afraid I won't change my mind, the café is going to close.”

“Wait,” the boss looked tiny behind the person who had just spoken. Like the weight of reality was finally falling on his shoulders. Stomping him to the ground like a pest, just how he had always treated his employees. "You can’t, you don’t have the right!"

“I have all the rights, I am a health inspector, and this place is completely unsanitary.”

Witnessing the whole scene in the front row, like she was in the cinema, Y/n was jubilant. Finally. Finally this place was recognized as being good for trash. Finally, the boss got what he deserved. Finally, things seemed to come full circle and it was all over.

The health inspector subsequently introduced himself to the employees. He looked very young for this job, early twenties, probably, long hair parted in the middle of his forehead and hazel eyes, but regardless, he had done his job properly so Y/n didn’t care about the details.

“This place is going to close. But don't worry, you are entitled to unemployment compensation. Time to find something better for you,” the inspector finished his speech with a wink. If Y/n wasn't so excited by the idea of being rid of this miserable job, she would have been sure that the wink was aimed at her personally.

A laugh brought her attention back to Dean who was still in front of her. As the health inspector informed the customers present of the situation and put a note in the door to say the café was permanently closed, Dean was giggling.

“You did this,” Y/n finally understood.

“Told you we would get you revenge. Now, can you please come with me and listen to me? I need to talk to you.”

“After what you did for me, lunch is on me,” Y/n laughed as well, took off her apron which she threw behind her, and left the café without a glance behind her.

“Listen. So uhm, how can I say this, so uhm… God, I’m so bad at chick flicks and emotional stuff.”

The two had been sitting at the pizzeria for about an hour and a half pizzas. The same place as usual, with the same order, but this time everything was different. It was not simply out of friendship that they came to share a meal, there was more. Hidden feelings, others clearly visible but which had not yet been addressed, and frustration mixed with regrets.

Dean had been trying for two slices of pizza now to say something, but would immediately turn red the moment he tried to open up emotionally. And Y/n couldn't even blame him, seeing the efforts he made for her, what he did at the cafe, for her, and now he was trying so hard to explain and make it up to her… He could say absolutely nothing and she would be satisfied.

“Take your time,” Y/n mentioned between mouthfuls, leaving all her attention on the young man in front of her who still made her heart beat so quickly. Of course, he had made mistakes, and to forgive him just because he had the best revenge for her was pretty stupid, but oh well. Love makes you stupid, right? “It’s not like someone is waiting for me.”

“It’s just,” Dean sighed and ran his hands over his face. Y/n's gaze stayed on the ring on his finger, a ring she had already noticed before. “Not easy to say this. I mean, not to you, but like, talking about my stuff like this. But there’s one thing I know I have to say, and here it is,” he finally seemed to find his bearings, beautiful green eyes anchoring into hers, his red cheeks creating a nice color contrast. "I'm sorry. Sorry for not saying anything when Kristina was there being a bitch. I guess I was taken up by surprise with what she said, but that’s no excuse.”

“Dean, it’s fine,” Y/n shook her head and closed her eyes briefly. When she opened them again, she knew exactly what she wanted to say to him. She took a big breath, words and sentences forming quickly in her mind. And it all came out of her mouth as quickly. “I am not ashamed to like you. Not at all. Because you are nice. Pretty. Hella sexy. And I feel comfortable whenever I’m with you. And I like spending time with you, and always wanna spend more. I won’t be ashamed to think all those things about you, because they are true, and they only make you a better person.” Pausing her words, Y/n forced herself to keep her gaze on Dean's again. She noticed that since those words had come out of her mouth, it was easier to hold his gaze. “You don’t have to have the same feelings, I understand. You don’t have to reciprocate or answer my confession, I can already see how bad it is for you to express feelings,” she laughed briefly at his scowling expression. “What I’m trying to say is… Yes. I like you a lot. And if you only like me as a friend, well, I’ll take that. It might hurt, but it would hurt more to not have you around anymore.”

Phew. It was hard to say, but once everything was out, Y/n felt better, lighter even. A heavy weight was finally leaving her heart, but there was still a little left. That was pressing. And tightening with the question… What will his answer be?

Dean took a brief moment to think before answering. Everything had gone silent, neither of them were eating, and both were probably holding their breaths.

“I've only known you for a short time,” Dean finally broke the silence, and the breath left Y/n's lungs which burned as it passed. She could feel the “but” coming. “But…” And there you go. “I really appreciate your company. A lot. I don’t know if it’s the same thing you feel, or if it’s love, but for the first time in a long, long time, I don’t want to leave this town. And I want to continue spending time with you.” Hope was reborn in Y/n, a wave of indescribable emotions suddenly invading her. “I'm going to have to leave, eventually, for work, but... I really want to take a break and try. I don’t know if I can do it, have a normal life, be with you, and just quit my job, so… I can’t promise you anything. I will probably leave eventually, I have so much stuff to do and…”

“You know,” Y/n continued when she saw him struggling with his words, hope now so strong in her body that she was almost vibrating. It wasn't a confession of love, but it was even better. This attachment Dean felt for her was worth even more than any cheesy love confession from the romantic movies or books she loved to delve into. “I no longer really have any ties to this city. No more jobs. If… We realize that things are working between us, and that you need to leave, nothing stops me from coming with you.” Realizing that it was probably too direct since they weren't even together, Y/n quickly adjusted her mind. “But those are just random ifs and thoughts,” she hurriedly took a bite of her pizza, just to make her stop talking.

“Y/n,” raising her head, she looked back at Dean. The latter had a big smile on his face and shook his head, clearly amused by her words. “If I told you what I did for work, you would never believe me. And when you”ll see it with your eyes and will be forced to believe me, you’re going to want to run away from me.”

“You’re a secret agent then?” Y/n hurriedly said, her mouth still full of pizza, her eyes wide. “Wow. Impressive.” She laughed, and Dean nervously laughed with her. If only it was that, it would be so much easier. “It really reminds me of my uncle.”

“Your uncle was a secret agent?” Dean asked, amused by the change of subject and how she was easily taking everything he said to her.

She was really the right one. Maybe she wouldn't run away after all.

“No, actually. When I was young, I often spent time at his house, but my parents stopped visiting him. They said he had lost his mind. But I loved these stories of ghosts and werewolves, he always told me he hunted them, saving people, like a secret agent of the supernatural,” a big smile stretched her lips at this thought, past memories flooding back into her head. It was so long ago, but she kept good memories of her uncle. Expecting the same reaction from Dean, Y/n only met a shocked face, frozen in a position that didn't suit him at all. Eyes wide, mouth parted, his skin white like he actually saw a ghost. She waved her hand in front of his face. “Earth to Dean?”

“Y/n, what’s your last name again?”

Taken aback by the sudden question, she blinked once and then twice. “Uhm, I don’t think I’ve ever told you. It’s Singer, why?”

A long silence answered her questions and her face dropped a little bit. Why did it matter?

“Your uncle… What's his name?”

“Dean, I haven’t seen my uncle in almost 15 years you know-”

“Y/n.”

“Robert. It’s Robert. But I always called him…”

“Bobby.”

It was her turn to have her eyes widen. “Yeah…?”

“I think you and I have more in common than I thought. And you really need to meet my brother,” he immediately stood up and threw two 20 bills on the table. Standing up in turn, confusion filled her entire expression.

“Dean, that’s way too much for two pizzas- Dean?” But she couldn't add more, and the confusion turned into this small, pleasant flame in the middle of her chest when Dean's hand met hers. “Okay, but you’re going to have to explain it to me because I don’t understand anything.”

“You'll understand,” Dean's smile was indescribable because it was so big. But that smile was hiding something else. Secrets that his beautiful lips had surely sealed away for far too long. “Let’s go,” he walked outside, said goodbye to the restaurant owner, and led her to his car. But once inside, he stopped before starting the engine, frozen yet again as another realization hit him.

“What? Something's wrong?”

“You… uhm… might recognize my brother, actually.”

“Why, was he a customer at the café?” Y/n laughed, fastening her seat belt. This whole thing was so sudden, so random, she just wanted to burst laughing. She felt good even if she didn’t quite understand everything that was happening.

“It was the health inspector,” he finally started the car and backed out of the parking lot and onto the road in one smooth, sexy motion.

“Oh. Wait, he’s a health inspector?”

“Not… Really?”

“Dean.”

Silence.

“Dean, did you fake the inspection?”

“Not really?”

“Dean!”

“Please. I’ll explain everything once we arrive. Do you trust me?”

For a second, Dean took his eyes off the road and looked into hers, and she held the gaze for the entire second and saw nothing but honesty. Then, he turned his head and broke eye contact, but out of the corner of her eye, she could see his right hand raised slightly towards her, waiting to be picked up.

“Yeah,” she finally said, gently placing her hand in his. It was warm. Comfortable. And how he squeezed, tenderly but also firmly, showed worry about losing her. “It might be crazy and stupid, but I trust you, Dean Winchester.”

Forever taglist: @nitnat6245 @eevvvaa @wickedinspirations@fictional-affairs @awkward-and-indecisive @peachyaliien @katbratsupernaturalwhore

Supernatural Tag List: @peachyaliien @sexyvixen7 @stixnstripesworld @charred-angelwings @treat-winchesterswith-kindness @lyarr24 @fiftyshadesgrl @this-is-me19

Dean Winchester Tag List: @akshi8278 @kazsrm67 @wtrpxrks @deanwanddamons @thoughts-and-funnies @charred-angelwings @jensendreamland @deanswaywardgirl @happyt0exist @waynes-multiverse @djs8891 @mimaria420 @this-is-me1 @syrma-sensei

#dean winchester fanfiction #jacklesversebingo23 #hurt comfort bingo #dean winchester #supernatural fanfiction #dean winchester x reader #dean winchester x you #dean winchester x female!reader #dean winchester x f!reader #baby dean winchester #supernatural dean #supernatural dean x f!reader #supernatural dean winchester #supernatural dean winchester x female!reader #fluff #barista!dean #barista!reader

83 notes · View notes

winchester-girl67 · 5 months

Text

Wild Hearts (Part 7) - Ten Years After Dean Came Back

Summary: Dean and Y/N attend a session of couples' counselling with Dr. Garth Fitzgerald. They struggle with Y/N's infertility and make a final decision about the future of their family together.

Masterlist

Pairing: AU!Dean x reader

Word Count: 2,668

Warnings: age gap (reader is 32, Dean is 37), infertility, couples' therapy, adoption, relationship angst, mentions of physical abuse by a parent, language, angst, fluff

A/N: After many rewrites and some creative differences with the characters in this series, we’ve come to the last part.

_____

Ten years after Dean came back.

"And how does that make you feel, Y/N?" The skinny man asked from his chair placed next to the couch.

He wore a tweed suit and you thought he looked more like a college professor than a couples' therapist. He had a notebook in his hands and jotted down notes every time either of you spoke.

"I don't know, not good." You shrugged.

"Mhm," he jotted down more notes, "I see."

It was your first appointment and Dean had yet to speak up for any of the questions. He told you there was no point in going since he still loved you and you still loved him. He made it sound so simple, but it was more complicated than that. And he knew you needed to talk it through, so here he was supporting you and holding your hand; you couldn't ask for more.

"And, Dean, how do you feel about it?" Mr. Fitzgerald asked.

Dean scrubbed his free hand over his mouth and chin as he side eyed you. Mr. Fitzgerald, or Garth as he told you to call him, hadn't directed any questions towards Dean until now. Dean didn't seem too happy about it, but refused to let that show in the way he looked at you. All you saw was love.

"I'm okay with it," Dean said, still looking at you.

"How can you be okay with it?" You asked, scrunching your forehead.

"Because I love you, this doesn't change anything between us." He said with a shake of his head. "It doesn't change the way I feel about you or the fact that I still want to spend the rest of my life with you. I need you here with me. I can't do any of it without you."

"Yes, you can." You said.

"I don't want to."

Garth stayed silent while he listened and jotted down notes. He was a nice guy but hadn't said anything helpful yet. Maybe couples therapy was about opening the conversation more than actual advice or guidance. Maybe he just worked as a buffer and had you guys find your own way through.

"Everything's different now, Dean."

"No."

"You're the one that had our future planned out; two kids, one boy, one girl, a white picket fence, a big yard, and a dog. You even hung a tire swing and started building a treehouse, for fuck's sake." Your chin started to tremble and you took a breath. "Dean, you want kids and I want you to have them but it's not going to happen with me. I'm broken, my body's broken."

After four years of trying to get pregnant and the endless testing and trials, you were spent. Your body was spent and you couldn't remember the last time sex felt like it was supposed to. It felt clinical now like you were running through a maze for a piece of cheese. You tried almost everything, there were calendars and ovulation sticks, hormone injections, temperature readings, wedge pillows, and you were sick of it all.

You couldn't imagine it felt any different for Dean either. Your sex life was present but unaccounted for.

"I love you." Said Dean.

He wiped your cheeks dry from the tears streaming down them and kissed your forehead. It didn't matter how many times you'd snapped at him over the past four years with your hormones in overdrive, you couldn't push him away if you tried. And you had tried.

That was one reason why you wanted to go to therapy, you wanted to come to terms with your infertility and let it go. You wanted to stop the hormone treatments and stop feeling the way you were. You wanted to feel like yourself again.

"Y/N, did you hear what Dean just said?" Garth asked when he saw you had calmed down. Dean clutched your hand in his and gave it a squeeze. You shook your head. "He said, he loves you, do you believe that?"

"Yes," you knew he did.

That was something you never had to worry about with Dean. He let you know in more ways than one and you never questioned it. Hell, he supported you through the trials for this long because he knew it was what you wanted. He saw the toll it took on you and wanted to stop a long time ago, but you weren't ready to make your peace with it, with your body. Until now, you hoped.

"So then why are you pushing him away?" Garth asked, resting his pen on his notebook and giving you his full attention. "Do you think that's what he wants? That it'll make him happy to find someone else who can bear his children?"

"Maybe," you shrugged and refused to meet Dean's hurt stare.

Dean shook his head. "Y/N, I love you." He whispered, he had been saying that a lot lately. Like he knew it wasn't sinking in.

