#I had a life then came destiel and oh well

[shellhawk]

Random Destiel Season 16 ideas…

Dean and Jack get Cas out of the Empty.

Dean, emotionally constipated, says not a word about the confession and avoids the entire topic for as long as he can.

After a hunt with Dean, Cas and Dean end up at the Bunker. Dean starts to head for his room and tries to leave Cas at his. Cas decides he’s not having it. Not for one more second. And since now he’s very pop culture savvy, he decides to pull out the stops and become the most dramatic man he can think of in that moment: Ronny Cammareri, from Moostruck. And being Cas of the eidetic memory, he doesn’t change an inflection or a word of the impassioned speech:

“Loretta, I love you. Not like they told you love is, and I didn't know this either, but love don't make things nice - it ruins everything. It breaks your heart. It makes things a mess. We aren't here to make things perfect. The snowflakes are perfect. The stars are perfect. Not us. Not us! We are here to ruin ourselves and to break our hearts and love the wrong people and *die*. The storybooks are *bullshit*. Now I want you to come upstairs with me and *get* in my bed!”

Dean raises an eyebrow. “Loretta?” He asks with a smirk.

Cas is embarrassed. “It was the best I could come up with.” He looks at the floor before tilting his head and lifting his eyes to take in Dean’s beloved face. “It was clearly ineffective, since you’re not in my bed.” He frowns. “I was sure it would work. It did for Ronny.” He starts to turn towards his room.

Dean closes the space between them before Cas can even get his hand on the doorknob. He grasps Cas by the shoulder and turns him, unresisting, to meet Cas’ ridiculously blue eyes with his own.

He takes a deep breath and says what he should have before the Empty tore them apart.

“‘course I love you, too Cas. It’s only been you for years. Didn’t you notice?”

Cas stands, stunned. It’s the longest ten seconds of Dean’s life. Lives. Whatever.

Cas smiles, shy and warm, and his tears well up and start to flow as he cups Dean’s face, reverent, and lays the gentlest of butterfly kisses on his lips. Dean is just as soft as he returns the kiss and wipes the tears away.

Cas bends and sweeps Dean off his feet into a bridal-style carry, uses a touch of his grace to whoosh them to the other side of his door. We can hear Dean’s deep chuckle, his boots hitting the floor, and the sound of clothing being hurriedly removed and dropped.

From under the door, a bright light.

Dean, also pop culture savvy, can be heard to say, “Wings? Far out!”

[secretmellowblog]

People who try to analyze what happened on Tumblr on November 5th, 2020, often really overstate how much it was actually “about” Supernatural. As someone who has never been in the supernatural fandom ever but dID join in on the hysterical destielposting—it was really more about the stress of the pandemic and the 2020 presidential election.

The two biggest Youtubers I’ve seen try to dissect “what happened that November 5th” in video essays both weren’t American—- and I think that explains why they both tried to explain the hysteria primarily via analyzing the Supernatural fandom/the original show, rather than through the lens of the election. And while those videos are cool, valid, informational, and make lots of really well-considered interesting points— I can tell you that me and almost all my mutuals had literally no knowledge or interest in the fact that “oh supernatural had made nods at the ship in the past but the creators were adamant that I wouldn’t be canon” or etc etc etc etc. the first time I learned about any of that context was way later, watching videos where people claimed that fandom history context (that I did not know anything about) was the actual reason for the hysteria.

But the reality is that people latched on to the Destiel stuff because it was a piece of big useless inane zero-stakes fandom news in a time when we were desperately waiting for serious high stakes election news. We were latching onto a “positive “ piece of inane stupid fandom news in a time of great stress, with all the desperation of a drowning man who latches onto whatever piece of wood will keep him afloat.

The core of the hysteria was that Americans (who make up a huge chunk of tumblr’s userbase) were currently glued to their laptops watching the live presidential election vote counts come in. These vote counts were taking an extended amount of time due to the pandemic causing high numbers of mail-in ballots, resulting in a constant state of Election Day Stress for multiple days straight.

This was also during the height of the Pandemic. People had predicted Trump’s presidency would be bad; no one had predicted it would be this apocalyptically bad. No one had predicted pandemics and lockdowns and hospitals overflowing with bodybags. remember Trump spreading Covid lies and conspiracies?? There were so many Qanon conspiracies about democrats being Satanic child traffickers who had to be put to death, and coup threats were mounting from the right wing side. It seemed like this election was a choice between ‘centrist democrat’ and “apocalyptic right wing conspiracy theory authoritarianism,” in the midst of pandemic conditions that people feared would never ever improve— and it seemed like a close election.

Another major point was that Trump voters were more likely to be antimaskers/Covid deniers, while Biden voters were more likely to take the pandemic seriously— so Biden voters were more likely to send in mail-in ballots instead of risking the in-person voting crowds, which meant their ballots would take much longer to count. And so, in many state electoral vote counts, it would initially seem like Trump was very far in the lead— only for Biden to slooooowly build up an agonizingly small lead as the mail in ballots came in, and then defeat Trump at the very end.

So you’re just watching these news sites giving live election updates, refreshing the page every 2 minutes to see if you’re going to live under a spineless centrist democrat or a literal Qanon Dictatorship. And then you go on tumblr to distract yourself, and there’s more election posting, and more agonizing over the votes, and more stress and despair—-

And then it’s been days and we’re right at the crucial tipping point where it’s anyone’s game and the next few hours will determine whether Trump will win, so you need to keep your eye on the vote count, because the next hours will determine the future of the pandemic and your country and your plans for your entire life—

And then stupid Destiel becomes canon! And it becomes canon in the silliest way possible!

If Destiel had become canon at any other time, it would have been a big goofy tumblr celebration? But we wouldn’t have gotten the insane explosion of hysterical interaction.

The entire core of it was the contrast between the inane meaningless stupidity of fandom news vs the actual stressful election news you wanted to hear! It really is best conveyed in that meme where Castiel says “I love you” and Dean indifferently responds with a piece of important election news.

It’s about the contrast between the low-stakes inanity of fandom and the massive life-destroying stakes of a terrifying election. There really was no reason it had be Supernatural specifically, except that Supernatural was a thing everyone knew basic things about from dashboard osmosis— it could’ve been any other equally huge silly fandom ship news about a ship everyone *knew of* but might not necessarily be invested in (ex. Stucky becoming canon, Johnlock becoming canon, Kirk/Spock becoming more canon somehow, etc etc etc.)

I think it’s true that people who weren’t paying agonizingly close attention to the American election news got swept up in it, and that non American Supernatural fans also were extremely excited for purely fandom reasons — but the entire reason it blew up to an unprecedented degree was because of that core of stressed out terrified Americans glued to their computers watching election results and suddenly receiving stupid fandom news instead, and deciding to just hysterically parodically hyper-celebrate this absurd useless zero-stakes news.

I think it was also all elevated by the fact that, as I said before, this happened at the crucial “tipping point” of the election where the next few hours would determine the winner. The fact that Biden began to slowly develop a lead in the hours after made it feel, hysterically, as if the hours after Destiel became canon was somehow the turning point where he began to win; so celebrating Destiel felt like celebrating that slow turn towards victory.

The tl,dr is that it’s so important to Remember the Fifth of November …..in preparation the inevitable hysteria that will happen in the presidential election on November 5th of next year. XD. Personally I’m rooting for Johnlock or Frodo/Sam to somehow become canon in the eleventh hour right before the democrats win

[happilyfeatherafter]

Happilyfeatherafter’s ficrec Fridays

Good friday y'all. Welcome back to a new fortnight of fics that I’ve read and loved recently. I took my first holiday of the year and IMMEDIATELY caught a cold that knocked me out for the week but at least it meant I got reading done. Save me, destiel, save me.

If you want to find more you can see my previous rec lists here!

29 March 2024

virga(e) by @shineforthee (art by @neversleepuntilfive) has gone straight to the top of the favourite fics ever pile, oh my god you guys, please read it immediately and admire the art that inspired it as part of @deancasreversebang. This fic is a thing of beauty from start to finish. In one version of the story of Dean and Cas, we find Castiel perpetually waiting in the desert, when a 26 year old Dean stumbles upon him drawn to the location mid-hunt. They must learn to trust each other, to figure out what's causing the push and pull that bonds them. The poetry of this fic, run through with this yearning devastating emotion on their journey together, coupled with the incredibly evocatively descriptions and research into the setting, come together to make the most gorgeous picture, the desert a place that seems desolate but is teeming with life. Much like the slowburn romance that flourishes between them. It also links back to post-canon in a way that is seeded so carefully and cleverly, and made my heart explode. It's funny, romantic, devastating, emotional, moving....I can't do justice to this fic with such a short snapshot, please read it for yourselves and come yell at me about it. It's so beautiful. shineforthee also has a great 9x06 fanfic gap one shot and an ongoing wip now too and I can't wait to read that! (Somehow need any more convincing? Check out @bloodydeanwinchester's Virga(e) liveblog).

It's all very complex by artichokeflower okay that was all very serious, so let's turn to a short and sweet smut fic that had me giggling gleefully throughout. 'After walking in on Dean's private time, Cas decides to do a little research and experimentation of his own and gets magically trapped in a book about sexual fantasies. And if that means Dean has to go in after him, well what are buddies for, right?' The thing that is just GOLDEN about this fic aside from the hot smut is the dry sense of humour, borderline French Mistake parody level porn and dialogue between Dean and especially Cas which just gets them so well...the cowboy scenes in particular. Glorious: “I’m sorry, Dean. That’s the end of the erotic violence. Are you hurt?” “Is there going to be any sex in your sexy fantasies?” Dean wheezed. “Not that the whole shoot out wasn’t fun. I just wasn’t expecting as much plot is all.” He coughed. That had probably sounded too eager.

Just Being and Just Having by Englandwouldfall I have recced before but is now complete!! This the post-canon fic series delves so incredibly beautifully into Dean and Cas’ history of miscommunication and gives them the chance to truly talk things out, finding themselves falling more deeply in love as they do so and understand their own mistakes but also what makes them work so well together when they’re no longer under Chuck’s thumb. Each chapter feels like therapy and a brain and heart massage! It sticks the landing so well and I just love these boys so much.

Something Happening Somewhen by allthismusic (@folkbloodbaths, art by @eggchef) aaaahhh time travel young Dean brought to the future to meet older Dean and Cas fic trope my beloved. A @deancaspinefest fic, Allthismusic is a fan of the trope too and this fic is a gorgeous tribute to it and the fics that came before. Cas saves 24yo Dean from an accident and brings him to the future when he witnesses what his life will be. Will Cas have to remove his memories to stop a paradox? Sweet and heartfelt, a joy to read.

Books, Pies, and Roommates by @seidenapfel (art by @kitshay) is a @deancaspinefest two-person love hexagon, with some excellently farcical misdirection. Cas moves in to the spare room of Dean's house, but he doesn't meet him, he meets Sam, as Dean is busy working. Cas is professor but helps his cousin out as a barista and his favourite customer is Deano. Dean's intrigued by the barista but he's not his online penpal and best friend Angel. Lines blur, connections are made, and hearts are gonna get broken...or are they?

Tag list under the cut, let me know if you'd like to be added! Please reblog <3

@dean-you-assbutt-cas-loves-you

[yourlilkaiju]

Here is the Reason Why I Am Not A Destiel Fan Anymore:

And the reasons I refuse to go back to being one:

So in retrospect, the SuperWhoLock fandom has been by and large a pretty big fandom that has been running a good while. I don't think it's stopped. I have always loved Doctor Who, as that- alongside the works of Mr.Henson and the brilliant creations from his creature shop, were my first introductions to all things weird and other worldly. Horror was another story. I will be more than happy to talk about that another day. So as time went on, in abouts the late summer/early fall of 2005, right before I turned 13, I was introduced to Supernatural. Starring Jared Padelecki and Jensen Ackles. The person I was watching it with was bouncing up and down, all excited because "Oh my gosh, it's so nice to see you watching something other than anime." (The cow.), and because it was nearing Halloween time and it was both of our favorite time of year for two very different reasons. This would end up being the start of my enjoyment of a long running series that had a good premise, but a very confusing story line after season five. (Sorry but it felt...skewed after that point. But I stayed loyal.) In any case, I eventually started shipping Destiel because of the constant queer baiting. Which didn't exactly, idk help the situation? And with that I ended up being a shipper for a good seven and a half, I repeat, SEVEN AND A HALF FUCKING YEARS. Hardly anyone sticks with a shop that long. (But being autistic you kind of stick with a lot of things for a long ass time. *Mumbles something about a certain one winged angel from the nineties*.)

My enjoyment of the ship came to a close when I was at a fantasy convention the spring of 2016. I was at one of the Double tree locations with an ex of mine and dressed up as a fae queen, laughing, having a good time and just having good conversations with the people at our table. I was with a troupe that my ex and I had started and we were initially responsible for acting out as "hosts" for the opening and closing for these events, and even "opening the portals to the realms" 🙄. When out of character we were still expected to be gracious hosts....well, more like I was. The man could get away with spilling a punch bowl over his head while mooning an entire audience, yet still somehow do no wrong. If I complained, or made a peep in my defense, the whole world would come crashing down. Even with some of the people we spent time with. And some of the people we spent time with were Destiel shippers who liked to bring strangers into our space without asking, or without any given warning or invitation. At that time, it'd been Supernatural fans who were not only Destiel shippers....but also Cockles fans.

[I am going to pause for a moment here because I feel the need to emphasize that shipping is fine. Shipping is a great way to escape reality for a period of time and even let loose the pent up need for some sort of intimacy in ones life, regardless of the type that is needed. But to allow it to interfere with reality, to force real people into seeing each other and actually make it so that it can't be left alone for years after? That's where there is an issue. And people who can't see that need to re-evaluate themselves and get some fucking help.]

There were few things that my ex and I agreed on, and one of them had been that uninvited guests had been a nono. However, the rules at play prevented me from saying anything while in costume. He had to dismiss the person. He had to tell them it was time to go and that "appreciated the travellers journey, however it was time for the court to take it's respite." . And yet he didn't. So as these people went on, our troupe laughed and carried on with the conversation. I did my best to segue into a different topic, and tried my hardest not to show discomfort. Because to do so would be breaking the rules. The uninvited guests went on....and on...and on. They ignored my attempts and ignored the fact that I had requested two glasses of wine and a white Russian. They carried on about how Destiel was technically canon, and how Jensen Ackles and Misha Collins were secretly dating behind the scenes. I looked for any reason I could to get the hell out of dodge. And I found my salvation when I found a friend of mine standing over by the bar.

"Pardon me, my dear..." I said, with a soft lilt in my voice. "As compelling as this conversation has been, I find that I have urgent business with a friend of the forest." As bewildered as my poor guest was, I immediately left before they could say anything more. I hated the conversation. I hated feeling trapped. It felt draining and honestly, going to my friend was the best decision I felt that I could make. And when I got to him, he mentioned that I looked like I needed help. And for a man like my ex to not say anything, he was a little disappointed.

Over the next few years, I ran into several more of these shippers at events that I'd helped run. I insisted that the rules be changed, and while he did not like it, he knew that I would not back down on the issue. The same people tried joining our gathering by one of our troupe members behest, and without warning. Upon recognizing me, they grew excited and hoped to continue the conversation from the last time they'd seen me.

"Why don't we talk about something else?" I groaned. I recalled the unpleasant experience I had with them last time as they hardly allowed a word in edgewise.

There was a long pause.

As if summoning a great storm, I was suddenly accused of being homophobic and told that I only played a queen because I whined and sobbed my way into it. And I stood there, allowing the insults to continue until they couldn't anymore. I figured it was just best to let them kick dirt at a statue and smile at them exhausting themselves.

I'm sure some of you may think me a horrible person fo this. I am sure some of you are thinking "why are you telling us this? There's no point."

Because some of you need to know the extent of how some fandoms and their shippers behave.

Back then Destiel and Cockles were as bad as LDS's. Now...well they're still just as bad. But twice as aggressive. And while I was one, I don't think I ever went that far. I would often ask things like "Aren't those two married?" When it came to the Cockles fans. Or say "I'm from way south Alabama and experienced ISA, please stop." To the Wincest shippers. Every single time I would say something like this, some would try to come directly for my throat. Literally. Hell, someone grabbed me by the hair once. All because I dared to disagree.

