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Dean has had a bad week. Well, month.
He’d recently relocated after a breakup, and the move had found him across town.
That in itself had been exhausting. Packing up his shit, trying to divide furniture and knickknacks in a way that was fair, compromising when they couldn’t even look each other in the eye.
It’d been horrible. But Dean had been fortunate enough to find a new apartment quickly, and he had enough friends to make the move in one day with a borrowed trailer and payment in pizza and beer.
He’d settled in alright. His neighbors were fine. Most kept to themselves. So Dean did too. It didn’t take him very long to feel the absence of his ex. Even if he’d never set foot in this new apartment, it seemed like he had a presence in the ear-shattering silence that inevitably fell at the end of each day.
Dean had tried for a rebound. He’d downloaded the most mainstream app, set up an account without too much personal info, and gotten ghosted twice for being trans.
So the month had gotten worse. Then his dad had called, which he usually didn’t. And on the rare occasion when he did, Dean usually didn’t pick up. But it’d been a rough day, and Dean was feeling lonely. So he’d picked up, gotten deadnamed, and hung up again.
It’d all left him feeling pretty dysphoric, both about his gender and in general. In order to stop the spiral, he’d packed up his laptop and gone down to the nearest coffee shop to spend the last few hours of the day drinking too much caffeine and get some writing in.
It beat sitting in his empty apartment feeling sorry for himself.
And of course – of course – he’d run into someone from before. When he was already feeling low, not in the mood to come out or explain anything, that’s when he’d look up and see someone he hadn’t talked to since high school, scrutinizing him as they tried to place green eyes and freckles that used to sit on a softer face.
And the person staring down at him from across the table wasn’t just someone from high school. No, it had to be Cas.
Dean was in no way emotionally prepared to deal with this. Not that Cas had ever really been anyone to him. They’d gone to high school together. Calling them friends would be a stretch, but friendly? Sure.
Dean had been femme presenting back then. Kinda butch, maybe, but decidedly girl.
They’d shared classes each year and had a sort of queer-y camaraderie despite never disclosing what their deal was. Most was unspoken but there had been an alliance, and beyond it, a sort of shared wavelength, even if the conversations they’d shared could be counted on one hand.
It’s been five years since then, though. A lot has changed. Cas is grown. Gone is the scrawliness, and though the downward-sloping eyes the color of the sky, the messy dark hair, and the expression of perpetual confusion, were the same, his shoulders now filled out his T-shirt and a five o’clock shadow covered his sharpened jaw and chin.
Dean had changed in many of the same ways. Broad shoulders, five o’clock shadow. Though the result was about the same, the change was more dramatic in Dean.
Cas was actually someone Dean wouldn’t mind catching up with. Reconnecting with, even. Coffee. Exchanged numbers. Dean wanted to know him.
Just not today.
Dean was not in the mind space for coming out and “being brave” and weathering probing questions, even if Cas undoubtedly wouldn’t be rude.
But the comments “oh wow I had no idea” “since when” “did you get the surgery yet”, Dean just couldn’t do it. Not today.
So when Cas passes by his table on his way to the counter, Dean hides his face behind the little specials pamphlet advertising an iced matcha with pistachio foam.
Of course, all Dean accomplishes with that is drawing attention to himself. He can feel Cas turning to watch what the hell he’s doing, even as he continues walking.
Dean peeks up from behind the matcha display. He makes eye contact with familiar blue and immediately looks away, blocking his face with his hand for good measure.
Face aflame, Dean keeps his face downward, studying his keyboard with great interest. But he knows Cas is making his way over.
Maybe it’s intuition, maybe he can feel the air particles move, or maybe he knows Cas better than he thought, even now. He just knows.
Something in his gut tightens like he’s about to be shoved out of an airplane and he can’t stop bouncing his leg, even as his boot makes little tapping noises against the linoleum floor.
He’s sweating when Cas stops in front of his table. He’s wearing the same puzzled and entirely adorable expression as he did as a teen, when Dean musters up the courage to actually look back.
“Do I know you?” Cas asks. His voice has changed. It’s a dark timbre and it warms something in Dean.
Dean blinks at him. He averts his eye for a second before looking back, quietly contemplating whether to do this.
“You seem awfully familiar,” Cas says. His eyes flick down to Dean’s cardboard cup, catching on the name. “Dean.”
Dean tries to bite down a smile and fails as his walls start to break. This is Cas. And he’s so goddamn Cas, still.
“You don’t remember?” Dean asks.
Cas squints, again all familiar.
Dean grins. “We went to high school together.”
Cas tilts his head, the exact same movement he’d make when Dean tried to be funny, and Cas didn’t understand why he’d even bother. He takes the shared past as an invitation to sit down and slides into the seat next to Dean.
Up close, Dean is hit by how handsome this version of Cas is.
“We did?”
Dean watches him for a moment, a small smirk still in place mostly as an armour. “We had home room together.”
Dean hesitates for a beat before adding the final puzzle piece. “All four years.”
He can see Cas go through the mental archives. He can see him find the right file, discard it, then pull it back out and dust it off, as he connects the dots.
Dean is fully prepared for one of those comments and he promises himself that he won’t hold it against Cas or even drop the smile.
But Cas reroutes. He smiles.
“That makes sense.”
Dean can’t help the disbelieving snort. “It makes sense?” He’s never gotten that reply before, even from those who hadn’t been surprised.
Cas leans back, confident in a way that makes him even more handsome. “I had a crush on you back then,” he admits openly. “It was very confusing. But now it makes sense.”
Dean chuckles, a wave of relief escaping with the sound. “Wow, you just came right out and said it, huh.”
Cas grins at him, leaning slightly closer. “I’m not ashamed of having good taste,” he says and delivers it with a dorky wink that makes it less suave.
Dean huffs a silly little laugh. Heat spreads in his cheeks and somewhere lower, settling somewhere that's hard to ignore.
Cas stays for a while. He forgets to order coffee, and Dean forgets to drink his as they catch up and flirt and laugh.
Eventually, hours later, a tired but polite barista gently ushers them out when the shop closes.
Out on the street, the lights have gone on. There’s a chill in the air that makes the hairs on Dean’s arms stand up.
Cas asks for his number and kisses Dean’s stubbled cheek.
Dean lets himself into his apartment later, the emptiness filled by the light from his phone screen as he replies to Cas’ texts.