"When's your flight?"

Dean swallows thickly as he turns to face his father; John Winchester slouches into the doorway of Dean's room. Giving the man a nod, Dean answers, "Tomorrow morning. Mom's taking me to the airport," and turns back to his packing. The clothes he needs to take back east need to get put in order — and he just blows at having things in order, even without the slimy feeling in the air as soon as Dad takes two heavy steps into the room. There's none of the familiar whiskey scent, or anything else that he associates with Dad, just the stagnated air that comes when the heat's running but there's no airflow in the house — and still Dean wonders what he's done this time. His broken nose has healed, and the busted cheek he got two days after New Year's, when he stepped between Dad and Sam — and with each of Dad's footfalls, Dean feels his breath hitch in his throat or shudder out.

His heart's racing like Seabiscuit when he hears: "Sammy told me you've got some new friend. At the library?"

"Yes, sir." Dean nods and folds up the Skynyrd shirt he stole out of Dad's laundry once in high school, after he got a broken wrist for Christmas. "His name's Cas. His dad's the campus pastor." This conversation should end now — Dean's pulse pounds so hard he's sure his chest will just give up and explode. He isn't even looking at his father, into those hazel eyes that have shown him both love and hate through their time together, and still he gets the sensation like bugs crawling under his skin and some unseen hound gnawing at the inside of his stomach. This always happens when he tries to lie.

"Jeez, Dean," Dad goes on, oblivious, or willfully ignorant. "First Tessa, then Anna, now this Cas guy — I swear, what is it with you and preachers' kids?"

He shrugs. "I don't know. It's just…" The souvenir shirt from his first concert trembles in his hands. (It was Metallica, when he was sixteen and snuck Tessa and Anna out to come with him because the tickets were the only things he got that Christmas. Even through the time that's passed and whatever Mom used to wash it, fingering the black cotton makes Dean remember the smell of beer and cigarette smoke.) Before he thinks to stop himself, the words start spilling out: "Cas is special, I guess. I mean, we didn't start out liking each other — we snapped at each other a lot, but he grew on me, and then we were reshelving books this once and he kissed me, and he didn't want to tell anyone because his dad is like…"

For the first time, Dean feels Dad's hand clenching on his shoulder. As he turns, Dean expects a smack or a punch; he flinches until he notices the muscular arms around his shoulders, pulling him into Dad's chest — but it isn't supposed to happen like this; he always thought that coming out wouldn't go at all well… There's supposed to be shouting, drinking, empty beer bottles getting flung at his head and just barely missing… Dad's supposed to kick him out, cut him off, not… Thoughts going too fast for him to process right, lungs twisting and turning like they might try to claw their way out of him, Dean does the only thing he can: leans into his father's chest and wraps his arms around Dad's shoulders. He bites on his lower lip as he leans his head into Dad's neck, trying not to cry, but he hiccups, and the tears come anyway as the stubble grates against his skin.

"It's okay, Dean," John whispers, patting Dean's back. "It's okay."

He waits until the tears stop before leading Dean downstairs; they don't tell Mom, and dinner isn't forced or full of awkwardness. It's been too long, Dean thinks, since he's had the chance to remember what Dad's like when he's sober.

Uncle Zachariah Adler is not related to Castiel by blood, a fact that the boy thanks God for every time Irene, his father's sister, and her husband darken their doorstep. Even when the sunlight reflects off the white BMW as it pulls into the driveway, gleams right into Castiel's eyes and briefly blinds him, he's just grateful that, if he thought he could get away with it, he could disavow the jerk uncle with the bald spot who has a patronizing remark for every situation. Straightening the tie his father's made him wear, Castiel welcomes in his relatives, leaning down to take a kiss on each cheek from Aunt Irene (who coos, "Oh, Castiel, you look so thin," drawling the last syllable of his name) and a clap on the shoulder from Zachariah ("He's just been working hard at school, haven't you, boy?").

Castiel supposes that he has been, and he bites his tongue through most of dinner; whenever one hand is free, he scratches at his knee, trying to keep himself awake. He's slept more than enough, this break, but there's been no apparent need to stay up all night, and it's been days since he took an Adderall. The steak rests uncomfortably in his stomach, as though it's come from the dining hall and not his father's talented hand, but it doesn't bother him nearly as much as the stories from his aunt and uncle's Christmas trip to Rome.