"And, Dean, when you tell Y/N that you love her, is that what you mean? Or are you trying to tell her something else that you can't find the words to say?" Garth asked and Dean cleared his throat and nodded. "What are you trying to tell her?"

Dean thought for a long moment, "The future I planned for us, I don't want that with anyone else."

"But we won't have it either," you said.

"I've made my peace with that and we're here so you can too." He rubbed the back of your hand with his thumb. His green eyes pleading with you like he still tried to convince you of everything he felt and hadn't been able to communicate.

"It's not fair, I wanted a family too. I never thought I would this badly, but I do. With you, I do." You sniffled, "It's not fair. The one thing I'm supposed to be able to do and I can't."

"We still can."

"How? I can't get pregnant, Dean, and I can't keep taking those hormones. My mood swings are all over the map with them and it's not working."

"We stop trying."

"What?" You frowned, "I don't understand, how can we have a family if I can't get pregnant? We can't afford a surrogate, Dean."

"Making a baby doesn't make you its parent, Y/N, trust me I know. My father might've played a very short hand in creating me but he was never a dad, he was never there for me, he never cared, he never loved me or Sammy."

"Speaking of unfair, how can a man like that make two kids and I can't even begin to form one? Ugh!" You sighed exasperatedly and fell back against the couch feeling defeated.

Dean smiled at your little tantrum and you wondered how he was able to do that. Find levity in the difficult parts of life. But that was his motto, something like: if you don't laugh, you cry. And for a moment, you saw him with a younger face, a bruised eye and a split lip. Smiling at you under the streetlamp with ice cream on his nose. That was almost seventeen years ago now.

You were finally voicing your disappointment at the cards you had been dealt and that was a step at healing. You tried for so long to be strong and composed but Dean always saw right through it. He hated seeing you hurt, but it was hard to come to terms with the fact that your body could never do what you wanted it to, it was less hard for him; even if the struggle was the same.

You had to live in your mind and listen to the little voice that called you broken. Dean just had to watch. Although, now that you thought about it, watching someone in pain could be just as painful. Especially when they refused your help and pushed you away.

You silently promised him you would never do that again.

"I love you, Dean." You squeezed his hand.

You were endlessly thankful to have him around to pull you out of your funk. You tried to smile back at him as you sat up.

"Can I interject here," Garth smiled, "I think Dean's talking about adoption. Sometimes a family you choose has stronger bonds than ones you make. You run that youth group, right, Y/N? So you of all people should know that there are many children out there that wish they could have parents that want them as badly as you and Dean want a child. At least look into it, if that's something you'd be willing to do."

"Do you want to adopt?" You asked Dean, he'd never mentioned it before.

"I looked into it after we found out conceiving would be difficult and again after your last round of hormone therapy. I kind of put our names on this list because it can take a long time to be selected." He confessed and quickly added, "I wanted us to have options and I'm completely fine with not having kids either. We could just be the cool Aunt and Uncle to Sammy and Jess' twins. I'd be alright with that as long as you're the one I'm growing old with. I want you in that rocking chair beside me on the porch and I'll tear down that white picket fence when we get home."

“No, don’t do that... maybe we could paint it though.” You shrugged.

"I like the way you think, sweetheart." Dean chuckled with a little smirk.

Garth looked at the clock on the wall and clapped his hands together, "Well, I think that was an excellent session and I've got a bit of homework for you. Y/N, I think it would be healthy for you to look into adoption with Dean, exhaust all of your options together before you commit to a decision about your future. And, Dean, I want you to try talking about how you’re feeling to Y/N rather than just declaring your undying love for her." You laughed and Dean blushed, "I think she gets it, but she's not a mind reader. Everyone benefits from open communication and all I'm asking is that you try, you don't even have to be good at it, just put words together until you get a sentence and keep doing that. The best relationships I see are the ones where each partner refuses to give up on the other. It's about equal give and take and allowing each other to be happy and loved."

"So, on a scale of one to ten. How did we do, Doc?" Dean asked and it was Garth's turn to laugh.

"I can't answer that, but I will say that you guys have a great foundation. We just want to open the lines of communication as a safety net for when times are a little tougher to see through the fog. When your love is hidden behind the walls you use to protect yourselves. You don't need to protect yourselves from each other; I can see that as much as you both can feel it." Garth said, buttoning his tweed jacket as he stood up. "We all need a little help sometimes and that's why you're here, you can't be expected to get through this without it. Whether I be the one to help you both, or you turn to friends, or family, it doesn't matter as long as you find your way back to each other in the end. Never forget that you are going through this together and the best thing you can do is communicate that. Sometimes one partner may feel like they're hurting more or they are more to blame and that's not true, we need to communicate to know."

"I got it, Doc, next session you want me to talk more." Dean quipped as he stood up with you and added, "I gotta know, what the hell is that?" He pointed to the sock puppet on Garth's desk in the corner. It had yarn for hair, blue button eyes and red lips.

"That is Mr. Frizzles," Garth laughed with a hand on his stomach, "Sometimes couples bring their kids to the session and the kids respond better to him than me. He insists it's his sense of humour but I think it's his uncanny ability to sense when someone is being a liar." Dean just stared at him and Garth laughed again, "I'm kidding, Dean."

"I like him," Dean said as you walked to the car together. "That's something I never thought I'd say."

Dean opened your door, "Me, too." You said, sliding into your seat. When Dean joined you in the Impala moments later you added, "So, you'd be open to going to another session?"

"I'm open to anything you want, sweetheart. We're in this together." Dean revved up Baby and headed towards home.

"Dean, I don't want you to keep things from me anymore." Dean side eyed you with a curious look, "The adoption thing... If that's something you're interested in, I want to be included. Maybe it's the right direction for us. I just don't want you to ever feel like you have to hide things from me, especially things you want."

"I wasn't hiding it, I was always planning on telling you about it but, I dunno, the longer I waited the more awkward it was to bring it up." Dean said and you grabbed his hand from the seat next to you. You gave his fingers a squeeze and he smiled. "The people I consider my family -aside from Sammy- that's you, Bobby and Jody, Cas and Benny, you're all people I found; people I choose to keep around through thick and thin. And I love you all, some more than others," he gave you a flirty wink and smirked, "But my point is when it comes to kids, biological or adopted, I don’t care as long as they’re ours. Family wouldn’t mean the same thing to me without you... So please stop pushing me away.”

You nodded and vowed, “I promise,” then leaned over to peck a kiss on his cheek, his stubble prickling your lips. “Maybe we can go over what you learned on adoption tomorrow?”

“Of course, Y/N, I’d love to.” He beamed and planted a kiss to the back of your hand.

“You’re all kinds of awesome, you know that?” You squeezed his fingers again until he squeezed back.

“Whatever happened to ‘strange and kinda wonderful’?” He teased and chuckled with you.

“I love you... my strange and kinda wonderful man.”

“I love you more, don’t forget that.” Dean smirked and bit his lip like he always used to when you were younger.

You glared at him a moment as he grinned sideways at you. He knew you hated it when he said things like that. Your love for him was just as strong, arguably stronger according to you.

“Pfft, hardly.” You declared with an eye roll. “Exactly what makes you think that you love me more? I was willing to see you with another woman just so you could have a chance at happiness and you wouldn’t even consider it.”

“Isn’t that proof right there?” He laughed at you.

“But it would make me happy to see you happy so-”

Dean stopped laughing and cut you off, “I’m happy with you and only you.” He glanced over at you a couple times before he asked, “Are you still happy with me?”

“You know I am.”

“Good, then I’m yours and your mine and our future will be what we make of it.” He slid his rough fingers between yours and cleared his throat. “You tamed my heart a long time ago, it would be cruel to throw me back into the wild now. Got it?”

You smiled, feeling whole for the first time in a while, “You’re right. I think I’ll keep you after all.”

Dean chuckled.

Whatever happened next you were in it together.

_________________________

This series is complete.

_________________________ Dean: @akshi8278 @laycblack @thoughts-and-funnies @mrsjenniferwinchester @crustycheeks @kazsrm67 @sexyvixen7 @lyarr24 @suckitands33 @eliwinchester99 @yvonneeeee @igotmajordaddyissues @djs8891 @leigh70 @globetrotter28 @backseat-of-deans-67chevy

SPN: @hobby27

Wild Hearts: @justrealizedimmascifygurl @evieluvsjamie @kimberkingrivers @vicmc624 @ladysparkles78 @deans-spinster-witch

#au!dean winchester x reader #au!dean x reader #au!dean winchester #dean winchester x reader #dean winchester x you #dean winchester x y/n #dean x reader #dean winchester x #dean x y/n #dean x you #dean winchester fanfiction #supernatural fanfiction #dean x #spn series #spn fanfic #supernatural #dean series #wild hearts series

92 notes · View notes

saltygilmores · 4 months

Text

THOUGHTS WHILE WATCHING GILMORE GIRLS: S3/EP5/8 O CLOCK AT THE OASIS (PART 3) Aka SweaterPaws, Fake Fish, The Best Okuh Ever, And Jess Mariano Is A Waterlogged Infant Kitten

Parts 1 & 2 and all other episodes can be found in my pinned post.

This scene of Rory overhearing an answering maching message from Dwight's irate wife combines two of AmyShermanPalladino favorite things: answering machines and (the voice of) Alex Borstein (Celine & Drella on GG, Suzie on Mrs Maisel. Also Lois on Family Guy). Gilmore Girls Producer: Attention, Gilmore Girls crew! It has come to my attention that our budget will not cover both Outdoor Landscaping Scenes and Fishtanks. Sacrifices will have to be made.

Finally she admits to herself that Dean is a serial killer. And casual swearing from Rory? Wow, what a delight to hear.

!!!SWEATER PAWS ALERT!!!!

What do the kids say? Unbothered. Moisturized. Flourishing? In my lane? Something like that. It's clearly a school day (since Rory is in her uniform) while it appears to be a rare day where Jess hasn't been scheduled to work in the Coffee Mines before school. Speaking of school, he's walking away from school instead of towards it and is not carrying any school supplies or a backpack. He looks happy. Just vibing in his ugly oversized clothing. Hopefully he looks up every so often so he doesn't walk face first into a lamp post.

Or that.

Blue Crush was a 2002 movie about a girl who surfs starring Kate Bosworth. Get it? Cause Rory is covered in water?

Hey. Eyes up top, Pal.

The floofy hair. The prominent draggy lip. The five o'clock shadow. Salty enjoys naming things she can see.

How many of Jess' books have been ruined with water? 2 so far. The answer is 2.

And now...ladies and Gentlemen...I present the greatest Milo Okuh Ever Okuh'D:

Get you a man who will risk soaking himself and pretend he didn't assist you with turning off a sprinkler so your boyfriend Dean won't fly into a jealous rage over it. It brings a tear to ol Salty’s eye. The episode wraps up with Lorelai attempting to end the Peyton Sanders nonsense by apologizing to Emily and taking the blame for the entire incident. Silly Lorelai, she didn't consider "What would Emily Gilmore think?" first and foremost before agreeing to go on one date with a random guy. I mean, Lorelai declining a second date with Peyton could have caused Emily to lose rank in her Tea Party Circle with Peyton's mother or some nonsense like that, according to a ridiculous story Richard just told Lorelai earlier in the episode. Let me be clear here, in case the message got a little lost- I am 100% siding with Lorelai here. She should not have to grovel like this over something so meaningless.

HOGWASH. Stop this right now Lorelai. Emily is standing just a few feet away and you're in a kitchen filled with many sharp knives and cooking implements. I'll look the other way. She even agrees to go on a second date with Peyton just to pacify Emily even though she just made it painfully clear how miserable it would make her to see this dude again. Emily is quite pleased seeing Lorelai's state of misery. Well, like I said earlier, you do only have a very small window of time before David Bowie stops performing forever, so go for it I guess. Take the tickets, then drop Hamm. Drop him like Rory dropped out of Yale. I have a final comment: Although by the end of this episode we don't see Rory at school, one would have to presume that after the sprinkler incident she either had to get on the bus and go to school sopping wet or go home and change and blowdry her hair and risk being very late to class. Either she gets reprimanded for showing up to school late or she gets reprimanded for the wet uniform and hair so she's screwed no matter what. If he didn't take an ounce of pity on Rory for her Hit By A Deer story, do you think Headmaster Charleston would buy some fantastical tale from Rory about her tardiness being due to a sprinkler, sweater paws, a neighbor with a board game fetish, and Dean the unabomber?

#8OCATO #gilmore girls #gilmore girls season 3 #rory gilmore #literati #jess mariano #soaking wet puppy #sweater paws #denise rewatches gilmore girls #No Dean in this episode!#No wonder it was so easy breezy

45 notes · View notes

ajvocals43 · 1 year

Text

Mine

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Plus Size!Reader

Word Count: 1058

Warnings: Slight swearing, slight smuttiness (if you squint), bad writing probably, body image issues

A/n: Another birthday fic I wrote for the wonderful Dean Winchester. Also can be read as a prequel to the fic I wrote last year: Birthday

"Up."

"No.” He gave me a look that I knew to cut off, “Dean, remember my thing about sitting on things that aren't made for sitting on?"

"It's a metal counter top. I promise there is no chance of you breaking it." And then he took matters into his own hands and lifted me onto the island himself. I had tried not to but I couldn't help the sound that came out of me at the feeling of being picked up. I knew he was strong but I didn't expect that.

"Dean are you-"

He didn't let me finish. "Y/n, I already told you. Your gorgeous body is not nor has it ever been ‘too heavy’. I would tell you if it were different, okay?"

“No, you wouldn't.” I protested, “I don't get this way for no reason, I'm big, I know that. I-”

He knew me well enough that he already knew where I was going with this. “Yeah. Big… beautiful… and mine.” He pulled me into him before saying, “I'll tell you as many times as you need to hear it, there is nothing about you that doesn't make me crazy about you. There's a reason that you are the longest relationship I've ever had. You and Sam are my everything. I wouldn't trade either of you for the world. Don't ever doubt that. Now sit there and let me feed you cake because it’s my birthday and I feel like feeding my gorgeous girlfriend.”

And that was all he wanted to say apparently because the next thing I knew, there was a piece of cake on a fork in front of my face. I didn't fight my smile, opening my mouth anyway to let him feed me. And I wouldn't lie, that cake was amazing. Some kind of mix of chocolate and vanilla that melted on the tongue and I couldn't help the moan that escaped at the taste.

