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Dean Winchester was always the center of the ensemble. The king of the spotlight. The lord of the stage. Thus, he was very confused when he walked out of his AP Physics course to find a chanting cheering crowd gathered in one corner of the quad. There was the distinct thrum of heavy bass through a well-maintained eighties boombox. A flash of movement barely showed above the crowd. This was the last straw. Dean Winchester just had to see what was going on.
“S’cuse me.” He mumbled as he wove through the crowd, most of the members sidling aside to let him through. You didn’t mess with Dean Winchester. Period. If he said to get out of the way, you got out of the way or you faced the consequences.
This wasn’t rap. This wasn’t even pop. What was blasting through the pristine boombox was rock and roll. Dean chuckled.
A man after my own heart . He couldn’t help but put a pronoun to whoever was playing this music. Stairway to Heaven, by Led Zeppelin. Damn, that’s a good song. What Dean couldn’t fathom though, was why everyone was so excited. What could be drawing this much attention? Was one of the bad boys getting into some sort of dance battle? To Zeppelin? He applauded the guy’s tastes, but really?
He was so engrossed in the possibilities that he didn’t realize he was all the way through the crowd until a large hand on his chest halted his progress. He turned to the offender, a challenge on his lips, but cut himself off when he saw that it was his right-hand man and closest friend, Benny Lafitte. He turned back to the center of the circle and was rendered speechless.
A boy in a black hooded leather jacket stood with his back to Dean, gyrating seamlessly to the music and twisting and flowing smoothly from each position to the next, combat-clad feet carrying their owner almost silently from position to position. His dancing alone was entrancing, but the kickers floated and flapped and stirred the air as they flowed to the music as smoothly as their owner.
It’s not as if Dean had never seen an angel. Nearly half the campus’s students were composed of the winged dicks. Most of them were haughty and rude because they felt that their species made them superior, but there were a couple that Dean was relatively close to. There was a snarky blonde one named Balthazar. He and Dean were pretty tight. Other than he and Anna - a super cute redhead chick -, Dean hardly got along with the winged students. He was just surprised he didn’t recognize this guy’s wings. There wasn’t a single set of identical angels on campus, so each set of wings was unique and distinctive. He hadn’t ever heard of an angel keeping their wings hidden of their own free will either, so it was odd that he didn’t recognize these.
Dean Winchester should have been able to recognize these wings on sight because they were absolutely spectacular .
They stretched from one edge of the circle to the other when fully spread, each one stretching at least twelve feet from their owner’s shoulder-blades and occasionally brushing some of the audience, eliciting the occasional gasp. They were a shape that Dean had never seen on an angel. They were angular and sleek, harsh matte ebony fading to the color of the sky after the last scarlet rays of the sunset drained below the horizon. The razor-thin edges almost glowed, but not brightly. Almost like the glow of the sun when you’re really deep underwater.
The last chords of the famous Led Zeppelin song started to fade, making the dancer slow, and eventually stop, spinning a 18Ø⁰ and folding in his wings as he crouched, putting one hand to the ground.
Ear-splitting cheers erupted, even Dean himself gave a whoop in congratulations. The dancer held his pose for a couple moments, before silencing the crowd with a soft rustle of feathers. Dean glanced up to see that the boy’s wings were slowly drifting open, but instead of being flat level with the ground like before, they were lifting almost menacingly. Like in those fantasy books where the big bad dragon looks dead, but it’s wings open and lift straight up as it prepares to take flight. The crowd seemed to agree, taking a collective step back. Dean almost joined them but forced himself to hold his ground as the long dark primaries brushed his chest in their ascent.
The boy turned his head - face obscured by a combination of hood and black bandanna - and fixed Dean with eyes the same color as his feathers, before winking slowly and pouncing into the air with a powerful downstroke of his long, broad wings. A flurry of gasps and cheers erupted from the crowd as the dancer spiraled away, disappearing over the top of the library’s clock tower.
As discreetly as he could, Dean Winchester slunk towards the library, strolling casually and pretending to scroll through his phone. As he slipped through the doors, someone ran smack into his chest. He held out a hand and stopped the person from falling over, pulling them - him - to his feet. Blue eyes met Dean’s and the face of the boy stretched into a smile.
“Hello, Dean.” The boy intoned, voice low and rough.
Dean returned the smile, patting the boy on the shoulder.
“Heya, Cas. How’re you doing?” Cas was one of Dean’s closest friends. Had been since middle school.
“Well enough. Just finished my English 241 paper. I assume the crowd that’s dispersing was because of you?” An odd twinkle lit up the smaller boy’s eyes as he fidgeted with the hem of his pale blue sweater-vest
Dean laughed.
“I wish. It was this angel, man. He had wings like none I’ve ever seen. I should be able to recognize wings like that on sight. They were badass lookin’, man.” He knew he probably had that “starry-eyes” look (as Sam put it), but he knew Cas wouldn’t tease him.
Cas cocked his head, his signature curious expression falling across his face.
