Work Text:
The Mark was always quiet on Monday nights, which is why Dean was surprised to come out of the office and see someone sitting in the back booth reserved for management next to the kitchen door. Benny typically usurped his booth only when the bar was full. However, the plastic “Reserved” sign was still on the table, and the solo patron sat with his back to the bar, nursing a beer. A good half dozen tables in the middle of the room were empty. At the occupied tables and booths, a range of college students and older couples polished off plates of Monday Night Meatloaf. It wasn’t a bad crowd, but it sure as hell wasn’t what they’d consider busy.
Gripping his stack of paperwork in one hand, Dean knocked on the bar to get Benny’s attention. Turning his head, Benny nodded at him but continued to pull a couple of beers for Pamela before flipping a mug onto the chipped bartop and pouring Dean a black coffee.
“What’s with the booth?” Dean asked, wrapping his hand around the mug as Benny pushed it across the bar.
“VIP.”
Dean paused a moment. “VIP?”
Benny nodded, eyes on the glassware he was putting away. “VIP.”
Rolling his eyes turned into a full body sigh. “Dude, we don’t have any VIPs. Why couldn’t you use a regular table?”
“VIP wanted to sit with his back to the bar. He tipped really well. Asked for you.” Benny wiped the spot where Dean’s coffee mug had been and moved away to serve other customers. Dean shook his head. Apparently the conversation was over, and he still had no idea what was going on.
“You know I pay your salary, right?” Dean raised his voice, but Benny didn’t even turn around, just flipped him off behind his broad back.
Curiosity killed the cat, but … “VIP,” Dean muttered to himself, and made his way across the room to the Reserved booth, nodding and waving at a few regulars as he walked.
He stopped at the head of the booth, glancing at the seated guy. Jeans, worn black leather jacket, t-shirt. Nothing special. Dean couldn’t see his face for the baseball hat pulled low over his eyes.
“Hi, I’m Dean, I manage the bar. Everything okay tonight?” Why are you in my booth?
The cordial smile died on his lips as the VIP looked up. The baseball hat had been hiding a pair of stunning blue eyes.
“Hello, Dean.”
Dean shot a betrayed look back to the bar, but Benny just smirked at him and grabbed a bottle of Jack and two shot glasses.
“Hey, Cas. I wasn’t expecting to see you again.” The “ever” remained unsaid but hung in the air regardless.
“You invited me to come by. I said I would,” Cas pointed out. He took a sip of his beer as Dean slid into the booth across from him.
“Right.” Dean busied himself stacking his paperwork in a neat pile as Benny arrived with the bottle of whisky and glasses. He poured two shots and left the bottle.
Dean rolled up the sleeves of his red-and-grey flannel, giving himself a moment to acclimatize to Cas’ presence. The slight shake in his fingers didn’t give him much hope of that happening.
Dean picked up a shot glass and pushed the other across the table. “Cheers, buddy.” They clicked glasses and Dean’s shot burned down his throat, landing uncomfortably on a bed of meatloaf and fries in his stomach. He grimaced and poured a second shot directly into his coffee.
Cas swallowed his shot in one go, dropping the shot glass back on the table. He fiddled with his beer glass while Dean stared at the top of his baseball hat.
“I wanted to apologize for my behaviour the other night. It wasn’t a good evening and I fear I took out some of my frustrations on you, both before and after I realized who you were.” Cas didn’t look up.
“Don’t worry about it, Cas. I’d completely forgotten it.”
Cas looked up and cocked an eyebrow. Dean stared back impassively while the meatloaf and the whisky danced a jig in his stomach.
“Still. I apologize for the way I left things between us.”
Dean looked over at the bar, watching Benny and Pamela work. Fifteen-year old guilt crept up his throat and spread across his face as a red flush, but he said nothing.
Cas dropped his eyes back to the table and sighed.
“I hope you don’t mind that I took your booth. It’s the only unoccupied seat that faces a wall.”
“You always face a wall when you go out for a drink?”
“I don’t normally frequent establishments such as this. But yes, when I do go out, I try to face the wall.”
Dean’s eyebrows raised incredulously. He hadn’t forgotten Cas’ “People like you” comment in the taxi, and here he was again, insulting Dean’s bar. To his face!
Cas glanced up, and tilted his head curiously at the look on Dean’s face. “Is something wrong?”
“Is there something wrong with The Mark?” Dean asked in a stilted voice.
Cas’ brow furrowed. “You’re angry with me. Again.”
“Is my bar not good enough for movie stars?”
Cas’ eyes widened. “That’s not what I meant at all, Dean.” He leaned forward earnestly. “I normally don’t visit establishments like this because … I can’t. It causes problems for the venues when other patrons start recognizing me, and puts the staff in the awkward position of trying to run security for me so I can have a beer in peace. I don’t like to inconvenience others, so I don’t often go out. When I do, I try to face the wall.”
Well, shit.
Dean rubbed the back of his neck and took a sip of his spiked coffee. “Makes sense.”
An uncomfortable silence descended. Dean found himself staring at the top of Cas’ baseball hat, noticing how Cas’ hair curled slightly around his ears. If he reached out to touch it, would it feel as soft as it had so many years ago?
“Yeah, uh, what brought you by tonight, then?”
“You did invite me,” Cas reminded him gently. Neither of them mentioned that the invitation had been carelessly extended weeks ago. “I didn’t realize that you worked here.”
Dean seized the opportunity to talk about something, anything, to take his mind off the fact that Castiel Novak, former teenage dork and current Movie Star, was sitting in his bar.
