December 2nd: Castiel, Dean, Bobby, Jimmy

Castiel.

"Hey, Cas." Sam glanced up from the plates of pancakes that he was serving up. "How d'you sleep?"

Cas slumped down at the breakfast table, dragging a hand across his eyes and letting out a groan. "Awful."

Once the general festivities and the Welcome Back To Lawrence dinner of the previous evening were over, inevitably the subject of room allocations came up in the conversation - in a house with four bedrooms that had to hold eight people for the next few weeks, it was bound to become an issue at some point. Mary and John had their room, Sam and Gabriel had theirs, Jimmy and Amelia had been given the spare room, which of course meant that the only room that had any space left for Cas was -

Dean's room. Great. Just when he thought that this Christmas vacation couldn't get any more awkward.

Amelia had offered to let him sleep in the spare room with her and Jimmy, insisting that they didn't mind, really, and Cas had almost agreed until he saw his twin brother's face that told him that he would mind, thank you very much. Which was how Cas ended up curled up under a blanket on the hard wooden floor of Dean's bedroom, pretending to be asleep when he heard the elder Winchester come in, cursing expressively under his breath before he got into his own bed and rolled over so that he had his back to him. Which was absolutely fine with Castiel, who wanted to avoid Dean as much as possible. Luckily, Dean had disappeared earlier that morning, up and out of the room without Cas even stirring from his light doze.

Sam gave him a sympathetic expression, sliding his breakfast across the table. "Sorry, man. I mean, I didn't think -"

"It's fine." Cas waved his apologies away. He couldn't think about the mess that his relationship with Dean had become, not right now, this early in the morning. Instead, he speared a chunk of pancake and popped it into his mouth, glancing around the kitchen as he did so.

"You kept it," he marvelled suddenly, eyes falling on a childhood crayon drawing still stuck on the side of the refrigerator, one that he himself had drawn one sunny afternoon during Kindergarten.

"Kept what?" Sam followed his gaze and then smiled when he saw the picture too. "Well, yeah, of course we did. You and Jimmy are part of our family, aren't you?"

"Are we?"

Sam looked baffled. "Yeah. Yeah, of course you are, Cas. You always have been. Didn't you know that?"

He shuffled. "I just thought - What with everything that happened with Dean -"

The younger Winchester let out a sigh, and shook his head. "Ignore Dean. Whatever he's got goin' on is his own problem. I know that he's my brother and I'm supposed to be on his side in all this, but I still don't get what exactly made him react, y'know, like that. I mean, college is...well, college, right?"

Cas nodded his agreement as he took another bite of breakfast. He'd been thrilled when both his and Jimmy's acceptance letters to their chosen college in Pontiac had arrived in the mail, so much so that the two of them had danced around the kitchen, shrieking and hugging as they did so, sounding like a pair of giggling five year olds, and he'd been so certain that Dean would have been just as excited for him as he was. Weren't people who were dating supposed to be happy for their significant other when something good happened to them?

Well, clearly not Dean, apparently. His face had fallen the moment that Cas had told him; it wasn't long before they had been yelling at each other and Cas was out of the front door and halfway down the street before the tears had started and Jimmy had caught up with him. That had been the last time that he had either seen or spoken to Dean, not even going to say goodbye when he left, for seven years - and now, here he was. Back in the house that had been his childhood home just as much as his parents' house had been.

"I don't know," he said now, in reply to Sam. "I guess he just didn't like the idea of me leaving town."

"Understatement," Sam snorted, a phrase that he had picked up from Jimmy years ago. "Gabriel!" He was calling towards the stairs now. "I made breakfast, and I'm not makin' you any more if it goes cold!"

"I thought you were supposed to be the loving fiancée, Samwich!" Gabriel yelled back. "I see I was wrong in that regard!"

Sam let out a mock gasp to match his faux wounded expression. Cas merely rolled his eyes.

Dean.

"So, what's the reason that we're drinkin' ourselves into the ground this time?"

Dean flashed Jo a half smile. "What makes you think there's a reason? Maybe I just really fancied a beer this mornin'?"

"Yeah, right. Even you, Winchester, don't drink until after noon." Jo leaned over the counter to clap him on the back of the head. "C'mon, Dean, what's bitin' your ass? Talk to me."

Dean paused, taking a swig of his beer, clearing his throat as he did so. "Do you remember a guy called Castiel Novak, by any chance?"

"Novak...Novak..." The blonde's brow furrowed as she thought. "Uh, vaguely, I think. He was the little nerdy guy with dark hair and the beautiful blue eyes, right? The one that you used to go out with and all the girls were super jealous of you because of it?"

"That's the one."

"Yeah, yeah, he was the one with the twin who never stopped eatin'. I remember now. What 'bout him? You ain't mentioned him in years."