It's a fucking series.

With fictional characters.

Played by actors.

And all the special effects are done by the crew.

But some people can't seem to grasp that.

I refuse to entangle myself back in that sticky little web and I would rather watch it burn itself out. I would prefer to see it go up in flames as it gets rejected by the fandoms it tries to infect, JUST because it is politely disagreed with.

Because it doesn't leave people alone after being told no or receiving the sense that, maybe, a person is uncomfortable.

[awakenthemusic]

Inspired

Summary:

Tags: Short fic, ~1,600 words, Destiel, Fluff

For Suptober 2023 Day 3 - Inspired

Under the cut or on Ao3

Dean grit his teeth as the bunker door once again screeched shut behind Cas.

Everything was fine.

Cas was just going… somewhere he wouldn’t say, to do... something he wouldn’t talk about, for several hours while Dean was left at home wondering what the hell was going on… again.

Dean had thought they were doing well. They’d cleared the air after Cas came back, everyone said what they needed to say, and the two of them had been… dating, or whatever you want to call it... ever since.

Then, a couple of months ago, everything had changed.

Well, not everything. He and Cas still shared a bed, Cas was just as affectionate as ever, and they still snuggled up close enough to make Sam roll his eyes during movie nights. But twice a week, every week, Cas walked out the bunker door for hours at a shot, alone, and refused to talk about where he went or what he was doing.

Dean had tried not to let it worry him, he really had.

After all, there was zero chance that Cas was fooling around on him. Dean trusted Cas completely, he just didn’t like being left out of the loop.

Sam was no help at all. When Dean had tried to talk to him about it, Sam had just shrugged and said, “Dude’s got his own life, that’s a good thing, isn’t it?”

And it was. Of course it was. Cas should feel free to leave whenever he wanted and go into town. Hell, now that he’d got his wings back, he could go pretty much anywhere in the world in the blink of an eye.

Dean tried not to think about that option too often; it made him break out in a cold sweat. He shook his head and started pulling out the ingredients for burgers, absolutely refusing to examine the need to make Cas’ favorite food nearly every time Cas went on one of his mystery jaunts.

Dean stabbed his fingers into the raw beef chuck harder than necessary, viciously tearing into it and working the spices deeper. Just focus on makin’ dinner, He told himself. Cas is always back in time for dinner.

—————

Cas wasn’t back in time for dinner.

Dean sat alone in the library, whiskey tumbler held loosely in one hand and his phone in the other. One, lone text from about 10pm glowed up at him from the screen.

Running late. Don’t wait up.

The words mocked him now, over three hours later, as he sat in the dim light and tried not to feel like an idiot. Everything is fine. Cas is an adult. Better than that, he’s an angel, he can take care of himself. He’ll come home when he damn well wants to…

A few minutes later, the bunker door finally screeched open and the wave of relief that washed over Dean at the sound highlighted exactly how little he’d believed his own bullshit.

Dean stepped into the war room just in time to see Cas sneaking down the stairs, a large wooden box clasped tight in his hands. “Hey, Cas.”

Cas jerked, nearly losing hold of the box, then met Dean’s eyes with a guilty look. “Dean! You um… You waited up, you really didn’t have to do that.”

Cas shuffled awkwardly, moving like he was trying to hide the box, which, considering the thing was at least two feet square and Cas was trapped without cover in the middle of the iron work stairs, would have been comical in any other circumstances.

Dean’s heart sank. First, Cas was staying out later and later; now, he was hiding things? He said, “Look, man, I know you’ve got your…” he gestured vaguely at the box and the door Cas kept walking out of, “Stuff you’ve got going on, and if you don’t want to tell me about where you’re going, or whatever the hell’s in that box you don’t want me to see, that’s fine. Well, it’s not really... it’s whatever, I guess.”

Cas opened his mouth to say something, but Dean steamrolled right over him.

“I’m doing my best to give you your ‘space’ or whatever, but if you’re going to be six hours late for dinner, I’m gonna need more than a five-word text message.”

Cas stared blankly at Dean for a long moment before light dawned. “Oh no, that’s not…” He rushed down the stairs and set the box down on the map table. “That’s… I don’t want space, Dean, I just…” He glanced at the box as though arguing with himself about something. “I do not want space,” He said firmly, turning back to Dean.

Dean nodded, some of the tension draining from his aching shoulders at the certainty in Cas’ voice. “Okay, then whatever this is, we can work through it, but you gotta talk to me, man.”

Cas abruptly stilled. Some emotion crinkled up the corners of his eyes and he said softly, “Oh, my love. I had no idea I was worrying you so much.”

Dean squirmed. On the one hand, he loved when Cas called him that, the one word that Dean had struggled to say for so long tripping from Cas’ mouth like Dean was its purest embodiment. On the other hand, an entire lifetime of instincts screamed at him that he was being too demanding, a burden, and he should have hidden his feelings better. He ducked his head, fighting the need to make a joke and pretend nothing was wrong.

Cas, who knew him too damn well, was having none of it. He crooked a finger under Dean’s chin and gently lifted until he could stare straight through Dean’s eyes down to his soul. “Dean,” Cas said, quietly enough that Dean had to lean in a little to make sure he didn’t miss anything Cas said. “I love you more than words can ever express. If I could, I would spend every moment by your side for all eternity. I did not mean to worry you, but I see that I have, and for that I’m sorry.”

Dean fought the urge to hide his face again as his cheeks burned red.

Cas said, “I wanted so badly to make you something special for tomorrow, I didn’t think about how it would appear from your point of view.”

Dean frowned, doing the mental math on the date and coming up dry. It wasn’t his birthday, wasn’t Valentine’s or any other sappy made-up holiday for people who were… it wasn’t Valentine’s. It wasn’t their anniversary… and fuck if Dean wasn’t still getting used to the fact that they had a fucking anniversary. Biting the bullet and ready to admit he was a terrible person for not remembering, he cleared his throat and asked, “What’s tomorrow?”

Now Cas was the one who looked nervous. “Well, it’s not anything really. I just wanted… you said I should find a hobby now that we’re not hunting so much anymore, and I…” Cas turned back around, one hand playing with the clasps holding the lid on the box he’d brought home, cleared his throat, and said, “I made you something for our six-month anniversary.”

Warmth flowed into Dean’s chest, both at the realization that Cas cared enough about their relationship that he was tracking their anniversary by month and at Cas’ clear nerves explaining that he was tracking it that closely. “Six whole months, huh?” A huge grin took over his face and he bumped Cas’ shoulder as he teased, “You big sap.”

Cas relaxed into a matching grin before he said knowingly, “Well, if you don’t want it—”

“Shut up, ‘course I do.” Dean grinned even wider. “You know, Cas, it’s after midnight already so… technically…”

Cas’ smirk didn’t do much to hide his excitement. “Alright, let me just…” Cas glanced around the room with his strategizing face on. “Okay, close your eyes for a minute.”

Dean nodded, scrunching his eyes closed. He listened intently to the sounds of Cas opening the box and pulling out a truly impressive amount of what sounded like crumpled-up newspaper, before something landed on top of the map table with a heavy thunk.

There was a bit more shuffling around, then Cas said, “Alright, open your eyes.”

There, glowing on top of the map table’s bright light stood a blown-glass sculpture. The center of the sculpture was human-shaped, with a cloud of delicate, twisting strands of glass twirling around it like translucent cotton candy. It seemed almost like it was a living, breathing thing as its mesmerizing swirls of colored glass shot through with gold dust caught and reflected the glow from the table.

Dean stared, completely transfixed.

“It’s not perfect,” Cas said, nervously fiddling with the remains of the packing materials. “The color’s not quite right, and I would have liked to get the outer strands thinner, but glass is an imperfect medium—”

Dean cut Cas off with an awed, “It’s beautiful.”

Cas let out a relieved breath and smiled down at the sculpture. “Yes. It’s you.”

Dean stared at Cas, dumbfounded.

Cas continued, “It’s your soul. As I said, it’s not perfect, there’s no way to truly capture the magnificence of your soul in any crude materials of the earthly plane, but, it’s close.” He darted a shy look at Dean. “I wanted you to see how beautiful you are to me, just in case you ever doubt… well, just in case.”

“Shut up,” Dean whispered reflexively, his cheeks so hot you could fry an egg on them, Looney Tunes style. He grabbed Cas, yanking him in for a kiss, mumbling a quick, “Love you,” against Cas’ lips.

[mangonatural]

Rules: Make a 24 hour poll with the names of your WIPs, let it run, then work for 10 minutes for every vote the winner receives.

Thank you for the tag, @angelcasendgame!!!!! I am not sure I will be able to work on anything very soon just because life came after me again, and turns out I'm gonna be moving over the next month or so, but I really do hope I can find time!!

None of these have names yet lol. I put the SPN ones first, but technically I've been trying to break my writer's block by returning to The Great Gatsby (It's all Nick/Gatsby btw, just realized that might not be immediately evident) with limited success. It's always come easier for me. But all of this is stuff I do actively want to work on.

Ohh I don't know who to tag. I'm sure everyone in this circle has been tagged already, and most of the people I talk to regularly enough to know about their projects have more or less left Tumblr... I do absolutely want to pass this your way though, @antique-ro-man!! (It's Wes, btw!) I also wanna tag @heyfagbutt! And then anyone else who sees this and wants to participate, I also encourage it!! This is such a cool idea :D !!

Long, rambling explanations down here ⬇⬇

I think the name is pretty explanatory? The gist of it is they go after the same guy and become pseudo-enemies but they keep bumping into each other like this and decide to work together after a while 👍 this is a really bad hook LMAO. Anyway, I'm trying to build on the idea that they work REALLY well together when they do it intentionally but fail comically when they don't.

Pretty much what it says on the tin as well. No Supernatural AU. Dean goes to a community college to get a certification to help with his work elsewhere, but Cas, a figure drawing model, catches him drawing (which Dean's been doing on and off as a hobby) and tries to get him to sign up for the arts program.

I technically only have a summary of this, and I'm not entirely sure if I will write it all out, but I do want to at least put more time into the development before I dedicate to giving up on it bc of scope lol. I just have SUCH a soft spot for fake relationship AUs. Also, I just found out that while I have FINALLY aged into independent FAFSA eligibility, I am once again tax bracketed out. Anyway, financial abuse is real and I want to project my suffering onto Dean. Also immigrant Cas, but I haven't decided where I want him to be from yet. I think this has a lot of potential for some pretty hefty character redesigns too so it's also compelling to me from that angle. I guess I could also write it for TGG, but I did initially think of it for Destiel, so.

I don't know how to explain this one very well except that I had unhelpfully written "poolboy au" in my notes and then proceeded to forget what the hell I meant. This fic was an attempt to resurrect that but ended up being a funky modern West Coast re-imagining where Gatsby can't even "make it" as much as he wants to, and Nick can't find a place to live except for a less-than-legally rented pool house. It's not meant to be a full rewrite or anything though.

Uhhh yeah, I'm keeping the details private for this one ahaha but that's just because it wasn't supposed to be a big deal and I told a friend she would see what it was when it was done...like oh god probably a month ago at this point... My original scope for this was quite small, but research for it, indecision, and a nasty case of writer's block that I've had for nearly a year now have kept development a bit slow. Hopefully, I'll finish it before the year comes to a close.

I also don't know how to explain this one well other than "after being rejected by Daisy (Canon Divergent), Gatsby attempts to buy his way into a bewildered Nick's heart. Though the fic is from Nick's POV, Gatsby's just had his worldview shattered and is in a bit of denial, but instead of pursuing Daisy harder, he channels all of that energy into Nick (though he's not really sure why he's doing it at first). I wasn't sure what to put up at the top because I absolutely don't want my code name for this public at least until it's done LMAO.

[dirigibleplumbing]

So, for Destiel, Dean not really dating or even hooking up that often in the later seasons works well for the whole “he's both pining for but also emotional fulfilled by Cas so he doesn’t feel the need”, but like, why do you think they actually just stopped even trying to give Dean a real love interest? The closest they came was kinda Amara? Was it the writers wanting to show Dean's too old for hook ups to “damaged” for romance post Lisa? Jensen didn’t wanna do so many hook up/kissing scenes? They only have so much character time and actor budget they'd rather have Jensen interact with Misha and the other regulars?

(Sam and Cas not sharing storylines makes sense due to how long those scenes would take thanks to Jared fucking with Misha and that time and character is better spent with putting Misha with Jensen or Alex lol)

Sam still had a few love interests (Eileen of course, could make the case for Rowena), tho maybe less after the backlash over the season 8 love storyline? I know the writers were of course aware of Destiel (duh) but I'm not so in deep that the popularity of the pairing vs the General Audience (GA)'s tastes would mean they only catered to the fannish side with Dean's storylines. I think Lisa was liked well enough vs how bad Amelia was disliked so I don’t think Dean not having a love interest was due to a backlash from the GA…perhaps just the taste of the new show runners? That the official romances in the show aren’t really loved by the GA so why bother? But it would give an excuse for letting at least one of the two leads have a break by having scenes apart during the romance plot line, but again perhaps they’d rather use the showtime and actor budget to have both leads take a break with adding more Jack and Cas stories.

(Metatextually it’s amusing to think of Chuck trying to get his Ladykiller main character to go bed some babes and fall for someone before Dean’s tragically killed off, only for Dean to pine and mourn for his dead angel BFF so Chuck kept bringing him back so Dean would stop being sad to get back to smooching ladies, only for Dean to accidentally fall into an almost asexual romance with said BFF and he slips into this frozen state of not getting any nor looking for any cause this is almost enough*. And now Chuck can’t get rid of the BFF or else his main character just stops functioning and it’s BORING)

You could also argue the addition of Mary and Jack is kinda a “love story” for Dean, tho for familial love rather then romantic, that Dean's emotion arcs were taken up by a “Mother and Son” and a “Son becoming his Father to his Son” storyline rather then a romance or rehashing more brother drama and poor Charlie got the “bonding then fridging” storyline with Dean as a platonic relationship rather then the usual romantic on on this show.

(And we can also totally see Cas, Crowley, and Benny fulfill the quasi romantic tropes in canon with Dean but again in the GA eyes it was platonic emotional arcs rather then romantic ones)**

*I can see Dean and Cas being in basically an unofficial Queer Platonic relationship pre-confession in canon, just 2 confirmed bachelors etc etc. Or even post confessions they could wiggle out of it by No-Homoing it as “oh yeah Cas loves Dean but doesn’t want sex and Dean's cool with it besties for life also you will never see him kiss or try and hook up with any women ever again ❤️ (except once because the network made us to truly no Homo Dean)” if they had to make a season 16 and the network is like no Dean can’t kiss the angel lol. (Apparently the network even said no the giving Cas a non Dean boyfriend storyline so they would totally stamp on any official reciprocation from Dean)

** how would you trope-ify and sort Benny, Crowley, and Cas as “standard” romantic interests? Benny=the love interest ur family doesn’t approve of for historical reason but they are drawn together anyway only to depart tragically? Kinda a Juliet-ish without Romeo dying? Boy from the rival school/visiting from out of state you have summer fling with and part knowing you’re lives are going in different directions? Crowley is the reformed Bad Boy, the rival to the central Love Interest that changes for the protagonist but doesn’t “get the girl (gender neutral)”/Redemption=Death? And Cas?

Cas is… oh boy. Uneasy Allies -> Allies -> Enemies -> Comrades -> War Buddies -> Fire Forged Friends -> Estranged Friends -> Betrayer -> Enemies -> Lost Love -> Uneasy Allies -> re- Fire Forged Friends -> Lost Love (again) -> Besties/Found Family -> Brainwashed Ally ->… Maybe as a “Long running show's long term Love Interest that can be concluded until the finale due to a fear of “Moonlighting” so there are increasingly convoluted reasons they can’t be together yet” lol

I have never once watched Supernatural as it aired, and wasn't active in fandom until November 2020, so I'm not really up to date on what's been stated or not stated by the writers, showrunners, directors, etc., nor what the common fantheories are about their motivations or intentions. 

I've read some general meta on the subject and people talking about particular writers and how they viewed various aspects on the show, but I mostly can't keep the writers' names straight in my head.

