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Every few weekends or so, Dean gives Lisa a call to check in. Once in awhile when he calls her home number, Ben will pick up instead.
"Oh, it's you," Ben says the first time it happens. He doesn’t sound very enthusiastic to be hearing from Dean.
"So, uh, did you ever get your P-C-whatsit?" Dean asks.
“PSP,” Ben corrects. “Yeah, it’s pretty cool.”
“Your birthday was last week, right? You’re thirteen now, huh.”
“Yep.”
“Did you get some other cool things?”
“A skateboard and some DVDs.”
“Sounds… cool,” Dean says, unsure of what else to say. He’s actually surprised Ben’s talked to him this long. He still doesn’t sound thrilled exactly to be talking to Dean, but he hasn’t passed the phone on to his mom yet either. “Is school going okay?”
“I guess. I got a B+ on my last math test. It sort of bummed me out.”
Dean lets out an amused snort of laughter. “You sound just like Sam.”
“Your younger brother, right?” Ben asks.
“Um, yeah,” Dean answers. He’s surprised that Ben remembers. “He was always a way better student than me.”
“I could have done better,” Ben gripes, “I was just distracted.”
“Distracted by what?”
“My mom’s new boyfriend,” Ben says petulantly.
“Your mom has a new boyfriend?” Dean asks. This is the first he’s heard about it.
“Yeah. He’s kind of weird.”
“Not as cool as Justin, huh?”
“No. Even you were better than this new guy.”
That should not make Dean’s heart swell with pride. Really, it shouldn’t - but actually, it kind of does. “You know your mom and I weren’t dating right?”
“Close enough,” Ben says. “Do you have any good ideas to get rid of him?”
“I don’t really think I should be encouraging this kind of behavior,” Dean says nervously. He’s pretty sure this is not the kind of thing Lisa wants him to be discussing with her kid. She’s got a knack for finding out about things that Dean would really prefer that she didn’t and he has a sinking suspicion she’s going to overhear this conversation at the most inopportune moment.
“Whatever,” Ben says. Now he sounds kind of annoyed. “Do you want to talk to my mom or what?”
“Hey,” Dean says quickly before Ben can yell to his mom that she has a call. “Just because I won’t help you plot against this guy doesn’t mean I won’t listen. If you want to talk, you know I’m only a phone call away.”
“Right, yeah,” Ben says distantly. Dean hopes he at least thinks about it.
The next day, Dean wakes up to find Sam nervously fidgeting in front of his laptop. They’d finished a chupacabra hunt just yesterday and had planned to take a day or so off before heading east. They’ve got their next hunt already lined up, a haunting in Ohio they’re pretty sure is a poltergeist so Dean knows he’s not doing research.
“What are you doing?” Dean demands. “Your noisy, girlish fidgeting woke me up.”
“Oh, sorry,” Sam says, not at all contrite. There’s a rapid spate of typing for a moment or two, followed by a pause before Sam laughs and types something else.
“Oh my god,” Dean groans, chucking his pillow vaguely in his brother’s direction. It lands a good three feet to the left of him, not to mention about a half a foot short. “Are you chatting online like a thirteen year old girl?”
“No!” Sam says in the tone of voice that means he totally is. “It’s just Facebook.”
“Who ya talking to?” Dean asks coyly, stretching out his arms before standing up with a grin.
Sam doesn’t answer, so Dean wanders over to stare over his shoulder. Sam tries to shut the screen before he can get a good look, but Dean holds out his hand to brace it open. “Sarah Blake,” Dean reads. “No way.”
“We just reconnected the other day.” His cheeks are slightly pink.
“Ah, Sammy, you missed her.”
Sam shrugs, and angles the computer screen away from Dean. “Okay, maybe a little.” He types another sentence that Dean suspects is unflatteringly about himself.
Dean pats him companionably on the shoulder anyway. “It’s been awhile since you dated someone… normal.” That’s pretty much the only word he can think of after the disaster that was Ruby.
Sam glares at him, but he can’t exactly argue. He hasn’t exactly had the best track record with girls who aren’t demons or werewolves or whatever lately.
Dean ruffles his hair and heads off to the bathroom. “I think she might actually be good for you,” he says.
Apparently, Ben actually does consider Dean’s words, because a few days later, Ben calls him. Grated, he doesn’t want to talk so much as convince Dean his mom’s boyfriend is actually a demon or something equally unnatural.
"Dean, I think my mom’s boyfriend is secretly a vampire. You have to come kill him."