When my eyes finally opened again, (though I'm not sure when they closed) I found Dean with heat in his eyes. Even after how long we’d been together, I was surprised that I could be the cause of that look from him.

“Shouldn’t I be the one feeding you because it’s your birthday?” I was scrambling for a subject change. There was too much to do between the pie in the oven and the party waiting to be put together in the next room. I didn't have time to act on his look, no matter how much I wanted to.

He shrugged before saying “You know me well enough that I wouldn't eat it, as close as Sam seems to think it is. Especially since you made me a pie that is currently in the oven.” He leaned in to seal his lips to mine in a soft kiss that made my heart flutter with its sweetness.

It was then that the timer on my phone went off for me to pull said pie out of the oven. When I straightened from the oven, placing the pie on top of a hot pad, Dean came up behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. “That smells delicious.” he groaned, “My favorite kind of present.”

“Well that's good, considering the other one.” I mumbled.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dean asked. Shit, did I say that out loud? “Y/n? What's wrong?”

“Okay so you do have a present from me, but I got it impulsively and I thought it was a good idea but now I'm not so sure…” I tried to pull away but he wouldn't let me.

“Sweetheart, what is it?” He seemed concerned. I felt the heat creep up my neck as I tried to find a way to explain the nonsense that had come out of my mouth.

I didn't end up saying anything. Instead, I took his hand that had been stroking my hip underneath my shirt and moved it up to the lace that covered my breast.

He groaned. “I stand corrected. Happy birthday to me.” he murmured in my ear. A shiver ran down my spine at the tone of his voice. That heat was back. His lips started placing slow kisses along my neck, his hands roamed my body, feeling the lace and killing my brain cells. Specifically the ones that would keep me from letting this go further. It took all the strength I had to fight off my arousal and Dean.

“No. Not now.” I said softly.

“What’s wrong?” it was like a switch had flipped. In an instant all the heat was gone, replaced by confusion and worry.

“I don't have time. I have to go to the store, remember?” I tried to pull out of his arms again to no avail.

“To hell with the store.” he nuzzled his face back into the crook of my neck.

“No, remember? I have to go get the stuff for burgers. Isn't that what you wanted for your birthday dinner?”

“But you take forever when you go to the store.” he groaned and I laughed both at the tickling sensation and at his attitude.

“Unless you want to go, I have to.” I told him, hoping he’d take the bait so that I could call Sam and the gang in to help set up the surprise party I had planned for tonight. His arms disappeared from my waist and he was walking over to the table to grab his coat and keys. “Where are you going?”

“To the store,” he said plainly. “I'll be back in half an hour.”

“You're ridiculous.” I said, shaking my head. I hoped he believed my acting skills because otherwise I was screwed and this surprise was ruined. Luckily, he hadnt seemed to notice anything and with a quick kiss to my lips, went down the hall towards the garage.

And then he scared the shit out of me when he popped his head back in the kitchen saying, “Don't think I’ve forgotten about my present.” I had to laugh as I ran to catch up and walk him to his car (to make sure he got there this time). I waited until I couldn't see his car in the garage anymore before I texted Sam.

We’re a go

To which I got the response:

You're lucky he’s in love with you.

Masterlist

293 notes · View notes

shelbgrey · 2 years

Text

🎃💉Grey's Anatomy Halloween Special💉🎃

“This Is Halloween”

Paring: Derek Shepherd x reader, read x multiple characters

Summary: you and Derek go to a Halloween fest with your friends from the hospital. It's all fun and games till someone gets hurt.

Warnings: horror, some gore, not edited.

Greys MasterList.

Halloween is upon us and the hospital loves to make sure we don't forget it. I'm definitely not complaining, I love everything gore and spooky. Dispite our busy schedules we like to at least take a minute to appreciate this time of the year.

If you work on the Peds floor like me and Alex you learn quickly that this floor loves Halloween. This gives the kids something to smile about and do during their stay.

Dispite his protest me and Arizona got Alex to dress up for the kids. Our trio Decided to dress up as super heros which the kids loved. Alex was carrying around a captain America shield and entertaining the kids while I was dressed up like Hawkeye and Arizona dressed up as a female Thor.

“what's up Cap?” I teased as Alex came over to the nurse's station with a scowl. “shut up”

Me and Arizona laughed as he sat his shield down only for a kid to snatch it and run off. Alex who was secretly enjoying it playfully yelled 'hey!' and ran after the giggling kid.

“I love Halloween” I smiled putting a sucker in my mouth. Arizona nodding agreaing as she grabbed a chart and walked off. I sighed happily and set down my fake bow and arrow. Before a could go anywhere a all too familiar voice spoke behind me.

“trick or treat” a small voice said. I smiled and saw Derek carring our son Who was Dressed up like Chucky. I smiled lovingly at my two boys as took out five year old out of his arms.

“what happened to the Harry Potter costume” I laughed remembering our son was indeed Harry Potter early this morning. Derek smiled like he didn't know what I was talking about.

“he said he wanted to be scary so while you were in surgery I took him to the Halloween store” I rolled my eyes and set him down so he could say hi to Arizona and Sofia.

Derek gave me a cheeky smiled as he placed his hands on my hips and pulled me closer to his body. “have I told you how much I love this costume on you?” he asked kissing my neck. I chuckled and pulled him away.

“children are present... Many of them” he slightly laughed and kissed me on the cheek. He leaned up against the nurse's station next to me and snatched a piece a candy from a bowl that was on the station.

“so I think Meredith and Ameila are planning something for tonight” Derek said breaking off a piece of his kit-Kat and hanging it to me.

“should we be worried?” he chuckled crumbling the wrapper and putting it in his pocket. “I know just as much as you do, I'm just the messenger”

“what about Dean?” I asked as our son ran up to us. “Bailey said she'd watch him”

“momma look” Dean said cutting our conversation short. Dean smiled and held up a little toy sugar skull that glew in the dark. As he played with it Derek came up behind him and fake jumped scared him. Dean giggled as Derek tickled him. Derek laughed to then looked back to To me.

“I'll take him to Bailey, say bye to mommy” Derek said. Dean waved his fake knife with a smile. “bye-bye mommy” I waved good bye then set off to fine our friends.

🔺▪️🔻▪️🔺▪️🔻▪️🔺

“Hell fest has finally arrived!” the report smiled on the TV.

I walked up to the nurse's Station Meredith, Amilea, Callie and Mark were at. “What are you guys watching?” I asked as Jackson and April joined our group.

“shh” mark said not taking his eyes off the TV.

The TV showed Seattle's annual Halloween fest. The place was called Hell fest and it was full of haunted houses and different actors who jump out and scare you.

“but unfortunately the haunted attraction has caused some controversy, with the realistic sets based on actual serial killers and true events. Is it distasteful or just plane Halloween fun?” the report continues.

The fest's advertisements was full of gore and slasher themed custumes. Amilea stared in amazement. “dudes we have to go”

Christina rolled her eyes. “it's just a bunch of cheep rides and haunted houses that aren't even scary. It's a waist of time”

“oh come on yang grow a pair” Mark said acusing her of just being scared. April who wasn't into it all shook her head terrified but she was ignored.

“those places are awesome actually” I added as Derek joined us. He kissed the side of my head and leaned against the nurse's station next to me.

“But the haunted attraction is based on actual events…isn’t that a little bit inconsiderate to the families of the victims?” April asked.

“What, you don't want to be chased around by Ted Bundy?” Mark joked as he fake stabbed Derek with a pen Derek chuckled and pushed him away from me and him as scrolled through my phone looking up the place. I smirked and tapped Merideth’s shoulder.

“Dude we have to go! This place is known to be haunted!” I said Meredith bugged her eyes out in surprise looking at the article. “Awsome”

“yes!” Amilea said looking over our shoulders. Derek just shook his head and smiled at the trio.

April sighed and garbed a chart. “I'm gonna check on my patient” I sighed and looked at April with a depressing look. “Fine we won't go”

Amilea made a fake evil laugh and followed April. “I guess I'll go with... So you don't get murdered by an escaped psyc patient” aprli slugged her in the shoulder as the two disappeared in the hallway.

I then looked at jackson. “And you guys can stay here all along… with the nerves parents and kids who ate too much candy” Jackson sighed and looked at the direction that April went.

Not a second later April’s screams erupted through the halls then a cash sound followed along with Amilea's cackles. The group looked over to where the sound came from with confused looks. April came racing in shaking while Owen followed, rubbing his head while Amilea was with him cackling.

“What happened to you?” I asked, chuckling.

Owen turned to April. “You hit me in the head with an empty bed pan” April whipped back around. “Well you snuck up on me in a dark closet, what do you expect?”

Amilea wrapped her arm on April's shoulder taking a breath from laughing. “Aw, come on Kepner, it's Halloween everyone's entitled to a good scare”

“So are we going or what?” Mark asked. “Going where?” Owen asked.

“Hell fest, you in?” I asked my best friend. Before Owen could answer Merdith butted in.

“We're going, we're just trying to get these two sissies to go,” Merdith said, pointing to Jackson and April. The couple quickly got defensive. “We never said that,” Jackson said, using his hands while talking, probably trying to get his point a crossed.

“Come on Avery it'll be fun” Amilea said. Jackson soon gave in with a smile. He nodded making everyone cheer.

“Hunt you in?” Mark asked. He smiled and nodded. “sounds like fun, sure”

“Callie?” I asked turning to here. She nodded with a big smile. “dude, I've been in for a while.”

After transportation planning and a few added ons(Alex and jo then Merdith convinced Hayes to come with us)we left for the Halloween fest.

🔺▪️🔻▪️🔺▪️🔻▪️🔺

“we made it!” Amilea cheered as the the both of raced in leaving the group behind.

“wait up guys! We still need tickets!” Derek shouted making us sighed and walk back.

The line was long but thankful we were towards the front. “lot of weirdos” Christina mumbled. A guy in a clown costume that was behind her in line tried to scare her. It didn't work and Christina made sure he knew.

“boo, so scary” she said sarcastically and moved over next to Merdith and Hayes.

We all finally got in with our VIP passes and the place was a sight to see to say the least. Before we set off Jackson came up next Mark with a creeped out expression.

“Avery we just got here, what's the problem?” Mark asked. He looked around a shivered.

“please say the ticket guy licked his lips at all of you and not just me?” April scrunched her noise up and Mark started laughing. Jackson never got his answer do to all of us setting off to explore the place.

I looked over to Derek who just took my hand. He looked around slightly board but still trying to look like he was having fun. “this really isn't your thing, is it?” I asked him.

He stopped and smiled. “it's your thing and I'm just happy to spend time with you” he was about to lean down and give me a kiss but a scar actor in clown costume scared us. I jumped into Derek arms and he laughed.

“okay, that was fun” he laughed. I giggled and pulled him along to catch up with the other.

“haunted house?” Callie asked. We all agreed making our way in. Merdith and Hayes went in first cleaning to each other. The first guy that popped out was mad doctor making Amilea jump into Owen's arms in fear.

She pushed him away like nothing happened. “and... That's just insulting” she said pointing at the doctor.

Strob lights and blood surrounded us as we walked into a canbilist farm themed room. The place was based off. The text chain saw mascara movies obviously.

“ew, that looks so real” April said looking at a dummy that was gutted to piece. I looked at it and decided to screw with April.

“that's probably pig intestines, it's what they used in Day of the dead” I said pointing at the dummy. Jackson wrapped his arm around April and looked at me disgust. “how do you know that?”

“same reason I know that I know they used corn syrup for pigs blood in Carrie” I shrugged and derek wrapped his arm around my waist.

Next we walked into a pitch black room. “okay... Something is gonna pop out” Jo mumbled clinging to Alex. “hello?” she yelled.

“they aren't gonna respond” Alex said as he looked around.

Strob light suddenly turned on and a Dr. Satan like man came charging at us with a doctors too from hell. Jo screamed and ran for it while Merdith laughed.

The final room was a back room full of maquines with wolf masks. “one of you are real” Mark mumbled. He successfully made it to the other side without getting scared which made April feel confident to walk through. As she went one of them moved and grabbed her scream bloody murder.

She ran out with Jackson and the rest of us chacing her.

“that was so badass!” Amilea cheered as we made it out to the end.

After that we hit the cheeply made games. Owen and I went up agint each other while Derek and Mark went to a Dart booth. Surprisingly I won and I wasn't gonna let Owen forget it. “yes! Suck on that!” he laughed and gave me the win.

“here you go” Derek said from behind me. I turned around to find my boyfriend Holding a little Teddy bear he won. I smiled and thanked him with a quick peck on the cheek.

Amilea, Christina, and Meredith then came back with giant preziles. “What did we miss?”

“y/n whipped Hunt in a Shooting game” Hayes laughed. “yes, that's my girl!” Amilea said high-fiving me.

“we should go to that IT experience thingy, I saw it when I was getting drinks” Callie said coming up next to me and handing me a drink.

Derek's eyes bugged out in fear from behind me. Amilea noticed and chuckled. No one knew of his fear so we all agreed while Derek reluctantly agreed.

“God, I hate clowns” Derek mumbled. I stopped and grabbed his hand. “We don't have to go in if you don't want to” he shook his head and pulled me along.

“no, you love this movie let's go” I rolled my eyes and tired to stop him but no dice.

We all went to the entrance which had the three doors from the movie. Scary, very scary, and not Scary at all

“not Scary at all right?” April asked walking towards it. I shrugged when she stopped and looked at me for confoation.

“I think we should divide and Concer” Mark said opening the door that said Scary. Callie, Joe, and Alex followed. April went through the not Scary at all door with Jackson and Owen. Hayes walked to the last door that said Very scary and opened it for Merdith. “ladies first” he said. Derek nodded and pushed his little sister forward.

“yup, ladies first” Amilea scoffed and pulled me along. “chickens”

Derek garbed my hand as we walked through a room full of glowing mirrors. It was the same set up from the second film. The light flashed on and off giving it an eary feeling.

As we walked by a Pennywise actor jumped out and pounded on the window. “holy shit!” Derek said grabbing on to me.

“Awsome” Amilea said as she watched Pennywise run around.