All to say: my takes are based mostly on vibes and notions I have about how writing and TV production works. 

The longer the show went on, the more it departed from the original monster of the week format. To the extent there were still cases, the week-to-week ones increasingly tended to be in service to a bigger mytharc, and less time was devoted to them onscreen. 

There are certain scenarios we'd seen so many times at that point--Sam interviews a MILF; Dean wears a costume; research happens; the monster is misidentified at first; they talk their way into the morgue/station/records room/security room; we meet a red herring for the killer/monster; etc.--that they could be abbreviated or skipped entirely in favor of recurring characters, characters who directly echo one or more of the main characters and their current acts, and the latest angst about the current mytharc. 

I think at a certain point, "Dean hooks up with a hottie" was, to an extent, likewise considered superfluous. 

Some of The Powers That Be undoubtedly noticed that Cas could fulfill the dialogue roles Dean's hookups used to. Plus, absolutely, everything you're saying about Mary and Jack--non-romantic partnerships, not just his “friendship” with Cas, often replaced that kind of narrative. 

Other TPTB figured viewers would assume that the hookups were still happening, only offscreen. And in classic spn fashion, I think TPTB hoped that by not mentioning the hookups as happening or not happening, they could have it both ways: shippers get to say Dean's not hooking up; anti-shippers get to say there's no evidence Dean's not not hooking up.

As for the metatextual aspect--yeah, that's pretty much how I see it, lol.

[cascigarette]

flames & ashes

for November 5th

destiel ~600 words

He had lost almost everything in the fire.

Almost everything.

He still had Sam. Until Sam left for college, he always had Sam. He always could count on getting a pat on the back when he protected him, when he fed him, when he looked out for him. And then Sam had left. Then Dad.

He lost everything in the fire.

The fire that was neon lights in shitty bars, flickering overheads in men’s bathrooms, on his knees until they ached and then limped away with a fifty in his back pocket. The fire that was chugging burning bourbon until he passed out in the backseat of his father’s car all alone, waking up to the bright sun to drive more and drink more and fuck more and hunt more. 

He lost Dad to the fire.

Well to be fair, he lost Dad to the first fire, 23 years ago. There was something simultaneously damning and freeing to losing Dad to the fire that he built on that tall pyre. No more mirror to look into to tell him he was doing something right for once. 

He couldn’t make a fire for Sam.

No, that was one thing he could never give to the fire. He bled for that kid and always would, he couldn’t collect his ashes and spread them out, he couldn’t watch his body fade and flicker away into nothing. He couldn’t smell Sam’s burning flesh. Just couldn’t. So he went to the crossroads and made a deal. To burn forever so Sam wouldn’t have to. 

Sam went to Hell anyway.

There was a time where the fire burnt him away to nothing, just a monster with black eyes and a seething soul. He had meant it when he said he liked the disease. It was pure, it was freeing. It was no more being scared of the flame. He was the flame now, and he was going to burn everything in his wake. Nothing would hurt ever again.

Of course it didn’t last. 

…

The fire took and took and took.

The fire bellowed hot and long into the night sky. He had lost too much to count, but this… this was the final blow. He never thought he would lose him. Not him. He was supernovas and sunlight. He was ethereal grace, larger than life. He was forever; even when he seemed lost, he always came back. He always came back. 

Now his body, his vessel, was floating up towards the stars. He built the pyre all by himself, refused to let Sam help. He wrapped him in a curtain and tied him with yellow ribbon and carried him by himself. He lit the fire with his lighter by himself. He watched the flames engulf him, feeling so fucking alone. 

Cas was burning. He was burning like everything else in his life had burnt. He would never see him again.

…

This time the fire was thick black goo.

He wasn't used to this. He wasn't used to the fire tricking him. 

"Why does this sound like a goodbye?"

"Because it is."

Oh God. No, not God. Something bigger, something more terrible and obsolete. He was losing him. He was losing him all over again.

"Something I could never have."

"I love you."

You dumbass. You son of a bitch. Of course you had it, you always had it, I just needed to get my head out of my ass. And I wish I had said it back. I wish I had said it back.

"I love you too."

He was gone.

He lost everything to the fire.

[hekate1308]

Fictober 2022, #29

Prompt: “You love this, don’t you“

Fandom: Supernatural

Rating: G

Pairings: Destiel

He first noticed the man on a Thursday.

Castiel had been sceptical when the library he worked at had decided they would allow volunteers who simply walked in from the street to read to children on that day of the week. After all, one never knew who could come by, and he had sworn to himself that he would pay special attention to anyone doing so.

So far, there had been nothing to arouse suspicion, if he didn’t count a strange and rather well-known local business man – rather well-known to be mean-spirited and stringy, at that – showing up, gifting them the entire works of Enid Blyton and spending an afternoon reading them to children.

But today, there was a different volunteer. And this one… Castiel didn’t even have to remind himself to keep an eye on him because he was utterly beautiful, more beautiful than anyone else he had ever seen in real life.

God, he hadn’t believed someone like this could even exist.

Almost unconsciously, he moved forward so he could hear what he was reading, and his heart picked up a pace when he realized he’d chosen Paddington Bear, always a favourite.

He was even doing voices.

At first, he thought he was being sneaky, or at least his version of it but then Charlie, his co-worker, said, “That’s Dean.”

“Dean?” he said before he could stop himself, and she chuckled.

“The volunteer you can’t take your eyes off of. He’s one of the best man I know.”

“I – he’s reading really well.”

“Yes, yes, I am sure you like his reading…” It just so happened that Dean had finished for the afternoon and was closing the book, and she quickly grabbed Castiel’s arm. “Let me introduce you two!”

“Charlie –“

“Hey Dean, this is Castiel. I’ve told you about him.”

“Yeah, of course, the one named after an angel, right?” Dean said before turning to Castiel and oh my God, now he was looking at him.

He nodded and said, “Hello, Dean.”

For some reason, he chuckled.

Quickly. He had to say something. Books. Books were safe. Books were good.

"You love this, don't you?" he asked, nodding at the book in his lap.

Dean once more read the title, then looked up and grinned at the librarian. “He –“ he glanced at the children who were still around. “Yes, I do. Very much. Used to read to my little brother all the time. He loved the tales of the knights of the Round Table, but anything I could get my hands on, really.”

His smile being directed at Castiel only made him more beautiful and he could already feel his tongue twisting; he was sure to say something inane and drive him away. “That’s nice” he finally managed.

“Yeah, imagine that – he went to Stanford! Shows you what reading can do.”

He wasn’t quite sure what the Knights of the Round Table had to do with college, but he nodded.

Dean got up from his chair and winked at him. “See you next Thursday then, Cas. I’ll be in touch, Red.”

Cas? He watched Charlie escort Dean out and escaped back amidst the books.

Despite what Dean had said, he didn’t actually expect him to return the next week – there were many volunteers who only came by once or twice – but Dean made it a habit of showing up, clearly delighting in reading to any children who happened to be there.

And he always not only talked to Charlie, but Castiel too afterwards. He’d quickly grown used to being referred to as Cas.

And the feeling in his stomach whenever Dean smiled at him was growing harder and harder to ignore.

“Hey, Cas” a voice rang out and utterly surprised, he raised his head. It was Wednesday, after all – not Dean’s day.

“Hello, Dean.”

He chuckled. “You always greet me like that.”

“Do I?” But of course he did. He tended to stick with what he knew worked so things wouldn’t grow awkward.

Dean cleared hi throat. “Yes, well, it’s – It’s lunch time.”

“Yes” he confirmed, looking at his watch.

“So I was wondering if you wanted to have lunch – with me?”

For some reason Dean looked nervous. Naturally he agreed though.

If he had had time to think about it, he would probably have been nervous, but instead, he and Dean spent the lunch talking about everything and nothing, and he couldn’t help but feel that he had never really gotten along so well with someone out of the blue.

Also, Dean was still growing more beautiful, but how, he had no idea.

It was after they had finished their meal and Dean was walking him back to the library that he said, “We should do this again sometime.”

He nodded happily.

“Or… maybe you’d like to have dinner.”

He stared at Dean, because certainly…

He managed to nod again.

Dean answered by kissing him, so it seemed his suspicion had been correct.

[literaryoblivion]

Abandoned WIP-SuperWolf Crossover

I’ll tag them with #my abandoned WIPs to organize it. If you see any and are so inspired by any of these to either create you own or finish, PLEASE tag me! I’d love to see if someone was able to take it and run with it since it stalled out for me.

SuperWolf Crossover AU with #Destiel & #sterek where Dean and Stiles are demons, and Cas is a hunter, and Derek is still himself (it would've followed events of TW S1 to a certain extent)

(A/N: This was meant to be a Supernatural/Teen Wolf crossover AU w/ both #destiel & #sterek. Demon!Dean is training brand new demon!Stiles how to be a demon. It would've followed the events of TW S1 only Stiles would know everything was supernatural & they'd recruit Hunter!Cas to help)

“Really?” Dean says with a look of pure disdain at the teenager standing before him. 

“What?” the kid replies, his mouth in a little smirk. 

“Of all the people you could possess, you pick some snotty brat high schooler?”

“If you think about it, it’s kind of fitting doncha think? If I’m going to demon school, might as well look the part, yeah? Besides, this kid is a genius, and all this kid has is a dad, which is a lot better than the little brother you made your guy leave behind all those years ago.”

Dean narrows his eyes because even though he could care less about the brother, with every mention of him the man inside screams, and it gives him a headache. It’s been a long while, and Dean and the man whose life he hijacked have grown to accept each other.

But with every slight indication of Sam, the man’s brother, he decides to flare up, which is really annoying if Dean’s being honest. “Whatever. This kid have a name or you going to make one up?”

“He goes by Stiles, and I kind of like it, so I’m keeping it. He’s pretty cool. We’re pretty similar, you know? I think he’s starting to get used to me.”

Dean clears his throat. “Alright, Stiles, Demon 101 first lesson. Tap into his mind to access information and background history, but you can’t let yourself go too much or he could overtake you.”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it.” Stiles closes his eyes in concentration to perform the task. 

“Okay, whaddya got? Who’re his friends? Family? Hobbies?” 

His eyes still closed, Stiles starts spouting off information, “Goes to Beacon Hills High School, where his favorite subject is English. He’s had a crush on a girl named Lydia with strawberry blonde hair since middle school, but she doesn’t give him the time of day. His best friend is named Scott, and they are both on the school lacrosse team, but Stiles always ends up on the bench. 

“Man, poor kid. It is a good thing I came along to help him out. When I’m through, he’s going to be the star player and get the girl!” 

“Stiles, focus,” Dean says, a little exasperated.

“Well, I mean it’s the least I can do right? That’s cool, yeah? That’s allowed? Helping the possessee out a little?” Stiles opens his eyes, solid black pupils reflecting the street lamp nearby, and looks up at Dean.

Dean rolls his eyes. “You can do whatever you want. If you want to feel better about yourself, fine. Can we get back to…” he says waving his hand for Stiles to continue with the lesson.

“Oh, right. Okay, umm let me see here. He had a mom, but she died of cancer when he was younger. His dad is the town sheriff, and he likes playing video games especially this fantasy one online—“ 

“What did you say?” Dean shouts, cutting him off.

“It’s some roleplaying game where they battle mythical—“ 

“NO. Not the stupid game. Did you just say this kid’s dad is the Sheriff?!” 

“Oh… ummm yes? In my defense, I did not know that ‘til just now.”

Dean rubs his hand over his face. “You idiot. Not only do we have to worry about hunters tracking us, now we gotta worry about cops! That face,” Dean points to Stiles, circling his finger to indicate Stiles’s face, “is going to be plastered everywhere because not only is this kid going to be missing, but his Sheriff dad isn’t going to stop looking for him. Ever.”

“Dude, I’m sorry! I didn’t know, okay? And… who says this kid is going to go missing?” he says, one eyebrow lifting up like he just had an idea.

“I don’t like that look. Stop. Look, kid, you’re just going to have to come out and possess someone with a few more years on him that doesn’t have relatives in law enforcement.”

“But I like this one! No, hear me out. Let’s stay here a while. I’ll go to school and do everything he normally does, and then I’ll sneak out and you can be my demon Yoda at night.” 

“Demon Yoda?” Dean deadpans. “Sneaking out every night doesn’t sound like a better plan.”

“What? Of course it does! Teenagers always sneak out. Plus I’m the son of a Sheriff, that’s like textbook cause for rebellion. Dean, come on, this is a good plan. No one knows you here. You can get a job and an apartment. You know… settle down a little before you beg your hunter lover to come find you.”

Suddenly angry, Dean lunges forward, grabbing Stiles’s throat and wrapping his hand around it.

Stiles flails a little in surprise, but he’s wearing a smirk on his face and shows no sign of Dean’s tightening hand having any effect on him. “Excuse me? You don’t have a fucking clue what you are talking about.”

“Oh I don’t, huh? That’s why you’re choking me? Cause I’m clueless? Which may I point out, probably not a good idea for a grown man to be choking an innocent teenager whose dad is the sheriff. Might be hard for you to make friends around here…”

Dean slowly loosens his grip around Stiles’s throat, but his hand stays pressed against the boy’s neck. “You don’t know anything about Cas, and if you say another fucking word about him, I’ll send you straight back to hell myself.”

“Geez, don’t get your panties in a twist. Didn’t know it was such a sensitive subject for you. I mean I’m not judging. Fool around with whoever you want; I might be new to this, but even I know it’s a rare occurrence that a hunter would rather jump your bones than send you back to hell.” 

Dean makes a move like he’s going to punch him, but Stiles throws up his hands in apology. “Hey, again I don’t care. Get with who you want. I just hope for your sake it doesn’t go south like that one demon that tried to put the moves on that angel Balthazar. And here I thought demons were supposed to be the deceitful cheating ones.” Dean looks a little taken aback by this information.

Clearly he’s been out of the loop for a while and hadn’t heard anything about someone trying to hook up with an angel. He knew plenty well what dicks angels could be, had heard about it from Castiel occasionally. “Cas wouldn’t do that. We have a mutually beneficial relationship, and if that changes, believe me, I won’t be sticking around long enough to see where the fall-out lands.”

“Yeah okay,” Stiles says, taking a step back from Dean and straightening his shirt. “I hope he knows that,” he murmurs under his breath. 

Dean hears it, but he doesn’t comment. He’s already embarrassed himself with how attached he is to Castiel, he doesn’t need any more.

[lifblogs]

SAVE DEAN WINCHESTER

Whumptober 2022 @whumptober-archive NO. 1 A LITTLE OUT OF THE ORDINARY Adverse Effects | Unconventional Restraints | "This wasn't supposed to happen."

Fandom: Supernatural Rating: Explicit Pairing: Destiel (sort of) Word Count: 1736 Summary: Castiel goes to Hell to save Dean Winchester, but something goes wrong, and Dean doesn't want to be saved. WARNING: Graphic Depictions of Violence READ ON AO3

This was not going how Castiel planned at all. RESCUE THE RIGHTEOUS MAN FROM HELL—those were his orders. The whole excursion should have been simple. Yet somehow when he’d gripped the Righteous Man, gripped Dean Winchester, and his hand had seared a mark into his flesh, Dean was able to resist. He took in the pain of Castiel’s brand, and somehow took more, took power too.

Now Castiel was in a dark stone room, a rusty metal grate closing off his only path of escape. A prison. It was lit by torches; lit by lava flows in the floor, bordering the room. Dean had him pressed against the wall, a knife to his throat. (Was it his throat? He’d chosen his vessel early, earlier than he should’ve. Yet, Jimmy was not in the back of his head anymore, as if Dean had somehow erased him. Oh, poor Jimmy Novak!)

“Dean,” Castiel got out in his rough voice, “I’m here to rescue you.”

Dean’s eyes were black, and despite his horrible situation, Castiel wondered what color they truly were. Were they beautiful? Were they kind? Could they be kind if he hadn’t been tortured for so long, twisted into this abominable thing before him?—a thing he was trying to save.

Dean raised an eyebrow. “Yeah? Well, I don’t need rescuing.”

His lids flicked as he looked him up and down.