"Nice try." Dean can’t help but roll his eyes, even if Ben can’t see him over the phone.
"He's a werewolf in disguise? He wants to rip my face off and eat it?" Ben tries again.
"I don't think so."
“He is really weird though.”
Dean’s about to laugh, but when turns around, he finds Cas has silently arrived and he’s standing just inches away from him, staring in that slightly creepy way of his that Dean has yet to break him of. He sighs. “Tell me about it,” Dean says to Ben. “You know, I gotta go. Do you want me to call you back later tonight?”
“No, that’s alright,” Ben answers. “I’m gonna do some research online to find out what this guy really is.”
“You do that,” Dean says, although he’s a little worried about what he might find. Does Lisa even have some kind of net nanny on her computer? He doesn’t remember. “Why don’t you look up the Ghostfacers?” he suggests. He figures they’re pretty tame, relatively speaking, and there isn’t a lot of trouble that Ben can get into based on their videos, except maybe make a salt lined mess. At least he’s not going to ask his mom for some lamb’s blood or something equally incriminating to Dean after surfing their site. Or so Dean hopes.
“Thanks,” Ben says and hangs up.
“Cas,” Dean says. “Aren’t you supposed to be at work?” It’s well past five, but Cas has been working long hours so that Chuck will let him take a week off for a trip that maybe, sort of, might be for his and Dean’s anniversary. Not that Dean will be telling anyone that. He told Sam that he and Cas were going to Hawaii because of its lack of bugs and scary monsters. Come to think of it, Sam hadn’t actually believed him.
Cas looks shifty. “My Father has sent me on the fifth coffee run of the day.”
Now that Dean takes a closer look at him, he notices Cas is looking pretty frazzled. He takes Cas’ hand and leads him over to sit on the bed. “Chuck sounds especially demanding today,” Dean says sympathetically. He’s learned that if he wants sex later, this is the best way to handle Cas’ complaints about his job, no matter how ridiculous Dean thinks they actually might be.
“His deadline for the next Supernatural book is just a week away and he’s only half done with it.”
Dean rolls his eyes. “He’s freaking God. I don’t understand why he doesn’t just magic up the thing.”
“He says that he enjoys the process of writing these stories himself.”
Cas is looking especially smite-y again. It’s the look he only gets when Chuck has sapped all of his all ready limited patience. Dean is a little worried about letting him go in this state and what he might say to the poor barista, so Dean decides some distractions are not only in order, but absolutely essentially. Also, with Cas here in front of him looking all rumpled and sexy after a long day of being God’s secretary, he’s feeling kind of horny.
“Hey, babe,” Dean says, leaning in to press a line of kiss down Cas’ throat, “if Chuck enjoys pushing his deadlines so much, I think we should make him wait for his coffee. For twenty minutes at least.”
“Mmm,” Cas moans appreciatively, his eyes fluttering shut. “I’ll just have to tell him there was a line.”
In the end, twenty minutes turns out to be more like forty-five.
“You think he’d believe they ran out of hot water?” Dean asks afterwards, panting slightly as he runs a palm over Cas’ sweaty back.
“He’ll just have to,” Cas answers, kissing along Dean’s collarbone.
Forty-five minutes is about to turn into an hour and a half right before Cas’ phone rings. He glares over at his trench coat, a pinched look on his face.
“Go,” Dean sighs, smacking Cas’ ass to convince him to stand up and answer it. “Ignoring God is not a good idea.”
Cas huffs out a sigh, but obligingly gets up and answers his cell. He scowls down at it after he hangs up. “He says since I’ve been taking so long, I can also bring him a box of éclairs. From France.” Dean smothers a laugh in his pillow. Cas turns the scowl on him. “I really hate my job,” he says.
“Love you, see you tonight!” Dean calls after Cas as he pulls on his pants and prepares to flit away. “You maybe want to bring back one of those éclairs for me?” he adds. He’s sure they won’t be as quite as good as good old American pie, but hey, if Cas is going there anyway, why not right?
Cas, regrettably, does not show up later that night with any kind of French pastry. He does, however, have whipped cream which turns out to be a lot more fun, so Dean’s still pretty happy about the whole thing.
When Sam finds a hunt in New York just a few miles away from New Paltz right after they clear up the poltergeist case in Ohio, Dean doesn’t say a word. Well, he might laugh for a solid five minutes, but otherwise, he keeps quiet about it.
