"Oh um, hi Meg!" Anna said, trying to be welcoming, "Ruby, should we introduce ourselves?
"No." Ruby said flatly. "Raphael, you want to get started?"
"Wait!" Dean called out. Ruby glared at him. He stuttered and pulled a sheet of paper out of his pocket. "Uh, I made a thing." He admitted.
Ruby narrowed her eyes, but she nodded at him to continue.
"So uh, the bake sale is next Tuesday, and I made like, a list of stuff we're gonna need. Cas is gonna make cupcakes I guess, and I'm gonna make pie, so that's covered, but like, don't anybody sign up for some weak sh-, stuff, like those grocery store sugar cookies. We want people to actually buy this junk. And the money is for… Ruby, what's the money for?"
"Rice bowls for people in Africa or something." She said shortly, glancing over at Meg, whose knee had grazed up against Cas's and hadn't moved. "Good job Dean." She growled. "Everybody sign his thing. Now lets get started, ok?"
While Raphael preached on about music being evil or something, and Anna tried and failed to be the bigger person and see the good side of their fearless leader, Castiel dealt with the emotional turmoil that comes from sitting next to a boy you're super crushin' on while the girl who got you arrested makes eyes at you. It's an extremely specific brand of emotional turmoil, and unpleasant.
Dean stayed after the meeting for a little bit to bully people into signing up to bake things. By the time he had everything sorted the meeting room was pretty much empty. Normally Anna stuck around to put the chairs away, but she'd shot right out of tonight's meeting in an irritated rush. For like, half a second he contemplated putting the chairs away himself, but it was too much of a suck-up move. He may be running a bake sale, but he was still Dean Winchester, damn it. He shoved the completed sign up sheet in his pocket with an extremely dorky sense of accomplishment and hurried to meet Castiel outside.
But there was no scruffy little nerd waiting for him on the steps to the ECM. Dean jogged down to the street to see if Cas was waiting for him there, but absolutely no one was in sight. Dean was alone with the streetlights and the occasional passing car. The thought of Castiel leaving with Meg struck Dean as utterly unacceptable for some reason, and he started to walk towards his dorm a little faster than usual just so he could make sure that wasn't what happened. As he was walking his phone buzzed.
"Yo Cas, where'd you go?" he asked cheerfully.
" Uh Dean? it's Sam."
"Sam?"
Dean hadn't prayed for his family that night in the prayer circle, but as ever it had been the first thing to spring to mind. He swallowed, feeling wholly unprepared to actually talk to his brother.
"Yeah, dude, did you think I was Cassie?" Sam said with a little laugh, referencing Dean's high school girlfriend who had dumped him because he was a dumbass.
"No dude, what's up? Is everything ok?"
"Yeah, Dean, everything's fine. It's just like, you haven't called for three months."
Dean's chest tightened. Had it been that long?
"Well, you know. College. It's busy." He said. "How's school?"
"Good. I might be valedictorian."
"That's awesome dude! Kickass!"
"Well, I'm ranked second right now. It just depends whether or not Kevin Tran's mom gets restationed to Idaho… it's not that great…"
"It's friggin' great!"
"How's college?"
"It's ok." Dean said. "I kind of feel like it's more your thing than mine…"
"No way." Sam sounded skeptical, and for some reason that brought on an almost incapacitating rush of homesickness to Dean. He missed picking up Sam from basketball practice and watching him in all his shitty plays. He missed wrestling him for the last slice of pizza, and beating all of his high scores on video games. He missed having the sole goal and purpose of his life be in the form of another human being.
"Miss you, kid." Dean said, and it was an understatement.
"Dean… I uh… Dad tried to call you, but there's kind of… news."
Dean hadn't pretty much raised Sam without figuring out what his different tones meant. And this wasn't sounding good.
"What's wrong?"
"Well, it's not wrong, it's just uh… so we've been living with Kate and Adam for a while now…"
"Mm." Dean said. His heart raced and he found that he couldn't walk in a straight line. He leaned against a light post.
"And, I know how you feel about it, but uh, Kate's really great, and Adam…"
"Adam? Dad's bastard who we didn't know existed until last year? Yeah, tell me about Adam."