Castiel tried to grab him, despite the knife to his throat, and Dean threw him. Hard pressure made itself known against his body, almost numbing, and then it hurt—just a bit. He collapsed to the floor, trying to catch his breath back from surprise. It was so odd that this body wanted to breathe.

“I have fucking power down here!” Dean yelled, approaching him. “Those sons of bitches were torturing me, telling me that if I said just one little word that the tables could be turned, that I could have power. And now I do. Why would I give that up? For Earth? Earth’s a god damn nightmare.” He gave a dark laugh. “Earth is where people die, where things hunt you, and hurt you, and where you give up your life because you think you’re doing the right thing. And now?” Dean spread his hands. “There is no right thing. I don’t have to make any hard choices.”

“We need you.”

“And whose we?”

“The angels.”

“Pfft, the angels? Where were you sons of bitches when my mom burned on the ceiling? Huh? Where were you when Sammy died and I had to make a deal to bring him back? Where were you when every low, evil thing out there had it out for us? Where were you?”

“Dean—”

He came over and pressed the knife against his lips, a clear sign to be quiet. Castiel’s chest heaved.

The knife cut his lips, and a slow trickle of hot blood made its way onto his chin.

Dean eyed it, and bit his bottom lip.

Was this really the Righteous Man? Did he have the wrong person? No, it was him. It had to be. This was Dean Winchester, and Castiel had to deal with that.

Dean caressed his face with the knife, and Castiel shuddered. Dean did too, mouth open, black eyes drinking him all in. And then, he smiled.

Castiel thought maybe then his heart dropped down to his feet.

“I think I know what to do with you.”

“Dean,” Castiel enunciated sharply, “I am here to rescue you. Heaven needs you.”

“Screw that. I don’t need them!”

Castiel tried to shove Dean away, which turned into a desperate struggle. Castiel didn’t want to hurt Dean, but oh, Dean wanted to hurt him.

Despite several punches and having his head head slammed back against the rock wall, Castiel got on top of Dean. He started speaking in Enochian, hoping that would disorient him. Dean threw his head back, screaming, his ears starting to bleed. Castiel’s eyes glowed blue, his whole body filled with golden light, and he could feel their presences in Hell weakening.

Dean was thrashing beneath him, snarling like a rabid dog. His head came forward, and crunched up against Castiel’s nose.

Cartilage broke, blood flowed. Now he was at a disadvantage. While temporarily disoriented, Dean managed to grab the knife, and he drove it right into Castiel’s chest.

If this was a regular enemy Castiel would just pull the knife out of himself, uncaring, and stab his adversary. But this was Dean Winchester, the Righteous Man. He could not hurt him.

Then, an idea came to him. Dean was a demon now. Demons liked deals—no, loved them.

Powering down, he leaned over Dean, putting an arm across his collarbones. “What if we made a deal?” he offered in english.

Dean calmed, but Castiel noticed that his hips tilted upwards where he was being straddled. He tried to ignore it, but couldn’t help but notice how interesting it was to have a body, and to have someone beneath him. It felt good. Maybe too good.

“What kind of deal?” he asked.

“What do you want?”

“You. Bleeding and screaming. All the angels. They need to pay!”

Cas raised an eyebrow at that, tilting his head. “That’s a bit much.”

With a roar, Castiel was shoved off of Dean.

Dean stood, and then grabbed him by the tie, pulling him up, almost strangling him with it.

“Fine. Your pretty angelic guts in my hands, and you can take me wherever the fuck you want.”

Castiel swallowed roughly, the body he was in reacting in quite terrifying ways at the thought of what would need to happen to him. His mouth was dry, his tongue seemingly sticking to the roof of his mouth, his legs were weak, knees trembling. And he was hot and cold, and he could feel the pulse of his blood pumping through him as his heart raced. Ragged breaths dragged in and out of his throat.

RESCUE THE RIGHTEOUS MAN FROM HELL.

“Yes.”

Dean put his lips to his. Castiel had no idea how to react to this, had only a vague idea of what this actually was, but he felt like something was sealed between them.

After, Dean thumbed his bottom lip.

“Damn, you’re pretty.”

“Thank—you?” Castiel responded, confused by the situation.

A chuckle left his charge, his adversary, his responsibility.

“Now what’s your name?”

“Castiel.”

“That’s bullshit. I’m gonna call you Cas.”

Castiel couldn’t care less about this shortened version of his name. Not when Dean started roughly stripping him.

He let him. He let him bare his vessel, shivering at the implications of his treatment.

Sure, he didn’t feel pain like a human, not even in a vessel. But something as intense and dark and disgusting as Dean had planned would hurt.

Soon, Dean, the Righteous Man, had Castiel by the throat, blunt nails digging in, fingers squeezing, and he cut into him a few inches beneath his pectorals. What Castiel could tell of this body from his grace, Dean had been trained well.

Dean walked forward, backing Castiel against the bars of his cell.

There was nothing he could do as he watched the horrid delight on the Righteous Man’s face as he made one clean cut downward, knife digging deep. He tried to hold in a scream, but he couldn’t, couldn’t control any of his reactions as Dean carved expertly.

As he slashed above his pelvis he almost collapsed, but the hold on his neck kept him standing. His spine stretched, his weight pulling against Dean’s grip.

Ugly sounds escaped him, sounds he didn’t know humans could make. It disturbed him, disturbed him to the point of wanting all this to end, to the point where he was berating himself for every choice he’d made since being given this mission. SAVE DEAN WINCHESTER. Well, as Dean would say: what a load of crap.

Another slash, and then Dean reached his hand into him.

Castiel choked and spluttered, and tried to fight Dean, but he was so weak now. Weak from pain. Pain. Oh, Father, why did you create such a thing as pain?

As Dean cut and pulled, ripping him apart, Castiel tried to remember his mission.

SAVE DEAN WINCHESTER.

SAVE DEAN WINCHESTER.

SAVE—

With a pull, his guts were out. Blood was splashing down onto the floor, rolling down his body, soaking into his pants.

Something fell out of him, maybe something Dean didn’t care about, but Castiel felt the wrongness, the hollow, gaping emptiness.

This body was broken, belonging solely to the Righteous Man.

Dean tossed the knife aside, and used both hands to pull his intestines out. His torturer was breathing heavy, voice leaking into his breaths, nearly moaning.

And then he turned Castiel around, leaving him with the air to scream and scream and scream, Dean’s ears surely bleeding from his angelic voice.

Despite that, hardness pressed against his backside—an unfamiliar hardness.

Wrists pulled behind his back now, a wet, slimy, ropy thing encased them. Blood slithered down to coat his hands. They wrapped all the way to his forearms, and then he was tossed onto his side on the floor, something cracking (his hip?), sparking more pain through him. Oh, how was it possible to feel more pain?

Castiel was lying in a pool of his own blood, of this vessel’s blood. Yet, in these moments where Dean had made him so intimately know this body, it really was his own. There was no other way to see it now.

Vision going in and out, the world spinning, he couldn’t see much as Dean put his ankles together, and started tying. His intestines didn’t make good restraints, but he didn’t even want to squirm against them or try to break free. They were no longer a part of his utterly ruined and degraded body, but to feel them break against his flesh would be too much.

Tied up, he lay there, participating in the action of what he thought might have been uncontrollable sobbing.

Dean knelt by him, and grabbed his chin. His grip was clumsy, fingers soaked in red.

“Ha! After all that, I’m not sure I want to leave. Maybe, just maybe, Cas, I’ll keep you as my little pet.”

Too weak to do much, Castiel continued to sob.

Dean pulled him into his lap, and let him sob against his chest.

[storm-and-starlight]

well. okay. I went and did it. I watched Supernatural season 15 episode 18: Despair.

I now present my thoughts as I had them during the episode, only mildly edited:

Apparently Chuck is already dead?

Also WOW the dialogue is fucking terrible

Okay so Billie betrayed them and I very much dislike that take on her

Also they decided to do on-screen teleportation after FIFTEEN YEARS of keeping it off screen and just like. Wow that's bad

like the off-screen teleporting just added Something to the show that worked really well? and removing it removes one more cool little aesthetic choice and makes everything fall just so much flatter

Okay so Chuck isn't dead he's just disappeared after the winchesters failed to kill him

Charlie! I didn't know she was in this episode

Well, apocalypse!Charlie, but still

I'm not so sure I like the direction they took cas in this season, like he's very very humanized and very casual and while it does make sense for his character I'm still not that much of a fan

Awww Eileen died

Awww brother hug

Heyyyyy, Donna!

Oh please tell me Donna survives.

Once again the dialogue is just really really bad

Wow Bobby looks young

Also he's just not acting like Bobby whatsoever

was Jim Beaver even in this episode?

Okay yeah this is just a bad fuckin episode

All the people from other worlds just got poofed out of existence and it was INCREDIBLY badly written and directed and acted

It's all stuff that's supposed to be "cool" and dramatic and intense but none of it is actually landing

Oh oop I think I'm at The Scene

Nope wait nvm it's Billie trying to kill Dean for coming back from the dead and being a rule breaker and like. Wow everyone really has forgotten that Sam was the original protagonist, huh

Good God the dialogue is HORRIBLE

"don't you think it's finally time for the sweet release" pause "of death?"

like kudos to Billie's actress for at least trying to make that one sound natural but like. damn.

Not sure whether or not the glowy wards thing is new but I'm not hugely a fan, and there's a LOT of it this episode in response to a lot of things and hrmmmmmmmmmm no not liking it

Oh oh here we gooooooo

I did not know Dean had a breakdown beforehand

Oh my god Cas gets himself schlorped deliberately to save dean's life by summoning the empty to get rid of death?

Also wow THAT'S a fucking sentence

Oh my god?

Okay Cas is actually crying wow

This is a really long love confession when Death is actively trying to break down the door to the room they're hiding from her in because she wants to kill Deean

Cas: Extremely long heartfelt speech about how wonderful Dean is Dean: why does this sound like a goodbye? Cas: Because it is. I love you. Dean: don't do this, Cas

OH MY GOD HE REALLY DOES HAVE NO EMOTION ON HIS FACE AT ALL

NONE

NADA

ZILCH

ngl I laughed my fucking head off when Dean gave the line because THE MEMES WERE NOT WRONG THAT MAN DOES NOT GIVE A SINGLE FLYING FUCK ABOUT CAS DUMPING HIS HEART ON THE FLOOR HERE

Also wow that's a hell of a closeup on Misha Collins there

They had the FUCKING NERVE to play Dean's Family Devotion Theme after he watches Cas confess his love to him with a BLANK FUCKING FACE oh my god

And now we get Dean having a surprisingly sedate breakdown

And we don't even get the quiet credits we get the rock credits

Goddamn. Okay. That was awful.

IN CONCLUSION: the... everything ... surrounding the Destiel confession scene aside, this is remarkably bad. The dialogue is terrible, the directing is terrible, the acting is sub-par even from people who are usually pretty damn good (Felicia Day as Charlie very very much feels like she's phoning it in), did I mention the dialogue is terrible? Because it's so bad, and the actual love confession... well, it certainly lives up to everything I've heard about it (and no, I didn't actually see it when I came out because I wasn't interested in this level of psychic damage then). Anyways. Yeah. Bad.

[xieyouji-xiegushi]

Just What I Needed (Chapter 3)

Cross-posting my fics while AO3 is down! This is a multi-chapter fic; please check out the contents page for additional tags, overall CWs and other chapters before reading!

Title: Just What I Needed (Chapter 3)

Fandom: Supernatural

Rating: E

Ship: Destiel

Chapter 3 CWs: none

Summary: All Sam and Dean have to their names right now is $200, a '67 Chevy Impala, and a lead.

Dean dropped Sam off outside the library. Sam waved, wishing him a good date and reminding him to be careful. Dean was relaxed. He’d managed to wash his hair under a standpipe at the gas station earlier, and he had one of his last clean shirts on. He knew he didn’t exactly look his best, but at least Castiel probably wouldn’t be able to guess that he was effectively homeless.

He parked two blocks away from the Cheesecake Factory at precisely 6.45, giving him enough time to walk the rest of the way. He didn’t like to park right outside in case his jilted date tried to follow him. It wouldn’t do to have some angry guy memorising his plates. He walked briskly, not because he was cold, but actually a little excited. He tried to contain himself, but it was a long time since he’d been on anything that had even the semblance of a real date. He might have been out here scamming older guys for food, but they were out to get something for themselves too. He just didn’t usually give it to them.

Reminding himself that, no matter how pleasant the target, this was still just a scam, Dean hurried inside. Castiel was waiting just inside of the door. He smiled when he saw Dean.

“Aaron, I presume?”

“That’s me. Shall we grab a table?”

“Yes, we should.”

After they were situated, with two glasses of water and their food on the way, Castiel decided it was time to start the conversation.

“I hope this is okay. The restaurant, I mean. I never feel comfortable at expensive places.”

“Oh, no, it’s fine. I get that.” Dean did get it. He was all about quantity over quality, especially recently.

“Good,” Castiel responded, before falling silent. Dean waited for a couple of minutes, but there was no follow-up. Odd. Maybe Castiel was nervous. Okay, Dean could work with that.

“So, uh, do you come here often?”

Dean kicked himself internally. Why was that the thing that came out of his mouth? If he’d had a brain, he’d be dangerous.

“No, I do not frequent the Cheesecake Factory. I mainly eat at home,” Castiel answered the question, apparently taking it at face value. He looked down at his drink. More silence. Dean began to feel a bit awkward. The conversation just wasn’t flowing the way it had seemed to earlier. It was… weird.

“Hey, uh, are you okay?” he asked.

“Yes. Sorry. My people skills are… rusty. I mainly talk to computers. I haven’t been on a proper date since… well, I can’t remember, actually. I’ve forgotten what to do.”

Dean laughed gently. That made two of them.

“Well, you were pretty conversational earlier. Just stick with that.”

“Oh. That. Texting is easier than face to face interactions. And the questions thing – I, uh, saw that on stackexchange. I’m nowhere near that smooth in real life.”

Well, that made sense. Dean felt just the smallest twinge of disappointment, but he shelved it. If the date was bad, he wouldn’t feel guilty for cutting out early.

“I think, this is the part where I ask you to tell me about yourself, is it not?” Castiel continued. “How long have you been in town?”

“Just a few days. You’re local?”

“Yep, born and bred. You here for long?”

“Not sure yet. Probably not. We move around a lot.”

“We?”

Damn. Dean usually went out of his way to avoid giving any personal information to his dates. Castiel was more observant than he was used to. Most of the guys he went out with just wanted to talk about themselves. Oh well, he supposed he could give a few details, as long as they weren’t identifying.

“Yeah, I’m with my family. My Dad, and my kid brother.”

“Your dad? How old did you say you were again?”

“I didn’t, but I’m 24.” Dean lied. Really, he was 20, but a lot of guys were put off by that, and the ones that weren’t tended to be trouble. “Family business. I help out and take care of Sammy.”

“That sounds pleasant. I haven’t seen my brothers for a long time. They’re not… the best people.”

Oh. Okay. Awkward, and a little oversharing. Castiel wasn’t really what Dean had expected, but, somehow, he found that he didn’t mind. It was honestly just nice to meet someone who liked to listen as much as talk.

“Sorry to hear that, man. Having a brother… it’s awesome. Sammy’s the greatest kid. Does good in school, everyone likes him, you know. Never gets in trouble. Give him some apple pie and he’s happy as Larry.”

Dean lit up when he was talking about Sam, and Castiel noticed, smiling at him softly. It was a kind smile. It made Dean feel warm. Not many people looked at him like that these days.

“What’s the family business?”

“Oh, you know. Contracting. Short jobs, different cities, that sort of thing. We mostly live on the road.”

“Sounds interesting. Tiring, I imagine, but it must feel… freeing.” If Castiel had noticed how Dean had deflected the question, he didn’t comment. “I’m chained to a desk most days, I’m afraid. Not a very exciting life.”

“Well, thank god you met me,” Dean quipped, before his curiosity got the better of him. “Actually, if this is your first date in a while… why did you ask me out?”

“I don’t know. I hadn’t even opened Grindr in, oh, must’ve been months. Today I just decided to check it out, see what’s out there, and there you were, right at the top. I didn’t know you’d just come into town. But it seems, I don’t know, serendipitous.”