Sam grins the entire drive there. Dean simply can’t tease him when he looks so happy.
It’s a completely different story though once they actually get there and Sam makes plans to go on a date with Sarah. He stands anxiously in front of the mirror and fiddles nervously with the cuff of his button-down.
“Does this shirt look okay?” he asks.
“You did not just ask me that,” Dean says from where he’s sprawled across his bed, watching a repeat of Dr. Sexy. “Next you'll be asking me if your hair looks perfect like the princess you are.”
Sam shoots Dean his traditional annoyed bitchface, but this does not stop him from wordlessly running his fingers through his hair. Dean has to admit it still looks much better than Cas' does after Dean's spent any amount of time alone with him.
Dean calls Adam after Sam’s left and Dr. Sexy’s over. Cas is still at work, running all over Chuck knows where fetching him things, and Dean's bored. Adam is, unfortunately, trying to study.
“You’re a pre-med student,” Dean says. “Would it really hurt Sam if I dumped an entire shaker of salt into his water bottle?”
“Do you actually think he would actually drink it all?”
“Okay, no. Maybe I’ll just have to stick to putting Tabasco sauce in his toothpaste.”
“Don’t you have anything better to do?” Adam demands right before he hangs up on him. “I’m trying to study for my finals.”
Dean promptly calls back. “Dude, I think we got disconnected,” he says, even though he’s pretty sure that wasn’t what happened.
“Why are you calling me?” Adam demands.
“Sam's on a date,” Dean says petulantly.
“Are you jealous?” Adam asks. “I thought you had a boyfriend.”
“No, of course I’m not jealous! He took my car and this motel doesn't have cable.”
“Where's that weird little angel guy you’re dating? Shouldn't he be around to distract you?”
“He's working overtime so we can go to Hawaii for our anni-uh, I mean, just for vacation.”
“Right. You don’t strike me as a guy who would chose Hawaii for vacation.”
“Cas decided. Apparently, there aren’t really any monsters there, just your average, run of the mill ghosts and shit so he thought it would be relaxing or something.”
“I still don’t see why you can’t call him instead of me,” Adam says.
“He works for God,” Dean answers like it couldn’t be more obvious. “Who may actually be Chuck, but he’s still pretty scary.”
“So?”
“This from the guy who kept calling us every night for an entire month all freaked out because you were afraid that that Chuck had sent some angels to stalk you, when really it was just a freshman with a crush.”
When Adam hangs up on him the second time, Dean can’t really say that he blames him.
“How was your date?” Dean asks when Sam finally gets back well after midnight. Cas is conked out beside him after another day of Chuck failing to finish his latest book yet successfully making Cas’ work life completely miserable. Right before Sam had shown up, he’d been mumbling in his sleep about chocolate scones.
The sleeping thing is a remnant of Cas’ time almost human, but not the way you might think. The first time Cas had fallen asleep after getting all angeled up again, Dean had absolutely freaked. He’d shaken Cas awake and waited impatiently as Cas blinked open his eyes, fretting the whole while.
“What is wrong with you? When did you start sleeping?” Dean had demanded.
Cas had given him a shrug that turned into a stretch of his arms. “It’s not necessary,” he explains. “I just do every once in awhile, when I feel like it.”
“When you feel like it?” Dean had repeated, incredulously.
Cas had looked bashfully away. “It’s nice, occasionally. I like it.”
This is the fourth time that Dean’s seen him sleep in the six months they’ve been back together. He’d thought that all those times when Cas had watched him sleep had been more than a little weird, but now that the tables have turned, Dean finds himself doing exactly that. He likes the way Cas’ face relaxes in sleep like it never, ever does when he’s awake, the way his lips purse and his brow smoothes out. Cas’ sleeping face reminds him of how much more open Cas’ face was the first time they’d met, as Cas leisurely took his time to flip through Bobby’s books, completely nonchalant when Dean not only shot him but plunged a knife into his chest. Of course, that was before Heaven’s crap had taken over and somewhere along the way Cas’ expression had turned world-weary.
“It was great,” Sam says, answering Dean’s question about his date with Sarah with a sappy grin on his face. “I think I might stay here for a few weeks, see how things go.”
Dean absolutely does not pout.
He calls Adam again the next morning. “Hey,” he says, “do you think I can crash on your couch for a while?”
“Dean, it’s finals week. Also, I live in a dorm.”
“So?”
“I don’t have time for this.” There’s a short click, followed by silence.