"Don't be a dick Dean." Sam said. "Adam's fantastic."
Dean's throat clenched up and he looked down, unable to respond.
"Anyway, Dad told me he's going to propose to Kate. I thought you'd want to know."
Dean hung up the phone. It was childish and stupid and he knew it was, but he was in no condition to deal with that kind of information right now. And from Sam?! Dad had had SAM call him? He shoved his hands in his pockets, and felt the crumpled sign up sheet that had made him feel so proud earlier. What an idiot. Here he was, trying to put together some lame ass life here at college while his family just carried on without him, doing BETTER without him, even. Fuck this. Fuck dad.
He was in pretty bad shape when he walked into his dorm lobby, and he almost walked right past Castiel.
"Dean!" He heard a voice call out. Dean turned and saw his dark haired, scruffy friend, looking vaguely nervous and apologetic. He'd apparently been waiting in Dean's lobby the whole time.
"What… What are you doing here?" Dean asked, trying to look normal.
"I'm sorry I left so suddenly Dean. Meg persuaded me to walk her home. She apologized for getting me arrested and she told me she owes me a favor."
"What kind of favor?"
"She wasn't specific. I thought I should apologize for leaving you behind." Castiel's head tilted to the side in the way that it did. "Are you all right?"
"I'm…" Dean was about to say he was fine, but he realized that he didn't want to. Cas had seen him at his absolute least fine, and he wasn't going to be fooled by some bullshit. "My brother called." He explained lamely.
"Is he all right?"
"Yeah, I mean, he's fine. He's great. He's going to be valedictorian actually." Dean said.
"That's wonderful. I just thought… you seemed upset, I assumed he might have been injured in some way."
"No… God that would be horrible."
Dean suddenly looked very strange, and Castiel worried that he'd unintentionally said something upsetting. Like that time he'd explained the intricacies of feline AIDS to Uriel, whose cat had just died.
"So you just waited for me in the lobby to apologize?" Dean asked, voice soft.
"I didn't want you to think I'd abandoned you." Castiel said. "I hope that all is well with your family."
Dean picked Castiel up into a bear hug so suddenly that it nearly knocked Castiel's wind out.
"Thanks." Dean said, finally pushing his friend back. "For everything."
He jogged away over to the stairs, leaving a stunned and giddy Cas standing in the lobby, trying to figure out what the hell had just happened.
Castiel felt a strong need to make sure Dean's bake sale went well, so he put some time and energy into finding the perfect cupcake recipe to make. At last year's bake sale he'd brought in no-bake cookies, which had sold ok, but he felt that this year deserved better than just half assed three ingredient cookies. Dean needed something to go well in his life.
After a few hours research on the internet and an unintentional 5 hour "Cupcake Wars" marathon, he found a dark chocolate cherry cupcake recipe that looked fairly scrumptious, so he decided on that. Dean had texted him just as he was about to drive to the grocery store.
"just realized I don't have a kitchen in my dorm." The text read.
"You may use my kitchen. I will pick you up." Castiel responded.
About an hour and a half later they arrived back at Castiel's apartment with all the ingredients they needed for an epic bake day.
"Wow. I thought you said you had a kitchen." Dean teased, looking at the absurdly tiny dimensions of Castiel's cooking space.
Castiel gave him a censorious look.
"I believe my kitchen will do justice to your pre-made pie crusts." Castiel oozed scorn, and Dean cracked up.
They decided to make Castiel's cupcakes first. It was more difficult than they thought. Every three seconds they were checking the internet for things like "Do you spray the cupcake tin when you have the little paper cups?" and "plastic bowls for melting chocolate, yes or no?"
"No Cas, you put the can of cherries in the batter." Dean read off the torn and chocolatey recipe sheet.
"Are you certain we don't bake the cupcakes first and put the cherries in as filling?" Castiel stared at him dubiously. Somehow he'd managed to get a streak of chocolate above his left eye, and Dean had no plans to tell him it was there.
"Dude, you can read it yourself, you're supposed to put them in the freaking batter."
Castiel took the sheet and read it. He looked at Dean with an expression of extreme skepticism, but dumped the can into the batter.