As he said this, Castiel met Dean’s eyes, and held his gaze for the longest they had managed so far. Dean could tell that he was completely sincere. He almost found himself agreeing. Castiel’s eyes were truly striking. Dean felt like he was at risk of answering any question Castiel asked as long as he was looking into his eyes.

Their food arrived, and Castiel got to work on his quickly, with Dean taking it considerably slower. The conversation was moving more naturally now. They talked about Castiel’s job, which sounded just as boring as he claimed it was, their hobbies (Dean left several off the list), music, and a bit more about their families. Dean was careful not to give anything else away. Castiel didn’t go into much detail about his, either. What he did say made it sound pretty complicated. Dean could relate. Neither of them pried beyond what they were willing to share.

Dean almost jumped out of his chair when he felt his phone ring. He quickly checked his watch – how was it 8.30 already? He hadn’t been looking at the time at all. He supposed he had just been enjoying Castiel’s company.

“Sorry, I gotta take this.”

“No problem.”

Dean walked away from the table and answered the phone.

“Hi, Sammy.”

“Ready to go?”

Dean hesitated, glancing back at Castiel, who was still sitting at the table. God, he was good-looking. A tiny part of him wanted to stay.

“Dean? Come on, I’m hungry.”

“Right, right. Sorry. I’ll be right there.”

He hung up and returned to the table. No need for a fake frown; he actually felt bad about leaving. Castiel clearly didn’t go out much. Dean felt like he was wasting a rare opportunity for him.

“Castiel, I’m so sorry. I have to go. My Dad has to go to work, so I gotta go home and take care of Sammy. Sorry, I was supposed to have the night free.”

Castiel was silent for a few seconds, before turning his face towards Dean with an understanding expression.

“It’s okay. Here, let’s get your food packed up.” He motioned for a waiter to come to the table. “Could we get this food to go? And add an apple pie to that, and the bill, please.”

“Apple pie?”

“Sammy’s favourite, right?”

Dean was taken aback. Now he felt really guilty.

“Hey, Aaron, I had a great time tonight. Could I get your number?”

“What? Oh, right, of course.”

Dean had been asked this after a date before of course. This time, though, he gave Castiel his real number. He felt his phone buzz in his pocket as Castiel drop-called him.

“There, now you’ve got mine. Ah, and just in time,” he said, as the waiter returned with the food. He handed the bags to Dean, who accepted them gratefully. “Text me when you get home, okay?”

“Uh, sure. Thanks, Castiel. Be seeing you.”

“I hope so.”

Dean turned and half-ran out of the restaurant. Castiel would hopefully assume it was because he was rushing home, but really Dean just didn’t know how to respond. When he got back to the car, he pulled out his phone and saved Castiel’s number, grinning stupidly. Yeah, he was totally smitten.

He got back to the library at 8.55. Sam was waiting.

“You’re late.”

“Five minutes! And I got you pie.”

“What? How did you manage that?”

“The guy. He ordered it.”

Sam gave him a sidelong look. “And? How was it?”

“It was nice. He was nice.”

“That’s good. Shame you’re not gonna see him again.”

Dean felt a slight pang of sadness. “Right. Yeah. I’m not into second dates, anyway.”

There was a faint buzzing sound, which Dean realised had come from his phone. He opened it to check the notification. Grindr. He opened it, just to see what it was.

hi

u into older

?

________________

Well, it was a bit soon after his last date, but maybe Dean could book in dinner for later in the week. It would give him one less thing to worry about.

i’m open

________________

Good start. Not shutting it down, but not looking like he was into it either. Dean had discovered that if he came on too strong, they didn’t feel as inclined to spend money on him.

u avail?

[location]

here

now

________________

Yikes.

buy a guy dinner first?

i’m free tomorrow

________________

no dinner

1 hr

p2p

200

u come or not?

________________

Dean wracked his brain. What was ‘p2p’, again? Drugs? No, drugs was ‘pnp’, or sometimes ‘pArty’. No, ‘p2p’ was… oh, right. Pay to play. 200. That must’ve meant $200. Damn.

Dean was under no illusion exactly what he would be doing for that $200. To be honest, he’d considered it before, sometime after they got down to their last $500. He just hadn’t really known how to actually, you know, find a job.

pics?

________________

[image]

[image]

[image]

________________

Well, one out of those three was not exclusively a dick pic. The guy was definitely older than Dean, but still only looked to be about early 50s. He wasn’t stunningly attractive or anything, but not bad. Dean made up his mind.

ok

just got off work

can I shower at your place?

________________

sure

________________

be right there

________________

Dean looked over at Sam, who was working on his food.

“Hey, Sammy. I’ve gotta go, uh, take care of something. I’m gonna bring the car, so you just lock yourself in, alright? It won’t take long.”

“Where are you going? Hunting? Can I come?”

“No, and no. It’s just… a thing. Don’t worry about it. I’ll be back before you know it.”

“Okay, sure. Just be careful, alright?”

“Yeah, yeah. Of course.”

Dean sped across town and parked two streets away from the location. He grabbed his phone, leaving the car keys with Sam. He reached the house and rang the doorbell, hopping nervously from one foot to the other. The man opened the door and looked him up and down.

“Hi. Come in.”

“Thanks.” Dean ducked inside, heading straight to the bathroom. In his haste, he missed the text that came through to his phone.

Hey, Aaron. Did you make it home okay?

- Castiel: 21.20

[c-is-for-circinate]

For a long, large part of my life, being queer in a media landscape--finding queerness in a media landscape--has meant theft.

I'm a Fandom Old, somehow, these days, older than most and younger than some, in that way that's grown associated with grumpy crotchetyness and shotguns on porches and back in my day, we had to wade through our Yahoo Groups mailing lists uphill both ways, boring and irrelevant anecdotes from Back In Those Days when homophobia clearly worked differently than it does now, probably because we weren't trying hard enough. I've seen a lot of stories through the years. I've read a lot of fanfic. (More days than not, for the past twenty years. I've read a lot of fanfic.)

When people my age start groaning and sighing at conversations about representation and queerbaiting, when we roll our eyes and drag all the old war stories out again in the face of AO3 is terrible and Not Good Enough, so often what we say is: you Young Folks Today have no idea how hard, how scary, how limiting it was to be queer anywhere Back In Those Days. Including online, maybe especially online, including in a media landscape that hated us so much more than any one you've ever known. And that is true. Always and everywhere, again and again, it's true, we remember, it's true.

We don't talk so much about the joy of it.

Online fan spaces were my very first queer communities, ever. I was thirteen, I was fourteen, I was fifteen--I was a lonely, over-precocious "gifted kid" two years too young for my grade level in an all-girls' Catholic school in the suburbs--I lived in a world where gay people were a rumor and an insult and a news story about murder. I was straight, of course, obviously, because real people were straight and anyway I was weird enough already--I couldn't be two things strange, couldn't be gay too, but--well, I could read the stories. I could feel things about that. I would have those stories to help me, a few years later, when I knew I couldn't call myself straight any more.

And those stories were theft. There was never any doubt about that. We wrote disclaimers at the top of every fic, with the specter of Anne Rice's lawyers around every corner. We hid in back-corners of the internet, places you could only find through a link from a link from a link on somebody else's recs page, being grateful for the tiny single-fandom archives when you found them, grateful for the webrings where they existed. It was theft, all of it, the stories about characters we did not own, the videotaped episodes on your best friend's VHS player, one single episode pulled off of Limewire over the course of three days.

It was theft, we knew, to even try and find ourselves in these stories to begin with. How many fics did I read in those days about two men who'd always been straight, except for each other, in this one case, when love was stronger than sexual orientation? We stole our characters away from the heterosexual lives they were destined to have. We stole them away from writers and producers and TV networks who work overtime to shower them in Babes of the Week, to pretend that queerness was never even an option. This wasn't given to us. This wasn't meant for us. This wasn't ours to have, ever, ever in the first place. But we took it anyway.

And oh, my friends, it was glorious.

We took it. We stole. And again and again, for years and years and years, we turned that theft into an art. We looked for every opening, every crack in every sidewalk where a little sprout of queerness might grow, and we claimed it for our own and we grew whole gardens. We grew so sly and so skilled with it, learning to spot the hints of oh, this could be slashy in every new show and movie to come our way. Do you see how they left these character dynamics here, unattended on the table? How ripe they are for the pocketing. Here, I'll help you carry them. We'll make off with these so-called straight boys, and we only have to look back if somebody sets out another scene we want for our own.

We were thieves, all of us, and that was fine and that was fair, because to exist as queer in the world was theft to begin with. Stolen time, stolen moments--grand larceny of the institution of marriage, breaking and entering to rob my mother's hopes for grandchildren. Every shoplifted glance at the wrong person in the locker room (and it didn't matter if we never peeked, never dared, they called us out on it anyway). Every character in every fic whose queerness became a crime against this ex-wife, that new love interest. Every time we dared steal ourselves away from the good straight partners we didn't want to date.

And: we built ourselves a den, we thieves, wallpapered in stolen images and filled to the brim with all the words we'd written ourselves. We built ourselves a home, and we filled it with joy. Every vid and art and fic, every ship, every squee. Over and over, every straight boy protagonist who abandoned all womankind for just this one exception with his straight boy protagonist partner found gay orgasms and true love at the end.

Over and over, we said: this isn't ours, this isn't meant to be ours, you did not give this to us--but we are taking it anyway. We will burglarize you for building blocks and build ourselves a palace. These stories and this place in the world is not for us, but we exist, and you can't stop us. It's ours now, full of color and noise, a thousand peoples' ideas mosaic'ed together in celebration. We made this, and it will never be just yours again. You won't ever truly get it back, no matter how many lawyers you send, not completely. We keep what we steal.

.

Things shifted over time, of course. That's good. That's to be celebrated. Nobody should have to steal to survive. It should not be a crime, should not feel like a crime, to find yourself and your space in the world.

There were always content creators who could slip a little wink in when they laid out their wares, oh what's this over here, silly me leaving this unattended where anybody could grab it, of course there might be more over by the side door if you come around the alleyway (but if anybody asks, you didn't get this from ME). We all watched Xena marry Gabrielle, in body language and between the lines. We sat around and traded theories and rumors about whether the people writing Due South knew what they were doing when they sent their buddy cops off into the frozen north alone together at the end of the show, if they'd done it on purpose, if they knew. But over the years, slowly, thankfully, the winks became less sly.

A teenage boy put his hand on another teenage boy's hand and said, you move me, and they kissed on network TV, in a prime-time show, on FOX, and the world didn't burn down. Here and there, where they wanted to, where they could without getting caught by their bosses and managers, content creators stopped subtly nudging people around the back door and started saying, "Here. This is on offer here too, on purpose. You get to have this, too."

And of course, of course that came with a whole host of problems too. Slide around to the back door but you didn't get this from me turned into it's an item on our special menu, totally legit, you've just got to ask because the boss throws a fit if we put it out front. Shopkeepers and content creators started advertising on the sly, come buy your fix here!, hiding the fine print that says you still have to take what you've purchased home and rebuild it with your semi-legal IKEA hacks. Maybe they'll consider listing that Destiel or Sterek as a full-service menu item next year. Is that Crowley/Aziraphale the real thing or is it lite?

And those problems are real and the conversations are worth having, and it's absolutely fair to be frustrated that you can't find the ship you want on sale in anything like your color and size in a vast media landscape packed full of discount hetships and fast-fashion m/f. It's fair to be angry. It's fair to be frustrated. Queerbait is a word that exists for a reason.

There's a part of me that hurts, though, every time the topic comes up. It's a confusing, bad-mannered part of me, but it's still very real. And it's not because I'm fawning for crumbs, trying to be the Good, Non-Threatening Gay. It's not that I'm scared and traumatized by the thought of what might happen if we dare raise our voices and ask for attention. (Well. Not mostly. I'll always remember being quiet and scared and fifteen, but it's been a long two decades since then. I know how to ask for a hell of a lot more now.)

It's because I remember that cozy, plush-wallpapered den of joyful thieves. I remember you keep what you steal.

Every single time--every time--when a story I love sets a couple of characters out on a low, unguarded table, perfectly placed to be pilfered on the sly and taken home and smushed together like a couple of dolls, my very first thought is always, always joy. Always, that instinct says, yay! Says, this is ours now. As soon as I go home and crawl into that pillow-fort den, my instincts say, I will surely find people already at work combing through spoils and finding new ways to combine them, new ways to make them our own. I know there's fic for that. I've already seen fic for that, and I wasn't really interested last time, but the new store display's got my brain churning, and I can't wait to see what the crew back at the hideout does with this.

Every time, that's where my brain goes. And oh, when I realize the display's put out on purpose, that somebody snuck in a legitimate special menu item, when the proprietor gives me the nod and wink and says, you don't have to come around the side, I know it's not much but here--there is so much joy and relief and hope in me from that! Oh, what we can make with these beautiful building blocks. Oh what a story we can craft from the pieces. Oh, the things we can cobble together. Look at that, this one's a little skimpy on parts but we can supplement it, this one's got a whole outline we can fill in however we want. This one technically comes semi-preassembled, and that's boring as shit and a pain to take back apart, but that's fine, we'll manage. We're artists and thieves. I bet someone's pulling out the AU saw to cut it to pieces already.

And then I get back to our den, which has moved addresses a dozen times over the years and mostly hangs out on Tumblr now (and the roof leaks and the landlord's sketchy as fuck but at least they don't charge rent, and we've made worse places our own). And I show up, ready for joy--ready for a dozen other people who saw that low-hanging fruit on that unguarded table, who got the nod and wink about the special menu item, who're ready to get so excited about this newest haul. Did you see what we picked up? The theft was so easy, practically begging to be stolen. The last owner was an idiot with no idea what to do with it. The last owner knew exactly what it could become, bless their heart, under a craftsman with more time on their hands, so they looked away on purpose at just the right time to let me take it home. I show up every time ready for our space, the place that fed me on joy and self-confidence when I was fifteen and starving. The place that taught me, yes, we are thieves, because it is RIGHT to take what we need, and the beautiful things we create are their own justification. We are thieves, and that's wonderful, because nothing is handed to us and that means we get to build our own palaces. We get to keep everything we steal.

I go home, and even knowing the world is different, my instincts and heart are waiting for that. And I walk in the door, and I look at my dash, and I glance over at twitter, and--

And people are angry, again. Angry at the slim pickings from the hidden special menu. So, so tired and angry, at once again having to steal.

And they're right to be! Sometimes (often, maybe) I think they're angry at the wrong people--more angry with the shopkeeper who offers the bite-sized sampler platter of side characters or sneaks their queer content in on the special menu than the ones who don't include it at all. But it's not wrong to be mad that Disney's once again advertising their First Gay Character only to find out it's a tiny sprinkle of a one-line extra on an otherwise straight sundae. It's not wrong to be furious at the world because you've spent your whole life needing to be a thief to survive. It's far from wrong. I'm angry about it too.

But this was my den of thieves, my chop shop, my makerspace. Growing up in fandom, I learned to pick the locks on stories and crack the safes of subtext at the very same time I learned to create. They were the same thing, the same art. We are thieves, my heart says, we are thieves, and that's what makes us better than the people we steal from. We deconstruct every time we create. We build better things out of the pieces.

And people are angry that the pre-fab materials are too hard to find, the pickings too slim, the items on sale too limited? Yes, of course they are, of course they should be--but my heart. Oh, my heart. Every single time, just a little bit, it breaks.

Of course the stories are terrible (they have always been terrible). Of course they are, but we are thieves. We steal the best parts and cobble them back together and what we make is better than it was before. The craftsman's eye that cases a story for weak points, for blank spaces, for anywhere we can fit a crowbar and pry apart this casing--that's skill and art and joy. Of course we shouldn't have to, of course we shouldn't have to, but I still love it. I still want it, crave it. I still thrill every time I see it, a story with hairline cracks that we can work open with clever hands to let the queer in.

That used to be cause for celebration, around here. I ask him to go back to the ruins of Aeor with me, two men together alone on an expedition in the frozen north, it feels like a gift. And I understand why some people take it as an insult. I understand not good enough. I understand how something can feel like a few drops of water to someone dying of thirst, like a slap in the face. If it was so easy to sneak it hidden onto the special menu, to place it on the unguarded side table for someone else to run off to, why not let it sit out front and center in the first place? I know it's frustrating. It should be. We should fight. We should always fight. I know why.

