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One morning Dean stumbles to the kitchen, half-hungover and sore, desperate for caffeine, and there’s black nail polish on Cas’ long fingers. They immediately catch the light as Cas goes to drop his coffee mug on the kitchen table, reaches for the sugar.
Dean blinks and coughs, searching for an explanation in his panic, swallowing down the nervous fire in his throat. But there can’t be a good reason for Cas to paint his fingernails, and so he’s forced to bring it up.
“Babe. You going to a rave later?”
Cas looks down to where Dean points, like he’s already forgotten what he’d done. To Dean’s surprise, he smiles softly, fondly even and flexes his hands to admire the color.
Dean watches and feels another hot tremor work its way through his gut. The paint job is smooth and clean around the edges, not like amateur work at all.
“I just wanted to try it. I did them last night after you went to sleep.”
Insomnia strikes the ex-angel at random intervals. Some weeks he’ll get only an hour or two at night, stumbling around groggy and more confused than usual until the inevitable crash, when the brothers tiptoe around the bunker to let him sleep past noon.
Dean’s accustomed by now to strange YouTube videos on his Internet history, cooking demonstrations in Japanese and clips of opera singers. He doesn’t bat an eye to find a bathroom scrubbed clean in the morning or one of their credit cards out, used for a midnight infomercial purchase. He’d made Cas promise he wouldn’t leave the bunker on his own while he adjusted to life without wings, but now, for the first time, Dean felt truly uncomfortable about what the light of his life got up to during those long nights.
“Okay,” he answers slowly. “So you’re thinkin’ about a new look, is all. Okay. Great.”
Johnny Depp did black nail polish, right? So he could chalk this up to another stupid trend, like the man-bun or whatever the fuck planet kale came from.
Cas stirs his usual five spoonfuls of sugar into his mug.
“I don’t know. Maybe. I like the way it looks.”
The next week, Cas’ nails are not rock-star black. They’re palest pink, and Dean finds himself staring.
“Cas, you can’t go out like that.”
Cas frowns, adjusting his tie with fingertips that gleam like gemstones, so foreign and unnecessary against a black suit. The tie even matches, Dean notices, with flowers in blue and peach, and he resolves to pay closer attention to Cas’ late night shopping sprees.
“Why not?”
“You just can’t, man, Feds don’t paint their nails pink.”
“Yes they do,” Cas insists, folding his arms stubbornly. “We met a detective just last week with lovely red nails.”
Dean bites his lip and walks away to brace himself against the dresser before answering. When he speaks, it’s with a tone of almost condescending patience, and he hates that, he really does, but he just can’t believe he has to spell this out.
“That’s because she was a woman, Cas. Chicks get to do fancy, glittery shit with their bodies, alright? They have lipstick and spray tan, we have extra dough to spend on beer.”
Cas fixes him with a brittle look.
“I don’t really understand that distinction. Up until five months ago, your human constraints of gender, aging, hygiene didn’t apply to me. You know these societal conventions are arbitrary and strange, and truthfully, I-”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Dean cuts him off, and wants to be able to say that’s because Sam is knocking at the door, trying to hurry them along, but in all honesty, he doesn’t want to have this moment. He’s annoyed for reasons he doesn’t understand that Cas’ fingernails match his tie and he’s not prepared to hear whatever Cas has to say about it right now.
In short, he’s a colossal, door-slamming dick, bursting from the room, ignoring Sam’s worried frown, and not speaking til they get to the crime scene.
Cas stays in the back seat, looking down at his hands with an unreadable expression.
A pair of rainbow-striped socks make their way into the laundry. Then a yellow pair with bees and a green pair with dinosaurs and a pair with actual lace at the top. Dean doesn’t say anything when he drops all the socks on Cas’ side of the bed or when the multicolored jumble ends up in their dresser. He gets Cas his own credit card after that.
Dean studies the bottles along the shower’s edge, water dripping off his hair. On one end, there’s a flashy tube of Old Spice and expensive conditioner. On the other, his own cheap bar soap melting over whatever shampoo happened to be on sale last week. But snug in the middle are a pair of black pots and a golden bottle that smells like honey when Dean snaps the cap to take a sniff. He squints at the labels on the pots. The ingredient list reads more like a snack than a soap.
