My Fic (on Tumblr)
Jake’s on third, aiming for home when you hear the insults behind you from one of the dads of the opposing team. You grit your teeth, determined to ride it out to the end of the game, to avoid another cop call that’d ruin your son’s favorite sport.
“Lookit ‘im,” the dad behind you says with venom hanging on his words. “Fuckin’ fairy, he is.”
You know he’s talking about Jake cause Jake’s the only one wearing a tutu and pink cleats.
“Yeah,” says the guy’s wife. “Any parent who’ll let their son walk out the house like that needs to have their kid taken away. S’abuse, is what that is.”
The anger builds inside your chest, nearing the explosive range. Your breathing speeds up and you dare to glance back at them. They’re massive, easily six hundred pounds combined. The guy looks at you and grins, like he knows it’s your kid he’s taking about.
“Kid like that should be kept inside,” he says, still looking at you. You turn back around just in time to see Jake slide in to home.
“Yeah!” You shout, temporarily forgetting that the fucker behind you even exists. “Way to go, Jake!”
Jake looks over to you and waves, smiling Cas’ smile. You throw him a thumbs up.
The last fifteen minutes blow by too quickly and soon it’s time for the parents to collect their kids.
Jake runs up to you with his Hello Kitty hoodie over his uniform, falling just above his sparkled purple tutu. “Did you see that last run? I did good, huh, dads?”
“You were friggin’ awesome bud!” You cheer. You lift him up into your arms and tousle his hair.
“You were amazing, Jake,” Cas says, leaning in to kiss Jake’s cheek. “Headed for the pros soon, I’m sure.”
Jake blushes bright red.
“Well, thas why he’s the way he is,” you hear from your right. You turn to see the man from earlier laughing with his wife as he points toward you. “He’s got two queers trying to play house.”
Cas’ hand finds your jacket and tugs at the sleeve. “Ignore them, Dean. Let’s just go.”
“Daddy,” Jake starts. It’s not the first time he’s heard people bash you and Cas, he knows what it means. You’ve both explained it to him. But it kills you that you even had to. There’s nothing wrong with you or Cas or Jake. You were a family just like them, only difference what that you weren’t ignorant bastards that took pleasure in bringing down complete strangers.
“Pizza or Burgers?” You ask Jake, turning your back to the couple and heading toward the parking lot.
“I want Papa’s Cheerio Casserole!” Jake squeals excitedly. Of course that’s what he’d want. It’s been his favorite dinner since Cas accidentally made it when Jake was three because there was barely anything in the house and you didn’t have enough money to make a decent meal. You can’t argue with it though, it’s fucking delicious.
“I can do that,” Cas says, chuckling. “So long as you make your world famous orange lemonade.”
Jake nods his head excitedly. “Deal!”
You’re half way to the car when you hear the man and his wife again.
“Bet the kid’ll end up offin’ ‘imself ‘fore he’s even outta school,” the man practically shouts, like he’s aiming for you to hear him.
“Good riddance,” the woman agrees. “Less we ‘ave of ‘em, the better.”
Cas turns around before you have time to grab him and hold him back.
“Cas!” you yell after him. You set Jake down and run after him, but his fist is in the man’s face before you reach him. Blood sprays from the man’s nose as he shouts out in pain. Cas glares at the woman and she shrinks away, moving as quickly as she can to aid her husband. Then Cas turns around, walks past you, picks up Jake, and walks all the way to the car.
You stand, dumbfounded for a moment, just staring at the mess Cas left behind. No one runs over to you to yell at you or help the homophobic couple. Hell, a few people even smile and laugh.
“Bout fucking time,” you hear someone say. Then you turn around and run off to meet Cas and Jake who’re already in the Impala and ready to go. You slide in behind the wheel and look over at Cas.
“You okay?” you ask.
He looks at you and gives you the famous tilt that led to you ask him to marry you all those years ago. “Yes, why?”
You laugh and lean over to kiss him. “Dude, you’re awesome.”
“Glad you still think so.”
You turn on the car and pull out of the parking lot. “Cheerio Casserole time,” you say, catching Jake’s eyes in the rearview mirror.
“And Orange Lemonade,” he reminds you.
“How could I forget?”
Jake smiles at you and sticks out his tongue. You return the gesture and reach your hand out to Cas. He laces his fingers in yours and squeezes.
“Shiloh is, well, unique,” the school counselor, Mrs. Norman, says, running her fingers over the spiral edge of her notebook. “He’s —”
“Not a boy,” you interrupt. She looks at you with her grey eyes and purses her lips.