“I think he hung up on me again,” Dean says to himself a few minutes later.
After all of Ben's nagging, Dean just so happens to find a hunt half an hour's drive from Cicero. Going to visit Lisa and Ben has absolutely nothing to do with Sam abandoning him for a girl.
Dean actually thinks nothing beats his current relationship in which his awesome angel boyfriend can commute to wherever he is, even if he does have a sucky day job. He’d tried to convince Sam to let Dean set him up with an angel too a few months back, but Sam had pretty adamantly shot him down. It hadn’t even helped when Dean had pointed out she could be a sexy, stylish angel, completely unlike Dean’s own nerd angel in an ill-fitting trench coat.
“One star-crossed romance between Heaven and Earth is more than enough for this family, thanks,” Sam had said.
Dean supposes Sarah is a much better fit for Sam anyway. Not everyone is so willing to put up with strange angel eccentrics, of which Cas has many. Most of which, Dean actually tends to find endearing.
Dean calls Ben the moment he hits the Indiana state line. “I’ll be in the area today and I was just wondering if you wanted to hang out and get burgers with me, maybe run some of your research by me.”
“Really?” Ben asks. He sounds pretty excited. “What time do you think you’ll get here?”
“Couple hours,” Dean answers. “Think your mom’ll let you go?”
“Yeah, you want to talk to her real quick just to check?”
“Sure,” Dean says. He thinks he can actually hear Ben running through the house, looking for his mom. He grins. It figures that all he needed to finally end up bonding with Ben again was his hunting expertise.
Dean buys Ben a cheeseburger and a root beer float and lets the kid expound upon his theories about his mom’s new boyfriend.
“He might be either a vampire,” Ben says, “or a werewolf, or a shapeshifter, or a skinwalker, or maybe a wraith, or even a rakshasa-”
“Dude,” Dean interrupts, “if you can’t narrow it down that far, I think you just have to admit that he’s a normal guy.”
Ben sighs. “You’re probably right,” he agrees.
It turns out that Dean is in fact wrong, though none of Ben’s choices were correct either. Lisa’s new boyfriend is over at her house when Dean and Ben get back, and he’s not actually a normal guy. He’s not exactly Lisa’s boyfriend either.
He does in fact turn out to be Lisa’s friend Cas, angel of the lord extraordinaire.
"That's not your mom's boyfriend. That's my boyfriend." Dean crosses his arms and glares at Cas. “Why is my boyfriend here?”
"They… what?" Ben says. Dean had always kind of assumed that Ben knew who Cas was, but he wonders now if they had ever actually met. Cas had gone on one last book run the while Dean had said goodbye to Ben and Lisa, which is the only day that Dean can think of where they might possibly have been introduced, but after this whole mix-up, Dean guesses it never happened.
"Cas and I are just friends," Lisa says. "He's that angel of the lord I told you about? He drops in to chat every now and again."
"That’s him? But I thought… I heard you making a date with him on the phone! You said you had a good time last Friday and of course you'd like to go see a movie with him this Saturday."
Lisa looks somewhat embarrassed. Her cheeks actually turn a light pink. Dean doesn’t think he’s ever seen her blush before. "Oh, right. That was with Mr. Thompson."
"Mom." Ben looks aghast. This is so, so much worse than when he'd just thought she'd been dating the creepy trench-coated guy. "You cannot date my math teacher!"
Dean would laugh, but he’s too busy being pissed at Cas. “I thought you were supposed to be working overtime while Chuck frantically fails to make his latest deadline.”
“I was. He finally managed to finish the book.”
Shocking, Dean thinks. He thinks he liked it better before he found out God was such a horrible procrastinator… or, you know, simply that Chuck was God. But that’s beside the point. “You’ve been spending an awful lot of time with Lisa without telling me,” he accuses.
“I did tell you.”
“You did? I don’t remember.”
“Clearly. I told you that Lisa has been stressed out lately because she was publishing a paper in a psychology journal.”
“That was Lisa? I thought you were complaining about Chuck and his writing again.”
“I also specifically mentioned Ben by name. I mentioned he got an A- on his history test just this past Tuesday.”
“Did you?” Dean really doesn’t remember. He tries to think back, but he gets distracted thinking about the blowjob Cas had given him just before this supposed conversation.
Cas correctly interprets the look on Dean’s face and shakes his head. “You have a regrettably short attention span after we have sex.”
“Dude, I’m only human,” Dean argues. “And a guy. You shouldn’t tell me things you want me to actually remember right after an orgasm.”