But my heart, oh, my heart. My heart only knows what it's been taught. My heart sees, this thing right here, the proprietor left it there for you with a nod and a wink because they Get It. It's not put together yet, but it's better that way anyway. It's so full of pieces to pull apart and reassemble. I bet they've got a whole mosaic wall going up at home already. We can bring it home and make it OURS, more than it was ever theirs, forget half of what it came from and grow a new garden in what remains.

And I go home to find anger, and my heart breaks instead.

[clairenatural]

1k. canonverse destiel fix-it with light emotional hurt/comfort. the events of 15x20 never actually happened but are referenced (including cut lines from the leaked script)

Castiel thinks his newly-human body is in denial about needing to sleep. It’s either that or he’s being intentionally punished, which he doesn’t rule out, because every time he tries to sleep he has nightmares—horrible ones, too. Ones that wake him up screaming. That, in turn, wakes Dean up, and after a week of that exhausting cycle he’s relegated himself to simply never sleeping again.

Instead he stares at Dean. He counts his freckles—as many as he can see, when Dean has his face half-buried into Castiel’s chest—and he trails his fingers along Dean’s arm.

“You know,” Dean grumbles, and Castiel freezes as if he’s been caught. “For a guy who just came back to life, you sure stare at me like I’m the one who’s gonna disappear.”

Castiel frowns. “I thought you were asleep.” It’s not an answer, but Dean hadn’t exactly asked a question.

“I could feel you watching me.” Dean tilts his head up, trying to make eye contact. Castiel avoids it. “What’s going on, Cas?”

He takes a deep breath and still doesn’t meet Dean’s gaze. He’s been vague, he’s danced around it, but now—he’s tired.

“I don’t want to watch you die again,” he replies, a hoarse whisper, and there’s a short shocked silence in which Dean pushes himself off of Castiel’s chest and onto one elbow.

“What?”

“Every night, Dean. I have to—watch you die, and I can’t do anything to stop it. That’s what the nightmare is.” 

Nightmare-Sam’s voice pops into his head, unbidden.

If Cas was here—

He’s not.

He has the lines memorized at this point.

Dean, real Dean, is still staring at him, expression unreadable in the darkness of their bedroom. “…I’m right here, Cas,” he starts, finally. Softly. “It’s just a nightmare. I’m not gonna die.”

Castiel turns to look at him, really look at him, for the first time. “Yesterday it was just a nightmare. But what if tomorrow—” he cuts himself off, frustrated. “Tomorrow it could be real, you could be really hurt, and I couldn’t—I couldn’t help.”

Dean just blinks at him. “Okay, well—how do I die?”

“What?”

“In your dream. How do I die?”

Castiel furrows his brows. “A hunt. A vampire.”

Dean snorts. “Cas, come on. A vamp isn’t gonna take me out.”

“It doesn’t.” Technically. “The rebar you’re impaled on does.”

“Ouch, okay.” Dean grimaces, and for a moment Castiel feels bad for going that far. “Okay, well. I ain’t dying on a vampire hunt, Cas, I can promise you that much.”

“I’m sure dream you said the same thing.”

This time, he actually rolls his eyes. “No offense to your brain, dude, but dream me sounds like an idiot.”

“That’s not the point.” Castiel narrows his eyes, actually a little irritated. “The point is I wasn’t even there. And even if I was—or am, assuming this is a similar real life scenario—I can’t do anything anymore.”

“Sam can’t do much against rebar either, and I still trust him with my life.”

“Except I could. And now I can’t. I—” It comes out harsher than intended, so Castiel cuts himself off. He swallows. He chooses his next works carefully. They probably still come out wrong. “I only know how to save you, Dean.”

Whatever dismissal Dean was planning—probably something along the lines of come on, dude, you’re putting way too much stake into a nightmare—dies at that. He stares at Cas for a long moment before abruptly turning over and turning on his bedside lamp.

Castiel frowns, pushes himself into a sitting position, and watches Dean pull open the drawer on his nightstand. He finally turns back, holding out a crumpled piece of paper. Castiel takes it.

He stares at it. It’s a job application.

“I got a job,” Dean explains, and when Cas looks back up at him he looks away, sheepish. “I mean—not that one, obviously, I never turned that one in, but, uh. A different one. Working on cars in town.”

Castiel, who has been looking back and forth between Dean and the paper, frowns. “You d—”

“I didn’t tell you, I know,” he replies in a rush. “I didn’t—I wanted to wait until I had something signed, you know? It’s still not official. But they called this morning and offered, so I guess it’s gonna be.”

It’s still not making sense.

“But what about hunting?”

Dean snorts. “What, a guy can’t have hobbies?” He pauses, then shrugs. Something in his demeanor shifts. “And, I mean—you know. With Sam all wrapped up in his archive project, and Chuck gone—there ain’t too many hunts in the first place.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, so. You don’t have to worry about me dying on a vamp hunt, alright? Or any hunt.”

“Oh,” Castiel repeats. “For how long?”

Dean shrugs again. “I don’t know. Maybe forever, who knows? All I know is that I fought God, man. I deserve a break.”

“You did,” Castiel agrees. He smiles. “You do.”

“Damn right,” Dean grumbles, but he’s smiling too. He reaches out to take the job application back. “Can we sleep now?”

“Yes,” Castiel replies, but he makes no movement towards lying down again until Dean puts the application back into his nightstand, turns off the light, and rolls back over.

They settle back down—Castiel on his back, Dean lying half on top of him, ear against his heart. He has one hand splayed across Dean’s back and the other one finds Dean’s hand and holds on tight. He feels Dean smile against his chest as he squeezes back.

“Cas?” he whispers. “You do save me, you know. Every day.”

Castiel smiles. He leans down to press a kiss into Dean’s hair. “You deserve to be saved,” he reminds, and even though he knows Dean thinks it’s cheesy he’s too sleepy to care.

For the first time in a long time, he doesn’t have nightmares.

[babesonly]

fic recs 2.0!

hello kings (gn) ive got significantly more fic than last time which means this is gonna be a little more organized than the last post bc it is much longer <3 categories in order are non casefic canonverse, casefic/roadtrip fic, finale fixits, endverse, non supernatural aus, and then non destiel ones. titles will be in bold for my favs! also within each category they’re in order from shortest to longest

Canonverse

I’m a tulip in a cup by godtiering (1.2k)

I worry that I never really came back from hell. I wonder why, if I got remade by heaven, I’m still the same screwed up kid that I always was.

Sometimes I worry I’m not into women at all.

"Guess not,” he looks at his shoes.

a REALLY good fic that’s basically just a look inside dean’s head during my bloody valentine do not read this looking for a fun time but please do read it

on vessels by flightsofangels (1.9k)

“You know,” Cas mutters into Dean’s bare skin. “When I was still… an angel, I used to dream that I would take you as my vessel.”

hello consumehimnatural fans!!!!! read newt’s fic right now its incredible

dean winchester is not a nicholas sparks protagonist by microcomets (1.9k)

Dean fell in love with Cas the way you fall asleep--slowly, and then all at once. Or some other hackneyed and trite bullshit. God, this is embarrassing.

dean is in LOVE. he’s also a disaster who keeps staring at cas’ hands. sigh

Stay by aeli_kindara (2.5k)

Coda to 13.06 (Tombstone). In which Castiel reckons with the aftermath of Dean's grief.

hello fellow widow arc fans <3 click here to see cas find out abt the events of advanced thanatology !

walking on a string by swordfishtrombones (2.7k)

Between the doomed offensive at the Firmament and the impending retreat from the ravaged northeast border, Castiel left camp long enough to answer one of Dean Winchester's prayers.

S6 DEAN IS A WAR WIFE. been really into early seasons deancas lately and this one is very good. god

the flesh of the mighty by Mudprophet (2.7k)

Ezekiel 39:17 "you shall eat the flesh of the mighty and drink the blood of the princes of the earth."

MY GOD. anyone who saw the @autisticandroids​ purgatory cannibalism talk and was interested read this right now. also anyone who enjoyed nbc hannibal OR raw (2016). if romantic cannibalism is remotely aligned with your interests read this right now. god

Sam Winchester, Ally At Law by alittleduck (3.3k)

Sam was pretty sure he could read every single gay friendly guide to coming out or supporting queer family members ever written and literally none of them would even imply that arguing with gay people that they were actually just homophobic constituted as "ally behavior". However, Sam was equally sure that none of those book authors had found themselves accidentally watching their brother get pounded by an Angel of the Lord at 9 am on Tuesday, so Sam was pretty sure he might actually still have the higher ground. Now, if only Jack would stop trying to bond with Dean using gay slurs long enough for Sam to convince everyone of that, he might just be able to cobble together some remnant of sanity or, failing that, dignity.

Or, the one where Sam desperately wants to invent PFLAG but Dean won't stop teaching Jack gay slurs

JACK VOICE HEY COCKSUCKERS. 

hummed low by microcomets (3.3k)

Dean pulls the Impala over at a cider barn about thirty miles out; doesn't really think about it, just sees the hokey orange lettering off the roadside and lets his hands guide the Impala off the interstate with gravel spitting under the wheels.

they get a nice day out together and dean has a gay crisis and it’s written beautifully mwah

Vena Amoris and Other Old-Fashioned Bullshit by pyrebi (3.9k)

In which angelic marriage bonds are apparently stupidly easy to trigger, Cas wages multidimensional war in Heaven, Dean can't catch a break like ever, Sam rather enjoys being a dick, love saves the day, and nobody consummates anything.

sometimes i think about this fic and it hits that at this point dean and cas would have been married for more than a year. cas my beloved...

an exploration of gender; angelic by sometimeswelose (4k)

Castiel's true form is made of electromagnetic radiation. He has spent the majority of his life, if you really want to add it all up and average the whole thing out, as a wavelength of celestial intent.

The thing about being made of light: it's light in the physics sense of the word. Castiel's waves are gamma, x-ray, micro, and radio. He's visible light too, of course, a visible light so intense that it is blinding to most humans.

hello trans cas community <3 he’s literally trans he was assigned genderless and then went hm actually i will be a man! love of my life

Some Boys are Sleeping Alone by prosopopeya (4.2k)

This isn't something that's okay, not for him, but it chases him through the years until it turns into something he can't -- doesn't want to deny. 

ohhh deans tenuous relationship with his sexuality my beloved...

love. worship. consummation. consumption. by redeyedwrath (4.3k)

ConsumehimNatural (copyright marcusantonius) the Series!

These are all snapshots centered around the idea of you know. Hunger in Supernatural. Both carnal hunger and other kinds. Fics are shown in semi-chronological order but this series is generally nebulously early seasons.

for ANYONE who is a consumehimnaturual this is required reading it is INCREDIBLE and gorgeous and very visceral and i am so very obsessed with it. thank you redeyedwrath for enabling my brainrot

the reach of human sense by perilously (4.5k)

“You know what Jimmy Novak looked like. You think he was beautiful—gorgeous, hot, all of it. It’s him. Not me. This isn’t my face.”

“But,” Dean says. He doesn’t know where he’s going with it. Just that Cas’ face is right there, brows drawn together and cheekbones gleaming in the lamplight. It’s a face that’s made his heart skip probably a couple hundred beats collectively since they met.

And it used to belong to someone else.

this one is just very nice <3 cas gets uncomfortable w dean calling him attractive since dean has never seen his trueform and they work it out

Down in the River by Ias (4.7k)

Alone in Purgatory and hunted by Leviathans, Castiel finds himself praying to the one person who can't hear him.

cas i love you <3 cas alone in purgatory praying to dean bc dean is the only thing he still worships i love you so much

Creature of Habit by trinityofone (5.1k)

The more you love someone, the more you want to kill them. Or: How Cas developed some bad habits, and Dean coped surprisingly well.

written in s5 when cas was depowered and completely nails the later seasons bitchy husbands dynamic it’s very good and fun <3

sink by crackers4jenn (5.4k)

"Where to?" A 9.06 coda.

very bittersweet very well written and also canon compliant so do not go into this one looking for a happy ending but i DO recommend it it’s very good

Sensational by castiowl (6.1k)

“When I first came to earth, it was advised that we temper the senses bound to our vessels. They were a distraction, we were told. An antiquated form of experiencing existence that would hinder our ability to complete our missions, whatever that may be. My true form can better facilitate these experiences. What you would recognize as heightened senses of sight and sound, among other things.”

Or, how Dean helps Cas experience all five human senses for the first time in one night.

early seasons deancas man. i love the sound part i love dean being so worried about doing a good job with this. god. read this please

Something to Protect by Sass_Master (6.2k)

Dean’s violent reaction to being unexpectedly woken has become something of a running joke among them, but Castiel can’t help but look past it to the underlying cause. It makes him ache to think that Dean feels so unsafe, so persecuted, before he’s even fully conscious.

Secretly, Castiel has been determined to work on that, to ease Dean into awareness in a less jarring way, smooth away one of the many stresses that follow him even in sleep. Now’s as good a time as any to try.

oh to sleep more soundly in the presence of someone you love...this fic is very nice i enjoyed it a lot

all this and heaven too by ftmsteverogers (7k)

“Hey,” Dean said. “I’m not ashamed of you, okay?”

Cas raised skeptical eyes to meet his.

“I mean it,” Dean insisted.

“I understand you mean it,” Cas said. “But I don’t think it’s any better if you’re only ashamed of yourself.”

hello trans dean community here is 7k of trans dean having to deal with his internalized homophobia now that he’s sleeping with cas <3 it is SO good

The wilderness. by orange_crushed (8k)

He takes a shower and the pressure is not especially good, but it doesn’t matter. It’s warm and he stands under the spray a long time. Human skin, he knows, constantly renews itself, shedding the dead cells of the epidermis. He wonders how long it will take until he is an entirely new person, until every cell on his surface is a new one. He looks at his hands under the water. It might take less than a month.

this might be the only post 9x03 fic on here with a happy ending actually? plenty of good melancholy leading up to it though <3 canon divergent after 9x03 though which means no 9x06 fanfiction gap but it is absolutely worth reading

till the juice runs by deathbanjo (8.4k)

Apparently whoever drew up the venn diagram of Dean’s sex life decided the circle labelled ‘good sex’ and the one labelled ‘sex with men’ should be kept far apart.

hello this one is SO funny dean finally gets comfortable enough with his bisexuality to start having sex with men and it goes so very bad every time so sorry about your shitty choices beloved </3

First Date by aeli_kindara (8.9k)

“We should go on a date. You and me.”

Castiel wishes he could see Dean’s face. He wishes he had any idea what to say.

“I’m asking you out, Cas.”

this one is very sweet i liked it a lot <3 good refreshing little fic where they just get to have a nice evening together

Entertaining Strangers by cadignan (9k)

Dean settles on to his side, lying in the bed facing Castiel. “So you had sex without me and you bit all my moves. I think I deserve to hear about it, at least. What was her name?”

op im in love with you. premise is established relationship deancas and cas mentions he did have sex before dean and not only that it was a threesome. good for him <3 this fic is cas describing the story of what led up to the threesome and what happened during it while dean interrupts regularly. incredible

the shape you take by noviembre (10k)

“What?” Dean says, fake-offended. “I’d be hot as a girl, you know I would.”

And this is when he really, really should have stopped talking. When he shouldn't have whipped back around and asked, “Cas, if I was a woman, you’d fuck me, right?”

Because if he hadn’t said that, then he wouldn’t have had to deal with this:

Cas, meeting his eyes, forehead wrinkles all smoothed out like there’s nothing to be confused about anymore. Cas with something at the corner of his mouth that might barely be called a smile.

Cas saying, calmly and without hesitation, “Yes, Dean.”

--

Dean Winchester fucks around and, with the inadvertent help of some witches, Finds Out.

dean winchester your gender is diabolical. this fic is insane and its the only thing that matters actually. dean fully convinced its normal and straight to think about being a woman so you can fuck your male friend. incredible. op im proposing to you

Sinnerman by a_good_soldier (10k)

Dean listens to Nina Simone, reads Anne Carson, and makes out with a dude (sort of).

yall want to read about dean realizing he’s in love with a man as a direct result of learning to better respect women right?

you’re fooling yourself by cowboydeanwinchester (13k)

Dean Winchester and Castiel retire from hunting to raise baby Jack. Dean struggles to allow himself the things he truly wants.