“She’s a bit of a handful in class,” Mrs. Norman corrects.
“Not a girl either,” you say.
She looks confused and her mouth moves at the same time you clench your hand into a tight fists. You still have scars on your knuckles from the first time you punched someone who called Shiloh an ‘it’. But Mrs. Norman looks to Cas and sighs.
“They is fine,” he says, providing her with an appropriate pronoun. He reaches over and squeezes your hand.
“They - Shiloh - is causing problems in class,” Mrs. Norman repeats. “They’re interrupting the teacher constantly, claiming that the teacher is wrong on certain subjects, like history or math.”
“Shiloh’s a smart kid,” you say, cause it’s true.
“Yes, I agree, but maybe Shiloh’s a little too smart for the grade he’s - they’re in.”
Cas nudges your hand until you open your fist and then he threads his fingers through yours, turning his head to give you a look as if to tell you ‘it’s okay, this is a good thing’.
“Yes,” Cas agrees. “We often wondered that ourselves even before Shiloh began school. Shiloh’s always been a too intelligent for their own good.”
“It’s not just that Shiloh’s intelligent though…” Mrs. Norman clears her throat. “There’ve been complaints.”
You knew this was coming.
“About Shiloh’s gender?” Cas asks.
Mrs. Norman nods. “Yes. The children are…confused.”
“So?” you snap.
“Dean.”
“What? It’s not any of their business. If Shiloh doesn’t want to be a boy or a girl then we shouldn’t make him choose.” You’re tired of this shit. People always telling your kid who they’re supposed to be and then getting pissed when they don’t follow through with the plan.
Cas gives you a look, eyes narrowed, and then turns to Mrs. Norman. “Excuse us,” he tells her.
She nods and Cas stands up, pulling you to your feet and out the door into the empty hallway. He pushes your back to the wall and watches you.
“What the hell, Cas?” you try.
“Talk to me,” he demands.
“About what?” You cross your arms over your chest, trying to deflect whatever Cas is throwing your way.
“You called Shiloh ‘him’.”
“I didn’t —” But Cas’ hand comes up to rest on your cheek and you stop. You hate when he does this to you, when he figures out how to push the right combination to get you to open up. You don’t want to, especially not here, of all places. But you can’t stop yourself. “He’s our son, Cas. He was born a boy. I just… What are we supposed to do? What the hell do we call him if he doesn’t want to be a boy, or a girl? And what do we tell everyone else?”
“You said it your self, it’s none of their business.”
“Cas…”
“Dean, I don’t know, okay? I’ve never done this either. I’m just as lost as you. But we have to respect Shiloh’s wishes too,” Cas tells you.
“He’s only eight, though.”
“True, but you know, as well as I do, that Shiloh might as well be eighteen.”
“Yeah, but —”
“But we need to let Shiloh make these decisions. Not us,” Cas leans in until his forehead rests against yours. “If there is nothing for us to call Shiloh, nothing to offer to other children or their parents, then we resort to the basics. They won’t like it, might even hate us. But this isn’t about them.”
“It’s about us, and Shiloh,” you supply. “Yeah, I know. It’s just hard. You don’t ever go into having a kid and think ‘what if they don’t go along with the gender binary?’ you know?”
You’re quiet for a moment, then Cas kisses your mouth softly. “It’s going to be okay, Dean.”
“Let’s just get this conference over with, alright?”
Cas steps back from you, letting you move toward the door. “Okay,” he agrees, then follows you back inside.
His shoes smacked against the pavement as he stalked in the direction that he thought Mr. Mackey’s Burger place was in (he was wrong, but you didn’t have the heart to tell him). He walked like he was trying to be a soldier, except his arms swung too wide and a grin was set on his face that was too big for anyone faced with the idea of being forced to kill someone else.
“What’re you going to do when you get there?” you asked, trailing behind him, hopping around the aquarium pebbles he kept dropping behind him.
“Dunno,” he said. “But it’ll be something. You gonna do it with me?”
You snorted at the accidental innuendo and he stoppped walking, making you almost bump into him. He glared at you.
“You coming or not?” he asked, annoyed.
You straightened up and lifted your chin. “Of course.”
Then he smiled and wrapped his arm around your shoulders. And you couldn’t help but like the way it felt.
Blood covers the floor, flooding the dimly lit silo with the scent of a million pennies. This wasn’t how the game was supposed to end. No one was supposed to get hurt. Deron lied.
“C’mon!” he yells. “We can’t stay here. The cops will be here soon.” He yanks my sleeve, pulling me toward the huge metal door on the left side of the room.