“What did they look like?” He asked, probably oblivious to how he was looking up at Dean through his eyelashes. Cas was far too innocent to intend to do that. Especially if he knew what that look did to the infamous Dean Winchester.
“They were long and broad - probably the biggest wings I’ve ever seen - and they were this gorgeous, gorgeous gradient, fading from this matte black to the most powerful-seeming glossy navy blue. And the shape … You know how most angels have wings that are owl-like or hawk-like wings?”
Cas nodded, blue eyes wide and earnest, before shifting his weight.
“Dean?”
“Yep? What is it, Cas?”
The brunette shifted again, glancing down apologetically.
“I really have to go to the bathroom. Stay here and see if this mysterious angel comes back. I want to hear this, but I’m kinda dying.” He shifted his weight again.
Dean laughed, slapping Cas on the shoulder playfully.
“Go ahead. I’ll be right here when you come back.” He said between chuckles, plopping himself into one of the cushiony seats facing the window.
Cas nodded and turned around, his stuffed-full leather messenger bag bumping against his thigh as he loped down the hall.
Dean Winchester watched the other students milling about in the quad, talking and eating and moving from class to class. His eyes flicked from face to face, trying to find the angel that had captivated the audience and himself. It wasn’t five minutes before Cas returned.
“Back to the conversation. You were talking about how most angels have Owlish or Hawkish wings?”
“Yeah, but this guy, his wings were all angular, like a falcon’s. They matched his eyes, and the grace he could move them with… You should have seen him, man. It was breathtaking. And his dance moves--”
“Like this?” Cas rumbled in his ear, making Dean turn around.
He couldn’t help but gawp, because holy shit.
Cas dropped into a crouch, spinning a smooth one-eighty before sweeping his wings out to either side.
Cas didn’t have wings.
“You don’t have wings, Cas.” Dean blurted as a single long primary ran down one side of his face, the silky pummels leaving a burning trail in their wake.
Cas just turned to face Dean, blue eyes twinkling above a black bandanna. He drew his wings to his sides, curling the primaries towards himself so that they tented over him in an impressive display. He pushed the hood off his head and untied the bandanna, letting it fall loosely around his neck.
“Then you are high on something good. Can I have some?” Cas teased, his normally-innocent face stretched into a playful smirk.
Dean just growled, stepping into Cas’s personal space, eyes alight with green fire. Cas glanced down, shuffling his feet anxiously.
“I’m sorry I hid this from you for so long. When I was young - before we met - I had a run-in with a gang of angels who thought that all angels should have white wings and all others were abominations that didn’t deserve wings. They almost cut mine off. That's why I hide them. I’m so-- mmph!” Cas was cut off suddenly.
Dean Winchester was many things. He was smart, and he was good at reading people. He was also a great big pile of dynamite with a short-ass fuse. The one thing he was not, though, was shy. That’s why his eyes were glowing so. That’s why he had stepped so boldly into his best friend’s personal space. That’s why when he grabbed Cas by the collar of that leather jacket he had changed into, he didn’t care about the half-dozen people around. That’s why when he finally kissed his best friend, he didn’t hold anything back.
God, and kissing Cas was like drinking straight fireball whiskey.
Honestly, Dean Winchester didn’t know what to expect when he pressed his lips to a frantically apologizing Cas, but it certainly wasn’t this. The angel froze up at first but didn’t stay that way for long.
Kissing Cas was like breathing fire.
Once he got his bearings, Cas was a force to be reckoned with. He flared his wings and flapped twice, stirring up a gust of swirling wind and sending it spiraling through the library.
Kissing Cas was like drowning.
Cas kissed back with intensity, tenting his wings over the both of them, pulling Dean even closer and hiding them from the rest of the world. He opened his mouth, tongue tracing the roof of Dean’s mouth as he hummed in satisfaction.
Kissing Cas was like flying.
There was nothing else around them. Dean was fairly convinced of that as the barest hint of mellow blue light filtered between the points of Cas’s massive wings. Dean drew back slowly, almost shy, the annoying need for air pulling him from Cas’s lips.
Cas’s blue eyes glowed in the dim light as the angel looked up at Dean through a curtain of heavy eyelashes.
“Cas…” Dean whispered into the dark, panting just a little.
Cas pressed a finger to his lips, effectively silencing the older boy as he recaptured his mouth. He nipped at Dean’s lips, growling low in his throat. Almost challenging.
Nobody challenged Dean Winchester.
Dean forgot anything he was going to say.
Nobody challenged Dean Winchester.
Dean gave in to himself, yanking Cas to his chest and delving into the smaller boy. Dean felt Cas smile against his lips, kissing back with the same furious abandon. He hummed happily, tracing the backs of Dean’s teeth, smoothing along the bottom of his tongue, not even trying to dominate, but not submitting either. Cas was anything but submissive. It had taken a long time to open up, but now that he did, Cas was an animal. Dean had never been kissed like this.
Kissing Cas was like floating.
No.
Kissing Cas was like climbing the stairway to heaven.