The coolest shoes ever
Cas left the coffee shop smiling, it was a beautiful morning and his coffee tasted wonderfully. He made two blocks before realizing he forgot about the dog. Fuck!
He hastily retraced his steps to the coffee place to see the dog was still there, leash tied in front of the door, the only difference was the kid squatting next to it, scratching his belly and giggling whenever Lucky whined or squirmed under him.
It was surprising since Lucky wasn't particularly amicable with people, or not with him at least. Sometimes he thought Gabriel only asked him to walk it because he knew of their mutual dislike, though he wasn't sure who he was punishing, him or the dog…
Yeah, yeah, Cas' brother was an assbutt but that's not important, we were talking about the dog and the kid. The kid was tiny, perhaps not older than three, and when Castiel said 'Hello!' the kid looked up at him and smiled.
"Hello! I'm Sam"
Castiel smiled and said "Well Sam, nice to meet you. That's Lucky, and I have to take him away now. Where's your mom?"
"My mama is in heaven sleeping with the angels" Sam said without looking at him, he was busy scratching the dog's belly. Cas bit his lower lip, took the foot out of his mouth and tried again. "Good to know your mama is in heaven, what about your daddy?"
Little Sam pursed his lips a little but kept petting the dog while speaking. "My daddy is in grown-up time out in an island, like a pirate, but he doesn't have a parrot or a boat. If I had a boat I could be a proper pirate, do you have a boat I can borrow?" He looked up at him scrunching his eyebrows a bit.
"N-no Sam, I'm afraid I don't have a boat…"
The kid seemed unfazed though the topics were serious, dead mom and Dad in grown-up time out? He wasn't unfamiliar with it, he made a living out of putting grown-ups in time out. This was turning in a way too unexpected direction. "Who do you live with Sam?"
Sam giggled when the dog wiggled its tail, but still looked up to answer. "I live with my brother Dean"
There was no one around the boy and Cas wasn't leaving a kid unattended in the middle of the sidewalk, he had to make sure there was an adult looking for him. "Sam, where's Dean?"
"He's there" Sam lifted the hand he was using to scratch behind Lucky's ears and pointed at a grocery store two shops down the block. "We ran out of peanut butter and bread and he said he's gonna make my favorite sandwich ever for lunch, peanut butter and banana! What's your favorite sandwich?"
Castiel was disheveled by his interactions with the kid, they had gone through very difficult subjects but Sam just kept on chatting. The boy was cute and lively, and very well spoken so Cas thought perhaps he was older, five or six. Anyway, he was looking intently at him, waiting for his answer. "My favorite is peanut butter and strawberry jam, but I'll try the banana one"
"Oh yes! You've got to try it! It's awesome!" Sam's eyes shone for a moment and then his attention was stolen by Lucky's insistent whining so Sam got back to petting him.
Cas had to smile at that, it was a small miracle that dog was being so nice. He paid another look at Sam, he was clean but he was small and scrawny, and thin, really thin. His clothes had seen better days and everything about him screamed 'poverty', not exactly homelessness but definitely poverty.
Something caught his attention, the boy's sneakers had duct tape all over them, possibly to keep them from falling apart since they looked way older than the kid himself and just this side of 'negligent care of a minor', so he had to ask, he didn't made it to detective in his fourth year in the force out of luck , he had to know more now. "Sam, those are some shoes you've got"
Sam let go of the dog, looked at them and his grin got impossibly wider "Dean fixed them and now they are the coolest shoes ever!"
"Oh, Dean fixed those?" Cas lifted a brow but schooled his expression, he had to if he wanted to hear more, which wasn't hard, Sam was more than pleased to talk about his shoes. The boy said in his proudest voice "Yes, the tooth fairy helped him"
"What now?" Cas squinted his eyes and tilted his head bot puzzled and amused.
"See?" Sam opened his mouth and showed him a missing tooth "My tooth fell out and the tooth fairy left money under my pillow but Dean said I could spend it like in candy or whatever, or we could buy tape and make them the most coolest shoes ever"
Cas had to grin at that, he couldn't believe the kid was so innocent he had fallen for that one, that Dean character sounded colorful by the moment. "Okay, I can see they are the coolest shoes ever. What do you say we find Dean and see if he can make my shoes look awesome too?" Cas untied Lucky's leash, took it with his left hand and offered Sam his right one.
Sam nodded and extended his arm towards him but when Cas was about to hold his hand the boy's expression abruptly changed, he frowned his brow and took his hand back. "You're a stranger and I can't go with you because Dean said I'm not allowed to go with strangers or talk with strangers unless they are policeman and you don't have a blue hat"
Cas bit back the chuckle menacing to leave his mouth, Sam apparently had his 'serious face' on and it was disrespectful to laugh at him. The kid was right and it made him like Dean more and more. Cas was off duty but he was carrying his gun and badge like any other day. "Well, lucky me I am a policeman, can I show you mi badge?"
Cas took his ID wallet out and showed his badge. Sam's face morphed instantly from defensive to utter awe, his eyes went wide and he asked in a whisper "Can I touch it?"
"Yes of course" Cas handed the wallet and the kid took it and looked at it reverently, tracing the engravings with his little fingers.
"This is awesome, I can't wait to tell Dean all about it!"
"Yeah, you and me both. We should go find him, right? So you can show it to him yourself" That was it, Sam had his easy smile on again so after he got his wallet back Cas extended his hand and this time he took it right away. "Okay"
They made no more than three steps towards the store when a very young man walked out the door and frantically paced back and forth, turning his head around. Yeah, that had to be Dean for sure. The young man spotted them and ran to meet them, going to his knees in front of Sam and taking the boy in his arms in a too tight embrace.
"Sammy! Where were you? Are you alright?" The man pulled himself out of the hug and examined the kid, patting his arms and softly tracing his face with his fingers to see for himself if the kid was unharmed. It tickled Sam and he squirmed out of the touch and giggled, and that tranquilized Dean enough to look around and notice Sam wasn't alone. Dean looked up and met Cas' eyes and for a moment the detective held his breath because that young man, that boy was A) stunningly beautiful, and B) too young to be anyone's guardian.
"Sam was keeping my dog company so we thought about looking for you, I had a special interest to know who fixed Sammy's shoes. You're Dean, right?"
"I um…" Dean said while standing up in a display of eloquence that got Cas' eyebrow up questioningly, but then he quickly nodded and, honest to God, blushed a bit at the mention of the shoes. He had freckles on his lovely face and –nope, that was it, Cas wasn't getting any further with the facial recognition he was making, damn that guy was, in lack of a better word, pretty, just pretty. Sammy, on the other hand looked at his feet and smiled proudly, everyone was talking about his shoes, they were really the coolest.
Cas regained some of his wit and continued talking, pretty or not he had to see for himself if the guy was a reliable guardian for little Sammy. "Nice to meet you, I'm detective Milton and..."
"I'm eighteen" the older boy abruptly said and Cas pursed his lips for a moment at the interruption and due to the fact that he had a hard time believing him. He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Tell you what, we go to the park nearby and talk for a bit while Sam and Lucky play around" It wasn't a question and Dean's slumped shoulders when he agreed to it were confirmation of that.
Sam was beaming though, his day was awesome already, his shoes got complimented, Dean said he could play with Lucky for a while and after that he was having his favorite sandwich for lunch. It was better than his birthday! Dean held his hand and the four of them started to walk towards the park.
With every step they made Cas knew there was going the rest of his day off, but it was alright, he wanted to hear more about the pair, especially about the maker of the coolest shoes ever.
4
