This is a mini story I wrote for an A03 Christmas exchange for the user subtextual.

Dean Winchester had never planned to become a cheerleader. It was all a mistake, a coincidence. Or maybe fate, destiny.

It was the fault of his two best friends that he even went to try outs. Charlie and Jo were on the squad, trying to complete their troupe for the new year at school. Dean was meant to be there to start and stop the music as the other kids trying out were put through their paces, when Charlie and Jo instructed him. And then he was meant to stop Jo and Charlie from vetoing everyone who was trying out.

Try outs hadn't gone well. Jo and Jess, another squad member, were meant to be showing the crowd a 'simple' routine, but no one seemed to have a handle on it. Eventually, Jo had signalled for Dean to cut the music again and glared at the assembled students.

"Guys, it's really not hard. A monkey could get this. There's eight steps, the music has a count of eight … have none of you been to dance class before?" She turned on her heel, her cheer skirt fanning out slightly as she turned to face Dean, her eyes alight with a new idea. Dean had a sinking feeling when he looked at her expression. That was never a good look on Jo, the new idea look. "Okay, Dean. Show them the routine."

He cringed. He already knew it. Jess was with his brother, she spent far too many afternoons at his house with Jo and Charlie, perfecting cheers, roping Dean and Sam and even on one occasion Bobby, into helping them, doing the lifts that the cheer boys were involved in. Dean and Sam never spoke of it, and Bobby, their adoptive father, barely acknowledged it as it happened. And now he had to do one of the more basic cheers in front of half the girls - and some of the guys - at school. He pretended to watch Jess as she slowly went through the steps, joining in when he thought he could get away with it. And then he kept pace as she sped up, the music clicking back on, and before he knew it, he was cheering.

And dammit, if it didn't feel good. To move seamlessly to the music, hit the points, to concentrate on making his body do what it was meant to. To yell out the simple cheers with what breath was left from the energetic movements. Dean threw himself into it. And then the music ran out, and Charlie was looking at him with that look. The one that said 'You're not going to like what I'm thinking, Dean, but I'm thinking it.' The one that told him that somehow, without meaning to, without wanting to, he'd made the squad.

Castiel felt good. He was back in position as the tight end on the team, which is where he liked to play best. He and the rest of the team had run drills, crossing the field as one, like a real unit. He loved feeling like there were ten other people within the confines of the football field, all thinking the same way as he did.

He had worked up a sweat, felt the familiar burn in his lungs, and play-fought with his older brother after practice as they headed to the showers. Gabriel always came off the victor in their rough and tumble games, but Castiel never got hurt. Gabriel wasn't that good. He spotted Sam, the new quarterback, peering through the gym doors.

"What's up?" He asked. Sam was a good kid. Ridiculously tall, but coordinated with it. It made him intimidating, especially given how young he was. It didn't seem fair to Castiel that Sam had skipped the awkward, gangly stage entirely, but it was hard to hate the guy. He was so effortlessly happy, even when he was being tackled by half the reserves.

"Cheer practice," Sam grinned, and made room for Castiel to peer through the door as well. "The girl in the uniform with the corkscrew curls? That's my girlfriend, Jess."

Castiel had seen her around. When she had come to the school the year before, the seniors on the team had gone on and on about how they would have a piece of her. Castiel actually felt relieved that she'd settled into a relationship with Sam. Sam, who was currently snorting with laughter that he could barely hold back.

"What?"

"My brother. I think he's trying out."

Castiel looked around the room, past all the tanned legs and short skirts to where Jo Harvelle stood at the front, calling out to the crowd. To the very familiar guy in the front who was easily the best dancer in the room. The guy who Castiel would always recognise from the back of his head. They'd been in enough classes together, Castiel always at the back of the class, Dean somewhere in the middle. In their respective places in the school heirachy. Yeah, Castiel had noticed Dean. But he had never seen Dean quite the way he was now. In his uniform of jeans and a button-down plaid shirt, pumping his arms in the jerky movements of a cheerleader, grinding his hips with a grace that made up for the uniformity of his upper body. You didn't need to see Dean's face to see that he was loving try outs. Even if he was in completely the wrong clothes.

"No, no, I think he's in," Castiel corrected. He straightened up and made his way into the guys locker room, where he announced to the room at large, "Guys, guess what? Winchester's a cheerleader!"