Jack is two, Castiel and Dean are idiots, and Sam's gotta solve everyone's problems.

love a married couple who doesn’t know they’re married <3 everyone say thank you sam for bullying dean 

The Girlfriend Experience by rageprufrock (15k)

While it's not like Dean hasn't had a couple of truly regrettable hit-and-runs in his sexual history, this is probably the saddest fucking thing that has ever happened to him.

a classic for good fucking reason. we’ve all talked about dean thinking holding hands is too gay after having just had gay sex but my personal favorite was sam accusing dean of cheating on cas because dean bought condoms. incredible

No Kingdom To Come by domesticadventures (16k)

“We should fuck,” Dean says.

Cas looks up from where he sits on his bed, hair still damp from the shower, frowning as he places a finger on the page of his book to mark where he left off.

There are a million things Cas could say here; Dean has rehearsed them. After lunch, his restlessness had given way to a vague panic, a dread that matched his every step and crept along with him from room to room. Eventually, he had returned to his bedroom and spent the rest of the afternoon pacing back and forth, playing out all the possible scenarios. When Cas asks him Why? or Are you being serious? or when he sighs and says, in that way he has, Dean, he knows exactly what he’s going to do. He’s going to shrug casually, like he isn’t invested in the answer, like he isn’t desperate for an outlet, and say, Why not? He’s going to raise an eyebrow and say, What, are you not interested? He’s going to crowd into Cas’ personal space, he’s going to shove himself right up in there and whisper Cas against his ear.

Instead, Cas says, carefully, “Okay.”

literally the only quarantine fic i’ve ever bothered to read in any fandom and completely worth it it’s SO good. they become fwb and dean has an existential crisis and he keeps bringing up meaninglessness and death during sex

Bodies by Speary (18k)

It was a secret they never acknowledged even with each other. It would change everything, end everything if either of them ever dropped the act. So they became very good at acting, at keeping up the lie that gave them what they wanted. Even if that lie involved constantly seeking out temporary, consenting female vessels, Cas would do it. He told himself it was worth it for Dean. He just hoped that he could stop wanting more, or maybe one day Dean might stop pretending that he wasn't really sleeping with Cas every time.

i don’t even have anything to add tbh if that summary did not immediately make you click we are very different this fic is incredible. god. fellas do you ever make yourself a woman so you can fuck the man you love without him having to talk about it or confront his sexuality

it’s such a mystery (the way you know me) by fleeceframe (20k)

So the man crouching in front of Castiel is named Dean. He wonders if that’s supposed to mean something to him.

“Cas must’ve got hit with something earlier. He just dropped like a sack of fucking potatoes a minute ago. By the time I was checking on him, he had already woken up again, but now he doesn’t fucking know who we are.”

“I’m right here you know,” Castiel says testily.

Sam’s eyes are wide even as his eyebrows are furrowed, and he looks between Dean and Castiel again.

“What do you remember, Cas?”

“Firstly, that I’m not Cas. I don’t know who Cas is, but it’s not me. I don’t know who either of you are, either."

or the one where castiel is hit with a memory curse that makes him forget the winchester brothers and is stunned to find out he has a family... also why can't he stop thinking about dean?

BEST amnesia fic oh my god. cas my beloved you deserve the world. everyone read this that is not a request.

More Than Ever by Sass_Master (20k)

Dean’s getting some pancakes together for breakfast when Cas saunters in after a run.

He’s trying to focus on whisking batter, unfairly distracted by Cas a few feet away, breathing heavily and shining with perspiration. Dean’s been painfully aware for a long time that Cas is pretty easy on the eyes, but he’s used to seeing Cas buttoned-up and unflappable, looking straight-laced in a stiff oxford and an unflattering trenchcoat.

Now Cas is sweating, Dean’s borrowed t-shirt clinging to his skin, flushed from exertion and Dean really can’t deal with that in his kitchen right now.

this entire series is really good i enjoyed it a lot, i’m just putting this one specifically on the list bc the rest of the series is very explicit and this is really good as a standalone for anyone who wouldn’t be into the rest of the series!!

Being Dean Winchester by Anonymous (20k)

"You should show me some respect. I dragged you out of hell. I can throw you back in."

Who the fuck was this bitchy "warrior of God" doing talking to him like that? Fuck Cas-tee-el and his dumbass trench coat and abrasive motherfucking attitude.

Dean was done with this shit.

***

Wherein a monster of the week steals the essence of Castiel's vessel, so he must use Dean, recently raised from hell, as a vessel instead.

it is at this point i realize that there are more fics than i expected there to be on this list that involves a threesome with only two people/using the presence of a female body to act like what’s happening is heterosexual. deangirlism is a disease 

I Shall Not Want by domesticadventures (20k)

His grace is burning out, and the wasteland it leaves inside him becomes an echo chamber for all the memories, all the fear and doubt and self-loathing he's collected over the years. Things said and done hound him on endless repeat until he's convinced they’ll break through his skin and fill the silence of the bunker.

His head is killing him, and he sits hunched over an open book, not really reading, just digging his fingers into his skull and praying nothing slips through the cracks.

this one is GORGEOUS i love it so so much. dean and cas are both struggling so much to get by and they’re trying to support each other but fucking it up and they have to grow together and learn to cope with the fact that this is where their lives are and they fall in love i need everyone to read this

To Boldly Go by 8daysuntiltheapocalypseiguess (24k)

Title: Just One of Those Things Author: Impala67 Series: TOS Rating: M Summary: Four years into their five-year mission, and all the planets start to look the same.

In which Dean is not Gene Roddenberry, but he does write Star Trek fanfiction.

mx winchester writing star trek fanfiction to process his own trauma <3 this is a wip but it’s SO good and i also have not consumed a single piece of star trek media so it IS definitely readable to anyone who isn’t a star trek fan. please read this

where the weeds take root by deathbanjo (30k)

“Are you happy? Y’know. Just—being here,” Dean says, gesturing to the yard with his beer bottle. “Being with—I mean, you used to fight in celestial wars and—and save the world. Now you’re growing vegetables and talking about chickens.”

this is on here just for the 1.5 people who were putting off this one like i did for no reason. it’s extremely good and it is just gentle. i enjoyed it a lot

Heroes for Ghosts by pantheon_of_discord (42k)

After Sam and Dean are arrested, Castiel is left alone and scrambling to find them. He knows they’re locked away in a government facility, and he’s still able to hear their prayers, but no matter how he tries Castiel can’t seem to track them. He chases leads and even attempts to hunt on his own, but Mary is AWOL, Crowley refuses to help, and Castiel’s options are running out.

Weeks pass, Castiel’s hope dwindles, and through it all Dean prays, keeping them connected. His voice is comforting, frustrating, and occasionally annoying, but in his solitude Castiel comes to cherish it. But then one day, without warning, Dean stops praying, and Castiel is forced to confront some uncomfortable truths about his feelings.

yall ever wonder what it would’ve been like if the sam and dean arrest storyline in s12 was interesting? yeah <3

Teaching Poetry to Fish by aeli_kindara (52k)

In which Castiel teaches poetry to fish. Also, himself. Also, eventually, Dean.

(A series-long story, diverging slightly from canon after S14.)

cas learning about humanity through poetry before dean and thats what led to him developing enough emotion to be lobotomized....cas i love you so much

Emergence by ellispark (58k)

Something’s been missing from Dean’s life for the past three years, a void left after a hunt gone terribly wrong. He often feels a sense of longing with no discernible cause, a need to talk to someone who isn’t there.

A call from an acquaintance leads Dean to James Novak, a man who disappeared more than a decade ago, and suddenly Dean gets the feeling he’s found what he’s been missing. But James isn’t really James — he’s the angel Castiel, who’s wanted by angels, demons and hunters alike. And he may be at the center of the storm that wrecked Dean’s life all those years ago.

another cool amnesia fic!! for unknown reasons everyone forgot cas three years ago but cas didn’t forget anything. cas deserves so much love and support. god

a turn of the earth by microcomets (95k)

Dean’s your typical half-orphaned, monster-killing 22-year-old until a trenchcoated stranger crashes into his back windshield one September night, claiming he’s an angel that knows him from the future and that he’s on the run.

Frigging fantastic.

(Or, in which Castiel gets stuck in Dean’s timeline preseries and Dean kind of hates it—until he doesn’t.)

cas getting to meet and fall in love with pre hell dean just as much as he loves the dean he already knows oh my GOD. i love this fic so much. turn of the earth my beloved

Crossing Lines by sometimeswelose (122k)

Two Deans, one Cas - it's not as sexy as it sounds

Or

An ethics lesson from Hell

Or

The one where Dean from the past meets Dean in the present. They're not sure they like each other very much.

deans intense self hatred vs cas’ unwavering love for every version of dean oh my GOD also this is a wip fair warning but it’s so worth waiting for updates i’m having such a great time with this one i cannot wait to see how it gets ended

Plot Holes by saltyfeathers (160k)

Of course it wasn’t over after the apocalypse.

There was season six. Then there was season seven. Against all expectations, there was season eight. There were the alphas and purgatory, and then the Leviathans, and then the angels fell. Enter season nine. Loose threads Metatron, Abaddon, and Crowley have to be tied up. Sam, Dean, and Cas have to try to tie them while at the same time dealing with their evolving relationships and newfound graceless states.

Amidst all the chaos, someone has started publishing the Supernatural novels again. Convinced there’s something amiss in the pages, Charlie starts her own quest to suss out the truth behind the Winchester Gospels.

With the help of various faces, old and new, they must now not only deal with the typical runs of demons and recently fallen angels, but also reconcile the battles raging inside themselves, as the fate of the world, once again, quite literally lays in the palm of their hands.

saltyfeathers said i WILL make the plot holes in this show mean something because the showrunners are sure as shit never gonna adress them ! and i thank them for it bc this was a really cool read

Casefic/Roadtrip Fic

Deprived Of Every Planet by KelpietheThundergod (9k)

Dean's breathing is audible in the scant space between them, irregular. The motel room is dark, pale blue shadows falling in through the gaps in the blinds. Throwing a pattern of uneven white stripes over the bunched up covers. Over Dean's fingers twisted in the sheets. One half of him in shadow, softened by the dark. The heat of his skin. The tremble of him under Castiel's touch.

He caresses a hand over Dean's chest, slowly. Dean's mouth falls open, his body arching into Castiel's touch. Castiel stops over Dean's heart. Through the fever of his desire, he rejoices about the wonder of experiencing another's heartbeat through one's own senses.

Dean gasps, but then he turns his face away and towards the dark. Eyes closed tight and brows furrowed like something is hurting him.

Castiel stills.

“Dean?”

the case is background on this one but it Does take place over the course of a case so im putting it here. god touchstarved dean trying so hard to work through his shit for cas head in my hands i love this fic so much

before and after breakfast by spocklee (10k)

The monster of the week is a ghost who hates meat, alcohol, and feeling yourself. Guess who it is during the commercials.

chapter 2 of this one.....god. dean and cas you are both so unwell <3 i love everything abt this fic everyone read it now

we shovel all the ashes out by xylodemon (15k)

Dean’s always known things were headed this way. He just figured getting dragged under would be cleaner and easier than jumping in feet-first.

fics that make you go Oh they love each other...also there’s lesbians in it literally what else could you want.

thunder road by dothraki_shieldmaiden (20k)

After Chuck is defeated and the Winchesters settle into life without God, Dean Winchester is bored.

OR: Dean and Cas take a road trip and figure out some stuff along the way.

this fic is just like. it’s kind! this fic is kind it’s just a pleasant experience and i enjoyed it thoroughly. they’re in love and it’s good

Suck It, Judy Garland by GlitterDwarf, midrashic (20k)

It had to be St. Louis. Or, the one where Sam and Cas get fake married for a case, and Dean loses his mind.

actually im gonna defend dean here imagine youre dean and cas gives what definitely sounded like a deathbed love confession while making eye contact with you and then immediately afterwards fake dates your brother. who among us would not have been a bitch about this

best friends without benefits by lizbobjones (20k)

It’s nearing three a.m. and they’ve been on the road a long time. Sam’s been asleep in the back seat since eleven. Giving up and handing the wheel over to Cas and letting the guy who doesn’t sleep drive had seemed like a good idea.

the premise of this fic is so funny. cas voice dean you want to fuck me so bad it makes you look stupid. everyone read this

the taste of gravel in the mouth by deathbanjo (22k)

This is what Cas gave up Heaven for: greasy diner food, shitty motel rooms with even shittier cable, long car rides spent in complete silence except for the same six tapes playing over and over again, and a burnt-out husk of a man who can barely hold a conversation anymore.

alt version of getting rid of the mark of cain, the darkness never happens. this one is VERY heavy but it’s so good and it has a hopeful ending. ive read this one twice and loved it both times

Someone Who’s Feeling For Me by ellispark (45k)

Dean sees her for the first time in nearly six years in some no-name town in Idaho, and it's panic at first sight.

Lisa Braeden, the one woman Dean ever actually had a shot at a real life with, back from where he buried her in his mind. And her hand is on Cas's arm like it's no big deal, like it belongs there. Cas, Dean's dorky, sweet, badass, angelic best friend, and he's just standing there next to Lisa and not moving her hand away.

Dean feels the jealousy rising, and it's not directed where he expected it to be. Because it takes this exact moment for Dean to realize he's in love with his best friend. He's in love with his best friend, and Lisa is looking at Cas like he's the best thing since automatic rifles, and Dean is utterly fucked.

hello op please contact me. please contact me and let me see the inside of your brain. this fic was an unparalleled experience and everyone should also go through it. i love it so very much

Bumper Cars by mansikka (111k)

Two teenagers are missing from an abandoned carnival, and there’s enough to raise suspicion that their disappearance involves a ghost. Dean, Sam, and Cas arrive in town to investigate, though what they find leads them away from those teenagers, and on the trail of a ghost story that churns up things from their past.

Can newly-human Cas, and Dean, with the help of shipper!Sam, work out the mystery behind the abandoned carnival and its ghost, and along the way, figure out the riddle that is them?

one of my absolute fav case fics it forces dean to confront some aspects of johns parenting and work through some shit and also him and cas fall in love and it’s really well done. love this one a lot <3

Finale Fix-its/Finale Denial

Sorry Jimmy by K_K_TiBal (2.1k)

Based on the tumblr textpost:

jellydeans: so are cas and jimmy novak just up in heaven existing at the same time katebushstandean: #jimmy moves to heaven timbuku so that dean stops trying to make out with him every time they run into each other at the heaven grocery store

this one is just extremely funny. local midwestern heterosexual man is forced to play relationship counselor to the dumbest gay people in existence because one of them wore his face

Dean Winchester Really Needs To Make Some Gay Friends by AreYouReady (2.2k)

“Like, I’m trying to think if I’ve had, I don’t know, crushes. If I ever had a gay thing before you came along and just didn’t notice,” Dean said.

Cas suddenly looked down, and away from Dean. If Dean didn’t know better, he would swear Cas looked guilty.

“What is it, Cas?”

“You have had several… gay things before.” Cas still wouldn’t look at him.

“What? When? How come you know this better than I do?”

There was no way the answer to this question wasn’t funny as hell.

dean learning about gay ppl via the memories of dean smith...incredible.

tiny difference (between ending and starting to begin) by sunforgrace (2.4k)

Sometimes Dean catches Cas staring at the sky.

It doesn’t happen often. Not when Dean’s around to tell, anyway. But often enough that he starts to notice.

Eventually Dean starts to recognize the pattern.

Cas just doesn’t watch the sky. He watches the birds.

Chuck is gone, Cas is human, and the world is safe. In the quiet aftermath Dean and Castiel find each other again.

i really don’t have much to say abt this one it is just very good and they love each other so much

Bring Home by cenotaphy (3.8k)

Dean's phone doesn't ring on the drive back to the Bunker, but that's okay. Because—well, maybe Cas lost his cell, what with getting shuffled back and forth between a cosmic void dimension and all. And anyway, Dean doesn't want this conversation to happen over the phone, he wants to—he wants to talk to Cas face-to-face. They should talk face-to-face.