“The hell is LUSH?” he grumbles walking into the library. “Follow-up question: is mango butter for eating?”
Sam keeps tapping away at his computer as he answers vaguely, “It’s an organic bath store. I took Cas the other day while you were getting dinner. And mango butter’s good for your skin, smart guy, you don’t eat it.”
Dean slumps in a chair, fidgeting.
“What’s Cas want that frou-frou crap for?”
“Well, some of us don’t want to smell like gunpowder and motor oil all the time, Dean. That’s not a crime, you know.”
“ ‘Course it’s not, it’s just…” He hesitates. “Isn’t it kind of weird? Cas? With the nail polish and the pink and the girly shower gel?”
Sam’s finally distracted enough to look up from his work, eyebrows meeting in the middle.
“Um, no? He’s human now. He’s figuring out who he is, what he likes, what’s important to him. You, for example. I know exactly what kind of ‘research’ you guys got up to last night…”
Dean waves him off, not about to be derailed by his own sex life (no matter how awesome).
“Figuring out what kind of tacos he likes, yeah, that I get. But he’s a hunter now. Our crowd doesn’t exactly go for spa days.”
Sam frowns.
“That’s what’s bothering you? That Cas might not be the manliest guy around since he fell?”
Dean squirms, feeling way, way in over his head just talking about this stuff.
“I don’t know, man, okay? Maybe? Maybe I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around the idea that the dude I knew, and chose to – ya know, be with – who flew around slaying angels and demons and shit, likes curling up in my bed wearing fuzzy rainbow socks!”
Sam stares back through Dean’s little bitch-fit, disappointment heavy in his eyes.
“Then that’s your issue to work out. If you really love Cas as much as I think you do, you’re going to have to come around to who he’s becoming. Recognize that there’s more to him than you thought.”
Dean opens his mouth to protest, but Sam just slams his laptop shut and bails, leaving him alone with his tangled-up thoughts.
The two of them are stuck in a long line at the supermarket. Cas has been touchy from lack of sleep, shooting down all Dean’s dinner suggestions and leaving half-full cups of tea across the bunker. It’s like living with an oversized toddler. As if to prove that point, Cas grabs a Snickers from the register and throws it moodily in the cart as they wait.
Dean closes his eyes. He breathes in and out, imagining the smell of chicken sizzling, the silence of the bunker. There was a time when being surrounded by so much noise and saddled with a grouchy lover would be enough to drive him out of his skin, make him pick a fight in the parking lot over nothing. Frankly, he’s just too tired for that shit now. Pettiness is exhausting. He only ever wants to go home.
The scent of honey rises under his nose and a warm weight falls against his shoulder, soft hair brushing his neck. Cas is cuddling up against him the grocery store, twining their fingers together, and that’s more than enough to get Dean to open his eyes, a flicker of fear in his throat. They’re in public, after all, Cas’ purple thumbnail rubbing against his hand for the world to see.
But Cas lets out this sleepy little hum like he could finally fall asleep right then and there, and Dean remembers he can just…close his eyes again. Keep the world out of their space until their cart hits the conveyer belt and Cas grumbles about all the work involved in food prep.
Dean’s unwinding after a full day of driving – beer in hand, Netflix going, feet on the table, never mind the dirt – when he realizes he’s been on his own since they rolled back in, hours ago. He pauses his movie (can’t believe he ever thought getting the service was a waste of money) and sets off for a quick tour of the kitchen, garage, dungeon, and his bedroom, which all turn up negative for the rest of Team Free Will. Starting to get worried, he loops down the hall to Sam’s room and catches a deep voice further on.
Dean pops his head into the bathroom. And blinks until he’s convinced what he’s seeing is real.
Cas and Sam are sprawled out on the edge of the bathtub, barefoot and laughing. There’s a mostly empty wine bottle at their feet and grayish clay stuff plastered on both their faces. It’s a scene straight out of Miss Congeniality or something (hey, motel cable doesn’t always leave a lot of options), one Dean knows he’s spoiled immediately.