We rounded a corner and ended up in the clown room from the first movie. “oh you got be fucking kidding me” Derek mumbled as he watched every single clown making sure one of them wasn't gonna move. All the clown Dolls then started to shake and their eyes glew as we walked pasted.

The next hallway was built to look like a sewer. It lead us to the last room which was covered in blood like Beverly's bathroom. It didn't have any jump scares and it was thast Room.

As we exited we saw everyone was waiting. “that was kinda disappointing” Mark said as we continued to walk around. “yeah I expected a bit more fear” Callie said.

Are walk was cut short as a guy with a chainsaw started chacing another guy. The pray triped and few and the actor fell and the saw went right threw the arm of the fake victim. The guy screamed in pain but at first it looked like an act but april was the first to realize it wasn't.

“guys... That's real”

“oh... Crap” Christina said as Owen and Mark went to help the guy. Owen tried to stop the bleeding while Mark picked up the arm from the pavement.

“We're all doctor, we'll help” April said as she call 911. The dude screamed in pain while the guy who cut the arm off ran away.

The part of the park that we were at got shut down so the paramedics could get through. Mark and Owen who were covered in blood left with them.

“well that killed the mood” Merdith said as we continued to walk after everyone was evacuated from the crim scene. “not really” Amilea said.

“you guys wanna head to the hospital? See what happens to the guy?” Callie asked.

As we walked a guy that was clearly high cackled as he called out his friend's name. He bummed into Callie in the process which didn't set well for her. She chaced after him and I quickly followed making sure she wasn't gonna fight anyone.

Before call could say anything the guy held up a knife to his friend and smile. “hey dude I found one of those retractable knives” me and Callie gasped as the the dude stabed his friend in the head and the knife didn't retract. Whatever drugs these dudes were on must of numbed the pain because they were giggling like idiots.

“I'm beginning to believe this place is haunted” Callie said.

🔺▪️🔻▪️🔺▪️🔻▪️🔺

After bringing the two high friends with Cookies(no, I'm not joking) to the ER the dude with the knife in his head sat on a bed waiting for a head CT.

“we need to figure out of to get the scan without removing the Knife, that thing is probably keeping him from bleeding out” Derek told Amilea.

“I don't even think they know where they are” she said looking at the patient and his friend. Both clearly on something. “and while your at it get a drug test” Amilea said walking towards the CT room.

“hey how's the Leatherface victum?” I asked as Owen passed me. He signed and took his scrub cap off. “he ain't getting his arm back and that guy-”

Owen was cut off by one of the druggies that started shouting out to Derek and Amilea. “Dr. Shepherds! I don't know what the big deal is.. All you got do is pull it out” he yanked the knife out of his friend's head.

I bugged my eyes out as Amilea and derek raced to him as the guy passed out.

“happy freaking Halloween” Owen sighed as he left to check in the patient.

I sighed and left to scrub in with Derek and Amilea. After a ten hour surgery we got the bleeding to stop and the surgery was successful. The three of us walked into the scrub room to get cleaned up.

“well Halloween is officially over” Amilea said looking at her watch.

“November 1st, it's day of the dead” I smiled drying my hands off. Derek chuckled and gave me a side hug. “don't get any ideas”

I shrugged. “I was thinking we could just go home and cuddle but...”

Amilea smiled. “you guys are adorable... It makes me sick” Derek flipped her the bird while giving me a kiss.

“thanks for going tonight, I know it's not your thing” I said wrapping my arms around his neck. He smiled and placed his hands on my waist. “I hade a lot of fun tonight actually”

“good, I love you” I said.

“I love you too”

#greys anatomy #derek shepherd imagines #derek shepherd #derek shepherd x reader #greys #greys anatomy imagines #Mark Sloan x reader #meredith grey x reader #grey sloan memorial hospital #owen hunt x reader #Callie Torres x reader #Ameila Shepherd x reader #april kepner x reader #jackson avery imagine #Christina yang x reader #Teddy aultman x reader

228 notes · View notes

confusedkittensposts · 16 days

Text

The things is Castiel's story is a tragedy in many ways, any part you pick up it's a fall

May it be pre series, or stopping the apocalypse or the civil war, even the part where he becomes a Father

He is someone who has been manipulated and used and everyone just keeps chipping him away

When we meet him, he is presented as this outwardly, powerful being who everyone is scared of, but you meet him and you realise he is all that but also curious and facinated by the world the around him, it's new to him in many ways, and he still cares about it.

And he has opinions that don't necessarily go with his family but he isn't afraid to state them. He cares about his siblings, he has a relationship of understanding with most of them and mourns them as much as he can.

He judges Dean not based on how dean treats him but what dean does for others.

Castiel is someone who sees his own world fall apart with the rest of it and even when the world for others is saved he can never get back what he lost.

He looses his home, his family, the relationships he had for millions of years, he losses his powers. Like imagine, and I lot don't understand that it's not Cas + powers, he was created with them, he didn't just loose his ability to do some fancy tricks he lost what is equivalent to lossing your senses, your limbs.

Scratch mourning, he isn't even allowed to state the extent of his loss. He is only allowed grief and anger and hurt if it's for the Winchesters.

In Monster at the end of this Book, deanakes it very clear their relationship can only be transactional, he tell Cas if Cas doesn't help his he will never return the favour, and you know what he does after cas helps, and keeps doing for more than a decade he doesn't return the favour

Castiel asked Dean, begged him for trust, for support, more than once but he was mocked and rediculed and told loud and clear that he doesn't get anything, not even basic decency

Dean didn't convince Cas to reble, he ordered it and then got angry because Castiel took more than 30 seconds to give up everything he had known since before the beginning of time.

The Winchesters constantly prove Cas gets a place in the metaphorical table as long as he can bring something, give somthing

The Gadreel excuse is funny, because Gadreel told Dean, Cas couldn't stay. Throwing Cas out with nothing, cutting off communication with him, was Dean's decision, his choice. Because he couldn't spare a second thought for Cas

He learned that he couldn't trust memory, that it's had been violated, he had been violated. They took his memories from him. Do you wonder if it was angels who fought alongside him that took him Naomi when he disobeyed, or if others had to go through lobotomies because of him? Because he asked them to fight with him? Do you think cas did?

Castiel had to watch father look at him and not see him, he had to watch his father come and fight for Earth and Winchesters and not even think about angels.

He had to watch the man he loved point a gun at son's head, he had to watch his father, who turned out to nothing but a cruel, egoestical, uncaring puppeteer, kill his son. He had to watch his son's face being twisted into mockery towards him by a demon, he had burn his son

But it doesn't matter, right? Why would it? What's Castiel's grief, his pain, none of matters right?

Cause at the end of the day the only thing his life and death can be about is Dean Winchester

Because making a disabled, traumatized and suicidal character die, and be happy about it is best damn thing you can do to them

#maybe i am just a broken record #but i know what its like to make someone your everything #someone ypu know will prioritise you #you can never count on #I see it THIS close #castiel #bitter Cas feelings #this night hurts #maybe tomorrow won't #hopefully not as much

6 notes · View notes

paellegere · 2 months

Text

final thoughts: supernatural season 10

wow holy shit that sure was a season. i'm not actually sure how i feel about it???? aside from the obvious brainrot it's given me and also the mental illness. idk i'll put down my thoughts and maybe by then i'll figure out how i feel.

for starters, this might rival seasons 6 and 7 for the "fewest amount of episodes i enjoyed" award. specifically, i liked 1-4, 8, 12, and 18-22. the finale... i'm unsure about currently. i'll have to think about that and come back to it in a few paragraphs. so 11 of 23 episodes is... whew. this season was rough for me for sure.

overall the balancing of the A plots with the B plots felt rather juvenile, even though the overarching plotling felt so much more present than it has since like, basically kripke era. it felt like for the most part, episodes started with a topical conversation between sam and dean, then they went off and worked a case that was hand-crafted to parallel the seasonal arc, and finally at the end they sat in the impala and discussed the lessons they learned today. feels more like kids programming than the TV-MA rating suggests, lol.

but see that's the thing, right? like i said, the seasonal plot felt so present compared to past seasons. everything was tied in together, nothing felt really out of place, it all circled back to the big picture of the season. for a post-kripke season, that's pretty damn awesome and a much needed relief. i've gotten used to half-baked filler episodes that hardly relate to the story at all and feel hamfisted in because they don't know what else to do, so it does feel nice that the plot was actually relevant, always an undercurrent to every episode and informing the characters' actions.

i just... well, i probably feel this way because of the poor pacing of the story. i mean don't get me wrong, i didn't necessarily love the A plots of those episodes either (for the most part), but like i mentioned in a previous post, i just don't think it's handled well. it's a GREAT concept but the execution is lacking in so many places between season 9 and 10. the dearth of serious developments throughout most of the season dampened the urgency of the plot, the lack of consistency in the mark's effects made it hard to predict where the show was leading, and the empty promises bored me. they're all absolutely terrible ingredients for a tense plot, so even though the plot was relevant in all these episodes, it felt stagnant and barren. there's really only so many times sam can fret about "dean getting worse" without dean actually, tangibly getting worse before i have to roll my eyes.

at the same time, a lot of those episodes i didn't like had some AMAZING dialogues and scenes in them. i know i've been raving about the parallels and mirroring between season 8 and seasons 9-10, but these seasons really are phenomenal at painting a Big Picture. they know what they want and how they want to do it; they just seem to really struggle with the details. dean confessing in a church to mirror sam confessing in sacrifice? sam lying to dean about burning the book of the damned to save him to mirror dean lying to sam about gadreel possessing him? sam getting charlie killed because of those lies to mirror how dean got kevin killed because of his lies? sam comparing himself to claire in order to highlight how he's abandoned his desire for independence? these are all really impressive story beats that on a higher level serve to contain these three seasons in some kind of sick brotherfucking ouroboros that's like, a narrative metaphor for how wrapped up in each other they are. they spin in circles around each other like binary stars, repeating each other's mistakes, throwing everyone else in their lives away, clinging to each other with a toxic ferocity and devotion that should kill them, that does kill them so many times, that ruins their lives and leaves them broken and bloody and alone except for each other. and still the story spins and spins and spins and never stops, because they never stop because they're insane. it's deranged. they're deranged.

i don't understand how there can be such a clear, amazing vision that's fucked up so spectacularly on an episodic level. i guess because i'm so used to seeing the opposite: the details are great, but the big picture is messy and unsatisfying. supernatural continues to defy logic, and it's utterly fascinating to me.

anyway i said i'd come back to the finale so here i am. i know cain foreshadowed the whole "dean will kill sam" thing in the executioner's song, but i really... don't think there was much substance to that to warrant the sudden development. sam continued to be, throughout both season 9 and season 10, pretty much the only person dean didn't nearly kill—and quite the opposite, since sam was the only one capable of placating dean when he had the first blade in his hand. sam functioned more as a grounding presence for dean, so the textual dialogue between the characters and the visual reality of it all just did not match up. and so when dean brought sam to him to kill him, it didn't really make any sense at all.

also frankly, the conversation between death and them wasn't all that convincing either: death claims with such self-assurance that sam would go to the ends of the earth to save dean at any cost, but sam and dean have both individually proven that they're capable of, well, not doing that. dean went to lisa after swan song, sam found amelia after survival of the fittest. and if sam is meant to be a mirror of dean in this season, then it stands to reason that, if sam made a promise to dean to move on (like dean promised sam in swan song), then sam would have made good on the promise. yes, sam is psychotic about his brother, but there's not only precedent for sam "moving on" (loose definition), but it would have been narratively cohesive to finish off the role reversal, if dean really had been sent into fucking outer space (lol). again: the textual dialogue does not match with the visual reality here.

so why did sam have to die? because, of course, they needed the cain and abel parallels. but they just... set it up so poorly, and they fumbled the mirroring, and in the end it felt weird and cheap. sure, bringing sam there to explain the circumstances and threatening him on pain of death if he interfered was totally warranted (sam is psychotic about his brother), but when he gave up? why would he need to follow through? there's a poor foundation for it, so the development felt very contrived and poorly executed. which is unfortunate, because i was looking forward to the fratricide. what's even more unfortunate is that this would have been such an easy fix. just make dean more aggressive toward sam. like deadass just have them fight more, have dean get uncharacteristically angry with him (though the thing at charlie's cremation was a nice touch), have dean actually visibly contemplate fratricide, yknow. something that isn't "oh my baby brother is the only person who keeps me sane" followed immediately by "i'm going to kill him." if you're going to have a prophecy, you need to commit to it!!! i'm just saying!!!

and now that i've written all that out, i think thaaaat's why sam's emotional speech at the end felt so cheap. there was no real reason for him to be in that position in the first place, and there was no support for the weight it was being given. honestly a shame, because i think the speech itself was very good and emotional; it just did not hit without the buildup to it.

and then not to beat a dead horse, but everything i said before was proven TRUE in the very next moment: dean killed death to save sam, because sam is his rock and his reason for living and he could never hurt sam, past present or future. like i said! dean really was a negative threat to sam this entire season!! sam was the only person who could even influence him positively!!! cas tried to do what sam so consistently did and dean beat him to a fucking pulp!!!! the tension was NOT there because dean is weak to sam; there was never any other option, or even a hint of it.

i suppose all that answers my question... i don't think i liked the finale, no. which is honestly surprising, because i think supernatural generally goes very hardcore with its finales. this might be the first one i've disliked? maybe? or no, i don't think i liked the season 7 finale either to be honest. but season 7 is season 7 so like. it is what it is.

i don't know. this season was bizarre, and there were a lot of moments that made me so, so much worse than i thought possible—like i thought the season 9 finale made me bad, but then they just kept going and good lord. i will not get over this role reversal plot any time soon. the concept was amazing, and i appreciate the level of commitment the writers had to this development. the mediocre execution really dragged things out longer than i feel they should have though, and as you can see i have plenty of criticism. it has so much charm though, and it finishes off the three-season wombo combo in what was meant to be a satisfying way—like i see what they were trying to do i just think they failed at it. so it's definitely no season 6, that's for sure. the vision was its redeeming feature, and GOD what a vision it was. i adore what they were trying to do with seasons 8-10 so i really can't dislike it yknow. because holy shit!!!

anyway i guess that's all. which means it's time for my detox, and after that i'll officially be in Late Season Supernatural, finally. i can't wait to see where that'll take me (i'm looking respectfully at red meat). i'm also watching season 1 with a friend, which is a delight because jesus christ this show has such an incredible foundation. if i get a chance between that and reading fanfic, i think i'll watch sharp objects finally, since it's short and sweet (not actually sweet, from what i can tell). so that'll be fun :)

#liveblogging: supernatural #this post is so fucking long i'm embarrassed for myself #.txt #spn reviews

2 notes · View notes

mlobsters · 3 months

Text

supernatural s13x22 exodus (w. eugenie ross-leming, brad buckner)

well, mom gets a hug. that's something i guess. no time for extended you're-actually-alive-reunions with lucifer smarming around in the background.

this trying to be i dunno, spookyish discordant atmospheric music is not hitting for me. it just feels wildly out of sync with the tone of the scene. i wonder who made iiiit. oh look, it's jay gruska. i seriously don't look it up until i have a ~vibe~ and i'm vaguely impressed with my consistent reactions to the two composers. i'm pretty much never rockin with jay. sorry, my dude.

