Archive of Our Own

Dean rolled his eyes at him. “We know, you’ve told us thirty times already. Lighten up, kid. I told you you should’ve dropped one of those classes when you had the chance.” 

Sam came up to lean over Kevin’s shoulder, taking a look at the notes he was studying. Kevin tried not to think too hard about how good he smelled. ”I can help you with some of this stuff if you want. But, honestly, I’m still having trouble with the Aufbau principle,” Sam said to him.

Though Sam was a junior and Kevin was a freshman, they were both currently taking advanced placement chemistry. It had made Kevin feel proud of himself, at first, that he could keep up with Sam academically—of course, that was before the class started crushing his spirit with electron affinities and spectroscopic notation.

Meg made a sudden buzzer sound, reaching way up to ruffle Sam’s hair as she appeared behind him. “You can study later, nerds. What point is there in meeting up at Kev’s house if he broods in the corner like a dipstick the whole time?”

Sam sighed irritably and swept a hand through his mussed bangs. “Much as I hate to admit it, she’s got a point.” 

"Yeah!" Charlie chimed in from her place on the floor. "You haven’t said a word about Gears of War to me in the past two weeks. I think some serious de-stressing is in order." 

Kevin put his head down on his desk silently, knowing that he was fighting a losing battle. Sure enough, Dean got off the bed and swept Kevin’s papers and post-it’s to the side, swiveling his chair around so that he was facing the group.

He noticed that Cas was sitting quietly by the door, reading one of those terrible joke books he liked so much. Kevin pointed at him accusingly.

"How come Cas gets to do whatever he wants, and I don’t? You’re all ageists."   

"Speaking of education," Cas said, looking up from his book with a gleam in his eye, "Here’s a good one: to write with a broken pencil is…pointless.” Five simultaneous groans filled the room as Cas nodded like he’d just unearthed the pun of the century. He did that at least three times per day. “That was even worse than usual, because it sounded like a fucking metaphor,” Dean said, wrinkling his nose. Cas lit up like a Christmas tree, taking a pencil from behind his ear and making a note on a page of his book. “I hadn’t thought of it that way. Brilliant.”

Meg crawled over to sit in his lap, distracting him from the book when she started kissing his neck. “Gross, we don’t need to see that,” Charlie said, as Cas chased Meg’s mouth with his own and kissed her back thoroughly. “Clearly, love can be a touchy subject,” Cas said under his breath, grabbing Meg’s butt. “Fucking hell,” Meg muttered, pulling away to simply sit with his arms around her. Kevin made a tiny retching sound before asking nobody in particular, “So, what’s on the schedule? You guys know there isn’t a thing to do around here. We should go out somewhere instead. Assuming Mom’ll let me.”  

"Nah, I’ve got a better idea," Dean announced, pulling out a beer bottle.

"Dude, no way!" Kevin hissed, eyeing his bedroom door as if his mom would march in at any second. "Cool your jets," Dean replied, "It’s empty, see? I thought we could play a few rounds of Spin the Bottle, for old time’s sake." Sam snickered. "What is this, an ’80s coming-of-age movie?" 

Dean mimicked his brother, jumping on top of him and getting him into a stranglehold.

 ”Ah, shit—Dean, stop it!” 

"The harm caused by sibling rivalry is relative,” Cas remarked sagely, as Sam gained the upper hand and flipped Dean over, knees clamped around his sides. Meg punched Cas affectionately in the shoulder for the pun, prompting them to start making out again. Kevin wished he had quieter friends. Charlie, who was alternating between scrolling through message boards on her phone and tuning in to the discord around them, shrugged apologetically at Kevin. He gave her a reserved smile and clapped his hands loudly to get everybody’s attention.

"Shut up, all of you! If you wanna play Spin the Bottle, let’s do it. Twenty bucks says I win." Dean snorted, but Sam still had him pinned to the floor, so he looked too stupid for his cool tone to work. "There’re no winners or losers in Spin the Bottle, you overachiever." 

Kevin narrowed his eyes. “Spin. The. Bottle.” 

"Alright, Hitler. Geez." Dean scrambled out of Sam’s grasp and ushered the rest of the group into a loose circle, setting the bottle in the center of the floor. "Who wants to go first?" 

"Sammy should go first," Meg declared, fluttering her eyelashes at him to his obvious chagrin. 

