#i went back on my ''i'm your huckleberry'' rule because the situation called for it

[valleydean]

Wild West City

Deancas, word count: 1,070 Summary: Cas and Dean take their children, Claire and Jack, to a Wild West theme park. It’s the best day of Dean’s life. Happy birthday, Chayya! @sweatercas

“Daddy, I wanna go on the ponies again!” Jack squealed, nearly flinging himself out of Castiel’s arms in his excitement.

“No way,” Claire argued. “We’re going on the train ride next!”​ She was clutching Dean’s hand so as to not be swept up in the crowd around them. Dean was very seriously scrutinizing the map in the theme park’s brochure in his other hand.

That bright summer morning, they’d woken up earlier than Castiel would have liked to drive two hours north to Sussex County, New Jersey’s Wild West City: a quaint and modest tourist attraction, if it could even be called such a thing, that was supposedly an exact replica of Dodge City, KS in the 1800s. (Though, how they knew that, Castiel had no idea.) Over the winter, Dean had heard about the park from another parent at one of the school’s PTA meetings. He went home and reserved tickets, four months in advance, and hadn’t stopped talking about it since.

Castiel suspected Dean was even more excited than the kids were.

And, finally, there they stood, on a boardwalk in front of a dining hall called the Golden Nugget Saloon, which boasted all the best meals the Wild West’s had to offer - like mozzarella sticks and pizza.

Jack and Claire were both donned in button-down cow print shirts, jeans, cowboy boots, mini-wool hats, and bright red bandanas which were tied around their necks. Dean was in a similarly themed attire, but his boots were much more expensive. His western-style shirt was black with metal collar tips, and he was wearing a bolo tie in the shape of a longhorn skull.

And then there was his cowboy hat.

That hat. He’d had it for years. Castiel wasn’t used to seeing it outside the bedroom. He should have known Dean would have found any excuse to wear it.

As for himself, he’d blatantly refused wasting money on attire he’d never wear again, but Dean did convince him to put on a “straw” hat from the costume shop in town. It was something he regretted, because the cheap plastic mixed with the heat of the day was making his head itch.

The things he did for love.

So far, they’d seen three shows that had taken place on the bleached-dirt street in between the rows of souvenir shops and museums: a gunslinger show, where two actors had a typical Hollywood-style shootout; a cowboy competition, in which a group of men and women lassoed horses; and a stagecoach hold up. The last was admittedly entertaining because Jack was chosen to participate as one of the “heroes” alongside the town “sheriff” in stopping the robbery, and Castiel took nearly three dozen photos of it with his phone. They’d also gone to the petting zoo, where there was a pig named Annie Oinkley, and the Native American museum in an attempt on Castiel’s part to have the children learn something. All that, plus the aforementioned pony rides.

There was, apparently, still plenty to do.

“Relax, we’ll get to all that good stuff,” Dean promised. He crudely folded the map back up with one hand and shoved it into his pocket. He had his game plan face on when his eyes met Castiel’s. “I figure next we can head over the jailhouse to get our photos taken in costume while most people are still eating lunch. Then we can hit up the blacksmith, and we’ll still have plenty of time before the Gunfight at the OK Corral.”

Castiel’s frown deepened. “That didn’t happen in Dodge City. It was in Tombstone.” He only knew that because Dean had made him watch the movie approximately a hundred times during the course of their marriage.

Dean pulled a noncommittal face and shrugged. “Close enough.” This, coming from the man who vehemently avoided the Doc Holliday museum because it had more to do with Old West medical science than dentistry, and Dean refused to take part in such gross misinformation.

Jack began wiggling in Castiel’s hold again, so Castiel set him down. He immediately went to Claire and grabbed her hand, tugging at her. “C’mon, let’s go to jail!” he said happily. The two scampered off in that direction. Castiel couldn’t help but smile fondly after them.

“Saw that,” Dean teased, glee in his eyes when Castiel looked back at him. He was pointing at Castiel’s mouth. “Told ya you’d have fun.”

Castiel bit down on his lip, trying to suppress a chuckle. “It’s something... different,” he allowed. “And the kids seem to be having fun.” He was having fun, too, but not because of the theme park. Claire and Jack were enjoying themselves, and Dean was glowing from the inside out with child-like exuberance. If Castiel could bottle the sparkle in Dean’s eyes, he’d wear it by a chain around his neck and never take it off.

His phone was on 15% battery, because he’d taken a lot more pictures and videos that day than just the stagecoach robbery.

“Good different?” Dean asked, brows popping.

Castiel nodded. “Good different.”

“Good, because we’re coming back every year until we die.”

Castiel tried to roll his eyes just to keep up appearances.

Dean hummed happily, his fingertips brushing against Castiel’s at their sides before he dipped in and pecked a kiss to the corner of Castiel’s mouth. It made Castiel’s hat tip back fractionally. “Thanks for humoring me, sweetheart.”

The gentleness of it, paired with the sincerity in Dean’s voice, caused a flutter in Castiel’s chest. “Of course,” Castiel told him, voice barely above a whisper and getting lost in the chatter of the crowd. Twelve years later, and Dean could still make him speechless, so of course Castiel would humor him. He’d do anything for Dean.

He threaded his fingers through Dean’s and told him, “I’m your huckleberry.”

Dean flushed slightly, smile becoming impossibly brighter. Those words were something else that was rarely brought out in public.

“Alright, come on,” Dean said, grasping Castiel’s hand tighter and pulling him after the kids. “We better catch up before they get themselves thrown into a Wild West jail for real.”

“Of course,” Castiel said again, playing along. “You’d be too jealous.”

“Hell yeah! That’d be so cool!”

The bright, warm sun beat down on them as they walked through the trail dust.

Dean took a glance at Castiel’s jeans and t-shirt and told him, “You’re gonna need a better outfit for the photo. Don’t worry. I’ll pick out something authentic.”

///

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