LUCIFER Don’t say he’s nothing like me. I’m the only one who understands him. This power he has? I’m powerful, dangerous, ruthless. In the...best sense, though. DEAN No. Kill him. LUCIFER (chuckles) He can’t. He’s not strong enough. GABRIEL Dean… DEAN (turns on Gabriel) You’ve got the blade. JACK (quietly) Stop it. DEAN He’s the devil. Kill him. JACK (shouting) Stop it!

in the land of not-a-show, this seems very reasonable. we have the means and opportunity to FINALLY fucking kill this guy, who has done unspeakably awful things to more than one person present. who they've been trying to take out for a long ass time. but, being that it's this show, yeah. of course it's not that simple. i think they had a general plan to kill him after they used him for the nexus excursion, yes? but them believing he'd still be captured and subdued until then was a bit of a stretch :p also, jack wasn't around for that convo and i suppose he might have some thoughts and feelings around cutting down bio dad right away

CAS In case your innate evil overwhelms this new found team spirit, you won’t mind wearing these then, will you. You’re not at full power. They should hold you.

LOL good one. is he not at full power because he was drained, juiced up, then used some of that juice to resurrect sam? (was also thinking about how like, cas stole someone's grace at one point. a bad someone, right? is it that different? why didn't gabriel just go that route? not actually socially acceptable? whatever. we needed to include lucifer)

jfc nic shut up

thank you, everyone, for that long ass hug. i'm not crying, no, i'm fine

i know the wiki has hugs and lengths (which amuses me to no end), i wouldn't be surprised if that was one of the longer ones. ahbl 29 seconds i think is an outlier being that sam is dead through most of it 😞 what a statement. excluding ahbl pt 1, top 3! lol

other thing he did, which he does regularly? when he's affectionate, that turn to the side like he's checking who's around or avoiding eye contact while he got a little mushy.

he does it before hugging a lot too, like the avoiding eye contact and pulling someone in. definitely with charlie, not sure actually who all he does it with, if everyone at one point or another? anyway. he doesn't instigate a ton of hugs. i'm not under the influence, i swear, i'm just extra... *waves hands*

jack having a little montage o'guilt with xfiles sounds rapid fire (they use it periodically now but i don't recall so many of them in one scene like this. i had to search for "shoe" on the wiki because my blog search is perpetually fucked and all i could remember of the scene was sam finding a shoe lol)

so like, the solution is all the au people come back with her through the nexus, right? so this is a moot conversation? but. dean's reaction to her "i know what you went through to come find me" was so right. like, understatement of the century and in fact i DON'T think you know what they did. and (show logic aside) sam died and only isn't still dead due to a fluke/luck.

interesting to see the production draft script has her saying sorry and that she's grateful, which didn't make it to screen

granted, i think they were doing the getting back to the nexus project for jack too, and i imagine they would have made the same efforts and paid the same prices. but anyway. feels like dean is always waiting for the other shoe to drop with mary, reinforced with her needing space business before, so understandably he's immediately reacting defensively and maybe a little childishly (do they need-need mary? probably not. but it's also reasonable and understandable to want your almost entirely absent mother [which she had no control over] once you got her back)

another thing i like about pellegrino's lucifer, the hair! it just is almost always unkempt in not a cool way, more the disaster been sleeping on it weird way. which my hair also is often in some degree of.

DEAN We have been mopping up the world for years. Years. We have been knocked down. We have been possessed. We’ve lost friends. We’ve lost family. We’ve lost each other. And we never walk away, ever. And sometimes, we should’ve, because not every fight everywhere can be won. It just can’t. Right? (turning to Sam) Tell her.

never (permanently) walk away. ignoring the nonsensical amelia aberration? 🤪 i don't really understand dean's logic. we never walk away, but sometimes we should have, so mary should walk away? doesn't seem like the best sell

SAM I think Mom made up her mind. DEAN See? Wait. What? SAM Mom doesn’t want to leave these people. So let’s take ‘em with us. MARY They’ll never leave their home. They’ll never leave their cause. SAM I’m not saying abandon the fight. I’m saying we get them somewhere safe, then we all figure out a way to take down Michael. Then once we do, they can come back and save their world. MARY You’d do that for them? DEAN Well, we got...what, nine busting out? What’s a few more. How many are we talking? MARY Twenty-five.

(don't know what that 9 number is referring to either, oh right, charlie and ketch? lol) sammy's plan seems very. pie in the sky and not something these other world people would necessary go for but mary's down so sure why not

LUCIFER Well, I mean, yes, I have done things that I am not entirely proud of. I have led the occasional soul to ruin. This is true. But, Jack, it’s because humans are so messed up. They’re -- they’re so willing to be led. JACK My mother was human. LUCIFER Awesome lady. Incorruptible. Not like that. You know, great kisser. And, uh, lost my virginity to her.

pointing to my very disgruntled thoughts about this in 12x08. we're going to regularly make allusions to lucifer raping sam via hallucifer and i think also when sam was stuck with him in 11x09 before cas sprung luci but then lucifer in the president vessel supposedly had never had sex. ok. i prefer to believe that rape isn't part of the torture package, but they make it real hard sometimes. but the show is gonna tell us that was the first time lucifer had sex. being generous and dumb, maybe he believes in the rehymenation like dean. or some particulars of being in a human vessel. as opposed to whatever it is exactly getting tortured in hell. soul in vessel-ish shape? because it wasn't dean's shiny glowing light of a soul on the rack, it was his person. i've been thinking about this off and on since we knew generally what a soul was supposed to look like

jack interviewing lucifer, the quote unquote father of lies, to whatever, determine if he wants to have anything to do with him? well. how could this go wrong?

DEAN I told you no talking! And I told you no listening. JACK Dean, he’s in chains. DEAN His mouth isn’t. Shoulda gagged him. JACK No, I need to know about my powers, my family. CAS Jack, we are your family. We’ve been protecting you. We’ve been honoring your mother’s wishes. We’re your family. SAM Jack, you have no idea who Lucifer really is. JACK And I never will unless I talk to him.

like yes obviously, going this route is going to make anyone shut down and not listen to what you have to say (acting like john winchester basically), especially someone who is framed as being a kid. HOWEVER! couldn't we just say that lucifer spent a year which is equivalent to whatever in dog hell years torturing sam. our sam, that's standing right there. your sam, who you're including as a father figure.

MARY (amused) Jack isn’t going to the dark side. He’ll see Lucifer’s true nature. And he’ll see through his own eyes and not yours.

like she's trying to impart some parenting wisdom - which this is surely applicable to regular real life parenting! but i don't think it's applicable to the situation at hand. being that the grown ass adults with a lot of life experience and big bad demons etc etc have been fooled by lucifer time and time again. at least he should be aware of the actual harm lucifer has done to everyone present that they've personally experienced. and maybe he does know? i'm thinking WAY TOO MUCH ABOUT THIS. for this half baked plot shit.

lucifer cutting off gabriel from telling him about the (oops not actual) murdering of himself would indicate to me he doesn't know so, yeah. whatever man. i gotta fucking finish this episode! i started yesterday but just yammered on too much and then it was midnight.

BOBBY Now about that. Mary said you wanna take a bunch of our people back to this Other Earth? DEAN Yeah. Yeah, that’s the idea. BOBBY Well, no offense, but that may be the dumbest friggin’ idea in a landfill of dumb ideas.

say it, bobby

sam's gonna give a rousing speech to get the people to come around though, right. and now ketch and charlie get to be tortured. so both ketch and rowena are all about the redemption arc life

i'm real tired of this episode lol.

GABRIEL Dad saw that your evil was like the first few cells of cancer...that it would spread like the disease unless He cut it out. That is why He locked you up, to stop the cancer. But it was too late then. And guess what? It’s too late for you now.

excuse me what. he's crying? what even

great, au!cas misha doing another accent. as a... nazi? seriously checked out at this point

sure. like that whole wound tending thing the first time they were there. weird vibes man, are we supposed to ship it

AW-CASTIEL Don’t think that you are better than me. Well, we are the same. CAS Yes. We are.

cathartic

this like. militaryish music as they ride off in the bus is.... oof. not great. ditto for the music with this goofy fucking jumping through the nexus proceedings

and now gabriel's gonna get into a knife fight with this basically impossible to win against michael, good idea. and sam and dean are just gonna hang back and watch him die

well, at least sam got to trap lucifer there with michael? 🤷 surely that won't go bad!

gives me the heebiejeebies all those people in there

CAS What about Lucifer? DEAN Sam handled it.

heaven forbid we actually kill him. wonder how they're gonna have jack react to this

and hey last minute mushy music during the toast by bobby to sam and dean. welcome to the family. mhm

and of course lucifer immediately plotting with michael

#supernatural #spnwatch #spn clip #spn 13x22 #spn script #eugenie ross leming #brad buckner #spn musical score #jay gruska #spn mushy music #spnwhinge

2 notes · View notes

twofrontteethstillcrooked · 5 months

Text

Make the season bright

deancas post-12x07 au, fluff and angst, mutual pining. Season's Greetings, y'all! 🎄

(first posted to ao3 December 2021 but I never really put it here, so. I'm putting it here now 😊)

22 December

"Orders must be in today to guarantee local delivery by Christmas!!!" the email subject line said, with its three exclamation point emphasis.

Dean sat bolt upright in bed and squinted at the phone screen some more. If today was December 22nd, and he had no reason to think his phone had been hacked to display a false date, that meant Christmas was three days away. Less than three. Two and change, the day racing into the lower half of an hourglass like a storm scouring everything in its path with sand.

He fled his room and skidded down the hall so quickly he managed to rake his ankle against the doorjamb and yelped to announce his presence.

"Dean," Cas said, eyes big as gumdrops. "What's wrong?"

"Ouch." Dean grabbed up his mangled foot before realizing he was going to tip over in the process, and caught himself on Cas's doorknob. "You're still here."

Still here still here still here. Hi, Cas.

Cas stopped folding a towel. "Yes?"

He'd arrived a week ago. The fervency with which Dean wanted him to stay -- forever, whispered the voice in Dean's head -- was in direct contrast to Dean's ability to discuss this for even one-tenth of a second.

"Just. Good." Dean put his foot on the floor and looked at Cas standing there in Sam's old sweatpants (cut off at the cuffs) and one of Dean's better old hoodies (blue a shade darker than Cas's irises) and nearly let an avalanche tumble out of his mouth.

One calamitous weather metaphor after another, Dean thought. That's me.

He cleared his throat. "It's good you're still here because I forgot to tell you happy solstice yesterday. And." His voice cracked a bit. The bunker air was so dry in wintertime.

He tried again. "Christmas is this Sunday."

"Oh." Cas placed the towel on a stack of towels. "Sam thought maybe you weren't doing that this year."

Dean narrowed his eyes. "You guys talked about it?"

Cas seemed to sense a need for diplomacy. "He wasn't upset at the prospect you were going to skip it."

Dean winced, flexing his foot. "He wouldn't be."

"But you don't want to to skip it." Cas smiled, looking down at the bed.

"Of course not." Dean rallied his sanity. "Christmas comes but once a year, the most wonderful time of the year, even, ho ho ho and mistletoe, and all that."

Crap. He hadn't meant to mention mistletoe and would not be referencing it twice.

"What would celebrating Christmas entail?" Cas asked, with what sounded like a promising amount of genuine curiosity.

"Whole lotta festive food, for starters," Dean said. "Maybe a tree? Exchanging presents." He thought about it. "Spiked punch. Or mulled cider, or something." He replayed what Cas had said in his mind. "And you're family, so. You get to set some traditions too."

"Oh," Cas said. His cheeks went a little pink. "I don't… The impression Sam gave me is that you didn't really have many traditions for the holiday."

Dean snorted, to conceal how much he wanted to sidle closer. "Sam has a standing annual engagement as the Grinch, with an understudy gig in Scrooging."

Cas frowned. "Sam seems always ready and willing to be generous about helping people in need--"

"I just meant, he's pretty 'Bah, Humbug' about Christmas," Dean said.

"You might be missing the essence of that novel," Cas said, head tipped like he was about to start an advanced discourse on the nature of social responsibility or the torment of eternal regret, as though those were two themes that hadn't bashed Dean over the head pretty much every waking day of his life.

Dean held up a hand. "Let Sam feel about Christmas however he wants to feel about Christmas. We can be merry with or without his active participation."

He bounced on the balls of his feet for a second and was content enough that his banged-up ankle didn't protest. A cold draft of something close to shyness crept up on him as he watched Cas think.

Another thought pierced through. "If you have someplace you need to be instead, because of Lucifer--"

"No," Cas said. He took a breath and held Dean's look. "Not yet, anyway."

"Well, then," Dean made himself say, like he was a healthy person who just said stuff out loud, "let's go shopping."

However, first there was coffee, showering, more coffee, putting away laundry, a bacon sandwich for Dean and a glass of water for Cas. One more cup of coffee.

Dean savored the last bite of crispy pork perfection and hummed to himself.

"What is that?" Cas asked. "You've been humming it for twenty minutes."

"Huh." Dean drank the dregs of his coffee. "I don't know."

