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Dean is five years old when Mary signs him up for his first ballet class. He’s awkward and doesn’t remember most of the steps at the recital, but he’s five and his lack of knowledge is adorable and the audience awes and cheers for him. Dean is five years old when he first realizes he loves the sound of applause and knowing it’s for him.
Now Dean is seven and he’s the best in his class. Dean even gets to be a leader for the smaller children. He’s the best leaper and does the best chasse for their group. Dean loves ballet even though he knows his dad doesn’t think it’s the right thing for him to do since he’s a boy. But it was okay cause his mom just shushed his dad up with a kiss and now Dean is able to keep doing ballet.
Dean is nine when another boy joins the class. He’s weird and awkward and always carries around a tan blanket. Dean thinks he should befriend the weird kid but he doesn’t really talk enough for Dean to actually become his friend. Despite the other kid’s weirdness and attachment to his blanket he’s a fairly good ballet dancer, nearly as good as Dean.
“Hi, I’m Dean,” Dean finally greets the other boy one day. The boy tilts his head and shakes Dean’s outstretched hand.
“Castiel,” he says softly.
Dean wrinkles his nose at the name. “I’m gonna call you Cas,” Dean decides with a nod. Cas just shrugs, and clutches his blanket closer. Dean studies Cas for a moment before nodding again. “We’re gonna be best friends,” Dean tells Cas. Cas only nods. If it wasn’t for him telling his name Dean would have thought he was mute.
Castiel is quiet and weird, but Dean finds himself drawn to the odd boy. At home Dean goes on and on about Cas, about his every trait and how weird he is but how much Dean actually really likes the weird things about Cas.
He’s eleven when Castiel comes over for the first time. Dean’s thrilled to see Cas open up more now that he’s not surrounded by other people. Cas tells Dean he’s really shy and that going on stage actually terrifies him but that he does it for his parents. Dean thinks that’s bullshit but he doesn’t tell Cas that since it’s a bad word and he doesn’t want to get in trouble.
Dean’s twelve when he stops admitting he does ballet after school. The boys at school mock him and call him gay. It hurts. Dean doesn’t think being gay is a bad thing, but they call him a fag and Dean hates it. So he lies. He lies about dates, and what he does with all his free time. It’s not that girls aren’t pretty, he just doesn’t want to date them or touch them. He would much rather hang out with Cas instead.
When Dean turns fourteen he begs him mom to let him try pointe. After days of begging Mary finally says yes and they go to get Dean pointe shoes. Dean doesn’t even care that the shoes are pink and have ribbons that he has to wrap on his legs. When they get home Dean takes his shoes and runs to Cas’ to show him. He knows Cas doesn’t see the point of pointe but he acts excited for Dean to have the shoes. That’s how Dean knows Cas loves him and he loves Cas, cause even though they don’t agree on things they are always excited for each other and Dean figures that has to be love.
After three weeks of pointe Dean is ready to quit. His feet ache, and he has to ice them and his ankles every night, and he still can barely dance on his toes like he’s supposed to. Castiel tells him not to get upset because it can take trained ballerinas years to master the art of pointe. Dean smiles, leans over and kisses Cas without thinking about what it means. Cas blushes and smiles back.
Dean thinks he might be gay. It’s been a week since he kissed Cas and since then they’ve gotten a little more touchier than normal for them. Dean doesn’t mind it though, he quite enjoys cuddling with Cas while watching a movie or doing homework. But he doesn’t know if that makes him gay. He tries looking at other men but it’s boring and he doesn’t get interested in them. Women either. Dean decides he just must like Cas, and proudly declares to Cas one night that he’s Cassexual which sends Cas into a fit of laughter. Dean finds he quite likes when he makes Cas laugh like that.
Another week passes and Dean tells his mom how he loves Cas. Mary only nods and lets Dean know she had known since he was nine. Dean smiles and tell Cas the next day while Castiel rubs at his feet and ankles. Dean decides Cas is a great boyfriend and tells Cas so. In return Castiel kisses him, and smiles the rest of the day.
When Dean turns fifteen he takes up jazz, hip hop and tap. His whole life is dance and Castiel and Dean finds he loves it this way. Castiel doesn’t do dance anymore, having finally stood up to his parents. But he still comes to all of Dean’s practices and works on his writing while Dean dances. A week after he starts the classes he’s invited to do competition dancing. It’s the first time Dean can ever remember being scared about dance.
