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Every day at the playground in kindergarten, when Dean and Sammy were playing in the sandbox drawing the strangest things, or running around pretending to hunt terrible monsters in order to protect their family, the brothers noticed another boy sitting in the grass.
He was tiny and thin and pale, and he refused to play with anyone. He’d just sit there and watch the other children play. Sometimes he looked a bit sad when he saw the other kids laughing, but most of the time he was just sitting there under a tree, slowly running his little fingers through the grass, looking satisfied.
Sometimes Dean noticed how the boy was watching them on their hunt, and when they pretended to kill yet another demon he winced a tiny bit, grabbing the grass he was just stroking so gently. Then he looked back at the green again, started muttering to himself and continued to stroke the blades of grass.
“Come with me, Sammy! I think I’ve found a ghost!” Dean said one day to his little brother, then he ran towards the unknown boy, looking at him with a stern look on his face.
He stopped in front of the boy abruptly, Sammy bumping into his back.
“Hey, you!” Dean said to the dark-haired boy, “Are you a ghost?”
The boy addressed looked up shortly, and Dean noticed his eyes, blue as the sky.
“No, he’s not a ghost, Sammy,” Dean stated. “He seems alive. No ghost has such eyes! Look!”
Dean bent down, Sammy following him, even though he was so small that he would have been able to look into the boy’s eyes standing straight.
“You’re right, Dean!” Sammy replied.
“Get the salt, Sammy! We will find out what he is!” Dean commanded, and waited for his little brother to come back with a handful of sand, pretending it to be salt.
“Here, Dean!” Sammy gave his brother the sand, even though most of it had already run through his tiny fingers and fallen on the ground.
“Well done…” Dean replied, satisfied with his little brothers skills. After all Dean was the best hunter teacher in the whole kindergarten!
“This is salt,” he explained to the strange kid. “If you’re good, nothing will happen to you! But if you’re a bad guy,” Sammy gasped, “you will turn into bubbles and fly into the air, and then you’re going to heaven!”
“Ooh!” Sammy said, as he took a step back, admiring Dean’s awesome speech.
“Don’t be scared, Sammy, I got this!” Dean assured his brother, before he turned quiet and slowly let what was left of the sand pour over the boy’s hand, while the blue-eyed suspect just silently watched.
“Dean! Nothing is happening! What does that mean?” Sammy asked while he jumped closer to the two boys again.
“Oh, I know!” he continued. “If you’re not a bad guy, then you must be an angel, right? Dean, he’s an angel! That’s so cool!”
Sammy suddenly got all excited and took the boys hand that had just been sprinkled with fake-salt.
“I’m Sammy, but you can call me Sam!” he said and shook his hand violently. “And this is my cool brother Dean. What’s your name?”
The other boy looked at Sammy first, then at Dean, and while his eyes rested on the older brother’s face, he said “Angel…”
“Yes, we know now that you’re an angel, but we want to know your name!” Dean said, grabbed the “angel“‘s other hand and together with his brother pulled the boy up on his feet. He was fairly smaller than Dean, but still had to look up a bit.
“Castiel…” he said, still staring into Dean’s eyes. “Dean…”
“You’re weird,” Dean stated, then made a thinking face for a moment. “I like you!” he blurted out, then the brothers dragged him to the sandbox.
“You are a good guy, so you have to help us kill monsters. And we will teach you here, because this place is full of salt and so we’re safe here,” Dean explained.
Castiel let himself drop to the ground as Dean and Sam moved around in the box and explained to him everything they knew. When they were done they wanted to hunt another monster that was seemingly near the tree Castiel had been sitting under before.
“There it is, Dean!” Sammy said, before Dean turned into the direction his little brother was pointed at and swung his plastic shovel like Thor did with his mighty hammer.
“You got him, Dean! You’re so cool!” Sammy applauded cheerily, while Dean grinned his victorious grin. Castiel instead had that sad puppy look on his face, and when Dean asked him what was wrong, Castiel replied, “Heaven.”
Then he went back to the sandbox, grabbed some of the “salt” and when he came back he sprinkled it over the spot where Dean had just fought his most glorious battle.
“Oh yes! Sending them to heaven is a nice idea! Right, Dean?” Sammy blurted out and clapped Castiel on the shoulder approvingly.
“Watch out, Cas, your angel is showing!” Dean said and laughed as Castiel turned around and started looking for something.
“What are you doing, Cas? Are you looking for something?” Dean asked and looked around as well, trying to figure out what Cas was looking for.
“My angel…” Castiel said while he continued his search.
The brothers bursted into laughter at the fact that Castiel did not understand the phrase’s actual meaning. When Cas saw Dean laugh, he smiled as well, even though he didn’t know what was so funny about that.
They continued their hunting trip, and during nap time Dean made sure that neither Sammy or Cas got hurt, holding their hands in their sleep. As they slowly woke up again from the noises the other children were making, Dean was awake really fast and wanted to scare his brother and his new friend, so he threw his black blanket over himself, spread his arms and yelled, “I’m Batman!”
Sammy was in shock for a moment, but then he laughed, while Cas was simply confused and said: “But you’re Dean.”
Once again the brothers started laughing and the three children happily continued their fight against evil outside, fighting terrifying monsters, and sending their pour souls to heaven. They were having a lot of fun, and Castiel also laughed once when a little girl named Ruby wanted to feed Sammy her french fries and Sammy tried to escape. Dean had told him that he would try to safe him, but his little brother had to learn how to fight girls by himself. They were not as evil as monsters, but surely as shifty as demons. Castiel actually didn’t know what Dean was talking about, but he nodded approvingly.