Cas cocked his head at him.

"Yeah, that's weird," Dean conceded.

He picked up his phone and dicked around with it until he found the evil so-called assistant that lurked inside it. He hummed as many bars of the chorus as he thought he knew.

The phone displayed Search Results: 87% match.

"Oh god," Dean said in agony.

"What did you find?" Cas sounded terrified for him.

It took all of Dean's strength to inform him, "It's by Perry Como."

"I'm sorry to hear that," Cas said, in a voice devoid of actual pity.

"You don't even know who Perry Como is," Dean sniffed.

Cas gave him a narrow look and took a very prim sip of water.

In what might have been the seventieth store they entered, the sole employee had the harried air of someone being menaced by vengeful ghosts or a pack of church ladies.

"Ma'am, I don't believe we have anymore of the dessert plates in stock, though we do have four of the soup bowls-- Yes. Yes, I will set those aside. No, the after-Christmas sale starts on Monday--"

After Christmas, Dean thought, passing the store's front desk with a pang of sympathy for the shopkeep who had a pencil sticking out of her hair like she'd stabbed herself in the head on purpose.

"--Will do. Thanks, Darlene." The shopkeep hung up and made a whoosh noise. "I am going to kill one of these uppity dipshits, so help me, Satan," she muttered to no one in particular.

Dean saw Cas flinch out of the corner of his eye.

The shopkeep pasted on a smile that appeared mostly sincere. "May I help you, dear?" she asked Dean.

"I'm just browsing," Dean said. With a gun to his head, he wouldn't trouble this frazzled lady old enough to be his grandmother.

"You were going to--" Cas started, waving from the other side of a curio cabinet.

Dean groaned inwardly. "You don't have any children's books for sale, by any chance?"

The shopkeep -- Sandy, according to her name tag -- perked up. "We do! A few still, anyway."

She came out from behind her desk to send him and Cas toward a back corner. In that booth was a shelf with a decently curated selection of kids' books from the early to mid parts of the twentieth century -- quite a bit before Sam's time, though Dean read through the titles on the worn spines just in case something interesting stood out. In between a grimacing Santa figurine and a jewelry box decorated with plastic holly leaves was a selection of junkier trade paperbacks.

"No luck?" Cas reached past Dean to pick up a yellow stoneware bowl; his hip pressed against Dean's.

Dean froze. He saw the bowl being turned over in Cas's large hands as though in a fugue.

He looked up to see Cas watching him, nothing but patience in his face. "Uh. No, um. I doubt Sam would find any of these--"

In forcing himself to look away from Cas, Dean'd seen something. He moved over and picked out a paperback with a faded green dogeared cover and a very pre-Nickelodeon illustration of two grubby children.

"It's perfect," he said, grinning at Cas.

Cas smiled back, game if confused. "One down," he said, like he was ticking items off a mental checklist. He glanced over his shoulder at a pegboard on the wall behind them. "Do you think Sam would like a hat?"

The slightly lumpy knitted toboggans were clearly homemade and came in an array of colors that could all be described as loud. "He likes to jog before breakfast, you know, like a freak, so probably," Dean said.

Nodding, Cas picked out one that was orange with a green zigzag around the bottom.

"Two down," Dean said. They took their finds to the shopkeep.

As Sandy rang them up, Dean saw Cas look at and look away from and look again at a tabletop tree, one of those faux vintage types with frothy white branches, decorated with golfball sized emerald green and candy apple red glass ornaments. A gold ribbon was threaded throughout, a spindly star tied at the apex. It was not exactly a towering behemoth of a tree, but it was awfully late in the season to go chopping down a balsam or a pine or buying one that was already halfway to kindling.

Oh there's no place like home for the holidays. Damn earworm.

Dean pointed down the aisle. "We'll take that little white tree too."

Sandy beamed at him. "Oh, I'm happy someone's taking it," she said. "It deserves a nice couple to enjoy it."

She scurried to the table to fetch the tree and Dean did not glance at Cas or say anything or even think anything. He was a blank sheet of paper, a bank of newfallen snow. He was fog and dissolving inside a descending fog.

Sandy was smart enough to give the tree to Cas, who took it with polite thanks.

Dean and he probably talked about something on the drive back to the bunker -- the weather, perhaps, which was by now worn-in levels of dreary. The tree was delivered to one of the library tables until Dean could think of a better place for it. Rain water trickling under his collar woke him up more quickly than a smack with a snowball would've. He wondered if he'd parked Baby in the garage or if he'd even turned her off. The bunker had some protective sensoring management thingy, though, didn't it? He and Sam wouldn't die of carbon monoxide poisoning overnight?

"Is there an agenda for tomorrow?" Cas asked, as though he hadn't noticed Dean's brain trying to leave his body and this whole infernal mortal coil through his nostrils.

Dean considered the question. Yes.

After a minute, Cas said, "Dean?" which, Dean guessed, meant Dean hadn't actually said anything.

"Yeah." There went that dry air again. His kingdom for a goddamn humidifier. "Yep. Um. Groceries. And finish up shopping." He drummed his fingers on the library table. "Probably. You. You don't have to get me anything, not at all -- like, I'm set." He refused to answer Cas's frown. "But I will probably need an hour in town. By myself."

Cas stood taller. "That's fine." His tone was as flat as a taupe paint sample.

Dean crashed onto the bed in an hour or two and laid there willing the snowglobe glitter sloshing in his mind to calm the fuck down already. He had almost achieved this as Sam stuck his head in the room.

"Busy day?" Sam said.

Dean jerked hard enough to make the bedframe rattle. "Fuckin'--" He rubbed his eyes. "Where've you been all day?"

Sam stepped inside with one of his aw, shucks attempts to seem short. "Movie. Told you that."

"Hmm. Yeah. What'd you see?"

The words that flowed from Sam's mouth were probably…European. Dean understood 'hallucinations' and 'Münchhausen' before Sam moved on to saying, "And the documentary went into a much more in depth discussion than I'd been expecting of dreams as illustration of quote, unquote, 'the fantastic' in cinema blah blah blah blah."

He had not actually said the blahs; Dean was merely an excellent translator.

"Okay," Dean said. He was reasonably convinced Sam had seen the world's most boring film and wasn't off somewhere plotting something catastrophic behind Dean's back.

If nothing else, Dean had spent the whole day with Sam's most trusted and chaotic collaborator, so.

"You talked to Mom lately?" Dean asked, busily untying his boot shoelaces.

"Ah," Sam said, in a knowing tone. "Yeah, she's hanging in there. Just finished up a case in Nebraska, I think. She's plotting revenge for your last word play, by the way."

"Squeezy, heh."

"Oh, don't like that."

"It has several perfectly respectable definitions, Sam. Grow up."

Sam rolled his eyes. "Nothing's come up on your radar, case wise, has it?"

"Nah." Dean checked his phone screen for alerts. "Nah. It's the holidays. Maybe the monsters are taking a beat."

He didn't mention Lucifer. Sam didn't mention Lucifer. Neither of them invoked their mother, or Cas, Amara or Chuck or that Arizonian night hag a month ago who'd been chewing on his neighbor's ear (detached from said neighbor, who turned out to be buried in the backyard) as Sam broke down the front door. It was almost comforting, the familiarity of not talking.

"Maybe," Dean said. "Glad we get to be home for Christmas. Spent enough of 'em in motel rooms."

"True. And Cas is here as well."

"He is," Dean said, mindful in stepping around the sinkhole in Sam's tone.

Sam gave him a look. Dean ignored it.

"Okay. I'm going to sleep." Sam waved and exited.

Dean sat with his feet flat on the floor. He stared at the wall until it appeared unlikely he would be able to punch a hole in it with his mind.

He sent his mom a quick text. "Hi. Hope you're well. Forecasters calling for snow Christmas Eve. Been a while since we had a white one."

Mary wrote back, "Ho ho ho!" plus a Santa emoji.

Dean put the phone on the nightstand and his head on the pillow.

23 December

Dean entered the kitchen the next day on a wave of violin music pouring forth from a bluetooth speaker. Cas had stuck pieces of scotch tape to the speaker's flat top, for easy access while wrapping, Dean guessed. The table where they ate was additionally cluttered with two boxes, a bolt of ribbon, a pair of scissors, and a scattering of tags. Cas was glaring at a large piece of foil wrapping paper printed with candy canes like it was Crowley.

He noticed Dean and his expression softened. He turned down the music. "This is harder to do than I had anticipated," he said in his deep voice, a bit sheepishly.

Dean poured another cup of coffee to give himself something to do other than what he wanted. And instead of ten things he might have asked, he said, "Whatcha listening to?"

Cas paused midway through sawing at an edge of paper. "Copeland. Rodeo."

"Rodeo like…a rodeo?"

"It's a famous ballet."

"About a rodeo?" Dean was lost enough he sat down on the stool beside Cas. Which, incidentally, was not the stool he'd intended to take.

"I am given to understand it's about a cowgirl looking for man." Cas resumed cutting, and moved on to folding, and furthermore to taping. The box he was wrapping began to look festive and not at all like the work of a skyscraper crammed into the body of an investment banker with subpar hand-eye coordination. "It's difficult for me to follow the synopsis of the storyline based only on the movements of the music. But it's humorous, and beautiful, at times."

He cocked his head at Dean. Dean sipped his coffee and hoped the light was bad enough that whatever blushing he was doing -- or flushing, that was more the thing, because the coffee was hot and full of legal stimulants -- wasn't noticeable.

"Sure," Dean said eventually.

Cas looked away with a small smile.

A text message *boing* interrupted the music for a blip. Cas turned over the phone and swiped the screen.

Dean could see an attached photo of Claire and Alex, cross-eyed and faces crammed near the camera. The visors of their respective baseball caps were festooned with plastic ornaments, one of which, on Claire's, was Bigfoot.

"Thx 4 the sasquatch & say hi to the dorks," Claire wrote.

"Hi back," Dean said, and Cas dutifully relayed the message.

"You're welcome," Cas also typed. "Merry Christmas to Jody and Alex as well."

He punctuated the end with a string of emojis so incomprehensible he had to have learned it from Claire.

Claire sent back a trio of crying-laughing smileys.

In a minute, Cas put down the phone, something vulnerable around his eyes that put a lump in Dean's throat immediately.

Before Dean could say anything, Cas changed the subject with, "The later in the day we head to the grocery, the more likely there is to be a crowd."

"Dude. Lebanon is not that big."

That statement should not have turned out to be the stupidest thing Dean had ever said, because he had said a royal fuckton of idiotic things in his cursed life. And yet.

Their shopping list had mostly been vanquished. For Christmas dinner, there would be ham and sides, beer, pecan pie with chocolate chips. The only bags of pecans left were large enough to make multiple pies, and though this was pleasing, the two men haggling over the last quart of egg nog in the nearby dairy case made the simple act of walking by them feel risky, like Dean was scaling an icy mountain ledge. Also, he'd wanted some nog. Alas.

"There's soy nog left," Cas pointed out.

Dean and the two hostile bros all looked at Cas with dismay. Cas's comment did pop the bubble of imminent violence. The bulkier of the nog hogs growled and pushed the carton into the hands of the other guy. A Christmas miracle.

"So that's no on the soy nog?" Cas asked Dean. Something about the look in his eyes was not quite innocent.

Heat shot up the back of Dean's neck fast enough it could've made an audible crack. He swallowed and wheeled away toward the other end of the baking aisle.

"I think we need one more dessert," Dean said, proud of how unaffected he sounded.

"I saw a recipe for cookies--"

"Yes?" Dean leaned toward him like a flower seeking sunlight.

Cas procured a torn scrap of candy cane wrapping paper from the depths of a trenchcoat pocket. "The recipe seemed very simple." He consulted a series of scribbles that may have been Enochian notation. "One cup each of creamy peanut butter and granulated sugar, and one raw egg. Unshelled."

"That's it?" Dean asked skeptically.

"According to the lore--"

Dean assumed that meant: Reddit, or some shit.

"--you stir until the egg is well incorporated. Roll spoonfuls into balls, press the balls onto a cookie sheet with a fork. Bake for ten minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit." Cas looked up at him in a way that made his eyelashes seem particularly dark and luxurious and distracting. "I don't mind peanut butter."

"You had me at a cup of sugar," Dean said, jolly as an elf who flirted with everyone and not just the guy he currently wanted to…

His breath stuttered for a second.

Bake cookies with.

A literal fact, and only that. No analogies, illusions, allusions, metaphors or euphemisms here.

Jesus fucking Christ.

Cas said, "The premade nut butters are an aisle away."

"We need a couple other things anyway." Dean girded his loins, the very loins he was otherwise disregarding entirely, as one would in a grocery setting and all other outings (fucking hell) with one's best platonic pal, and pushed through a clot of customers raiding the loose nutmeats tower.

There were fewer people in the new aisle, but also fewer available choices. Cas stood on tiptoe to grab the one jar of peanut butter in plain sight, and Dean pondered soup.

"Acorn squash or tomato bisque?" he asked.

On a delay, Cas said, "You know Sam will eat either."

Something about the way Cas clipped off the last word made Dean follow his line of sight.

Several feet away, a baby, not yet a year old most likely, was held on a woman's hip. The baby swung one foot back and forth as if sitting on a dock watching a turquoise lake ripple in northern breeze.

A tiny foot, in a tiny lavender sock.

One emotion and another crossed Cas's face far too fast for Dean to describe them, much less name them.

The baby's eyes were glued to Cas: anticipation.

Cas gave her a tiny wave. Her gummy, drooly grin was instantaneous.

The woman gave him a friendly smile and said, "She's never met a stranger." She crossed her eyes at the baby and the baby laughed. "Have you, Pattycake?"

The baby agreed by patting her adult's face.

Cas waved goodbye and the baby threw her hand up in an approximation of a high-five.

Dean took a breath for the first time in ages. "I'll get tomato." He tipped two cartons into the cart.

His shoulders felt tight. Concrete floors were hell on the ol' bones.

Cas seemed to twitch back into his body. He placed the peanut butter jar in the cart as well. He didn't avert his eyes from Dean as much as not seek him out. Dean exhaled against some somethingerother squatting on his gut. An out of context passage of Dickens floated up to the surface of his memory.