"Of course, it might have been nicer to go for Easter," Zachariah explains, and Castiel's free hand itches to punch him in the smarmy, cracked grin. Knocking his teeth out might just complicate things, but Castiel's also certain that it would satisfy him. "But the Vatican gets mobbed for Easter — Catholics from all over gather up in a flash mob. Besides…" With a smile that looks like a smirk, he squeezes his wife's hand, "Irene just had to see the Christmas decorations." As soon as he can, Castiel begs off to his room. He dry swallows a pill and fusses with the details of his appearance — going at the tie again, brushing nonexistent loose threads off his shoulders — until Dad shepherds him into the study.

Dad, Zachariah, and Aunt Irene all take glasses of wine; Castiel just fidgets with his hands and listens to more stories from his Aunt and Uncle's Roman holiday, until… "You know, the only thing that we had any real trouble with was these fag protestors—"

"Zachariah," Aunt Irene warns, arching an eyebrow and downing the rest of her third drink.

"I'm sorry: these gay, lesbian, bisexual, and tranny protestors," the bastard corrects himself, and Castiel has to clench his fingers on his chair's plush armrest, just to give himself something else to focus on. "You know, I've always enjoyed Dante, and Irene wanted to see the Uffizi, so we took a few days in Florence, and for the most part, it was just perfect — couldn't have asked for more. …Until these radicals started having some protest march outside of San Martino while we were trying to leave the Casa di Dante — and when I say radicals, I don't just mean those two lipstick dykes who're in charge of Harvelle's queer club, Paul. We're talking like shaved heads, men trying to pass as women, glitter — and they're just traversing through the streets, shouting some creative obscenities at everyone…"

As his uncle continues blathering, Castiel turns his eyes to Dad. He searches his father's face for some kind of a reaction, anything beyond an odd quirk of the eyebrow or a knowing nod — his stomach writhes around as he prays to find any show of disapproval, or judging Zachariah, or of wishing that he would just shut his mouth and keep it shut. Nothing comes up. Swallowing thickly, Castiel looks to the carpet between his feet. When school's back in, he ought to break things off with Dean; it's just easier for both of them if they're not together. Or whatever they've been until now.

Bela sighs. As soon as the office door thunks on the wall, she smells his scotch and although she bristles at the sounds of his heavy footfalls, she does not startle; all she does is turn her attention back to the papers she needs to put in order. Her parts in the Gay-Straight Alliance fundraisers and events need to get organized before she returns to Jo, so then they can collaborate and make more concrete plans. Bela hates the way her inhalation shakes, and she feels her father's hand, so smooth and with so firm a hold, wrapping on her shoulder; even without him speaking, she can hear that voice like tires on an unpaved road, hissing, Come on, little Abby. Show Daddy what you can do with those whore lips of yours…

"Bela?"

She whips around, eyes wide, clutching the perfectly ordered papers to her chest — and then she glances down into her foster mother's loving eyes, the same kind smile that she wore when they filed Bela's adoption papers, and the ones that changed her name from Abigail Baty to Bela Talbot.

Bela's lips curve into a show of genuine affection and her Mother tells her, "Your father's ready to drive down to Joanna's, sweetheart."

Tessa shudders, and she wishes very much that she never had to open her eyes; the smooth fabric of the dress holds her in an antagonistic closeness, and when she does honor her mother's requests — "Come on, Tessa! Just a peek — you know, it's the groom who's not supposed to see you in the dress yet…" — she can hardly see her reflection through the veil. She hardly needs to. She knows that it'll just look wrong, and for more reasons than the dress being deathbed white. Sue-Ann Le Grange comes to stand behind her daughter and lifts the veil off her face — not without some difficulty, considering the six inches Tessa has on her when she's in her bare feet. The white heels pinch her feet, and she towers over her mother.

"Don't look so upset," she murmurs, brushing wayward hairs off of Tessa's shoulders. "Mama's little nightingale… Scott's such a lovely young man, and his parents are good. people." Abruptyl, Sue-Ann pauses. Tessa feels her frown deepen, and she squirms beneath the scrutiny as her mother's eyes trace down her face. "…Why don't we do a reading, darling?"