"So are you going to let Meg do you any favors?" Dean asked, teasingly, leaning back against Cas's bare and depressing refrigerator door.
"She doesn't owe me anything." Cas shrugged, stirring the delicious dark chocolatey mixture.
"Dude, she got you arrested!"
"I've already forgiven her. And I think it's good enough that she is coming to Fellowship meetings."
"You're a saint." Dean said. Cas had started spooning the batter into cupcake tins, and Dean swiped a drip of chocolate off the counter to taste. He raised an eyebrow. "Nice! You're shaping up to be a cute little housewife Cas!"
Castiel rolled his eyes at Dean, but his heart (to his dismay) skipped a beat.
"So…" Dean continued, trying to steal more batter and getting death glares from Cas, "You think maybe Meg likes you?"
Cas stopped ladling. He looked up at Dean in confusion.
"Why?" He asked.
"Well Cas, generally when a girl makes out with you at a party and then stalks your life, she's interested." Dean laughed.
"I don't think so." Castiel said, but his hand slipped and he got batter all over the cupcake tin in exactly the way the website told him not to.
"I don't know man, it seems pretty cut and dry to me." Dean continued, helping Cas wipe up the mess. "She totally likes you."
"Nobody ever has before." Castiel responded flatly. The two-dozen cupcakes were all spooned out and ready but they realized that they'd forgotten to preheat the oven. Cas pressed the necessary buttons in frustration and then looked back at Dean.
"People have totally had crushes on you!" Dean scoffed. The thought of attending high school without a crowd of chicks following you around was alien to the absurdly good-looking young man. If you were writing a history of Dean Winchester's high school experience it would read like a soap opera.
"Not to my knowledge." Castiel said.
"Trust me, you are way too hot to not have anyone crush on you. They just didn't say anything." Dean assured his friend.
Cas fumbled and nearly dropped the batter bowl that he was trying to move to the sink.
"What are you doing!?" Dean protested. "Don't wash that! We haven't licked the bowl yet!"
"What?" Castiel asked, brow furrowing.
"Licked the bowl."
"That sounds unsanitary." Castiel said.
Dean rolled his eyes and gave Castiel a spoon, and took large wooden one they'd been stirring with for himself. He started scraping what batter he could off the side and licking it off the spoon. Castiel stared at him RAPTLY.
"Didn't you ever do this as a kid? Best friggin' part man. It's like, one of my best memories of my mom, doing this."
Dean smiled at Castiel warmly. Cas tentatively scraped his spoon around the sides of the bowl and ate a little bit of the batter. It was delicious, even he felt vaguely worried about the raw egg.
The oven beeped, finally preheated, and Cas reluctantly separated himself from Dean to put the cupcakes in.
Once the cupcakes were carefully placed in the extremely tiny oven and the timer was set, Castiel turned back to Dean and saw that he had a big smudge of chocolate on the side of his mouth.
"You… you have…" Castiel pointed towards Dean's mouth.
"Where?" Dean asked, teasingly trying to lick off the batter.
"Right there… you're making it worse." Castiel frowned.
Dean laughed and reached out to rub the smudge of chocolate over Cas's eyebrow.
"I wasn't going to say anything man, but that's been there for like ten years…"
But suddenly Castiel's hands were on the sides of his face and Dean was pulled roughly down into a kiss.
He tasted like chocolate and cherries. They both did.
Castiel pulled back first.
"Oh no." He said, covering his mouth and backing slowly away from Dean.
"You… wha?" Dean asked.
"I'm sorry." He said. "I had no intention… I'm very sorry."
Dean was still leaning against the edge of the counter, breathing slightly heavily and looking at Castiel with new eyes. Castiel looked so sweet and ashamed and he still had that stupid chocolate smudge...
"Don't stop." Dean said, softly, biting his lower lip. "You don't have to stop."
Castiel was all the way pressed up against the wall of his kitchen but he was still within arm's reach of Dean. If he wanted to he could reachout and touch Dean's face. Castiel's expression became serious, questioning.
"May I?" He practically whispered.
"Do it." Dean invited.
