After class on Monday, Dean, Sam, Charlie, and Dorothy met up at the bar just off campus called The Roadhouse. As they walked in the door, Ellen stopped wiping down the bar long enough to wave.
"Hey, guys. How's class going, Dean?" she asked. Dean rolled his eyes and followed the rest to their usual table, a circular booth in the back corner of the bar. Ellen resumed wiping with a satisfied smirk on her face. The four of them sat down, and right away, Jo brought out three beers and a root beer for Sam.
"You know, Jo," he said, "I could probably pass for 21."
Jo smiled sweetly, "Don't make me start carding you guys." Sam accepted his root beer graciously. He propped his wrapped ankle up with a wince across booth. Dean looked at Sam's ankle out of the corner of his eye as he shoved his backpack to the floor.
"And you did that tripping up the stairs?" he asked.
Sam nodded, "Yeah, and…?"
"We live on the second floor. It's only one flight of stairs," he said, "You twisted your ankle on one flight of stairs. I know you're not the most graceful kid, but damn."
"What does the amount of stairs in our building have anything to do with—"
Dean's phone rang loudly. It was Cassie. His heart stopped for a second and not in a good way. He always worried Cassie would call to tell him how she got badly injured while in training or something equally devastating.
He answered her call, "Hi."
"Dean!" she said loudly. There was quite a bit of static on her end. He wasn't quite surprised since she was currently in Germany, and she was using a pretty crappy cell phone.
"Hey, Cassie. What's up?" he asked.
She said, "I'm coming home soon." That was certainly unexpected. Cassie had been in the army for a little under a year, so her coming home had been pretty far from Dean's mind.
"What?" he asked, excited.
"Oh, shit," she said, voice muffled.
Then, the line went dead.
"Cassie?" Dean said, checking his phone.
When he saw they'd been disconnected, he muttered, "Dammit."
Charlie raised her eyebrows at him. He was about to explain when his phone rang again.
He picked up instantly and said, "Cassie?"
"Uh, no," Lisa said.
"Oh, hey, Lisa. I thought is was—"
"Cassie, yeah. Is she why you don't want to move in? Never mind, that's not why I called."
"Wait, what? No, I—" he stammered.
"I need you to watch Ben tonight; I have to work," she said.
Dean thanked whatever powers-that-be that he had enough money saved up from working over the summer with Benny at Rufus' garage that he didn't have to work during the school year. It helped that Sam and Dean had inherited money from their parents' life insurance policies and were able to use a trust fund that their mom had gotten from her father, so they did not have to worry about paying for school or housing. Still, anything else had to come out of pocket, and Dean had been lucky enough to get on Rufus' good side over the summer.
"Sure," he answered quickly, "And I'm just not ready to move in. It has nothing to do with Cassie." Sam eyed Dean and shared a confused glance with Charlie.
Lisa sighed in Dean's ear; "I'm not getting into this over the phone." She quickly told him to pick up Ben by 6pm and hung up. He pocketed his phone quickly.
Charlie glanced at Dorothy and fixed Dean with a stare, "Umm, Dean? What?"
Dean got up from his spot on their circle booth and said, "Cassie said she's coming home."
Before anyone could ask anything more, he quickly walked over the where his friend, Benny, was playing foosball against some kid with tousled black hair and bright blue eyes who was staring at Dean with enough intensity that Benny scored against the guy completely uncontested by any of the miniature players. It was seriously unnerving.
Dean walked to Benny's side and said, "Nice shot." Benny opponent dropped his gaze from Dean awkwardly. Was it legal to have eyes that blue?
"You want to play next, Winchester?" Benny asked him. Dean looked over at Sam, Charlie, and Dorothy who were alternating between looking at him and talking amongst themselves. He knew they wouldn't come over since, for whatever reason, they didn't like Benny.
Dean answered, "Sure."
He only felt slightly guilty for using Benny as a human shield. He hadn't told them about Lisa pressuring him to move in, because he knew he didn't want to, and frankly it was his problem to deal with, but damn, he didn't want to talk about it now. Just before Benny won what was probably the easiest and most one sided game of foosball known to man, Dean's phone rang. He didn't recognize the number.
"Hello?" he answered.
"Dean! Finally! I hate my stupid phone," Cassie said.
Dean walked away from the foosball table with his phone to his ear.
"What happened?" Dean asked.
She laughed, "My piece of crap cell phone won't hold a signal for shit. My old phone would've been fine with international calls."
Dean rolled his eyes with a smile on his face.
"You know," he said, "I don't know how many times I have to tell you this, but losing your phone on that roller coaster was not my fault."
"Tell that to my missing phone," she teased. He laughed and changed the subject.
"So, you were saying you're coming home?" he asked.
She said, "Yeah, I should be home in a month or so. They just told us today. It's just a holiday leave, but we definitely need to catch up."
He answered, "Can't wait. I miss you, Cassie."
"Well, I'll let you know when I have a more concrete date," she said, "But I'll be home soon. I miss you, too, Dean."
Before he could say anything else, she said, "Hey. I have to go. It's a lot later here than it is there. It was nice talking to you."
She hung up.
Worry wormed its way into Dean's stomach. He was certainly happy about being able to see Cassie. Even though they didn't talk often, he still considered her one of his best friends. But it had been a while since he'd seen her. He wondered if she was still the bubbly, dark-skinned girl he'd known for so long and had even dated at one point, or if being in the military had changed her in some big way. She'd been in for so long that, even though her absence had started with Dean worrying constantly about Cassie getting hurt or winding up dead, he had gotten to the point that he only missed her when he thought about her, which truthfully wasn't very often.
Lately, he'd though about her more frequently since she'd probably be the only person he'd feel comfortable talking to about his problems with Lisa. Cassie dated him once; she knew how stupid he could be with relationships. She would probably be able to give him some good advice. Even if his and Lisa's problem couldn't be fixed, talking to Cassie would at least make him feel better. But he still had to wait.
Dean put away his phone and went back over to Benny, who had engaged in a rematch with the blue-eyed boy. Maybe 'boy' was the wrong word. He looked to be about Dean's age, anyway. He checked his watch, realized he had a half hour to pick up Ben, and said a quick goodbye to Benny.
Going back to their table, he slowly approached the awkward and uncomfortable stares of Charlie and Sam. Dorothy must've gone to get more food. He took a breath and reached for his backpack on the floor behind Sam's feet.
"Dean," Sam said. Dean didn't have time for this.
"I don't want to talk about it right now," he said, "I'm not moving out, so don't worry. I've got to go pick up Ben. See you guys at home."
Dean arrived at Lisa's at 6:09pm, earning him a baleful glare from Ben's mom.
He ignored her and said, "Hey, kiddo. Ready to go?" Ben bounded up to him and reached for his hand.
"Dean! I have to show you something! I HAVE TO SHOW YOU SOMETHING!" Ben shouted, hyper as all hell. Dean could see the brewing argument in Lisa's eyes. Her look told him they would be resuming their discussion later.
Swallowing his anxiety over what that would entail, he picked up Ben with one arm and said, "You have to show me something? What is it?"
Dean waved a quick goodbye to Lisa as Ben started babbling about the gold tar he'd gotten on his drawing in class and how his kindergarten teacher said the star meant he was special. He didn't try to hide how proud he was of Ben's gold star as they made their way to Dean's apartment.