Tessa nods. She follows her mother into the study, sits at the card table and shuffles Mom's old Rider-Waite; once she's satisfied, she lays out the Celtic cross spread. The first card that Mom turns over is Death.

The silver crucifix necklace weighs Anna down, hunching her shoulders over the dinner table, and the skin beneath it tingles as though it might catch flame; Deacon Rich Milton keeps eyeing it as though he thinks it will, as though what his daughter's done with Reverend Roy's daughter — what they kept secret for so long before that blackmailing happened — has turned her into some kind of demon and can never be forgiven. It's worse than pointing out the irony of their family being Catholic over Easter dinner with Father Patrick, the way she did in her junior year at Lawrence High, not three days after the first time she'd felt Tessa's tongue inside her — she still remembers that diatribe, hears its words mulling around in her head, I mean, for all the obvious religious dialogues that exist in Paradise Lost, Milton sided with Oliver Cromwell and the Puritans, and Satan's palace of Pandemonium is obviously meant to resemble a Catholic church…

She swallows thickly, nearly choking on her own anxiety, not to mention her dinner. No one expected anything about her and Tessa, then. Now, Anna keeps her eyes down, looking for the secret to life, the universe, and everything in her peas, her chicken, and her mashed potatoes; she knows she'll never find it, but her cheeks feel hot enough without meeting her parents' eyes. Her gaze stays locked on the table, until she hears her father's announcement: "So, Amy. Anna. …Father Pat and I've been talking — about this lesbian thing our daughter's gotten herself into…" Trembling, Anna raises her eyes; her father acknowledges this with a nod, and continues: "He thinks an exorcism might be the only way to go about fixing it."

Anna's fork clatters to her plate. "A-a-a… what?" she stammers. A wave of nausea hits her, and she stares at her father; he only shrugs; she glances to her mother instead, looking for some kind of uncertainty, any indication that she doesn't approve of this plan.

Amy Milton shrugs. "It might not be a bad idea, sweetheart," she whispers. "You haven't been yourself, we've both seen it…"

"Dad, please—"

"She's not been herself, you've noticed it, too, right, Rich?"

"Of course I have, darling — and Father Pat's booked solid until early spring, but he's agreed to help us out—"

Without asking for permission, Anna shoves her chair away from the table. She all but dashes to her room and locks the door behind her; she slumps against it for a moment, and doesn't let the tears come up until she's on her bed, clutching her ragged pink teddy bear to her chest and whispering, "God damn it… an exorcism, just a… a fucking exorcism?" This never would've happened had she or Tessa gotten pregnant.

The question gobsmacks Crowley, and as soon as he's processed his own surprise, he can't believe that it caught him off his guard. Trying (and failing) to shake himself around (and revitalize his vocabulary and vocal chords in the process, one hopes), he stares down the dinner table at his parents, his tall, balding father and his mother with her heel shoes and dyed red ringlets. "Alexander," Mother repeats herself with an affectionate shake of her head. "I said, when are we going to meet this Gabriel boy that you've been seeing?"

"Soon, soon, I…" Crowley pauses, hearing a whining noise around his ankles, the one that means Gabriel's favorite pup needs to go outside. "I'll be right back."

As he escorts the little creature to the backyard, Crowley sighs. He leans against the wall and waits for the dog to handle itself, wondering where Gabriel thinks he can get off, wanting to drag Castiel out of the closet. Fussing with his phone, Crowley pauses, reading over an old sext from his boy, one that brightened up the day he got it: prof's talking about heteronormativity in the media. good thing you're sick today, I'd jizz my pants if you were here. Does this count as a kink? "Come out, come out, wherever you are," Crowley mutters, staring out the window at the kennel instead. "Unless your name is Gabriel Lyesmith."

After the pneumonia-contracting shenanigans, and after they return from Bali, Gabriel mostly avoids his parents. It's nothing personal, and they make it easy on him. Dad has work meetings, Mom has business at the church with Cas's asshole father, and Gabriel has pills, his boy, and, once the illness clears up, he has a bottle of Jameson from Mom's brother out in San Francisco. He also has a series of heated texts and calls from Bela, demanding that he get his shit together soon or, so help her, she will carve out his liver and cook it for her and Jo's anniversary. "I'll serve it with a nice chianti, too," she snaps on their last call. "For the full Hannibal Lecter effect."

