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In a fairly spacious and definitely well–loved apartment in Lawrence, a retired monster hunter was attempting to balance a sword on its pommel. He followed the movement of the weight, and for a few moments, it stood upright, unsupported, but then, traitorously, it dipped to the side. The hunter followed the movement, almost falling off of his chair as he did.
The door opened, and Castiel entered his and Dean’s bedroom. He blanched as he saw Dean drop the sword and catch it by the blade and was about to shout, when —
“Relax!” Dean said with a smile. “It’s foam.”
Castiel peered at the sword, and realised it was indeed foam — the seam of the mould was visible, as well as the blemishes in the paint — and that Dean’s hand was entirely intact.
“Oh,” Castiel said, blinking.
“Charlie gave it to me,” Dean said, by way of explanation, and put it on his desk. He spun around in his chair, watching Castiel pull off his work vest, unbutton his shirt to shrug it off and remove his slacks, then replace them with pyjamas — a matching flannel set, blue and green. “It was meant to be a birthday present but shipping was a bitch,” he continued, “‘s a LARP sword.”
Cas hummed to indicate he had heard Dean, then moved past him to retrieve a book from the shelf — Romeo and Juliet, in Spanish — giving Dean a kiss on the forehead as he passed.
Dean grinned and spun back around again. He’d finished up at the store about an hour ago, sorting out all the new stuff that Jody had ordered in. He was getting used to managing a business, slowly but surely.
“How’re Sammy and Eileen doing?” Dean asked as Cas settled into the armchair nestled by the window.
“They’re doing well. Sam is helping Jack colour. Eileen says dinner will be ready in ten.”
Dean nodded and leaned back in the chair, feeling warm contentment spread through his chest. The apartment smelled like bolognese, the heat was on low, the light was dim, and there was a framed photo of him and Cas, Claire, Jack, Charlie, and — well, everyone on his desk.
He was finally, and without any strings attached, happy.
After a few minutes of pages turning and Dean tapping through a wave of messages from Charlie of photos from Dean’s birthday lunch that she’d forgotten to send when they actually had the lunch — two months ago, in fact — there were tiny footsteps up the hall to Dean and Cas’ room. Dean looked up just as Jack won a struggle with the door handle that he was only just tall enough to reach and skipped in.
“Dada! Papa! Look what I made!” he said happily, waving a piece of paper.
Dean grinned at his son and lifted him up to set him down in his lap. “What’d you make, kiddo?”
Jack enthusiastically thrust the paper into Dean’s chest until he took it. “I did a drawing for you!”
Dean took the paper with a smile. A crayon bee and flower garden — all of the flowers had smiles — and a sun in the corner. Dean’s smile widened.
“I love it,” he said and pressed a kiss to Jack’s forehead. “Y’know what? I think I’m gonna put it… right here!” As he spoke, Dean turned so he could reach a magnet that was sitting on the corner of his whiteboard, and stuck the drawing up.
Jack giggled happily, and bounced back and forth in Dean’s lap. “Papa!” he called over to Castiel, who had been watching over his reading glasses for the past few minutes. “Come look at my drawing!”
Castiel smiled, put a bookmark in his book, and came over to stand behind Dean’s chair and peer at the drawing. “It’s perfect,” he said, ruffling Jack’s hair. “I love the bee.”
“Did you do your homework with Mommy and Pops?” Dean asked Jack.
“Yeah! It was some, ummm, maths and spelling! Pops says I’m good at maths.”
“You sure are, kid,” Dean said and gave Jack a hug. He still wasn’t quite used to his new, tiny frame, but he was getting there.
Castiel had returned to his seat by the window and his Spanish Shakespeare. Dean spun around with Jack, thanked him again for the drawing, then asked him about his day at school.
“It was good! Umm, there’s a boy in my class — his name’s Eric — ‘nd, uh, he said that you’re gay? I don’t know what that means.”
Dean blinked at his son. “Oh, well — ” he looked at Cas, who frowned, then shrugged. “Uh, well, y’know how Papa ‘nd me are married?”
Jack nodded eagerly, his hair flopping around as he did. Dean brushed it to the side absentmindedly as he continued. “And that we’re both boys? Um, Mommy and Pops are married too, but that Pops is a boy and Mom’s a girl?”
“Uh–huh.”