"...A little thing affects them. A slight disorder of the stomach…"

Yeah. That's all it was. Undigested beef. Wavy gravy. Whatever.

Still, he crowded next to Cas as they continued toward the check-out at the front of the store. There were indeed more and more customers arriving, right before dinnertime and this close to Sunday. It was a courtesy to conserve space.

Sam helped them unload groceries and even helped making and eating some sub sandwiches, and then he escaped the kitchen, probably to partake of nerdiness like reorganizing the magic spell ingredients room or discussing Proust with other nerds online.

"We're having ham on Sunday," Dean yelled down the hall at him. "Happy Christmas!"

"Sounds great," Sam yelled back, from wherever.

Dean rounded on Cas, who was fidgeting with the oven. "You have to press down on the dial and turn. No jangling," Dean said. "It's gotten loose or outta whack recently."

"Jangling?" Cas asked under his breath.

"No jingling either." Dean took down a big metal bowl and tossed it with a clang onto the metal countertop. He did the same with their one cookie sheet, which always looked to him like the Men of Letters had used it for target practice, and a metal measuring cup. "Cookie time, hell yeah."

The dough, such as it was, was funky thick. Not too terrible to work with. Forming it into balls seemed pretty simple. Cas used a fork to press tine-marks onto the tops with a concentration appropriate for advanced surgery. They put the sheet into the oven and closed 'er up, and leaned against the counter with the general air of two clueless guys waiting for a kid to be born.

Dean winced, as soon as he thought it.

He let himself settle. "Hey."

"Hmm," Cas said.

"How are you?" He looked over and caught the bloom of surprise on Cas's face.

"I'm fine," Cas said slowly, like Dean had asked a trick question.

"I mean." Dean didn't look away. "You had a rough time of it, with Lucifer. For months," he clarified, as though Cas might've forgotten.

"I knew what I was doing, Dean." Cas studied the stovetop. "With Crowley as well, even if that was… Not the same." He huffed out a breath. "At least working with Crowley… He never had control, of course."

It might've been a dismissal, of the kind Dean was an expert in providing, if not for the sadness in Cas's eyes.

Sadness. Resignation.

"I truly thought Lucifer could help us," Cas said. "But as usual I didn't--" He shook his head. "Everything with Amara and Chuck was so much bigger than I imagined. So much worse, for a while." He raised his gaze back to Dean, and it pierced right into Dean's chest like a blade. "You had it much worse than I did."

You really believe that, don't you? Dean thought. He could barely breathe around it.

"Amara," Dean started, and stopped. He let the timer tick off ten or fifteen seconds. He chose. "She thought she knew me. Understood me. She brought Mom--" His voice faltered. He kept going. "Amara had the power and I. Did not. I was ready to die to keep her from killing the world, but I didn't want to die, you know? And she was in my head because she let herself in, not because I let her in."

He thought about Cas hugging him. Saying, I could go with you.

In the inadequate kitchen light, Cas's eyes shone. The blade sunk in deeper.

"I don't think I had it worse," Dean said. "I just had it different."

Cas made an expression that seemed to say he would accept this falsehood for the sake of manners. Dean wanted to kiss him so badly he shifted backwards in case his treacherous hands went reaching for Cas of their own volition.

"I'm sorry he hurt you," Dean said, and Cas's face was about to crumple, he could tell, and that was the exact second the timer buzzed loudly enough to make them jump like they'd been goosed.

"Fuck." Dean slapped the timer off and grabbed a potholder, the adrenaline snapping through his veins making his hands shake.

The cookie sheet was removed from the oven and placed on the stove top. Dean took a chance on glancing at Cas, whose eyes were wilder than cookies normally required until he took a deep breath.

"They do look like cookies," Cas said with the dry serenity of a desert.

Dean cough-laughed and grabbed a metal spatula from the drawer.

"We're supposed to wait two minutes before removing them," Cas said.

"Okay."

Dean squinted at the cookies. They did appear to be cookies. Round. Lightly browned. Smelled fantastic. All in all you would not mistake them for anything other than cookies.

Two interminable minutes gone by, Dean tried scraping one off the cookie sheet.

"Hmm," he said, as the cookie splintered into chunks.

He went at the next ones more gingerly, until the plates Cas had were full and most of the cookies intact.

"Moment of truth," Dean said, putting one of the broken pieces into his mouth and chewing.

Cas did the same.

They looked at each other.

"Holy shit," Dean.

The sentiment was mirrored on Cas's face. "The molecules are still prominent," he said, "but I like it."

"These're stupid amazing." Dean was already cramming a whole cookie into his gob and attaining transcendence. "Three fucking ingredients."

"They are nice," Cas agreed, chewing another bite with measurably more dignity.

"Goddamn voodoo," Dean said, picking up cookies double-handed, 'cause second-degree burns? Worth the risk.

All but ten of the cookies were gone in a matter of minutes. Dean inwardly congratulated himself for buying extra milk at the grocery earlier.

He felt giddy with cookie triumph, or possibly just sugar. Cas was watching him with a smile almost right there, threatening to break out at any time, and now Dean was bumping his arm against his. He wanted to see that smile at full wattage. The cookies were Cas's idea, Cas deserved the glory here. Best batch of cookies Dean'd ever had a hand in.

He could kiss the taste of them off of Cas's mouth--

"You make cookies?" Sam said, strolling into the kitchen like he lived here or something.

Cas moved away to find Sam a plate.

Dean thought about the jury trial that would have a prosecutor proclaiming things like, ...And he killed his brother with a metal spatula a mere two days before a national holiday. Your honor, we seek the death penalty.

Before he shut himself resolutely alone into his own bedroom, Dean did knock on Sam's door.

"You're doing okay with everything, right?"

Sam squinted at him and toed off his sneakers. "Relative to what?"

"Been a stressful few -- several -- months. Possibly years, even."

"Possibly." Sam let his eyebrows rise and fall. "I'm okay, Dean."

"You wouldn't tell me if you weren't, would you."

"Probably not." Sam paused. "We gotta stop Lucifer, but. What else is new."

He didn't sound dangerously hollowed out about it, so Dean let it go for the time being.

"Okay!" He clapped his hands together. "Good chat."

Sam laughed silently. "You invited Mom to dinner Sunday?"

That brought Dean up short. He looked at Sam for a beat, past the white noise. "I will."

It was a simple text, after another hour of deliberation.

"Having ham n stuff Sunday around 6. We'd love it if you'd join," he wrote.

"Thanks. Love you," Mary wrote.

It wasn't exactly an affirmative RSVP, but he hadn't expected one.

24 December

Someone was throwing a concert in the largest bathroom at seven a.m.

The song, amplified by the tiles and concrete, coagulated as Dean entered.

Cas was scrubbing one of the stalls with a sponge and chemicals strong enough to singe nostril hair. On the floor, the clunky jambox Dean had bought for three bucks at a junk shop issued forth the impeccable Mr. Plant and his beseeching vibes.

As you would for me, oh, I would share your load -- let me share your load.

"Hello, Dean," Cas said over Page's guitar. "I won't be but another half hour or so." He rinsed the sponge in a bucket.

"You're listening to the mixtape," Dean said, startled and grinning, and possibly not awake enough for prudent self-censoring.

"Of course," Cas said, as though it was patently obvious he would. He had a fond look on his face. "I like this song in particular very much."

Dean was suddenly far too awake, far too underdressed, far too…far too… Ol' Robbie just kept singing, "Baby, let me," and oh hell what was Dean supposed to say to that. He'd given Cas the tape weeks before, having made it one night with the help of what, in retrospect, was liquor-fueled bravery.

It was hours too early to start drinking again.

"Um. Yeah. Yes. I like this song as well." Dean fidgeted. "Obviously."

Cas, preoccupied with disinfectants, was not noticing this display of barely concealed panic, thank god for minor mercies. "The lyrics have a lovely message."

"Yes," Dean said faintly. "Oh."

Cas looked over.

"No," Dean said, "it's only I-- It took a while for this song to grow on me when I was younger. It felt too much like prog to me."

"Is prog anything like a trog?" Cas asked. He stepped out of the stall with a small smile.

"No." Dean shook his head, smiling a little defeat. "It means-- You know, it isn't important."

Whatever track his train was on had derailed at the sight of Cas's forearms, uncovered by the rolled up sleeves of an old plaid flannel that may have been Sam's.

Cas did notice this lapse in conversation. "There's fresh coffee in the kitchen," he said, like caffeine withdrawal might explain Dean and his jitteriness.

Coffee did sound great, though. Maybe it would still be scalding hot and Dean could pore it directly onto his face.

"Thanks for cleaning in here," he said, moving toward the hallway.

After he'd downed a cup of coffee so quickly his tongue was numb, he tried to put himself in some sorta order, mentally.

Cas was supposed to listen to the mixtape; that was the whole reason Dean had made it for him.

Cas lived in the bunker, as far as Dean was concerned. It only stood to reason Cas would be responsible for some of the chores.

Cas had arms. Arms were not invisible.

Unfortunately, all of these thoughts in procession had the cumulative effect of making Dean feel even less sane.

Another pot of coffee would cure him. He was sure of it.

He'd heard once that shopping on Christmas Eve wasn't too bad since by December 24th a lot of folks had given up and/or were tapped out, finances wise. Dean was not benefitting from any widespread collective surrender, but he did find his mom a beautiful winter scarf in shades of gray and pale green. He bought Sam some of those overpriced multivitamins he liked, and, for want of figuring out anything else to buy Cas, another blue hoodie, this one paler with a zipper.

He didn't know what it was about this time of year, or this specific year -- the persistent gloom, the hooky-spook feeling of everyone in the country being out of the office, emotionally or otherwise, the long-delayed whiplash of being batted around by the creator of the universe and His questionable-to-horrific kin, the revelation that England had a Men of Letters chapter and they were such a bag of dicks they made angels look civilized (no offense, Cas), etc., etc. Traffic jams. In Lebanon, even. The town's population measured in the dozens, but okay.

Dean turned off the Impala and sat there in silence for a few measured breaths. He imagined Cas into the backseat and his face went warm.

So much for that, he thought, shaking off the daydream.

The bunker was suspiciously empty at six o'clock and smelled like someone had been cooking, despite a lack of foodstuffs sitting around. Dean was about to start calling names and kicking butt, and then saw something twinkling in the library.

The tabletop tree had been bedazzled with a single string of teensy white lights. A piece of folded paper was tucked beneath the tree base.

Behind the bunker, on the knoll

Cas's handwriting.

He left his bags in his room and put his coat back on. Outside, he trudged up the hill in powdery snow that had begun to accumulate on the grass. In the strange bright darkness, he could just see Cas sitting on an old log, his face tipped up to the sky.

Dean watched his profile for a minute, from a safe distance. He let the ache roll over him until he knew he could withstand its weight.

He kept climbing.

Cas had probably heard him huffing up the last few steps, where the embankment seemed slipperier. He'd buttoned up his trench like he was capable of getting cold -- although, maybe he was? He looked cold and elated to see Dean, and the combination made Dean's longing heavier for a moment.

"Good thing I wore my lumberjack boots," Dean said, because why waste an opportunity to be an asshole.

Cas stood up, expression changed on a dime. "Good thing there's no-one around to be offended by my stiff wardrobe." That one cocked eyebrow was less polite.

Touché.

A big brown cardboard box sat at Cas's feet.

Dean looked at it pointedly.

Cas sighed. "I didn't know what to give you." He held up his hands. "I know you said what you said. I wanted to get you something."

"Pretty big box, Cas," Dean said, putting on a smarmy voice. "Settin' the bar real high here, man."

"You may want to reserve judgment on that." Cas rubbed his hands together, less from glee and more, perhaps, from chill. He picked up the box with zero effort, as always.

Dean took the box from him tentatively, until he realized it was extremely lightweight. He sat it on the log and opened up the untaped flaps.

"You bought me…popcorn?" Dean asked, staring down at what was a whole jar's worth of kernels popped into fluffy abundance.

Cas plucked at a piece and a long, long, long rope of popcorn rose from the box. "I saw somewhere that some people have a tradition of making popcorn garlands for the wildlife at the holidays. I thought we could put it on this fir that's up here."

The wind was sure cutting into Dean's eyes, wasn't it? Making them burn.

He wanted to laugh, or scoff, and found he couldn't, he just couldn't. He was going to have to walk back down the hill with Cas in a while and pretend like this wasn't the most romantic Hallmark movie shit ever, like it wasn't crushing him that Cas didn't mean it that way, 'cause why would he.

Dean helped Cas take the popcorn chain all the way out of the box and they walked in general synchrony to the fir. Their hands lifted the garland up and around the not too tall tree; when they were finished they stood back and admired the effort.

It looked like a proper Christmas tree in a storybook, like twee squirrels and precocious deer would arrive soon. It was the prettiest Christmas tree Dean had ever decorated.

"Thanks, Cas," he said, meaning it more than usual.

"You're welcome." And if Cas's voice sounded kind, well.

That's who a real friend was, wasn't it? A kindness.

Bird feeding, homemade gift giving, dashing Disney prince amounts of kindness.

In his bedroom, Dean stood around opening and closing his hands, trying to put their circulation back in order. Trying to clear his head, lift away the twinges in the crooks of his arms, the back of his neck. He needed to wrap his measly offerings. He needed to plan tomorrow's cooking schedule, get some sleep already. No use waiting around as though sleigh bells were gonna ring out.

Cas would know where the wrapping paper was being stored. Dean knocked on his bedroom door twice.

"You decent?" he asked, opening the door after there wasn't an answer.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Cas wiped his eyes and looked over. "Of course."

The tears thick in his voice were so disconcerting, so unexpected and rending, Dean was perched beside him in an instant without as much as another conscious thought to justify his actions.

"Cas?" he asked softly.

Cas closed his eyes. Another tear or two dripped onto his hands folded in his lap. "I've been thinking," he said.

And as soon as he said it--

"No," Dean whispered.

There was no snow here, no froth or fog or checking out. Cas's intentions were as clear and sharp in Dean's brain as an icepick.

"I should leave Monday," Cas said, watching the flame of a jar candle on the chest of drawers flicker. "I'm of more use to you, to all of you, if I'm actively searching for Lucifer, which I should have been doing all along."