"Well, y'know Sammy's gettin' hitched, right? He invited those two chuckleheads to stay at ours over Christmas and Cas is now sleepin' on my floor -"

"And, let me guess, you'd rather he was sleepin' in your bed, right?"

"Jo!" Dean aimed a shove in her direction. "No!"

"Well, what's this all about, then? I mean, I get that he left town and that, but you've been pissed at him for years. Why?"

"You'd be pissed too if the guy you lo - you were goin' out with suddenly turned up on the doorstep and was all "Hey, babe. Sorry, can't stop, I'm leavin' town next week and forgot to mention this to you earlier. No big deal, right?"."

Jo clucked her tongue as she thought. "I guess so. But, hey, at least he'll only be here for a couple o'weeks, right? Once the holiday's over, he'll be gone."

Dean hummed in agreement and took another drink from his beer. The sooner that Castiel Novak went running back to Illinois, the freaking better. Just the sight of him again made him feel all funny inside - something that he needed to put a stop to as soon as possible.

"You done your shoppin' yet?"

"Huh?"

"Christmas shoppin', Dean. You done it yet?"

Dean snorted. "What do you think? You know I don't do all that festive crap nowadays." Christmas had never particularly been his favourite holiday, hadn't been for a long time, not since he was a teenager. The last Christmas that he could truly remember being merry was roughly ten years ago, when the entire Winchester household had gone out for dinner with -

He quickly banished that thought from his mind. How the freaking hell did Cas Novak came up in everything he thought about? The quicker he left, the quicker things would return to normal, and the happier Dean would be for it.

"You're thinkin' 'bout Novak again, aren't you?"

"No!"

"Don't bullshit me. Your eyes go dilated whenever you think 'bout him. You know what that means, don't you?"

"Shut up." Dean tossed a couple of notes across the bar in order to distract the shit-eating grin starting to form across her face. "Whatever we had - or didn't have - is long gone."

"Uh hu," Jo replied, unconvinced. "Whatever you say, Dean. I'm not going to stop you from tryin' to live in denial for the rest of your life. Tell Cas to drop in sometime, though, if you're actually speakin' two words to him, and that twin of his too. I'd like to see both of those dumbasses again - plus, I need to officially offer Sam my congratulations and all that."

Dean nodded. "I'll tell him to call you," he replied, eager to hurry up and get himself away from Jo and her prying, all-knowing eyes.

Bobby.

"What the hell you doin' here, boy?"

Dean rolled his eyes in Bobby's direction as the older man poked his head out from the office in the back of the garage. "Oh, well, hello to you too, Bobby. I'm havin' a great day, thanks, especially now that I've noticed that the King of Hell ain't here, how 'bout you?"

Bobby sent him a hard stare. "Don't take that sass with me, son, you know what I meant. It's ten o'clock in the mornin'; what're you doin' here so early?"

"Workin'," Dean replied with a shrug of his shoulders.

Bobby's eyes narrowed. "Your shift don't start until twelve."

"Am I not allowed to make social calls now? Sheesh, it's like that time I bought Sammy a cake all over again." Dean shook his head, his shoulders giving another shrug, trying to pass the situation off as nothing. "And, anyway, can't I just drop by an' help out of the goodness of my heart once in a while?"

Bobby shook his head. Dean only dropped by to "help out of the kindness of his heart" when something was wrong back at the Winchester house that he didn't want to acknowledge was there. "Victor Henrikson bought his car in earlier. You can start takin' a look at that if you insist on bein' here so damn early, since Crowley hasn't bothered showin' his ass around here yet."

Dean gave him a grin, looking relieved that he had been permitted to stay - not, Bobby knew, that he would have listened if he told the boy to go back home for a few more hours - and peeled his jacket off, draping it over the nearby work bench and reaching for the wrench out of the toolbox.

Bobby knew why, of course. Sam had called him a few days before and warned him about the Novaks coming back to town. He often found himself sighing when he thought about the damn mess this whole business had become. Dean hadn't even mentioned Castiel in years, at least half a decade, but Bobby could clearly remember when those two idjits were joined at the hip. He'd lost count of the times he had wandered into the garage when Dean used to drop by after school and found those two seated around a car together, Cas watching everything his best friend did with some sense of awe and wonder, Dean explaining everything that he was doing and laughing when Cas tried to guess what was the best way to fix up the car. Sometimes, Bobby wondered where that cheerful, carefree smile had gone; he'd see flashes of it from time to time on adult Dean's face, but no where near as much as he had when high school sophomore Dean had been tinkering around in the garage with his best friend beside him.

Bobby hadn't actually asked about what had happened between them, before and after Cas and his brother had left town - it was none of his damn business, after all - but it must have been serious if it had wiped away that carefree smile the way that it had.