After Ruby got tired of trying to feed little Sammy, she got angry and punched him, but another girl with blond, curly hair saw it and hugged “poor, little Sammy” in a motherly routine, even though she was just like Sammy only 3 years old.
With Sammy being busy, Dean decided to take a break from hunting and spend some quality time with Cas, who was supposed to sit on a swing while Dean was pushing him.
“You don’t talk much, do you?” Dean said after a while.
Cas hesitated a moment, then shook his head. “The other children don’t… like me. They say I’m weird.”
“They are stupid!” Dean said and stopped the swing. He positioned himself in front of Castiel, staring into his eyes, and continued, “See, I like you, and Sammy likes you, too! You are nice! And you’re an angel! That’s cool!”
“You think… I’m nice?” Castiel asked, his bright blue eyes wide open.
“Boy, you should be happier about me calling you “cool” than “nice”! But yes, I… think you’re nice!” Dean said.
Castiel smiled again, but it was a wider smile than Dean had ever seen it on his face.
“I like you, too!” The little angel said, jumped off the swing and landed on his feet, his face close to Dean’s. Then Castiel full-on kissed Dean on the lips.
The little hunter jumped back in surprise, and started blurting out, “What are you doing?!”
“But I…” The happy expression on Castiel’s face changed to an expression of insecurity. “That’s… what people do when they… like each other. That’s what my dad said.”
“What? NO! Boys don’t do that, that’s weird!” Dean’s face turned bright red, out of anger, he assumed. He wanted to continue being angry, but Castiel just turned around and left. He watched the boy slowly walking towards the big tree again, under which he sat down and started caressing the grass again while he was mumbling to himself.
“Dean! Dean! What happened?” Sammy shouted as he came running from where he had just been playing with Jessica.
“N…nothing…,” Dean replied, but threw a look at Castiel again. Unlike before, he didn’t watch the other children play, but just looked at the grass.
“Then why did you start shouting? Go to him and apologize!” Sammy commanded, and crossed his tiny arms in front of his torso, a seemingly angry expression on his face. “I will not play with you until you do!”
“Wha… Sammy!”
“No! Apologize!”
“FINE!” Dean gave in and muttered a silent “Screw you” under his breath. He turned around and walked towards Castiel and his big tree.
“Sorry,” he said as he had reached him, but Castiel didn’t react to his apology.
“I’m sorry?” Dean tried again, but got nothing in return.
“I’m apologizing, you prick! … Oh, no! Don’t tell anyone I said that, I didn’t mean it! My dad would be so mad at me!”
Since Castiel still did not react, Dean wanted to give up and turned around, but then he noticed that the little angel was actually weeping silently.
“Cas! Why are you crying?” Dean shouted, not knowing what to do now. When Cas did once again not answer, he turned around for help and saw Sammy gesturing that Dean should just hug him. Dean knew that this had always helped with Sammy.
So he kneeled down, closed in on Cas and hesitantly laid his arms around the shaking little boy.
“Go away, I’m weird!” Castiel cried, trying to free himself from the embrace, but Dean held on tight.
“I already told you, I didn’t mean it!” Dean said angrily. “We’re friends, right? And you’re an angel! And you see, angels are different from normal people, and they do different things, and I guess that’s okay… I guess. Okay?”
While Dean was talking, Castiel’s resistance shrank and soon stopped completely. “Okay…,” he replied.
“Okay!” Dean said and wanted to let go again, so he stood up, but the two tiny arms shot forward and grabbed Dean’s shirt. While Dean was interrupted in his movement, he lost control over his own body and fell right onto his friend. Cas fell on his back and so they both lay on the ground and while Dean started laughing, Castiel started giggling as well.
After some time Castiel said, “You and Sam are my best friends. I like you both. But I like you more.”
“O-okay… I guess I’m okay with that,” Dean replied. “Just promise me not to kiss Sammy, too, okay?” He grinned.
“I promise, Dean,” Cas said, smiling, as they both got on their feet again.
“Castiel, dear!”
As they turned around, their teacher approached to them and said, “Your daddy just came to pick you up!”
Castiel patted the dirt off his clothes and ran towards the gate where his father was waiting.
“Daddy!” he said and he ran into his father’s arms and laughed.
“Hey, little lamb!” his father replied as he lifted his son off the ground before he put him down again. “How was your day?” The teacher noticed how worried he was, since Castiel had not had any friends up to this day and didn’t like kindergarten at all.
“I have friends now, daddy!” Castiel said cheerily as he pointed back at Dean and his brother, who had been walking towards them slowly to say good-bye to their new friend before he went home.
“That… that is good! That is very good!” Castiel’s dad suppressed a happy tear as he looked at the two boys who managed the impossible.
“So, you’re Castiel’s daddy? Then you must be God! This is so cool, Dean!” Sammy concluded and tugged at Dean’s shirt continuously.
“Erm, no… I’m not God,” Castiel’s father said and laughed, actually really confused. “You can call me Chuck. And now we gotta go, little lamb. Tell your friends good-bye, you will meet them again tomorrow.”
“Okay…” Castiel said, the smile fading from his face. “Bye…”
“See you tomorrow, angel!” Dean said, grinning.
“And you gotta sleep a lot! Mom says if you don’t sleep enough, then you’re a bad hunter!” Sammy said, holding Dean’s hand.
Chuck took Castiel by the hand as well, while his son replied a loud okay, and together with his dad the little angel went to their car.
“Daddy, Dean said he liked me, and so I kissed him on the lips. You said that’s what people do when they like each other, right?”