And they were kissing again, Castiel shoving Dean back against the counter with surprising strength. It was better than kissing Meg, much. With Meg it had been strange and wet and he'd been painfully aware of how bizarre a ritual it was to press your mouth against somebody else's.
But with Dean he felt like he was on fire and had the shivers all at once. The mechanics of putting your tongue in somebody else's mouth didn't matter because it was Dean's mouth. He kissed deeper and harder and from the groaning sound Dean was making he was doing something right. Encouraged, he held Dean tight and, in his enthusiasm, somehow managed to shove Dean flat up against the refrigerator. Dean grabbed Cas's waist and pulled it up against him and all of a sudden there was friction there, which was a whole new sensation entirely.
"Holy fuck Cas!" Dean groaned, but Castiel stopped him talking with a kiss, and began to undo Dean's belt. He felt Dean's erection pressing against his jeans and grinned at the tiny whimpering sound Dean made as Castiel unzipped him. He nuzzled his face into Dean's neck and listened as Dean tried to get his breathing under control, all the while rubbing Dean's stiffening cock through his briefs. "Nobody's liked you before!?" Dean wheezed, hardly coherent. "ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?!"
Castiel grinned, exultant, kissed Dean fiercely again, and then lowered down to his knees. Freeing Dean's penis from its confinement, he licked his palm and began to rub it like he would his own. Dean had his head tilted back and was leaning against Castiel's refrigerator for dear life. Tentatively, Castiel put his tongue on the base of Dean's penis and licked slowly up the shaft.
"Mother of God…" He heard Dean blaspheme, and Castiel grinned. He tried the licking thing again, until he could tell from the way Dean was shaking that the time for teasing was past. He put his mouth around Dean's cock and began to give him an earnest if slightly inexperienced blowjob. Dean's hands cradled the sides of Cas's face, not pushing, keeping Cas entirely in control. Cas used his hands and his mouth and pretty soon Dean came with a rapturous shudder.
Castiel sat back on his kitchen floor, wiping his mouth and looking at Dean with an almost reverent love, and Dean sank down onto the floor with him, spent. He gave a little goofy half smile, still panting a little, then leaned forward and kissed Castiel sweetly.
The buzzer for the oven went off, with grating electric certainty. Dean laughed, almost having forgotten what they were doing before his world exploded.
"Oh yeah. Cupcakes." He said.
Castiel however, pulled back from Dean at the sound of the buzzer. His face, which had been so free and teasing and loving a second ago was suddenly almost blank. He was staring straight ahead at his tiny apartment with almost the same expression Dean had on the days he couldn't bring himself to get out of bed.
"Cas?" Dean asked, "Hey.. dude." He touched the side of Castiel's face tenderly and Castiel jerked back.
"We're making cupcakes for a Christian fundraiser." Castiel said, in his most emotionless, gravelly tone.
"Cas, you ok?"
"I just gave you a blowjob in my kitchen." Castiel said.
"And it was awesome?" Dean said.
"Please leave." Castiel said. He looked at Dean sort of desperately. "Don't you see? I'm supposed to be helping you. I've ruined it."
"You… Castiel, it's ok!" Dean tried to grab Castiel's arm again but Castiel scrambled up and away from him. He pulled on oven mitts and opened the oven door, trying to look normal but Dean could see the cupcake trays shaking as Castiel pulled them out.
"Please leave my apartment." Castiel said, not facing him. Dean wanted to reach out and comfort him, to wrap his arms around his shoulders, but Castiel's back was a brick wall. Dean had no option but to sort of ashamedly pull up his pants and retreat.
"Cas…"
"I'll see you later Dean, now go. Please."
Dean reluctantly left, feeling like a complete sack of shit. He had like, 4 miles to walk home, but he couldn't bring himself to text Ash for a ride. He shoved his hands in his pockets and started the trek, feeling ashamed and confused and guilty.
Castiel stared blankly at the cupcakes. They had puffed up perfectly and evenly, and even without frosting they looked tempting. The whole apartment smelled like warm chocolate and cherry.
He turned of the oven and sat down with a thud onto the rubbery tiling of his kitchen floor.