Gabriel throws his drink back and doesn't mind the burn. "I kinda think I'd go better with cognac."

"I don't give a damn what you'd go better with! Get your presidential, student activities-running arse going and honor the promises you gave me and Jo about coordinating the GSA events and our club's involvement in the Bacchanalia."

Rolling his eyes, he sighs, "How's the detached retina?"

"It wasn't detached, and it's fine. Can you walk without wanting to fall over yet?"

"Oh, please, Princess. My boyfriend knows how to fuck me properly."

"That's excellent," Bela says, and her voice sounds far too chipper. "If you want him to keep doing so? I'd suggest you get off his prick, get off my nerves, and get on this assignment."

The line goes dead without enough room for Gabriel to argue back — why do all his friends have such a last word-seeking complex? Stretching out as he goes, Gabriel gets off his bed and meanders down the hall to Mom's office; he can smell her crisp peppermint schnapps even before he knocks on the door, and Dad's probably at the bar with his corporate suit coworkers. He doesn't wait for her to drawl, Come in, just does so. The smile she shoots up at him is so crooked it might fall off her face, and her string of family heirloom pearls hangs off her neck at an odd angle; her lipstick's faded where she presses her lips against the glass.

"Whatever does your little heart desire, sweet thing?" She's tried so hard, he knows, to speak like their fellow WASPs, but from the way her Louisiana brogue and inflection are slipping up, Gabriel thinks she must've had four drinks by now.

"I just got off the phone with Bela," he explains, sitting down on the edge of her desk. "We could use a charitable donation for the GSA."

Mom asks no questions; just writes and signs a check made out to "Cash" and instructs Gabriel to fill it out as he and Bela decide they need to. As he tries to stand, though, she takes him by the wrist; she pulls him back to sitting and slithers her long, bony fingers down his cheek. "I just wish you'd find it in you to let your father know, dearest. Your Alexander's such a nice boy."

"Yeah," Gabriel agrees, keeping silent his thought of, Like that'll ever happen. He'd sooner dive naked into a pit of really pissed off scorpions — but as he leans down to kiss her cheek, Gabriel just lets Mom think what she wants.

Ellen tries not to blink when she finds the black lacy panties under the cushion of the living room sofa. She says nothing about the bra that turns up on the lamp, the one that is definitely not Jo's because first of all, Ellen's daughter doesn't wear a C-cup, and second, Jo would not wear magic eight ball prints on her chest. By the time she sees a series of stains along the floor and various other fixtures, Ellen is suspicious, but she doesn't sigh until she gets into the kitchen and sees the mess: a bottle of chocolate syrup and a can of whipped cream sit, toppled over, on the floor, surrounded by an interesting array of both their contents and Jo's boyshorts with the rainbow decal on the ass.

"JOANNA BETH!" Ellen bellows to the rest of the house, impressed her own self when it echoes back at her. "What in the Hell did I tell you and Bela about leaving your toppings out all damn night?"

Ellen rolls her eyes at the fits of giggling that she hears as the girls come downstairs. She loves the two of them, and even hugs both delinquents good morning, but Ellen Harvelle works too damn hard to clean up after twenty-one-year-olds who really ought to know better.

"MOM! Sara took my unicorn!"

"DAD! Lily won't share with me!"

"Parental units, will you please shut the squirts up! I can't focus on my Borges reading — and it's for school!"

"Oh, please, Carrie, like you've ever read anything for school…"

"Shut your fucking mouth, May!"

"Chuck," Frederick Shurley sighs, "can you go and investigate what's taking the girls so long?"