Castiel kisses him, tells him that he’s a fantastic dancer and deserves the invite. Dean accepts and suddenly he’s spending every day at the studio dancing. In between classes he and Cas do homework. Dean wouldn’t bother since he kind of hates school but Cas keeps pointing out how important it is for the future. Dean thinks he would like to be a dancer professionally and maybe one day open a studio up. Cas likes the idea and kisses Dean nose when Dean tells him they can move to California one day and get married.
Dean is seventeen when he does a solo at a competition of all the dances he knows. It’s the most complicated dance he’s ever done, involving several costume and shoe changes but he pulls it off and wins platinum. Someone records it and puts it on youtube. The next week he gets a call from Juilliard, they want him for their school and are willing to give him a full ride. He’s so shocked that he’s not sure what to do and that’s how Cas finds him an hour later, still clutching on to the house phone. When Cas finally pries the news out of him they celebrate together with a fancy dinner and sparkling cider. Dean thinks he’s never been more in love with Cas than he is in this moment.
School finishes and before they know it Dean and Cas are moving to a one bedroom apartment in New York together. It’s hard at first, they only see each other at night, their schedules too conflicting and both of them too worried about school to figure out a way to see more of each other. After the first month things slow down some, and they work out a schedule for the two of them that works. They’re mostly poor, and living paycheck to paycheck, but they love it more than anything because it’s theirs.
It’s their sophomore year when Dean and Cas get in the biggest fight in their relationship. Cas goes to stay with a mutual friend for an entire week. In the end Dean stops being stubborn and apologizes to Cas for staying out all night and making Cas think he was dead. Dean goes out the next day after Cas moves back in and buys an engagement ring.
In their junior year Castiel goes out and buy Dean an engagement ring. Dean still hasn’t proposed but keeps the ring in his jacket in case the perfect moment pops up. In school Dean has found he loves musical theater. He’s better at singing than he ever thought he would be, and he’s surprisingly good at acting. He always dreamed of being a dancer but now Dean dreams of being on broadway. Castiel learns he loves languages and changes majors to become a professor in languages.
Dean can’t believe when it hits their last year of college. Dean has been in several off-broadway plays, and Castiel has spoken at many language seminars. Cas learns he also loves translating old texts to English, and has an interview with a company that focuses on translating. He gets the job. Dean and Cas celebrate at a fancy restaurant. This is where Dean finally gets the courage to ask Cas to marry him. Of course Castiel says yes, pulling out the ring he had been carrying around himself, presenting it to Dean. The two laugh over the fact they had both been so nervous to do something they both clearly wanted.
They get married in the spring the year Dean turns twenty-five. Mary cries as her and John walk Dean down the aisle where Castiel waits. Dean won’t admit it, but he cries as Cas reads his vows, hands clutched in Dean’s. John won’t admit it but he cries when Dean and Cas kiss and are officially announced as husband and husband.
Dean and Cas are both thirty when they adopt twins, a boy and a girl. They name them Sam and Mary. They become Dean and Cas’ entire world and they both take a month away from working to watch after their two bundles of joy.
Dean is thirty-five when he becomes a dance instructor. He had loved the broadway life, but with his two babies, he had soon tired from being away from them all the time. Castiel writes a bestseller and decides to stop working at the current company he works for. Instead he starts to teach seminars
At forty Dean opens up his own dance studio, occasionally Castiel teaches a class just for fun. The dance studio is very successful and Dean has no problems hiring instructors, or with filling up the classes. They even have a waitlist for certain classes. The nights Dean isn’t teaching, him and Cas go for a drive in the impala until they can see the stars, and have a picnic.
Dean and Cas both sob when Sam and Mary graduate high school. The summer passes too fast for both their liking and before they know it,Sam is off at Stanford and Mary is off at Juilliard. The house is quiet now, but Dean and Cas quickly find they enjoy it.
In Sam’s junior year of college he proposes and gets married to his girlfriend. Castiel and Dean cry, although both deny this. The next year Mary gets married as well. Dean has long been retired from being an instructor at his studio. Instead he mostly does the business work that comes with owning a business and spending time with Castiel.
Dean and Castiel have lived a fulfilling life together, filled with love, happiness and laughter. Sometimes Dean thinks back to when he first met Cas, that strange little boy with a tan blanket and thinks about how far they’ve come together. He tells Cas how glad he is that he went and talked to Cas that one day in class. Cas calls him a dork and kisses him softly. At ninety-two the two of them die in their sleep holding each other. It’s sad for Mary and Sam, but they both know this is the way they would have wanted to die, with each other so they never had to be apart.