“Oh, hey!” Sam’s a little too loud, a little too fast in jumping upright once he notices Dean at the door, touching the headband corralling his hair self-consciously.
Cas, for his part, just gives a “Hello, Dean,” and goes right back to patting the clay on his cheeks. He looks comfortable in pajama pants and Dean’s t-shirt, relaxed like Dean never imagined any of them could be after all that they’ve lived through.
“Would you like a facial?” Cas asks calmly, holding out the pot.
Dean swallows hard and fights back his impulse to scream. No, he doesn’t want a facial. He doesn’t want Cas to want a facial either, and the fact that he’s pissed off yet again is triggering alarm bells inside his head because something that’s happening here is wrong, and he’s not too sure it’s on Cas’ end.
Instead of answering, he picks up the wine bottle and drains the last bit – speaking of wasting money, the gas station sticker reads $7.99, and what an expensive way to get drunk – before dropping a kiss to Cas’ clay-free temple. He goes back to his movie, to keep himself from further ruining whatever his brother and Cas are creating together. Because he doesn’t understand at all, but maybe there’s a chance Sam does, and Dean guesses that’s something.
Cas’ smile is wide and warm and more than a little smug as he opens the plastic bag in the car to show Dean.
“I spent the beer money on lipstick.”
And maybe it’s just shock that compels Dean to ask, “What color?”
Sometimes, Dean misses the feel of a puffy nipple going stiff under his lips. He remembers silky wet warmth and small heels digging into his back, and really, he can’t ever say if the guilt that comes is from missing these things or from not missing them all that much anymore.
Now his world is thick, hairy thighs. It’s chapped lips on his neck and chest and cock, walls of muscle that hold firm against each thrust. Even as a human, Cas is so strong. God, but it’s pure, them together like this, and forbidden and honest and alive, transcending anything Dean’s ever felt with another person. It’s not just because he’s got a dick too, Dean realizes, stroking Cas and wanting nothing more than to see him come.
It’s just…Cas.
“I don’t get it.”
Cas sighs in frustration and looks back to Sam perched on the counter, who offers an encouraging nod. When Cas turns to Dean again, Sam shoots his brother a meaningful glare instead: Try harder, you jerk.
Cas starts over.
“I want you to call me by ‘she’ today. Just to try it out. Just to see if it feels right. I’ve only been a man for a few months, but I’m not sure I want to be one. I don’t like having those limitations, now that this body is mine for the rest of my life. I don’t….feel as strongly about manhood as you do, Dean. I think I want more. Today I want to be your girlfriend, and I want to hear you call me that.”
“But I don’t get it,” Dean repeats, also frustrated, because he really doesn’t. “It’s not that simple, you don’t just decide to be a girl one day.”
“Why not, Dean?” Cas is inches away from yelling now, hands balled up in fists. “Why can’t it be that simple? Just because you’ve never heard of something happening doesn’t mean it’s not real; you’re a hunter, you know that! The first time we met, you didn’t believe I was an angel. That was years ago. Why can’t you believe me now, when I tell you I’m no more a man today than I was then?”
There’s silence in the kitchen while Dean works through that one, tries to piece together the chaotic shards of everything he’s known or thought he’s known about Cas since the night in the barn.
“So…” For some reason he can’t quite meet Cas’ eye, so he talks to the orange-painted nails peeking out of those fists. “So you’re a girl now? That’s how this is gonna be?”
Cas shakes hi – no, her head, and Dean winces a little, correcting himself, but at least he can make it happen.
“Not quite. I don’t really think that suits me either, but I’d still like to try it. I’d appreciate you trying it with me.”
He just nods. There doesn’t seem to be anything else to say, but Cas looks relieved.
“Thank you, Dean.”
With just the three of them, he can get by without using pronouns much at all as it turns out. ‘Cas’ jacket,’ ‘The insomniac’s napping,’ and it’s easy, but it doesn’t feel right, and Dean knows why.
