Chapter Text
The teenage Gas-N-Sip cashier leaned on her elbows, grinning. The couple had walked in bickering, and they weren’t stopping as they approached the counter.
“Hey, two for one sale,” Dean Winchester said, flashing a shit-eating grin over his shoulder at the angel in the trench coat behind him. He proceeded to snag four, not two, bags of spicy pork rinds.
“Dean,” Castiel leveled, gravelly as ever, “You know Sam doesn’t like it when you eat things like that in the Impala.”
“It’s my car,” Dean answered.
“I was trying to be delicate,” Castiel admitted, sighing. He spared a glance to the cashier and leaned in towards Dean, lowering his voice. “Sam thinks they cause you undue flatulence, which, of course, doesn’t bother me, as my senses are—”
“Damnit, Cas, come on!” Dean huffed, indignantly grabbing two more bags and piling them into the crook of his arm. “To spite you both,” he muttered, jabbing a finger at Castiel as he passed for the checkout counter.
The bells on the door jingled, heralding Sam’s arrival. He threw out his arms and called across to Dean, “Dude, what’s taking so long?”
“Dean’s trying to spite us with…” Castiel squinted at the bags of pork rinds remaining on the shelf. “The fried skin of pigs. Which doesn’t seem—”
“Dude, what?” Sam rolled his eyes, turning back to Dean, who was doling out dollar bills to the cashier.
“Two for one, Sammy,” Dean answered simply as Castiel approached the counter.
“I told him of your objections,” Castiel said sagely to Sam. “Dean was unconcerned.”
“I’m right here, Cas,” Dean grumbled.
“You know those make you gassy,” Sam leveled at Dean.
“Oh, like you aren’t toxic after you’ve—”
“Sam’s not exactly wrong, Dean, though again, I’m—”
Dean and Castiel talked over one another, Dean bitching at his brother, Castiel doing his best to defuse the feuding brothers, with Sam joining the chorus of complaints with his own until only snippets of individual words made it out of the chaos, everything else devolving into gruff, masculine grumbling.
“So like, how long have you guys been together?” cut in the high-pitched voice of the cashier as she bagged Dean’s pork rinds. All three men went silent.
“Yeah, that’s my brother, Mandy,” Dean said, squinting at the cashier’s nametag.
She shook her head at Dean and popped her gum, nodding towards Castiel. “No, the other guy. Blue eyes over there.”
Dean blinked back his shock and Sam’s lips turned up into a silent, satisfied smirk, that only grew larger when Castiel, having misread the situation, answered, “I believe it’s been eight, or six, if we logically subtract the years I was—”
“Cas!” Dean interrupted, his face all hard lines and blush.
“What?” Cas said, blinking at Dean. He turned to Sam, then, and asked with total sincerity, brows knitting, “Is my math incorrect?”
“No, nope, that’s—sounds right to me Cas,” Sam said, practically beaming. Dean remained silent and slack-jawed, though his gaze hardened to something sinister at his brother.
“Figured as much,” the cashier said, shrugging happily before backtracking, “I mean, not that—it’s cool, I have two moms. I just meant you guys argue like they do.”
“This is amazing,” said Sam, running a hand through his hair. “I just found our angle for getting in on this new case I caught.”
“Shut up, Sam,” Dean griped, snatching his bag of pork rinds and stalking for the exit.
***
Dean was silent for most of the drive—all eight hours of it—while Sam and Cas chatted happily about lore. Sam never missed an opportunity to pick the angel’s brain when they had him trapped in the Impala, and Castiel was always happy to oblige Sam’s curiosity.
“So what about, like, domesticity?” Sam asked, and then intentionally pushed, watching Dean bristle from the corner of his eye. “Do angels settle down? Get married, have kids, the whole nine?”
“In a sense,” Cas said, leaning up on the middle seat. “But it isn’t like your human marriages. We’re more…partners. More about loyalty than romance—that’s a concept angels don’t understand. Unless, of course, we fall.”
Castiel’s eyes trailed from Sam to the rearview mirror as he spoke, where he briefly met Dean’s green gaze. It was quick as a blink, but Sam didn’t miss it.
“So, no kids then?” Sam prodded.