Chuck furrows his brow and looks from his dad to his mom, then to their new neighbors, Jonah and Rachel Rosen, who sit on the living room sofa, all smiles with his head on her shoulder. Their daughter hasn't gotten here yet, and as he trudges up the stairs to check on his little sisters, Chuck wonders if having just one is any easier than having four. He spends fifteen minutes going between the girls' rooms, each time getting yelled at or having something thrown at him; when he descends again, he sneaks into the kitchen and breaks out the scotch Dad thinks he's kept hidden well, even though he hides it behind Mom's peach schnapps. As he's pouring a glass, Chuck startles at the sound of the screen door slamming on the wall and a heavy set of shoes stumbling in; some of the amber liquid spills on the counter.

Whipping around, Chuck finds himself face-to-face with a girl who wears, despite the piles of snow outside, a green-and-blue tartan skirt that hits above her knees. Her dirty blonde hair goes well past her shoulders, and underneath her pink parka, he sees a sweatervest in their school's shade of green (with an apparently home-made white emblem of the Harvelle Badger on the chest). Her blue eyes are wide as she gives him an uncertain glance.

"…This is the Shurley place, right? …I mean, my parents gave me the directions, but I was down at Turner's for the release party of the latest installment in my favorite yaoi series, and I haven't really figured out the streets here yet and… oh…" A huge grin leaps onto her face and her hand shoots out toward his. "I'm Becky, by the way."

Chuck arches an eyebrow at her, and then extends his hand. "…Chuck."

Her eyes dart down to the Harvelle badge on his shirt. "…Have I seen you at school before? …Animanga Anonymous meetings?"

"It was just the one, I think… the time when you guys showed Akira? …I mean, I'm not, like… really into anime, but that's just such a great—"

Becky beams at him as she shrieks, "I LOVE AKIRA!"

They talk for so long that Dad comes in to make sure Chuck hasn't gone and exploded himself with the oven. Once Fred's content that his son is fine, Chuck asks Becky out for coffee; she says yes.

When she gets back from the airport, Sam avoids Mom for a while; sending Dean back east to school never goes well, resulting in tears, and sensitivity, and clinging, and the answerless question, What am I gonna do when you go out to California, Sammy? All he can think of to say is that he's not a guaranteed in at Stanford yet — he couldn't apply early decision, not when Dad harangued on and on about money and how they didn't have it, and not when Mr. Pepper in the college counseling office kept telling Sam to look at other options — and it never calms Mom down any.

He finally joins her when she's folding up the laundry; sitting beside her on the sofa, Sam does what he can to help her out. Maybe Dean's never liked this chore, but as he tries to get the creases in Dad's sleeves right, Sam can't see what makes this such a "chick thing," and hey, if liking his clothes to look presentable makes him less of a man, then he's okay with that. At least he'll look less like Mister "I just rolled out of bed and grabbed whatever smelled clean enough" Winchester and more like he gives a shit. Sam adds his stack of handiwork to the basket at his and Mom's feet, and pauses his reaching for something new when he feels her stroke his cheek and cup his jaw.

"Your dad's going out to a hockey game with the other guys from the garage," she says. "What do you say to a day out for just us?"

Sam licks his chipped lips and takes his phone out of his hip pocket. As he agrees that it sounds good, he taps out a text to Ruby, asking if she's free tomorrow instead.

Even with the lights turned off, the pyramid of translucent orange bottles against Castiel's wall glitters in the glow from his TV. This first night back on campus brought him a snow-covered Dean — case of beer in hand, the white stuff falling off his hair, his boots, and leather jacket, he just showed up with a smile and some slasher horror flick that he'd brought from home. Sighing, Castiel empties his fourth bottle and adds it to their heap. They'll probably accumulate enough to split a muffin at the campus coffee bar, once they return the empties to the Stop-N-Shop down the road. Neither he nor Dean has said a thing about the rattling sound that came when Castiel let his jeans fall to the floor; they just sit together on Castiel's bed, Dean in jeans and Castiel in his boxers, backs pressing into the wall and the case at their feet.

As he cracks open another — number five to Dean's sixth — and as the scantily clad, promiscuous girl finds her head lobbed off by a chainsaw, Castiel slumps into Dean's shoulder, rubs his five o'clock shadow into the cotton of Dean's t-shirt. Dean's arm snakes around his shoulders and holds him closer than Castiel can remember being held by anyone, even Andy. Before he thinks too hard on this, Dean's fingers wrap around his arm and Castiel sighs. "I missed you," he whispers against Dean's neck, and the trembling in his voice surprises him; he had not thought that he'd missed Dean so much as that. But now, as it's out there and as he inhales Dean's scent of beer and books and gasoline, Castiel feels the shivering spread from his vocal chords to his muscles, to his spine and lung, and he knows that he presumed incorrectly.