It’s a coward’s move.
He sleeps badly that night, and in the morning, he waits until Cas is brushing her teeth before asking, hesitantly.
Cas looks at him in the mirror, spits out the toothpaste.
“Yes. Still a girl.”
She replaces her toothbrush in the cup next to Dean’s and frowns, reconsidering.
“Still not a man, anyway. We should pick up ketchup while we’re out this afternoon.”
It’s starting to stress Dean out, how much time he spends just thinking now.
He practices to himself while driving, murmuring, “Girlfriend, girlfriend, my girlfriend Cas,” and remembers Crowley’s snarling taunts, calling Cas his boyfriend to mock him, them.
He rolls his eyes and spits out, “Nice going, Samantha” when his brother tracks mud inside only to feel a cold pit in the bottom of his stomach.
He stops complaining about the glittery little nail polish bottles crowding the sink because when Cas reaches for the polish remover instead, he kind of misses the color.
He sleeps a little better though.
It occurs to Dean that his brother doesn’t seem very inconvenienced by the switch. He gets nowhere thinking about that.
Cas glares at him across the table and growls, “Don’t call me that.”
Dean stares in disbelief. After two weeks of struggle, dry-mouthed choking with effort, he can finally say, “my beautiful girlfriend” and mean every word. Only to have Cas throw it right back.
“But you said-”
“I know what I said, Dean!” She’s not just annoyed, but angry. “Listen to what I’m saying now! Don’t call me that today. Don’t call me ‘she’ either.”
Cas gets up and stalks out of the kitchen, leaving Dean with no clues to fix whatever he’s done wrong. So he lets her...him...go. (The change back is harder than he expects) And when Cas doesn't come to bed, he lets that go too. A night apart won't kill them. But then Sam wakes him up in the morning with a case - werewolf mauling, a two-man job but urgent - and Dean wavers hard before leaving Cas alone in front of the TV. He should stay, make sure this thing is going to blow over. A half-hearted goodbye dies in his throat.
When they roll back in, thirty-six hours later, Cas hasn't moved. He barely looks up from the tube, doesn't ask what he's missed or apologize for the empty junk food boxes and Dean's stomach drops because he's seen this movie before. But Cas' eyes are red from being open too long, not some illicit substance. Dean allows himself a private sigh of relief, re-doubles his promise to watch Cas' spending. He tosses a heavy bag of Tupperware on the table.
"Brought you back some real food. Jody sends her best, girls are doing great - Claire got herself a sword. They say you're due for a visit."
"Thank you, I'll eat later," Cas answers in a tone that hints he won't. The silver polish on his nails is chipped. Dean clicks his tongue and decides to risk bodily harm by thumbing the power button on the TV and plopping down across the table.
"C'mon, man. What's going on with you?"
Cas closes his eyes and inhales deeply, making it a sharp, irritated noise.
"Not a man, Dean. I'm not a man, not a woman, not anything really, just a Graceless creature trapped in this...decaying flesh prison."
"Hey now." Dean brushes off the slight to his species. " 'S not all bad though, right? You got pizza and blow jobs and dreams that aren't nightmares, hmm? Remember your one about the Ferris wheel for puppies? And what about, ya know, lipstick and that new eye shadow with the fuckin' glitter in it?"
The snort Cas gives is not encouraging.
"Right. Lipstick. As if that could compete with the facial hair I have to shave off every single day in order to tell the world I’m not male, or grow out to definitively prove that I am." He rubs his own fuzzy cheeks with both hands, scrubbing at the hair like it's smothering him. His eyes close again.
“How can you do it, Dean? Be a human, be a man for all your life? Perform this elaborate show of gender for decades, and feel good about it? Does it even feel good for you? Are you happy being a man?”
Dean wets his lips and it’s a testament to how deep in love he is for this greasy-haired angel brushing Cheeto dust from Dean's old jeans that he actually tries to think about an answer.
“Yeah,” he finally murmurs, so soft he has to repeat himself. “Yeah, babe, I am. But…not- not always.” He rolls his eyes up toward the ceiling, gathering himself, and Cas follows the motion, frowning, listening.
