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Dean is leaning on the Impala, taking a breather before going to join Cas in the motel room, when his cell rings.
“Sam, what’s up?”
“Dean, check this out, Lu found-“
“Sam! I want to tell him!” Dean could hear Lu grab the phone from Sam, “Da… Dean, so Sam gave me this book to look through for the case you and Cas are on…” Dean had heard the catch in her voice. Lu’s been with Sam, Cas, and him for a while now. She was fast to refer to Sam as her uncle, but Cas and him have been letting her figure out what she wants to call them. She’s said “dad” a handful of times, mostly on the phone, which Sam said is from how much she worries about and misses them when they’re on the road.
“Dean! You there?” Lu’s voice snaps him out of his thoughts, but he’s filed away what she said, anyway.
“Yeah. Good work. Look, how’s Tony?” he asks her.
“Whiny. One year olds are awful.” she responds. He chuckles.
“Lu!” Dean hears Sam in the background. “Did you get nail polish on this? This book is 300 years old!”
“Sorry, Dean, gotta go. Tell Cas I miss him,” Lu whispers conspiratorially into the phone. He hears a muffled “Sorry, Uncle Sam,” as the phone undoubtedly shuffles hands.
An image of Lu leaning back in a chair, cradling the phone between her head and neck, her feet freshly painted and propped on a pile of ancient texts on the long tables of the batcave keeps Dean laughing as he walks into the motel room. Cas looks up from the bed as Dean retells the conversation. He leaves out Lu almost calling him, “Dad.” It’s something that has been coming up a lot, lately. It first came up when they enrolled Lu in school briefly (that was a major disaster), and they still weren’t near figuring it all out- the 5 of them and how their unit “worked.”
“Maybe we’ll be home by the weekend, then,” Cas says as Dean bends down to kiss his forehead. Quieter, he murmurs, “Should Lu be going through those books?”
“Lu was hunter’s kid. She’s seen firsthand most of what she was reading,” There’s a note of doubt in Dean’s voice as his thoughts turned to Tony. He was still young, but Dean wondered when the questions would start. It had taken Sammy a few years to catch on, but Dean wasn’t John and there was no Bobby to drop the kids off with on more dangerous cases. Plus, with all the Men of Letters books and artifacts around… Cas stares into his eyes as he thinks, drawing Dean out from his thoughts.
“If we’ll be home in a few days, might as well not waste a night without the brats, then.” Dean says as he moves to Cas’ mouth.