Hello!

As promised, the first in a short series of little companion fics to "Alterations," all set in the same verse. It won't exactly make too much sense if you don't read that first- you'll have no idea about the various characters and their personalities and stuff- but I guess... nah, I just suggest you go read that.

Anyway, please enjoy the first in a series of few. Review if you liked, review if you didn't!

And then, in the warm almost-silence made of soft breaths and the whirring of cars on the street below and the hum of a radio playing classical music in the next apartment over and the quiet brush of skin against fabric or vice versa, Castiel's voice grated out, "Halloween," as though it were a completely foreign concept to him, which it may well have been.

Dean blinked, not breaking his rhythm of running his thumb along the area of Castiel's back he could reach while keeping his hand in place. "What about it?" he asked, voice muted out of respect for the sacred nighttime silence and the other people that lived in Castiel's thin-walled apartment complex.

"How would one celebrate it?"

Dean let his eyes slip closed, mouth spreading into a smile. "I'm guessing you haven't had a lot of interactions with it."

"This is only my first year of freedom, Dean," Castiel reminded him. "My brother only moved out of here two months ago—on my twenty-third birthday. And growing up, my entire family was extremely religious and saw it all as... devil worship."

"I know, I know," Dean sighed. He frowned minutely, asking, "Wait, hang on—you're twenty-three?"

"Yes." Castiel's voice was bemused.

"Oh."

"Is that a problem?" When Dean didn't answer, Castiel shifted against his side so he could look up to meet Dean's eyes. "Dean," Castiel urged, "how old are you? We probably should have established this earlier. Are you 50 or something? Though I've seen you up close, and I don't think it's possible to age that well—"

"I'm 32," Dean responded, faintly disgruntled. "You're so young, Cas, God."

"That's not that old," Castiel said, and Dean could see the reassuring light in his eyes. "And I'm not that young. So there's a bit of an age difference—so what?"

"So nothing," Dean smiled, moving his hand up along Castiel's back, past his shoulder-blades, and up into his hair. "I'm just going to feel old around you now. Since you're practically jailbait."

"You'll look good with greying hair," Castiel murmured, pressing himself in closer to Dean's side and tightening his arm around Dean's waist.

"Thanks for that," Dean said, rolling his eyes. "Anyway. Now that we've got that all talked out. What's this about Halloween?"

"Well," Castiel began slowly, overly serious, as always, "I'd like to celebrate. And you seem like a nicely generic American, so I thought I'd ask, because you probably know how."

Dean grinned up at the ceiling. "Yeah, Cas, I know about Halloween. People dress up in various costumes, y'know, and carve pumpkins, and sometimes they decorate their houses, and kids go trick-or-treating and stuff. And you're supposed to stuff yourself with candy and watch spooky movies."

"I don't understand the appeal," Castiel grumbled.

"Boo hoo," Dean said. "It's a fun, commercial holiday."

"How is it a holiday if you don't get off work?" Castiel asked astutely.

"We have a Halloween party," Dean protested. "There's a costume contest and stuff. It's great."

"Have you ever won?"

Dean snorted. "No. Most I've ever gone as was, like, Marty McFly one year."

"That's—nice," Castiel said shortly, and Dean could tell by his tone that he didn't understand the reference.

"Hey," Dean said suddenly, snapping alert. "Would you—would you wanna go with me? As my date?"

Without hesitation, Castiel replied, "Could we have matching costumes? That I make?"

"We can have anything you want," Dean assured. "And after, we could go back here or to my place and watch spooky movie and hand out candy to trick-or-treaters."

"I'd love to," Castiel said softly, snuggling in closer and tangling his legs with Dean's under the multiple layers of blankets. "All of it. I'd love it."

"And we can try to carve pumpkins and end up getting extremely injured."

"I could try to bake a pumpkin pie," Castiel mused.

"Oh, hell, yeah," Dean replied instantly, grinning. "See? It's not a hard concept as far as holidays go."

"What should we go as? Costume-wise, I mean."

Dean shrugged. "I don't know. You're the... seamster here."

"Seamster?" Castiel repeated, mouth twisting up a little.

"I didn't know the proper male form of 'seamstress'," Dean grumbled.

"Seamster works," Castiel said, a fond expression on his face. "And if you think I know anything about Halloween costumes, you're very wrong."

Dean sighed. "Look, I don't know. Superheroes."

"I don't know any."

"You don't—" Dean gave up. "Okay. Um, mummies."

"Take too long to make."

"I, um. I kinda like the idea of cowboys," Dean finally suggested. "I don't know."

"Cowboys," Castiel repeated, a pensive expression on his face. "We could do that."

"Cool," Dean said with a nod, feeling a flush beginning to slide up his neck.

"So when you say you... like cowboys," Castiel began, tone full of faux-innocence. "Does that mean—you like cowboys?"

"Shut up," Dean mumbled. "Yes, okay? Yes. I like cowboys. Whatever. Quit judging me—I can feel you judging me."

Castiel hummed in contemplation. "That explains why your face gets all red whenever I try to do a proper American accent."

Dean choked. "Does not!" he protested hotly. "That's—it's—no, that's just because that's not an American accent at all; it's ridiculously Southern, and I'm just offended for my—"

"Shhh," Castiel soothed. "It's alright, Dean. We all have our kinks."

And before Dean could ask Castiel to kindly elaborate on what his kinks were, Castiel had continued on to shrug and say, "Furthermore, you know the saying."

Dean frowned. "I know tons of sayings. Which one?"

Castiel tilted his head so blue eyes met green and one of his eyebrows rose. "Save a horse," he began, sitting up and swinging one leg over Dean so he was straddling him, one hand on each pectoral, "ride a cowboy."

Dean's eyes went wide, and his mind reeled for words as heat began to curl comfortably through his body. "Cas," he said hoarsely after a pause, "we have got to teach you how to smile more."

Castiel's eyes narrowed mischievously. "Oh, shut up," he drawled, vowels becoming soft and Southern, swooping down to cover Dean's eager mouth with his own.

And thus, the sacred nighttime silence was broken over the next hour or so, with Dean panting, "What are we, twelve-year-old girls? Come on, let's feel some skin, dammit—" and Castiel testing just how nonexistent the limits of Dean's cowboy fetish were ("The limit does not exist!" Dean announced proudly afterward, but Castiel stared at him so blankly that Dean decided right then and there to give up forever on making Mean Girls references) and Dean doing a bit of research himself on what made Castiel's blood boil a little hotter.

Just to stay on the safe side, they went to the Halloween party as superheroes.