“I didn’t know, alright? With Dad breathing down my neck all those years, making sure I believed that bein’ tough was the only way to survive this life and there couldn’t be any room in the car or the day for anything pretty, anything nice. If he could see the way we live now, three kinds of coffee creamer and fabric softener in every load…” He shakes his head, wills himself to remember it doesn’t matter now.
“I didn’t know there could be more. Never thought I could have a real kitchen, with beer in the fridge and dishtowels in the drawer and still be me. Never thought I could have you. There’s more to all this human crap than people make you believe, okay? You just gotta do you. If you don’t wanna be a dude, it’s nobody’s freakin’ business but yours. Same if being a chick’s not working out either. I don’t understand what’s going on with you all the time, but I’m not going anywhere, you got that?”
Cas sits up straight. His eyes, still red and exhausted-looking, run up and down Dean like he’s looking for something but then he reaches for Dean and when he speaks, he sounds sure.
“Okay. Yes.”
A week goes by before Cas decides to try out womanhood again. For a few days after, she’s still scruffy-faced, but then a package comes to their P.O. box addressed to Castiel Winchester, and inside is a dress.
Cas is ecstatic. She’s modeling it in the library before Dean even has his boots off. Sam admires it, her, and his smile says he means it. Dean is back to not talking. He still doesn’t trust himself not to ask, “Why?” so instead he just looks. Watches the way the silky fabric slides over Cas’ bare thighs. Sees the muscle of her stomach flex against the tight waist. Follows the dip of her collarbone down to where cleavage would show if she had any.
And yeah, it’s okay.
This is just Cas. Cas happy, smiling, safe. Not covered in blood or Leviathan goop or entrails. Cas in a dress.
He stays quiet, but he catches Cas’ eye, pulls her to him to touch the soft blue material. Gives everything he’s got into a long, meandering kiss, and Cas responds with an understanding press of fingertips to the sides of his face. He doesn’t hear Sam leave the room.
“Mix them up, use them both.”
“Are you serious? What, like, There goes Cas, she likes playing that weird cat game and never remembers to bring his damn dishes to the sink?”
“Yes!” Cas laughs, but he’s not joking.
“Dude-sorry-babe, I dunno about that one. But yeah, I’ll try.”
They don’t have an anniversary. Even if he could remember a date, of the first time Cas touched his shoulder and didn’t let go, the first time they melted into each other under the sheets, the first time he whispered that dangerous word into her ear, it still wouldn’t feel right, celebrating just one day as the start to all this. But, hell. As long as they make the drive to a decent-sized city, maybe one where those god-awful flags wave from a few store windows, sometimes they can get a free dessert out of a night out.
Cas looks handsome and pretty and sexy as all fuck in a suit and red nail polish, black stuff lining his eyes. When their waiter comes over for the first time, Dean’s heart starts to race, as it always does, preparing for a fight, hating itself for doubting. Cas never seems to worry though. And somehow, it usually turns out alright.
(There have been times, dark days, when people stare too long, and some of them finally come over and say something and Dean’s fears are confirmed. He wishes he could say he handles it well, but they’ve been banned from a few restaurants dotting the middling states and Cas does not thank him for it, even as her eyes linger on his bloodied knuckles during those silent drives home.)
Cas smiles more easily these days, Dean thinks, watching him over their plates. It’s a good thing to look at, an even better thing to put on Cas’ face himself, firing off crazy little jokes and flirtations just to see that soft grin.
They’re picking at the ice cream melting into the crumbs of their free chocolate cake (their sixth anniversary, Dean told the guy, feeling bold) when the check comes and Dean reaches for his wallet absentmindedly before he notices Cas already laid down a slim stack of bills.
“C’mon babe, you don’t have to do that.”
“Don’t have to do what?”
“You know, pay.” Dean drops his voice on the last word and it comes out awkward, like there’s a secret underneath.
Cas treats him to a spectacular, Sam-worthy eye-roll and pushes the money toward the edge of the table.
“Dean, I love you, but you’re a less than impressive breadwinner.”