"No," Dean said, for once in his life not in anger but in utter dismay. "You don't have to earn your keep, for pity's sake."

Maybe Dean was reentering puberty and that's why his voice was so perpetually fucked up anymore.

Cas wouldn't look at him, something ashamed and mournful in his eyes.

Something lonely.

A calm, terrible sorrow poured into Dean's throat.

"I don't want you to go," he said, enunciating every word, not fumbling as he dipped his head into Cas's space to make him look at him. "Cas. We need you-- I need you to stay. Not because you are capable of smiting a demon or tolerating Crowley. Not because your dumb fuck of a brother is plotting whatever he's plotting and your dad left, again." Dean took a breath. It made his voice shakier. "I want you here because I want you here. You have any idea how much I missed you when--"

The when being any of a number of times Cas had been in heaven, captured, hunted, imprisoned, possessed, tortured or outright dead, or assumed to be such, and Dean--

Whatever Dean felt had been like its own animal stalking a cage; a clawed-open wound that only ever began to heal when Cas was home. How Amara might have empathized, if she'd understood human empathy. Dean had been able to keep his own feelings locked away for years.

And now… Not so much.

Despair was creeping in at the periphery; he only had a little courage left.

Cas didn't look away.

Dean's throat closed.

I could be your home, if you wanted, he thought, without hope.

The lock clicked back into place.

He looked down, swallowed. Okay. Okay. Cas would be leaving. He'd survived before.

They both had, Dean supposed.

"Dean," Cas whispered, and his fingers gently pried open one of Dean's clenched hands, until he could press their palms together. He was leaning closer, his eyes full of candlelight and wonder.

Dean had missed something.

"I heard you," Cas said, his forehead touching Dean's, "when you prayed to me, a moment ago."

The lock began to crumble. Dean lifted his other hand carefully.

"Please, please stay," he whispered, brushing his thumb across the top of Cas's cheek.

Cas leaned into his hand. He nodded. Dean ducked his head again, and Cas met him for the softest, warmest kiss Dean had ever felt.

They pulled back. It could have been left there, maybe. A modest kiss. A friendly, fleeting moment.

For as many as two more unsteady breaths they stared at each other. Dean felt his stomach lift as Cas's pupils dilated.

There was nothing chaste about what Dean wanted, or what he saw in Cas's eyes.

When he and Cas crashed back together, somebody made a helpless, relieved sound. Each of them had the other's head cradled in his hands.

Neither of them left the bed for hours, and neither of them slept.

25 December

"Deck the Halls" issuing forth from the floor did rouse Dean from an ultra relaxed haze. He groaned and reached down over the edge of the mattress. His fingertips met cloth and boot treads and he scrabbled around attempting to locate the errant phone that was mixed up in the heap. The phone kicked into high gear with a shriller version of the song, prompting Cas to snap his fingers.

The music stopped.

"Nnnn," Cas said into Dean's shoulder blade.

The heat of his exhalation trembled against Dean's skin. "Was that an alarm, or did you change your ringtone?" He shifted back into Cas's hold.

Cas tightened the arm around Dean's waist. "It's eight a.m."

"Ah."

Dean drifted and basked. Cas opened his hand and began to slide it lower. Dean was extremely, if sleepily, into this next gambit. And then he remembered what day it was.

He caught himself before he actually fell out of bed.

Standing up was successful, in that he didn't fall down then either.

"You have to start cooking already?" Cas blinked at Dean like Dean was endearing and inexplicable.

The floor was numbing Dean's feet as he tried to distinguish his clothes from Cas's. "Soon. Coffee first."

"Naturally." Cas sat up and stretched and yawned and scratched through his messy hair that made him look like he had when they'd first met, which in turn made Dean's heart cramp with adoration. "I can make that."

A pot of coffee guzzled, they dragged each other into the bathroom, propped a chair against the doorknob, and cleaned up, round-aboutly. Getting dressed in clothes that hadn't been on the floor was also somewhat less efficient than it might have been under other circumstances. The caffeine was meeting serious resistance; Dean almost fell asleep halfway through putting on a sock, since he was lying down, curled against Cas.

Cas stroked his fingers through Dean's hair over and over. Already addicted, Dean raised his head to kiss him, and it was more effective than another pot of coffee would've been.

Around ten o'clock, a crust was being blind-baked and Dean was wiping down the counters for the next phase. A kettle of apple cider and cinnamon simmered on the stove. Cas was up to his elbows in potatoes at the sink. He'd queued up a Christmas playlist on Dean's laptop and Loretta Lynn was singing to heck with ol' Santa Claus.

Dean had rarely been happier in his life.

"We're still friends," he said with some amazement.

Cas plopped the pan of potatoes down on the counter. "Was there some question about this?"

Dean blushed, feeling lovesick and disastrous. "No. It's only... I am really great at ruining things." He flubbed around for the peeler and managed to feel even stupider.

"Dean." Cas put a hand on Dean's wrist delicately. "I'm never not going to be your friend."

Sensing perhaps that Dean was one million percent incapable of responding to that without crying, he leaned up and kissed Dean's temple.

Dean hugged him.

Cas hugged him back. "I'm not peeling the potatoes, Dean."

Jesus. That crafty look in his eyes was going to be Dean's kryptonite.

"Chop pecans for me instead?" Dean asked, taking advantage of Cas's inability to stop looking at his mouth.

Cas kissed him and slid a knife out of the closest drawer simultaneously. Dean tried not to perish from lust.

At some point it crossed his mind that Sam was taking advantage of a holiday to sleep late. He bounced down the hall to give him grief, as was his right as the older brother.

Sam's bedroom was empty. Instinct told Dean that Sam's bedroom had, in fact, been empty since sometime yesterday morning.

The bunker's main door clunked open and Dean raced toward the map room yelling "Sammy!" with enough panic in his voice that Cas was right on his heels. They mostly crashed into the room together.

"The fuck, man," Dean panted as Sam clipped down the stairs.

"Mary," Cas said, looking up at the balcony.

Sam gave Dean a half apologetic, half brat grin and hoisted a giant duffle bag into Dean's hands. "Merry Christmas."

"Hey, Dean," their mom said as she descended, smiling more regretfully. "Hope it's not too late to say yes to dinner."

"No, of course not," Dean said, thrusting the bag back at Sam, who had reached for the other bags Mary had and was therefore lousy with bags.

"Here," Cas said, more helpful than a concierge. "Hi, Sam."

The two of them hauled away the bag assortment, leaving Dean and his mother unencumbered.

She hugged him at the foot of the stairs. "You doing all right?" she asked. She smelled like vanilla and frost.

"Yeah, Mom." He let go with immense reluctance. "Real well."

She put a hand on his jaw and studied him. He tried not to squirm, wondering what she saw in his expression.

"Good," she said, eyes shining. "I hear you've got quite a menu planned. Need any help in the kitchen? Or company, at least?"

"The latter for sure."

He took a deep breath. She hooked her arm around his and they went to join Sam and Cas.

"Dude, no way," Sam said before he'd even torn all the paper off the book. He'd lit up like a bottle rocket as soon as he recognized the bottom half of the cover illustration.

"'The Herdmans were absolutely the worst kids in the history of the world,'" Dean recited, and Sam joined him in unison: "'They lied and stole and smoked cigars -- even the girls -- and talked dirty and hit little kids and cussed their teachers and took the name of the Lord in vain and set fire to Fred Shoemaker's old broken-down toolhouse.'"

Sam cackled like a witch. "Thanks, seriously. A classic."

Their mom and Cas shared a look of pure confusion.

"It was my favorite book for, I dunno, two or three years in a row," Sam explained.

"Try five or six years, minimum." Dean tossed a sticky red bow him. "I read that book to you I could not even count how many times. Hundreds."

"Maybe ten."

"Fifty-seven times if it was once," Dean insisted.

"I said thank you," Sam said loudly.

Cas hid a laugh. Dean knocked his knee against his in solidarity.

During the bestowing of marshmallows atop sweet potatoes, while their mother and Cas chatted and set one of the library tables for dinner, Sam said, "So."

Dean stirred the pan of green beans. "Yeah?"

Sam placed the final marshmallow and admired his handiwork. "You and Cas, huh." He waited, gave up, and opened the oven to slide the dish of casserole inside. He closed up the oven and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Yes," Dean said, content to leave the topic there.

He glanced at Sam. Sam flicked him on the head, and Dean swatted his hand away.

"No fighting near a major heat source," Mary said, returning to the kitchen and exiting just as quickly with a tray of veggies and dip and a stack of napkins.

"'Bout time, is all," Sam told Dean, following her out.

Well. He wasn't wrong.

"They remade Shop Around the Corner into You've Got Mail," Sam was telling Mary, "which was about people emailing each other. I think." He shrugged. "Email was still basically a novelty in the '90s."

"I think it's novel now," Mary said. "Type a letter, a million words, I guess, hit send, it goes around the world before I can even open the next one from Bath & Body Works." She shook her head. "They send me about nine emails a day, and they sell so many types of soap. Who is using this much soap?"

Dean blinked. "I mean. We do go through a fair amount more than most folks."

Mary threw a wadded up napkin at him. "Yes, all right. But normal people, I'm saying."

Sam changed the subject back to holiday movies. "There've been a bunch more adaptations of A Christmas Carol, including one with the Muppets."

"What?" Mary's eyes bulged.

Dean's attention was drawn to Cas coming back into the room with the gift Sam had given him, a leather pocket journal with a removable notebook inside.

Cas sat in the chair beside Dean and started filing out the notebook's first page.

"Emergency contacts," he said.

"You're such a Boy Scout." Dean set his foot against Cas's under the table.

"You have a higher than average number of phone numbers." Cas hooked his ankle around Dean's. "And I'm already on my twelfth phone in eight years."

Dean resisted the urge to put his chin over Cas's shoulder, but he did poke at a corner of something sticking out of the journal until he could slide it out.

The badly ragged photo turned out to be of himself from over a year ago, taken at a dive in Tennessee that Dean vaguely recalled as being named something like Rubbin' Butts BBQ. He looked delighted; there was a pile of trashed ribs on the bar in front of him. Sam's elbow was also in the picture, to the side.

Cas cleared his throat and kept making notes.

Dean couldn't kiss him here. Or, technically, he could, but it seemed like the kinda thing that would bring the other discussion to a screeching halt.

The ache he'd felt over the last few days -- months, years -- when thinking about Cas hadn't dissipated as much as evolved, in the scant, if intensely pleasurable, hours since late last night. It occurred to him that just because he could have what he wanted, didn't mean he wouldn't want it.

Like, at all. And what he wanted, he wanted very, very badly.

Cas gave him a steady look.

They were definitely gonna have to figure out this thing where Dean started praying without realizing that's what he was doing.

"I like the version with Patrick Stewart in it," Dean blurted overtop whatever Sam was saying about Albert Finney.

He was the only one who heard Cas snort. He kept his foot right where it was.

"These antlers were made for a child," Dean grumbled.

"Then take them off," Sam said, unimpressed.

"I didn't say I was gonna do that." Dean added another glug of brandy to the mulled cider and stirred. "But you have to put the Santa hat back on."

"Fine." Sam ladled punch into four cups. "Are we watching a movie or no?"

In the other room, their mom laughed a hearty belly laugh.

Sam shot Dean an amused look. "I think she's telling Cas about that time you peed in the bathtub."

"I was two," Dean protested. "It's not like I still pee in the tub."

"You better not," Sam muttered, taking two cups as he wandered out.

Dean turned off the stove and was about to bring the other two cups to the library when Cas strolled in with an armload of dirty dishes. He was already wearing the sweater Mary had given him, more to prove it fit than because the bunker was chilly. Winchester genetics, or maybe sheer common sense, meant Cas's casual wardrobe was quickly becoming a trove of blue tops.

Cas left the plates on the counter. Dean kissed his cheek; Cas went very still, and his eyes went very black.

The kiss Cas returned to him was the sweetest, filthiest thing that had ever happened to Dean in any kitchen, which felt like a challenge for future encounters.

…When no-one else was essentially a room away.

"Are we going to watch a Christmas film?" Cas asked, as though the spot behind Dean's ear would reveal this most hallowed secret.

Dean never really answered. They did wander back into the library eventually, one after the other, Cas carrying the kettle for the refills bound to be necessary. Neither Mary nor Sam seemed annoyed by their temporary absence and thrilled to be offered more cider.

Dean ate another slice of pie, in case the pie felt neglected.

None of them had the energy to stay up and visit much past ten p.m. The dishes were declared the morning's business. Dean left Baby's new five-quart bottle of motor oil on the library table and his own new sweater folded neatly beside it. Goodnights were exchanged in the hallway. Mary headed to her old room and Sam to his. Dean saw Cas touching one of the feathery white Christmas tree limbs with a smile before he clicked off the lights.

Dean offered his hand and Cas took it, let Dean lead him away.

Cas just held him for a long time, the two of them slumped against the door inside Dean's room, where it was quiet and safe.

Both the room, and the circle of Cas's embrace.

"Wanna hold you too," Dean murmured.

The tenderness in Cas's face was almost too much to endure. Dean still found himself starving for it, greedy to be gentle with Cas in return, to make him shiver and gasp.

Later, Cas traced a triangle with his fingertips on Dean's bare hipbone.

Dean kissed the notch of Cas's throat, his clavicle, his palm, caught as Cas raised his hand to bring Dean back to his mouth.

Together, they learned how best to pray, no other soul or spirit privy to a single syllable of their confessions.

26 December

"Dean," Cas said.

"Mmmm." Dean made himself as immovable as possible. "What time is it?"

"Almost ten." Cas stroked Dean's back with his huge, warm, perfect hands. "If you let me get up, I can make coffee."

As though he couldn't pick Dean up one-handed.

"Mmmmmmmm," Dean said, without doing anything else like opening his eyes or rolling away.

After a minute, he said, "So. Anything about the holiday you'd care to make a tradition?"

Cas didn't respond.

Dean lifted his head from Cas's chest and smiled at the sight of him.

My dear home, he thought.

"Any of it," Cas whispered, eyes soft. "All of it."

"Done," Dean said, and kissed him good morning.

#deancas #destiel #spn #fic #holiday fluff

6 notes · View notes