They say that you should never meet your idols—that they never live up to your expectations. Castiel knew that. He knew not to have high expectations. He had readied himself for weeks with the knowledge good writing didn't guarantee any sort of winning personality (he should be the poster boy for this fact). He had mentally prepared himself over and over again… but Dean Winchester was still very much Not What He Expected.

Castiel didn't know who They were, but he decided that he definitely need to pay more attention to Them.

Dean Winchester, author of Castiel's favorite series—the man who had actually inspired Castiel to break out of his shell and show someone his writings—was a complete asshole. He shouldn't have been so disappointed. He had spent nearly every waking moment since he had gotten the opportunity to come to this convention very decidedly not imagining what meeting him would be like. He had also definitely not thought over and over again about what he would say (something clever and quick witted, nothing at all like his usual awkward self). Definitely not.

…Okay. So maybe he'd thought about it a little bit.

But really not all that much.

Really.

He let out a sigh and dropped his computer case onto his bed with perhaps slightly less care than he should have and then flopped down beside it. The thing in the elevator really wasn't so bad. Everyone thought his name was weird, and he'd definitely heard plenty of creative (and not so creative) jabs about it. That he could get over. What wasn't so easily forgiven was the rude way he had been treated afterwards. How dare he make Castiel feel as if he was somehow inferior—this may be his first convention, but Castiel was anything if not sure of himself. He was comfortable enough in his own skin that jabs at his name, the way he dressed, talked… None of that mattered. He was good at what mattered. He could write.

So he shouldn't let it bother him, but…

It would have been one thing if the man had been awkward, quiet, shy, or even standoffish. Any of those things would have been better than the belligerent high schooler Winchester seemed to be channeling. Honestly.

He knew he should stop moping about it. This was his first writers' convention, and to be quite honest, he was still pretty excited. How often does one get the chance to discuss their passion with like-minded people (he was going to assume that not all of them were like Dean Winchester)? He was looking forward to meeting other authors and even the publishers—the very reason that he was here was because Harvelle Publishing had displayed interest in taking him on. He should be ecstatic. He was ecstatic.

He decided to go back downstairs after readjusting his tie (he had a bad habit of pulling at it when he was uncomfortable), annoyed with himself for worrying. He would go meet other authors and forget that his all time favorite author was a complete jerk.

In most other situations, Castiel was extremely awkward, but when a half hour he found himself surrounded by a small group of people who were just as interested in literature and writing as he was, he found himself actually talking. He talked animatedly and excitedly, pleased to find that he had successfully gotten the incidents from earlier today off his mind. That is, until one of the others, a pretty journalist named Joanna (she insisted that everyone call her Jo) called out to the very man Castiel had been pointedly avoiding.

"Hey, Winchester!" she said suddenly, as if she had just noticed him standing nearby with a beer in his hand. He grinned lazily when he saw her, said something to the woman he had obviously been chatting up, and then sauntered over to their group.

"Long time no see," he commented, standing over her as if he were trying to intimidate her. Instead of looking in anyway cowed, she put her hands on her hips and immediately started to scold.

"You haven't answered a single call in weeks!" she accused, lifting a finger to poke him in his (very firm and defined through his T-shirt) chest. "Or my e-mails! You promised you wouldn't turn into a recluse again. I've been forced to call Sam just to make sure you're still alive!"

Dean groaned and Castiel tried to look as if he weren't watching this all with a sort of morbid fascination.

"You've been calling Sam?" he asked, scowling at her. "Don't believe a word he says."

"Dean…"

He rolled his eyes, turning away from her before she could say anything else and then saw Castiel standing there. He tensed up immediately, but before he could say anything, Jo stepped in again.

"You've met Castiel, right?" she said, making it clear with the disapproving tone in her voice that she knew exactly what had transpired between them. As it turned out, Chuck could be pretty chatty when he was drunk (which was apparently most of the time) and had already told half of the convention what had happened. Dean's face looked pinched and Jo shot him an exasperated look before turning to Castiel with a much softer expression on her face.

"Don't mind him," she told him with a roll of her eyes. "He may have never advanced beyond the age of about seven—" this earned her a growled "hey!" from Dean—"but he's really harmless."

"Harmless?" Dean scoffed.

Jo shot him another look and then a mischievous smile crept onto her face right before she announced, "This is just how he treats people he has crushes on."

Dean gaped at her in horror and she continued, "Like I said. Seven."

She was called away suddenly by her mother and the other three they had been standing with cleared out as if there was a storm approaching fast, leaving Castiel standing awkwardly facing Dean alone.

"I do not have a crush."

Castiel raised a brow, for some reason highly amused by the admittedly childish tone in the other man's voice.

"I never said that you did," he responded, his lips twitching with the effort not to laugh.

"Good," Dean responded gruffly, looking decidedly awkward. He took a drink from his beer, as if to give himself more time before he said anything else. Castiel decided that now was the perfect time to ruffle the other man just a bit more.

"Of course, it is rather common for one to feel that he has to hide his true feelings with displays of anger," he commented seriously. "There's not shame in admitting that."

Dean actually sputtered, choking on his beer.

"Dude—I'm not—that's not—"

Castiel found himself laughing, harder than he had in a very, very long time (which sadly wasn't actually all that hard). Dean seemed to realize that he was joking because that pinched face returned again, as if at the realization that he was the butt of this particular joke.

"Ha ha, very funny," he said, raising his bottle to Castiel in a sign of what he sincerely hoped was good will. He took another sip and then smiled at Castiel for the first time, his eyes crinkling just slightly. They were green, Castiel thought suddenly. Like a forest in the summer. They brought to mind for him the way light cascaded through the leaves in the middle of the day, shining but only through a slight barrier. Dean's smile, however slight it was, lightened up his whole face, shooting strange little shivers down Castiel's spine.

It was stupid. He was still mad at the other man. There had been no reason for him to be angry with Castiel earlier. It had been rude and he hadn't even apologized. Castiel was still angry. He was.

Dean licked his lips then and Castiel silently cursed the other man for his good looks. He wouldn't forgive the man for just smiling—Castiel was not that shallow. He was still angry. At the very least annoyed.

"Cas?"

Dean's voice broke through the filters of Castiel's mind, pulling him away from his thoughts and bringing him back to the present. A present in which Dean was staring at him (probably because Castiel had been staring at the other man first) and had just called him Cas.

"Yes?" he said, glad that his voice came out steady. Castiel wasn't the capricious, quick-to-anger and just as quick to forgive kind of man. Nor was he the sort that developed strong feelings toward others quickly, one way or another. Yet, with one smile and a one-syllable nickname, Castiel knew he was lost.