“Been a while now. I manage the place. Worked my way up from dishwasher. We do pretty well, run specials every night and we get a good mix of college kids and couples looking for a night out. The staff is great, I hired most of ‘em myself or I’ve worked with ‘em for years. There’s an apartment upstairs, makes the commute short.”
Cas smiled, a small genuine upturn of the lips, not the big close-mouthed dead-eyed thing that Dean was used to seeing in tabloid photos. It fascinated him, this glimpse behind the façade at a Cas he’d used to know. It certainly wasn’t his fault if he stared a moment too long.
“It sounds like you have a good set up here,” Cas said. He reached for the bottle of Jack and tipped it towards Dean, who shook his head. He poured himself a shot but sipped at it slowly.
“It’s no 16 Parkside Lane, but I get by.”
Cas snorted a little and met Dean’s eyes. “That house is a rental. The need for a tall gate comes with the career.”
Dean shifted, settled against the padded backrest and stretched out his left leg underneath the table. “Yeah, I can see how that’s the case. But good for you, man. Houses everywhere, right? Seattle, L.A., San Francisco, too? Must be good to be one of the gods of Hollywood.”
“I’m nothing, Dean. Just a man who happens to be good at putting on a mask and convincing most people that he could be someone.” A wry look crossed his face and he dropped his gaze.
“This is you and Sam, right?” Cas tapped on the table, drawing Dean’s attention to the “DW” and “SW” etched into the surface. The meatloaf did a somersault in Dean’s stomach as he watched those long fingers gently trace the grooves of his initials.
“Yeah.” Dean cleared his throat and tried again. “Yeah, me and Sammy. He got into Stanford, got his JD, just started working at a local law firm.”
“That’s great, Dean. I bet your parents are proud.”
The involuntary smile that appeared whenever he talked about Sammy folded in on itself. “My parents are dead. It’s just the two of us.”
Cas’ jaw dropped. “Dean, I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. What happened?” He reached across the table and rested his warm hand on top of Dean’s.
Dean wondered if Ash had properly cooked the meatloaf. It didn’t seem to want to settle in his stomach at all. He glanced around. No one else was paying their table the slightest attention, and no one else appeared to be in gastric distress.
“Car crash.”
“I’m sorry,” Cas repeated. Blue eyes drowning in sorrow met his. “I remember meeting them. At camp. They seemed like lovely people. Was it recent?”
Dean shifted, drew his hands back across the table and dropped them in his lap. His left leg spasmed, but he ignored it.
“No, not recently. It was, uh, it was that Fall. After camp.”
Cas’ eyes widened. Dean could see more questions coming as the actor tried to put pieces together. Dean tapped his knuckles on the table in a staccato rhythm, trying to come up with a different topic to broach, but Cas persisted. “Dean, I’m still grieved to hear it. You were so young, you and Sam. I can’t imagine life was easy after that.”
Dean stayed quiet for a moment, eyes on the table. “Happened a long time ago, Cas. Long time ago. I had to grow up and move on without them.”
Silence fell for a moment, but Dean knew what the next question would be, couldn’t think of a way to avoid it.
“Do you still dance, Dean?”
An ironic smile crossed Dean’s lips, and he downed the rest of his mostly-cold spiked coffee with a disgusted face. “No. Turns out that Julliard wasn’t for me.”
Benny came to the rescue, dropping off two glasses of ice water. He nodded once at Castiel, then turned to Dean and picked up the bottle of Jack. Dean nodded and he took it back to the bar with him.
“To this day, you’re one of the best I’ve ever seen, Dean.” Sympathy crowded out the gravel in Cas’ voice.
“Some things aren’t meant to be.” Dean’s eyes were empty as he met Cas’. He slapped his hands on the table and fixed a smile to his face. “I’d love to stay and chat, but this paperwork ain’t gonna do itself.”
“Oh, yes, of course. I understand.” Cas reached for his coat and came out with a worn leather wallet.
“Your money’s no good here. My bar.”
“I…well, if you insist. Maybe I can get it next time?”
“Yeah, sure.” Dean responded as cavalierly as he had in the taxi.
Cas didn’t give up so easily. “Could I give you my number? You could text me when you have a free night? We could go to the theatre or get a meal?”
“Are you allowed to have a cell phone?” Dean couldn’t help himself.
“Yes, Dean. I am allowed to have a cell phone. And friends. And occasionally, a night out with friends. I’m not in jail.” A hint of exasperation coloured his words.
“No need to get snarky, Cas.” Against his better judgment, Dean pulled his cell from his pocket. Unlocking it, he slid it across the table. Maybe before he went to the office, he’d better visit the restroom. He was positive at this point that there was something funny with the meatloaf.
Cas quickly opened up Dean’s Contacts list and inputted his number before sending a quick text to himself. “There. Done.”
Dean piled the cell on top of his paperwork and sat up straight, flannel gaping open as he stretched. “I won’t post your number online, don’t worry.”
A gummy smile crossed Cas’ face. Dean blinked like someone had turned on a neon bar light in front of his eyes.
“I’m not at all worried, Dean, or I wouldn’t have given it to you.” He slid out of the booth as Dean stood up. “I’ll see you around.” Cas tugged his hat down across his face and headed for the door.
Dean watched him go, watched how he weaved unobtrusively through the tables, just another guy leaving the bar, nothing remarkable to see here. Turning back to the table, he picked up his stack of paperwork and headed to the office. He’d had enough ambience for tonight, he’d finish the paperwork at his desk.
He didn’t see Cas turn around for another glimpse of Dean as he reached the front vestibule, nor did he notice Cas’ eyes track him as he limped heavily across the room to the office and shut the door.