“Not in the way you’re thinking,” Cas answered, looking at Sam once more. “Angels do copulate and bear offspring, obviously. You’ve heard of the Nephilim, I’m sure—the forbidden children of humans and angels. But remember,” Cas gestured down to his body, “We don’t look like this. These are vessels. Your ideas of sex are—well, frankly, limited. And birth is more like the creation of stars. The bonds of parenthood are tenuous at best. And gender, of course, is a human construct, fully irrelevant to angels.”
“Huh,” Sam said, chewing the inside of his cheek, resisting the urge to peer over at Dean, who he could practically feel seething beside him. “Did you ever have any kids? A—partner?”
“Alright, enough,” Dean finally interjected gruffly. “You’ve been grilling the poor guy for hours, Sam.”
“I don’t mind,” Castiel said quietly, staring Dean down in rearview mirror. Finally, when it became obvious Dean wouldn’t look back, he said to Sam, “No, I never did. I was a soldier, was meant to be from my inception. There was never opportunity for partnership.”
“Right,” said Sam, and then, “Does it bother you?”
“Enough, Sam,” said Dean.
“It doesn’t,” said Castiel simply, though his gaze slid back to Dean, where it remained as the brothers spoke.
“Tell me about the case,” Dean said, changing the subject brusquely.
“Something is snatching parents from a local high school,” Sam said, clearing his throat. “The article I read said they were all from the same PTA group.”
“Fantastic,” said Dean. “So, what—I’m going to be a P.E. teacher again?”
“Well, actually I was thinking…” Sam began, his gaze trailing back to Castiel.
“What?” Dean said, and then caught Sam’s gaze. “Wait—no. No way. Why don’t you two play house, huh?”
“Because one of the parents was a teacher, and I already sent in fake documents saying I could be a substitute,” said Sam.
“I could be a sub,” Dean scoffed.
“Dean, not to be a dick, but you didn’t go to college.”
“So? I got my GED. We’ll watch some Magic Schoolbus.”
“You know I probably won’t actually be teaching,” Sam said, sighing. “I need to get into the teacher’s lounge, have access to files…besides, you heard that girl at the gas station. You guys kindof vibe. You’d be our in at the PTA” he finished, looking from Dean to Castiel.
“I’m not opposed to it, but I don’t want to make Dean uncomfortable,” said Castiel.
“Okay, this is stupid. I’m not uncomfortable,” Dean griped.
“So you’ll do it?” asked Sam.
“Yes, fine, whatever,” Dean answered indignantly.
“Good,” said Sam, grinning. “Because I already called Claire. Congrats, guys: you’ve got a teenage daughter.”
“I hate you,” said Dean. “So much.”
“I know you do,” Sam said, grinning.
The car fell into a comfortable pseudo-silence. Dean turned up the radio and focused on the road. Sam stared down at his phone, researching the case. Castiel sat quietly in the backseat, watching Dean, smiling barely to himself.
***
Claire had been working a job closer to the plagued high school and beat the boys there. She scoped out the area and found a small, but unoccupied and still mostly-furnished foreclosure home in a suburban neighborhood close enough to the school that the bus ran down the street. She plucked the sign from the yard, picked the lock, texted Sam the address, and had already claimed the biggest bedroom by the time the Impala grumbled up the drive.
“Good work, Claire,” Sam said in lieu of hello, giving the girl a side-squeeze.
“Thanks,” said Claire, and then smirked at Dean and Castiel. “So, who’s Dad and who’s Daddy? Our last name’s Jones, by the way. Keep it simple, easier to fake the IDs.”
“Shut up,” Dean said, rolling his eyes.
“It’s good to see you again, Claire,” said Castiel, smiling, but cautious. Things with Claire had improved, but she still needed distance from the body of her father inhabited by someone else.
“You too,” she answered simply. “So, my guess is we won’t be here more than a week tops, but I took the master bedroom anyway. But the other one’s cozy. Got a twin bed and everything.”
“There’s only two bedrooms?” Dean said, wheeling around to gawk at Claire, who nodded. “We are not sharing a bed,” he pointed at Castiel.
“Of course, Dean,” said Castiel simply. “I don’t sleep.”
“Glad that’s settled,” said Sam. “Let’s get going. Mr. and Mr. Jones, you have a PTA meeting in an hour.”