“It was more than half an hour later!”
“Or whenever Dr. Sexy’s on.”
Cas shoots him a look like he seriously questions why he’s been reduced to dating a human. It’s a look Dean’s actually become quite accustomed to in the past year. He pats Cas on the shoulder and presses a kiss to his cheek like he always does when Cas gets that look on his face. “You know you’d be bored without me,” Dean says.
Cas does tend to roll his eyes at this point, but he never argues.
eitherLisa and Dean drink beer on Lisa’s porch while Ben shows Cas how to play his PSP. Cas is an utter failure at it, randomly pushing buttons until Ben says, “No, like this,” and pushes the correct button for him.
Lisa laughs at the expression on Dean’s face while he watches Cas. “You look so relieved that he’s not doing well.”
“I’m just glad that I’m not going to have to buy him one.” Dean still doesn’t understand why those things are so damn expensive.
“Why am I not surprised?”
“So,” Dean says. “Your kid’s math teacher? Really?”
Lisa flushes again. “He’s really good looking,” she says. “And such a good kisser.”
“Lisa. You’re really going to date your kid’s teacher?”
She sighs. “I don’t know. Ben’s only got a couple more months left in middle school. Maybe we can just hang out until then. Platonically.”
Dean shrugs. “That’s probably a good idea. Although maybe you can make out a little, since he’s such a good kisser and all. Just be sure not to tell Ben about it.”
Lisa laughs. “Or I can always tell him I really am dating Cas.”
Dean just frowns at her. He’s not sure he likes that idea any better.
Lisa pats his hand. “Don’t worry,” she says, “I wouldn’t actually steal your man.”
“Gee, thanks,” Dean says, but he grins back at her.
Later that week, when Cas and Dean are hanging out in Dean’s motel room, Adam calls Dean and says, “I’m done with my finals now and I have some free time, if you wanted to, you know, come visit. If you want.”
Adam sounds so iffy and unsure about it that Dean can’t help but say. “Aw, Adam,” he says, “I’d be honored to come have a slumber party with you.”
“Never mind,” Adam says. “I’m uninviting you.”
“Be nice,” Cas orders from his place beside Dean.
“No really,” Dean corrects, “I’d love to come.”
“Okay fine, but it’s not a slumber party. You’ll have to find a motel.”
“You wouldn’t let your very best brother crash on your couch?”
“How many times do I have to tell you, I live in a dorm. I don’t have a couch. Also, I think I like Sam better.”
Dean pouts. “Hey,” he says.
Cas takes the phone out of Dean’s hand and scolds, “Apologize to your brother.”
Adam may have gotten over his fear of God, but Cas still freaks him out. ”I definitely like Sam’s girlfriend better than your scary boyfriend,” he says accusingly once he’s sure that the phone is back in Dean’s hands. “She sent me a care package full of muffins.”
“Don’t worry,” Dean says with a laugh. “I’ll make Cas do something nice for you when we come visit.”
“We can take him out for to a bar,” Cas suggests. “Lisa has been teaching me to how to play pool.”
“Dude, seriously?” Dean is a little jealous. He hopes that Lisa’s not so good a teacher that Dean won’t be able to step up behind Cas and crowd him against the pool table under the pretense of correcting his technique.
“I thought you liked pool.” Cas looks confused by Dean’s frown.
“I do. I was just hoping to be the one to teach you. You know-“
“Guys!” Adam loudly interrupts. “This is not the conversation you want to have with your little brother on the line, so I’m hanging up now.”
“How many times have you hung up on me this week?” Dean asks, although, this time, he’s not really that upset about it considering the intense look Cas is sending his way. He’s actually kind of looking forward to getting off the phone and having some private time.
“I told you,” Adam answers, “it was finals week. But I am looking forward to hanging out with you as long as you promise that I don’t have hear about, see, or otherwise know anything about your sex life.”
“Deal,” Dean says. “See you in a couple days.”
“So,” Cas drawls. “I hear PDA is strictly off limits this weekend.”
“That’s what Adam says.”
“But I find it so hard to keep my hands off you.” Dean’s pretty sure that Cas is joking, though he sounds completely serious. That doesn’t stop him from sliding his hand up under Cas shirt.
“I suppose we’ll just have to make the most of the time we have right now.”
“I guess so,” Cas answers, pulling Dean forward into a kiss, his lips smirking up into a smile against Dean’s own.