Dean's fingers give Castiel a squeeze, then trail up to caress his cheek. "Did you eat at all over Christmas?" With this thrown out there, they fall into a kiss as though there's been years between their meetings, and not just a month; Castiel only separates from Dean so he can set their beers on the table by his bed. As soon as he has, Dean pulls their mouths together once more, jerking Castiel toward him. They tumble onto the mattress, and unlike the last time this happened, in the library, Dean places himself above Castiel, handling his head onto the pillows as though he's taking care of something fragile, something in which he doesn't want to put another crack. The skin of his fingers brushes — rough, warm, tender — up Castiel's side, sliding the white Oxford out of its tucked position; then Dean takes it slow, worming each button from its hole until he can run his hand down Castiel's pale, exposed stomach.

He shivers underneath Dean's hand, then pushes back, sitting up with the intent to knock Dean back and instead bringing them to a seated position, his ass on Dean's lap, Dean's erection already rubbing against his leg. They kiss in a fever of messy graspings, lips finding lips as though by accident as Castiel drops his hands to Dean's side, rips off the t-shirt and throws it aside; Dean shows more care with Castiel's clothing, ghosting his palms down Castiel's arms and shoulders as he removes the shirt, then tossing it to the floor without a care. Dean fumbles until Castiel is sans boxers (Dean's rough, worn denim brushes against his naked thighs), until his own jeans are undone and at the foot of the bed; he only barely remembers to get the lube from his pocket and as he slicks his cock, Castiel dives into a long, deep kiss, one that (he hopes) might leave Dean's lips bruised.

Castiel rides Dean slowly at first, sliding down with care, gasping as the initial pain subsides, as Dean fills him, then grinds his hips up into Castiel's, working deeper into him and dragging up a series of moans with his guttural grunts. In the midst of it, Castiel lets his head fall to Dean's shoulder and he mutters into Dean's neck, "I was going to break up with you tonight." An anxious thrust makes him fight for breath. "…My father. And my uncle. Over break." The kiss Dean flings into Castiel's Adam's apple is hot and wet and filled with the gnashing of teeth — Dean breaks no skin, but he makes his claim nonetheless.

"They don't know," Castiel assures him, snaking a hand through Dean's hair, falling back at the pleasure that ripples through him; he holds himself up with his hands on Dean's shins and one of Dean's arms at his back. Dean's fingernails scratch at his skin, and Dean's free hand takes Castiel's cock, working him up harder, faster, out of time with his thrusts but still feeling so right as his rough fingers pump up and down; the force from this straightens Castiel's back until he can collapse against Dean's shoulder, warm, sweaty skin of their chests meeting again and Castiel dragging his teeth down to Dean's clavicle. The heat between their bodies doesn't subside, even as Dean takes one of Castiel's wrists and presses a gentle kiss to the scar he finds there. "I'd never tell them, Dean. I wouldn't. …They don't suspect. …But they made me wish… I… Dean!"

As he comes, ejaculate spilling onto Dean's hand, Castiel grabs onto Dean's right shoulder — he digs his fingers into the skin, the flesh, the muscle, hard enough that his own groan finds punctuation in Dean's ragged yelp — Dean finishes quickly and as Castiel sinks onto his sheets and pillows, he's certain that, even if his green-eyed boy's lips recover from the assault waged on them, Dean will have a bruise tomorrow, right there on his shoulder, in the shape of Castiel's hand.

"I'm not quitting you," he answers the unvoiced concern, feeling Dean slink down next to him, warm breath caressing the back of his neck. "Even if I knew how to do it, I wouldn't want to." Dean responds with an arm draped around Castiel's waist, pressing his chest into Castiel's back and a trail of gentle kisses into his shoulders; Castiel drifts off to the sound of the movie's credits rolling.

Once he's sure that the boy in his hold is asleep, Dean leans over to kiss his cheek and whispers, "I love you, little darlin'."