“Well,” Dean said, gathering some confidence as he went, “Some boys like girls, like Pops, and some like boys, like Papa!”
“What about you?” Jack asked, his tiny voice squeaking up into a questioning tone.
With ease that only came from plenty of practice and a lot of reassurance, Dean said promptly, “I’m bisexual. I like boys and girls.”
“Oooh, that’s cool!” Jack bounced again, grinning.
“Yeah. Mom is kinda similar too — she’s pansexual, which means she likes everyone regardless of their gender.”
“What’s a gender?” Jack tilted his head in confusion, just like Cas. Something that felt very much like peace unfurled in Dean’s chest then bubbled up into joy at the sight of his son.
He laughed. “I think that too sometimes. Um, it’s whether you’re a boy or a girl, or neither, or somewhere in between.”
“Or all of them,” Cas chimed in from his chair, where he was half focused on Romeo and Juliet.
“Or all of them,” Dean amended.
Jack looked thoughtful for a moment, digesting the new information, then nodded. “That’s cool. How do you know if you’re gay? Or um — pans… pans... ”
“Pansexual?” Dean finished for him.
Jack nodded.
“You don’t need to worry about that just yet, kiddo,” Dean said, somewhat hesitantly. He wasn’t sure how to go about these things. He looked to Cas for some sort of indication of how he was doing, and Cas showed no obvious disapproval, so, go figure? “But if you ever want us to call you something different — a different name or anything like that — just let us know, okay?”
“Okay!”
Dean smiled, then gave his son a hug.
As he let go, Sam called from the kitchen, “dinner’s almost ready!”
“How about you go help Mommy and Pops set the table, huh?”
Jack grinned, gap–toothed and gummy — “Okay!” — and he scrambled down to the floor and darted out the door.
There was a tiny thundering of sock–softened footsteps down the hall and some muffled conversation in the kitchen, but otherwise, Castiel and Dean’s room lay in a comfortable silence for a few moments as dishes clattered and Sam laughed.
“We should probably get to dinner,” Cas remarked.
Dean turned around to face his husband. “Yeah, probably,” he said, studying closely how the warm light softened Cas’ features and reflected in his glasses. He wanted to keep this moment forever — gentle comfort and easy domesticity, soft smiles and the clanging of silverware — and tried to etch it into his mind as best he could.
Then Cas looked up, and the moment broke, but that was fine, because there was plenty of affection in Castiel’s gaze; acute fondness that, after so many years marred by misunderstanding and missed opportunities, Dean finally understood what it was.
Castiel smiled very gently at Dean, the corners of his eyes creasing — crow’s feet, Dean recalled, but crows were some terrible omen, and whenever Cas’ eyes creased it meant he was happy, which made Dean happy too, so perhaps they should be renamed — and put his glasses aside, marking his page.
Dean stood as Cas did, and he met his husband in the middle of the green striped rug Sam had insisted they buy ( “It’s cool! It matches the painting!” ). Cas took his hands in his own — both calloused from years of heavy use. Dean’s hands were scarred and roughed up, and Castiel’s had a cut that had almost healed on his right palm, from the warding he had made several lifetimes ago.
Dean brought Cas’ hand up to his mouth and kissed his knuckles, gently, reverently. Castiel breathed slowly, deeply.
“We took forever gettin’ here, huh?” Dean said quietly, lips brushing against the back of Castiel’s hand.
Cas shifted in front of him before answering, and pressed his cheek against the side of Dean’s bowed neck. His husband’s skin was warm against his own. “Yes,” Castiel said finally, and brought one hand down to Dean’s waist as if they were dancing. “But no matter the time it took, there’s nowhere else I’d rather be.”
Every tiny bit of tension melted from Dean at Castiel’s words. He smiled tearily, and pressed his face into Cas’ neck.
And then they were dancing — the world moving around them was background noise now, a gentle melody of comfort that Dean swayed in time to, dancing with Cas to a song only they could hear. It was slow, and they moved accordingly, making up for lost time. Making up for every time they’d hurtled straight by any sort of kindness, every time they had to miss out on good things because they were too busy saving the world whenever it upended. Making up for every regret, every chance they’d had to make things right.
As Dean danced with his husband, as he rested his cheek on Cas’ collarbone, he thought about family photos and fancy dinners and road trips. He thought about macaroni art and ice cream cones and movies.
He thought of the life that was yet to come: the life they could finally live together.