I swipe the back of my hand across my face, smearing tears and snot all over my cheeks. I jerk my arm away from Deron and for the first time in thirty minutes I can see what we’ve done.
My knees tremble as I stare at the body on the floor. Zach’s laying face down in a puddle of blood. There weren’t supposed to be any bullets in the gun. We were just trying to scare him, to make sure he’d leave us alone for good. We just wanted to stop the bullying, that was all. We were only supposed to make him pee himself at best.
In this kind of lighting, with huge swamp lights casting gross, hospital yellow beams onto everything, the puddle around Zach looks a thick mess of red candy apple coating.
“Hurry the fuck up, Danny! We can’t stay here!” Deron hollers. His voice jumps up an octave as he runs his hands down the front of his shirt.
JACKSON stares teary-eyed at the red head checking himself out in his mirror. He’s not crying, just seeing how long he can go without blinking. Because lately, closing his eyes - even for a split second - seems like a chore. And he figures it’s because he’s been awake for at least three days straight, maybe more.
Time runs together when you have insomnia.
“Will you cut that out,” Noah says as he plucks a hair from his chin. “you’re freaking me out.”
“Sorry,” Jackson apologizes, closing his eyes for the first time since Noah first showed up. “I just…I don’t like —”
“Look,” Noah turns from the mirror to look at him. “you can’t keep doing this. It isn’t healthy. It takes a millisecond to blink, Jackie.” Noah walks over to where Jackson is sitting an kneels in front of him. “He can’t get you in that little of time.”
Noah cups a hand to Jackson’s cheek, resting the other on his knee. Jackson leans into the touch and bites his lip.
“A second is all he needs,” he whispers.
- - - -
“You tell Sam and I’ll kill you,” he says, leaning back on his elbows. “No one will ever find your body, you got that?”
Cas smiles and shakes the small bottle in his hands. “Of course, Dean.” He untwists the cap and rests his arm over Dean’s leg, turning his back to hold Dean’s foot in place. “I don’t know why you’re worried anyways. It’s not like he can see through your boots, or anything.”
“Yeah, but hunters don’t paint their nails. Not the guys at least,” he says.
“Have you met all the hunters in the world?” Cas asks. He coats the small brush and drags it across the nail of Dean’s big toe.
“Just shut up.”
They’re quite for a moment, Cas taking his time and making sure he doesn’t get any polish where it’s not supposed to be; Dean just watches him and breathes deep, relaxed.
“Why’d you pick yellow?” Cas asks when he finishes Dean’s pinky toe.
“My mom used to have flowers on the kitchen table that were that color,” Dean says almost too quietly.
Cas reads the name on the bottle. “Sunflowers?” He looks at Dean from over his shoulder, but Dean stares out the window.
“Yeah,” Dean admits. He doesn’t say anymore and Cas understands.
“It looks nice on you.”
“Just do the other one, okay?”
Cas smiles. “Anything you wish, Dean.”
“Do they ever wonder where you’ve been?” she asks.
“Ever look you dead in the eyes and say, ‘I was worried, man’?”
“All the time,” he replies.
“Never stop, really. Make it like I owe something to them.”
“Well,” she says, shrugging her shoulders and popping her neck.
“I mean, you kind of do.”
“Not like they think, though, right?”
“Can’t really say,” she admits, cracking her knuckles now.
“Half the time I want to punch you, you know that?”
“Everyone does.” She smiles, “I’m used to it.”
“So what now?” he asks, pulling the old flask from his coat and pressing it to his mouth.
“Time’ll only tell. How’re you feeling?”
Everything moves past them in slow motion and he sighs.
“Right now,” he says, voice weighed down with a million things unsaid. “I’m just tired.”
“i just want you to be proud of me,” he mutters, face turned down to stare at the sheets he tugs through his fingers.
“what made you think i wasn’t?” you ask, pulling on the jeans you wore the night before.
he shrugs his shoulders and white-knuckles a fist full of deep red cotton. you bite your lip and move to kneel in front of him.
“what are you worried about?” you question, trying to position yourself so that he’s forced to look at you whether he wants to or not. “that just because i don’t shower you with a million atta boys that i don’t love you?”
his cheeks flush pink. “maybe.”