Wincing at the blow to his pride and dropping his voice again, Dean answers, “Yeah, but can I at least feel like I’m taking care of you? My cards are fake, sure, but what we’ve got is real, baby.”
He can’t blame Cas for rolling her eyes this time. The little smile that follows though makes it worth it.
They stand to leave at the same time, Cas picking up her bag (this Dean can see the appeal of, it’s handy having somewhere to stash money or an extra blade, even if that somewhere is in bright blue leather), Dean reaching for his jacket only to have Cas snatch that up too. He barely has time for a half-formed “Wha-?” before Cas is holding it out by the shoulders, coaxing him into letting her help put it on. He huffs and allows it, letting loose a snort when Cas wraps an arm around his waist and whispers huskily, “Let me take care of you, baby.”
“Okay, hell, I get the point!” They reach the car, swaying into each other in laughter, and Cas lets go. “I’ll cool it with the macho crap. Besides, ‘s nice, letting you pick up the tab sometimes. How’d you get all that cash, anyway?”
Cas settles in the passenger’s seat with a happy little hum.
“Same way you and Sam do, at the pool table. No one expects the guy in lipstick and heels to screw them over that badly.”
There’s a sale at Victoria’s Secret, one afternoon when they stop by a mall to kill time during a case. Dean’s intrigued, but bashful, hovering awkwardly near the door until someone drags him back to the fitting room. The girls all love Cas. They coo at him over the door and bring him armfuls of sparkly, lacy things; padded bras and tiny underwear and colorful stuff made of silk. All of it has Dean’s pulse skyrocketing – in a good way, for once – but none of it compares to Cas herself once he’s thrust into the tiny room.
He buys everything. For a long, long time, he forgets to miss silky, wet warmth under those scraps of lace. And if one pair of plain, pink undies ends up on his side of the dresser? Well, that’s nobody’s freakin’ business.
Dean flexes his tired knuckles against the steering wheel and feels the adrenaline in his veins finally start to cool. In the back seat, Sam’s conked out enough to snore lightly; beside him, Cas watches the road too. There’s blood crackling dry on all of them, one of many souvenirs of the night, along with a cut across Cas’ forehead, a dull ache in Dean’s shoulder.
And yet, Cas is making a face that’s almost a smile, Dean notices when he shifts to flip on the heat. Could be a wince, from the way dried mud crinkles at the corner of her eye. But no. Cas looks down at his hands and huffs softly, laughing to himself.
“What’s got you giggling at 4 AM, covered in vamp guts?”
“It’s just kind of funny. That clerk at the liquor store still calls me sir every time we go in, but the vampire who tried to tear off my arm stops to make sure it’s your girlfriend she’s tying up. Funny it’s the monster who thinks to ask.”
She’s right, Dean realizes. It is funny. Not in a ha-ha way, but like how that same clerk looks at him different now, treating Cas like an infection that’s spread to Dean. How a touch of color in the wrong places could do that.
Exhaustion loosens his lips.
“Might be easier, if you choose, you know. One side or another.”
“Yes, I know. Abandoning masculinity entirely, or trying harder at it. Ambiguity makes people uncomfortable. Makes you uncomfortable.”
Sam keeps snoring. Dean’s shoulder hurts more when he shrugs.
“Doesn’t matter.”
“It shouldn’t,” Cas agrees with a sigh. “We’ve had to give up so much of ourselves. But I’ve been in love with you for a very long time Dean, and I do care what my choices mean for you. Be honest. Would you prefer that I was your girlfriend? Only your girlfriend?”
It’s a simple enough question, and he should have a simple answer in return but he doesn’t. No shameful ‘yes’ or righteous ‘no’ comes to Dean.
Instead, he just looks at Cas. She can’t read his mind anymore, he knows, but sometimes it’s hard to believe that’s true.
Sure enough, Cas smiles. His eyes are warm and so is his hand when he reaches to take Dean’s from the steering wheel.
“What’d you tell the vamp girl, anyway?”
“I said it didn’t matter what she called me, because my boyfriend was coming to kick her ass.”