Dean will tell him—

Dean doesn't know what he'll tell Cas. Dean is, in fact, terrified by how utterly and completely he does not know what he'll say to Cas.

cas being forced to face the consequences of sending the risky text that was despair <3

dean’s coworkers vs the heteronormative agenda by cowboydeanwinchester (4.1k)

Dean started working at a local auto repair shop in Lebanon, Kansas about a year ago. His coworkers don't know much about him. Except that he has a wife. Or maybe he doesn't. But he has a kid. Who is either a toddler or a high schooler. Who is either named Jack or Sammy. He also might have a best friend named Cas, but that also might be his wife.

Truth is nobody knows what to make of Dean.

obsessed w people not knowing a single fucking thing about dean because he talks so much and never explains anything. this fic is SO funny

Enhanced Extraction Techniques by goldenraeofsun (5.8k)

The Empty takes Meg’s shape, Samandriel’s, Duma’s, every one of the thousands of angels Cas killed up in heaven. But in the middle of lecturing Cas in the form of Balthazar, it explodes in a burst of light and sound.

Dean Winchester stands in the aftermath.

the empty playing mind games on an awake cas bc it can’t put him to sleep is a thing i like a lot and this is very very good 

Speak Silence No More by rea_sunshine (8.1k)

When Dean imagined this moment, it went like this:

Dean bursts into the Empty—guns blazing, chin high, righteous anger coursing through him. No matter what form his plans and fantasies and whiskey-drunk-whispered-promises took, he is always, always successful. When he imagined it, he was finally the hero Cas deserved.

The reality of the moment is this:

It’s fucking cold.

dean and cas STILL managing to not communicate with each other properly after the confession is so funny to me and this fic does it really well. also i like that a human being in the empty, where humans do NOT belong, had some like. consequences

my heart is a compass by lagaudiere (10k)

“There you are,” the Empty says, in Dean’s voice. It’s cold, like Dean’s eyes are cold, his expression set in contempt. It’s the expression Cas feared, he realizes, all the times he thought about saying it. Revulsion. It makes him feel sick in the way that goes beyond physical, here where there is nothing physical left.

The moment before it happened had been so sweet it covered up all the hurt. For years, Cas had been holding back those words, biting down on his tongue to keep from saying them. And now he had said it, and he knew that it was good, knew that it was worth it. But on the other side there is only this.

--

In the Empty, Cas dreams of his regrets, until someone comes looking for him.

one of thee best dean rescues cas from the empty fics out there i love the way his memories are written i love how many of them were ones that this fic came up with to give me new things to have brainworms over instead of just making me more fixated on He Watched Him Rake Leaves than i already am

killing time by orestespdf (11k)

It's been four years since Dean saved Cas from the Empty and confessed his feelings in return, and in their Vermont lakehouse, the retired couple is now learning how to heal. One morning, Dean gives Cas a haircut.

(A character study of Castiel.)

perfect fic perfect fic no notes no complaints they love each other so much and now dean is giving cas a haircut and they’re spending the day together. god.

and every time we kiss, i swear i can fly by knameless (14k)

Every time, Dean tells himself it’s the last.

--

aka, twelve times dean and cas kiss.

a just boy best friends kiss for every season <3 mwah

for which no words exist by MediaWhore (14k)

'a prayer for which no words exist' // richard siken

"Dear Cas who art in my bathtub, give me the strength to be honest about how I feel. For your sake and for mine. Forgive me all the times I wasn’t in the past, all the words I should have said but didn’t. And please stay. Please stay with me when all is said and done. Amen. "

Dean rescues a newly human Cas from the Empty. That's the easy step.

mediawhore i am in LOVE with you oh my god this fic. this fic. dean taking care of cas after rescuing him dean wrapping cas in a blanket oh my GOD

swimming with the fish pond fish by februyuri (17k)

Some time between Dean bleeding out on a makeshift hook in a barn in Ohio and Sam making marshmallows on his funeral pyre, Dean was brought back to life. By Castiel. Again. Dean agreed to it if only to give Jack time to work out the glitches up top. So, now Dean’s back in the land of the living and things are ... actually good, for once.

Or, as good as they can be when demons are attacking Earth, Dean’s failing to get over why he died in the first place, and Cas is suddenly, inexplicably taking every opportunity to casually tell Dean that he loves him.

this is a wip! but it is so good and so worth the read i love it a lot and am very excited for the last chapter. it IS pretty heavy though dean has a LOT to work through

looking like a true survivor (feeling like a little kid) by courfeyrac (20k)

"Jack’s a clever kid—has been ever since he was born, maybe even before that—but Dean’s pretty sure he hasn’t figured out where they’re going yet. And Dean’s… Dean’s excited about it. He remembers planning surprises for Sammy when they were little—saving up quarters and sneaking off to the arcade the year he turned seven, or slipping a book Dean had seen Sammy admiring into his jacket before sprinting out of the store the year he turned twelve. There was only so much Dean could give him back then, hindered by lack of finances and transportation and a father who paid attention. Now, though, Dean’s got a wallet full of cash, a tank full of gas, and the freedom to give his kid the kind of birthday he deserves."

Or, it's Jack's fourth birthday, and the kid wants to go to Build-A-Bear.

EVERYONE READ THIS RIGHT NOW. that is not a request this fic undid me. oh my god. oh my god. they’re a family and they’re going to build a bear and they love each other. oh my god. also no it isn’t a baby jack fic he is 4 and he is also alcal

what’s missing is found (our souls can exhale now) by sobsicles (27k)

It's not the first time Claire has ever gone missing. It is, however, the first time Kaia panics about it. Dean's dragged into the mess, but he soon finds that it's the best thing that could have happened to him.

~~~

"But have you ever just met someone and maybe it wasn't from the first moment, maybe it was after all these other moments that meant more than you ever expected them to, and it seems like your soul just—just—" Kaia makes a helpless gesture with her hands, pushing out, and she breathes out loudly. "Like it can finally exhale. And that person isn't guaranteed to make you happy, but they're—they're important. You just know it, you can't even escape it, you can't let them go. Ever met someone like that, Dean?"

"I—" Dean halts, his mouth hanging open. He's looking at Kaia, who's looking at him, and his heart is fluttering in his throat like a caged bird aching to soar again. His mind threatens to spiral out of control, but he focuses, swallowing hard. "Yeah. Um. I—yeah, I have."

deancas AND dreamhunter we love to see it also dean DOES smoke weed with kaia and apologizes for pulling a gun on her what more could you want in a fic

Command Me To Be Well by prospopeya (28k)

Dean did a lot of thinking about when and how he would get Cas back. Months of it, actually, stretching into a year, because while Sam and Eileen were settling into their new lives, Dean was stuck. He was stuck in a faraway corner of the bunker, dark and empty and hollow, ringing with the sound of a vibrating phone.

So when he falls to his knees in that same room, exhausted, hurting, breathless, and he feels a hand on his shoulder and looks up to see Cas, he realizes that he doesn't have a single clue about what to do now. Getting Cas out had been easy--actually, it'd been the opposite of that--but the planning of it, the methodical desperation of one attempt after the other had been a familiar rhythm. It'd been soothing almost, solid, something to focus on that wasn't Cas's eyes, watery and jubilant in a way Dean hadn't ever seen that up close on anyone, let alone Cas.

And now Cas is pulling him to his feet, and Dean's stumbling, and he instinctually grabs Cas's arm, and his hand lights up with a fire that he isn't prepared for.

"Hello, Dean."

oh post despair lack of communication....oh dean refusing to work through his feelings...this fic is incredible i love it everyone who enjoys dean doing everything in his power to avoid talking about feelings up to and including having sex with the guy who’s in love with him multiple times should read this

break the skin (to break the barriers) by sobsicles (29k)

The first time she meets him, he's nothing more than an almost-missed appointment.

SOBSICLES TATTOO FIC MY BELOVED. dean grieving and getting tattoos and it turns into tattoo therapy. im SO in love with mitzi it’s insane. requires some suspension of disbelief for how long a tattoo takes but it’s an incredible fic and an unparalleled experience. sobsicles does not miss

ascend by quiettewandering (53k)

Something in the world is wrong.

Demon activity is rising where mysterious black substance oozes and unusual ecological events are shaking the world. Dean, grief hanging on his shoulders, restlessly searches for answers that might lead him to the Empty… and to Cas.

But what Chuck wrote can’t be undone. The narrative thread pulls Dean along, forcing him to comply. Because once a story already has an ending, it can’t be rewritten.

Or can it?

SUPER cool concept i liked this a lot i’m pretty sure everyone’s read it already but just in case someone hasn’t you absolutely should

oh sooner or later it all comes down to faith by sobsicles (62k)

Getting used to Heaven is something of a marvel. It ain't perfect, and Dean thinks he'd hate it if it was, which is probably why it isn't.

~~~

"You don't understand," Dean whispers, exhaling shakily. "I know you don't, because even I don't. The instant you were gone, I wanted you back. Cas, I wanted you back. I wanted—I wanted—"

Cas stares at him, searching his face. After a moment, his own face falls slack, eyes widening just so. "Oh," he breathes out.

Dean wants to be furious that Cas has figured it out before he has—whatever it is—but he's not even that surprised. Cas knows him too well, always has, even more than Dean knows himself. He's been kicking Dean in the goddamn teeth with how deeply he understands him, even about the things Dean doesn't, ever since they first met. You don't think you deserve to be saved, that's what Cas had said. All bundled up in impossibilities and power, this being that looked at Dean Winchester and knew every single inch of him, as if he had a right to each part.

"What?" Dean grits out.

"I love you, too."

the ONLY heaven fic. i do not read heaven fics bc i refuse to budge in my finale denialism i refuse to read fic where it is accepted that dean dies. i was hesitant to read this but god im glad i did it was so good. literally the best possible outcome of dean dying

Endverse

final fantasy. by orange_crushed (1.9k)

“If I’d actually been born human, would I have gotten sick like everyone else? Would I be running around gnawing on the neighbors?” Castiel tilts his head up and even from here Dean can see the black ring of his pupils, wide and dark as dead stars. He’s high as fuck and he’s been loading the guns for forty-five minutes. He stares into the space where Dean is. He smiles and shows his teeth. “Maybe you’d have already put a bullet in my head.”

"This is why you don’t lead storytime anymore," Dean says. "This kind of shit."

endverse last night on earth fics are something that can be so personal actually. god

The Last Song by Moorishflower (3.5k)

The very last song is the Song of Solomon, and Castiel sings it only for Dean. Set in "The End."

this is like. pre endverse and the tone is so like. wistful? is the best word ive got? it’s gorgeous i love it but fair warning there is graphic description of like. viscera and infected wounds

to think that we could stay the same by cipherwriter (6.5k)

cas has all he needs; himself, his creation, and enough power to continue this cycle for a long time. he's fine. dean wants to take care of him anyway.

oh my GOD this one is good it’s based off the thing of how originally endverse cas was supposed to be just sitting in a room killing and resurrecting the same cockroach over and over. very bittersweet at some points i love it a lot, do not read it if youre looking for something happy though lmao

the first church at the end of the world by withbloodstainedclothingon (11k)

The angels don’t eat the brain. Only Croats do that.

this one is fucked but it’s incredible it contains very heavy and violent subject matter and cas is an Actual cult leader he doesn’t just have orgies it is SO well done and i had a great time reading it i recommend it very highly if the warnings sound like something you can stomach

Down to Agincourt by seperis (1.1 million. i know. yes it’s a wip)

There is no such thing as a guarantee when it comes to war.

The outcome's known. Why try? Return your rusty sword to battered sheath, bow your head and bend your stubborn knee. Why take the field when you cannot win the war? But Harry -- he went down to Agincourt.

PLEASE. i know the length is intimidating i KNOW it’s a very long fic but please. please read down to agincourt i am begging you. head in my HANDS this series is incredible.

Non Supernatural AUS

Long-Term Relationship by bendingsignpost (2.7k)

Castiel says, budging over to make room for Dean on the couch, “I thought we should have a serious talk about our relationship.”

Reflexively, Dean laughs.

Castiel does not.

“Uh, Cas... you know we’re not dating, right?”

look man it’s bendingsignpost okay. it’s bendingsignpost it’s good and it’s sweet and you should read it

One White Lie by komodobits (11k)

Castiel takes a deep breath and rings the doorbell. He doesn’t need to run through what he’s going to say – he’s already planned and edited and rehearsed it a thousand times. He is going to ask Dean Winchester out to dinner. If it’s not too forward, he’ll say, perfectly charming. You see, I’ve seen you around the neighbourhood and you always seem so earnest and I’d really like to get to know you bette— The door swings open, and Castiel panics.

He intends to excuse himself. He means to apologise and come back some other time. However, in a moment of blind fear, what comes out of his mouth instead are the words, “Could you spare a moment for Jesus Christ?”

do you ever pretend to be a jehovahs witness for months to hang out with the guy you like because you fucked up asking him out? yeah.

separate ways and sleeping dogs by sobsicles (53k)

Dean is three years sober when Cas comes back into town.

~~~

For a moment, they just stare at each other. Dean, once again, has to swallow the urge to offer to swallow something else. It's very hard to resist the gut-wrenching pull of want that hooks in his chest whenever he looks at Cas. And to think, he used to have him, used to be able to act on that want.

God, he's so fucking stupid.

Well, there's no point in kicking himself three years later for shit he can't change. He'll just sit right here and pretend that his fingers aren't twitching with the urge to reach out and touch. He can't do that anymore, and it's his own damn fault.

"Three years ago," Cas prompts.

Dean huffs a weak laugh. "Yeah. Eventful."

this fic hit me SO hard emotionally oh my god. don’t have much to say bc most of my thoughts on this fic are very personal but my god read this please

Everyone’s a Critic by Englandwouldfall (109k)

The one where uninspired chef Dean Winchester has a one night stand with the male (!) food critic who described the flavour of his garlic bread as 'closeted' and accidentally ends up dating him to try and prove that he's a kick ass chef, thank you very much.

(He may have a point about the 'closeted' thing).

this one is SO fun. dating the food critic who called your garlic bread closeted and lying about your career because you’re embarrassed and you want to redeem your food in his eyes but then you fall in love with him

Non Destiel Centric

gender? you mean that thing i have that pisses people off? by bigender dean winchester (homosexualitie) (946 words)

sam and dean paint each other's nails and dean abuses the technicalities of her gender. what more could you want? 

HELLO HE/SHE DEAN COMMUNITY oh my god the pure rush of euphoria reading this. oh my god. oh my god. 

the quiet road to a distant city by rottingbrains (1.2k)

Sam stares out the windshield again. They’re approaching a city, and she can see the lights in the distance. She’s past the danger zone, and she feels like the world around her reflects that in some way she can’t put into words- as if God is telling her that it’s okay. She did the right thing, and soon she will be past the lonely unknown and into the warm, forgiving light of acceptance. Or something. Come to think of it, the lights only look warm from far away, and she knows that the actual city will seem far less welcoming. Still. Best not to imagine the worst when it’s already going well.

required reading for transfem lesbian sam fans. fics that live in your ribcage to make your heart feel good

Four People Ruby Seduced & One She Actually Fell For (Or: Ruby's Epic Love Affair with Humanity in General and Sam in Specific) by tuesday (3.7k)

In which Ruby has a lot of sex, is not any kind of therapist that would be legal, and helps a few people out for her own reasons. (S4/S5 AU)

for everyone out there who enjoys ruby being a girlboss <3

Fractured Link by Trell (orphan_account) (5.5k)

Meg goes on, resolute despite the way Dean flinches, "He likes me. He likes me a lot, and I like him back, and that's probably good enough for both of us. But fuck me for saying so, Dean-o, he loves you, probably more than anything else on his daddy's green Earth, and you need to man up and give back what Clarence over there has been devoting to you for years."

this is meg/dean/cas which is not smth i really seek out but this was extremely good. set in s7 so it’s meg and dean and honey cas and it’s a lot of dean figuring his shit out and trying to forgive cas and i love meg a lot in this