“well stop it,” you tell him and raise your head up to capture his lips with yours. you push him onto his back and travel your mouth down his neck and to his chest. “i praise you enough every single night,” you say between kisses. “anymore and your inflated ego will slap me with an eviction notice.”
you bite softly at the spot on his hip that makes him buck up against you every time .
he whimpers. “okay, okay - shit,” he concedes, trying to relearn how to breathe. ”i just —”
“no,” you say, stopping him. “you’re being stupid and i’m late for work.” you stand up from the bed and pick up a t-shirt from the floor, smelling it first them slipping it on. you look back at him to find him staring at the ceiling, the way he always does when he’s trying too hard not to pout. “if you’re gonna be a baby about it then i’ll show you how proud I am of you after my shift, okay?”
he sits up at that. “promise?” he asks.
you draw a cross over your heart and blow him a kiss.
he shakes his head and laughs. “you’re such a pushover.”
“only for you.”
then you’re out the door before he can con you into a goodbye fuck.
River Phoenix looks twelve; no one knows her real age, just that she looks like she belongs in the sixth grade and has a mouth that belongs to a retired soldier who’s seen her fair share of bullshit. River wasn’t bad, or at least she wasn’t the worst person I’d ever met, but she was something else and everyone who’d ever met her, even for a second, knew it.
So when she lights her second cigarette of the morning and sits down on her deathbed, I’m not too surprised. Though, I am glad that her oxygen tank is somewhere else, this time.
“You won’t see the strings unless you look for them,” River says, wiggling on top of her ratty Superhero comforter like a dog turning circles before it lays down. She crosses her legs and flicks ashes onto the bed.
I sit in the old recliner across from her and set up the foot rest, avoiding the metal spring that jutted out. “And what do they look like?” I ask, incredulous, as I cross my arms behind my head.
“Fuck if I know,” she spits. She waves her hands in the air like she’s trying to catch something, a thought maybe. “All anyone’s ever told me is that they’re web-like and stringy. Cold maybe, I dunno.”
“Well that’s helpful.”
“Oh shut the fuck up. I ain’t never seen ‘em, so this is the best you get.”
I roll my eyes and lean forward, reaching out my hand for her cigarette. River raises an eyebrow and motions to the pack on the bed; I take it an shake out three. “So why am I looking for these strings in the first place?” I shove two of the cigarettes in my pocket; River lights the third.
“I ain’t the one to answer that,” she confesses. “I just give you the assignments. You know that.”
“Yeah, but you usually have something up your sleeve.”
River sucks in a shaky breath and snubs out her cigarette butt on the sheet. She shakes her head, “Not this time, Mack. The spirits are silent - more than usual. Think they know I’m coming or something.”
“Probably,” I agree. The Dead always seem to have creepy insight to stuff like that. And with River’s track record, I’d be more surprised if the ghosts and demons didn’t have a party around River’s bed when she took her last breath.
“Hey,” River starts after a moment, standing on her toothpick legs and hobbling over to the bar in the corner of her room. “How’s Jay?”
I take a long drag off my cigarette and hold the smoke in my mouth; I don’t want to talk about him. But River eyes me from over her shoulder and I exhale. “He’s good,” I lie. “Get back to normal, I think. Should be walking soon, you know.”
River turns back to the bar and I know she knows of my deceptions. But she doesn’t comment on it and instead she says, “Good, good. He’s lucky he’s got someone like you, Mack.”
For some reason, her words hurt and all I can do is sit there and watch her step into the bathroom.
She has it wrong.
“I guess,” I finally say when the toilet flushes. “But it’s not —”
“Look at me, baby,” River whispers, her voice right in my ear. I didn’t even see her walk out of the bathroom, let alone get as close to me as she is now. She pressed her tiny hand to my face, stroking my cheek with her thumb. “You can’t blame yourself for what happened to him. There are bad things out there just dying to taste your doubt and shame and saddle themselves inside your worn down chinks.” I close my eyes and she takes my hands in hers, squeezing them. “Don’t let them, Mack. Promise me that you won’t fall that far.”
“I don’t know how to sink through floors,” I say, trying to make a joke to cut through the sudden thickness of the air. But when I open my eyes River is staring at me, her face pleading with me. I’ve known River for years; this is the first time I’ve ever seen her beg. “Okay,” I concede. “I promise.”
“Good,” she says, nodding.
Then, as if nothing had happened, River grins and walks back to the bar. She pours herself a drink and goes back to the bed, lighting up another cigarette.
“You gonna pour me one too?”
She scoffs. “Your hands and legs ain’t broken.”
I shake my head and stand up.
“Hell’s gonna love you,” I quip, grabbing a bottle of Jack.
“They fucking better. They’ll be under new management after all.”
She laughs and I follow suit.