"Little man hasn’t popped his lip cherry yet, am I right?" 

"What? Of course I have!"

Meg wiggled her eyebrows at him. “The lady doth protest too much, if you ask me.”

Sam groaned with annoyance and gave the bottle a hard spin, watching intently as it passed over everybody twice before coming to land on…Charlie. (Kevin told himself he wasn’t disappointed.) She grinned at Sam, and he returned the look sheepishly, leaning across the circle to give her a friendly peck on the lips. “Man, if you call that a kiss, it’s no wonder you never get laid,” Dean retorted. 

"Fuck off." Before the brothers could go for each other’s throats again, Charlie interrupted them. "Easy, children. Let’s keep the game going, huh?" She took her turn, ending up having to kiss Meg. Dean looked a little too excited about it, causing Sam to start in on one of his lectures about objectifying women. This in turn led to another wrestling match, which everyone else ignored until Meg spun the bottle and it landed in the general vicinity of where Sam and Dean were elbowing at each other. "Incestuous threesome," she crowed, leaning her face in between them so they could each give her a reluctant kiss on the cheek.

They did rock-paper-scissors to determine whether Sam or Dean should go next, and when Dean inevitably lost, his spin landed on Sam.

They stared at each other in horror as Charlie and Meg cracked up gleefully, urging them to lock lips. “Challenge accepted,” Dean stage-whispered, grabbing at his brother’s face and mashing their mouths together. Sam’s arms fell loosely to his sides and he simply let himself be kissed for a minute until Dean broke away, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“I won that one,” he said, standing and taking a bow as the others clapped indulgently for him. Kevin peeked at Sam, who was frozen in place, and noted that his cheeks were reddening belatedly. In one quick movement, he stood up, too, and made for the door. “I’m—bathroom,” he stammered out clumsily, and shut the door behind him as he left.

An unusual silence settled over the group for a stretch, before Cas broke it by saying, “Well. That was strange…even for Sam.” Dean eyed the door with sudden concern. “Yeah. Think I went too far? I guess I shouldn’t have done that.” Kevin waited for Meg to make a snide remark, and was surprised when, wonder of wonders, she didn’t say anything. Charlie cast a questioning glance around the circle. “So, uh. We done playing, or what?” 

Dean shrugged, rubbing at the back of his neck. “Not really in the mood anymore.” There was a smattering of affirmative noises, and then Dean excused himself, presumably going off to find Sam. Charlie shook her head wonderingly. “Those guys’re something else.” 

"Weirdos," Kevin added, gazing longingly back at his chemistry textbook. Meg snapped her fingers in front of his face, forcing him to look away. "Eyes on the prize, Kev."

"My grades are the prize,” he whined. “Besides, what’re we supposed to do now?”

"We could go to the arcade," Charlie mused hopefully. "Or to my place. Same difference." 

"It’s past my curfew," Kevin said.

Meg checked her watch. “It’s only seven!” 

"Like I said. Curfew." 

"I’ve got an idea," Cas proclaimed, "Let’s recite our own poetry. I happen to have my portfolio with me right now—" 

"I like you a lot, babe. But I’d rather have to listen to a straight hour of your puns than do that." Cas beamed at Meg, undiscouraged. "We could do that, too." 

“No, Cas,” Charlie and Kevin said in unison.

All four of their heads turned to the door when Dean walked in, eyebrows drawn together in an uncharacteristic frown. “Where’s Sam?” Kevin asked, when it was clear that he wasn’t coming in after him. Dean sighed pensively and sat down between Charlie and Kevin. “Went home. Said he wasn’t feeling too good—he didn’t even wait for me give him a ride. I mean,” he looked up entreatingly, eyes wide, “It can’t have bugged him that much that I kissed him, right? It was just a joke.” 

Cas squinted at him thoughtfully. 

"Your brother is an enigma. Who knows what’s going on in that colorful brain of his." 

"You’re one to talk, Rain Man," Dean scoffed, playing absently with his necklace. He looked to Kevin and said, "Mind if I head back early? Should probably try to figure out how pissed he is at me before he like, switches my skin mags for copies of Good Housekeeping, or something." 

Kevin waved a hand. “Sure, go ahead. Nothing would make me happier.” After a brief pause, he asked, “Would he really do that?” Dean’s voice was grim as he collected his keys and his leather jacket from Kevin’s bed.

“It’s happened before.”