"Heard from Sam the other day," the older man began cautiously.

"Oh?" Dean had already poked his head under the hood of Henrikson's car. "What he say? He told you 'bout him and Gabe yet?"

"The happy couple? Pretty sure anyone with half a lick o' sense coulda seen this comin' for miles." Bobby snorted. "Nah, I'm talkin' 'bout your holiday guests."

"Oh. Them." Dean shook his head. "I'm tryin' to block it all out, to be honest."

"Dean -"

"Bobby, I don't wanna talk about it. Can we drop it? Please?"

"Okay." Bobby held up his hands, but his gaze was reproachful. "Whatever you want."

Dean smiled gratefully and went back to work.

"Idjit," the older mechanic muttered under his breath.

Jimmy.

"Tell me, what does one get their irritatingly uptight twin brother for Christmas?"

Amelia chuckled, as Jimmy slid yet another book back onto the shelf. "No luck, huh?"

He let out a sigh. "You could say that." He reached for another book. "Cupcakes In Cups. Maybe this? It might make him better at cooking."

No one in their apartment building was going to forget the night that Cas tried to make some toast and ended up setting off the fire alarm and hailing the fire department, leaving everyone stranded outside in their pyjamas in the middle of a rainstorm. His twin brother had never made friends easily, but Jimmy was certain that it was a lost cause when the identity of the culprit was discovered. At one point he thought he was going to have to step in and break up a fight. Since then, he'd taken it upon himself to try and teach Cas the way of preparing food, and so far it hadn't resulted in much success.

"Not even my brother could mess up using a microwave, right?" He exchanged a look with Amelia, before both of them shook their heads, Jimmy placing the book back. "Yeah. Maybe not the best idea to let him near electricals. Better stick to cold cut sandwiches for now. Speaking of sandwiches..." He turned to glance imploringly at her. "Can we go eat now? I know this great place called the Roadhouse not far from here..."

Amelia shook her head again, but this time in fondness. "What about your brothers' Christmas presents? I thought the whole point you coming along with me was to get something for them."

"Do I really need to get Gabriel anything, though? I mean, c'mon, he's already got himself a fiancée this Christmas, I'm pretty sure he's done alright this year."

She gave him a gentle nudge with her elbow. "That doesn't count unless you're Sam."

Jimmy turned to glance back at the shelf. "Maybe I'll get the cookery book for Gabriel. He looks like he knows how to handle a microwave." He reached for it, and then paused. "Although, that being said, he did microwave a spoon once and blow the machine up."

"Are you sure that wasn't you?"

"Hey! I'm not that great at cooking, but I know how to use a microwave." After another moment of deliberation, Jimmy plucked the cupcake book from the shelf. "Sam'll just have to take the risk." He nodded once in confirmation, and slung a warm arm around Amelia's shoulders, letting her snuggle into his side. "What do you think of Sam, by the way?"

"He's...nice. They're all nice." Amelia hesitated for a moment. "Just Dean's a little...how do I describe it?"

"Bitchy?" Jimmy offered up.

"I was going to go for intense."

He rolled his eyes at the ridiculousness of it all. "It's only because he can't stand the fact that Cas and I are here. He didn't exactly take the news of Cas leaving for college very well."

"Why?"

"God knows. I didn't understand then when I went over to his house and threatened to do some damage to his face for breaking my brother's heart and I still don't understand now. All I know is that he can't stand the sight of us, even after all this time."

"I noticed. I saw him run into Cas in the hallway last night; he looked like he wanted to either lock Cas in the broom closet and then leave or jump in there after him and aggressively make out with him when no one else could see."

Jimmy snorted. "To be honest, Dean always looked at Cas like that a little bit. Except he didn't always look like he was capable of torturing puppies whilst doing it. That appears to be a new thing."

To say that the older Winchester was brooding over his twin brother would have been an understatement. Even Cas himself had noticed it, and Cas was known for being rather unobservant when it came to romantic advances. It had taken him three years to notice Dean's interest in him back when they were all teenagers in high school and then another six months before he admitted that he felt the same way. Locking them in the stationary cupboard in Ms Milligan's classroom had been one of the proudest moments of Jimmy's life so far, especially when Dean and his brother were eventually allowed to emerge and both of them looked more unkempt and rumpled than they had done when they went in.

"Stop that."

Jimmy turned to glance at his girlfriend, who now had her arms folded. "What?"

"I know that face. That's your scheming face. Cas warned me about that." The redhead added a smirk to her all-knowing expression. "What is it this time?"

"Nothing!" Jimmy insisted.

Well, nothing yet.

Well, that's all for December 2nd!

Until December 3rd, my little sock puppets... x :)