10. high school popular kid/nerd au

---

Dean doesn’t mean to spend so much time by the river, out of sight but not quite out of hearing range of the top-40 pop blasting from the bluff high above him. This year, the prom committee had rented out the ballroom in some country club that overlooked the Missouri, with an open veranda at the top of the cliffs and stone stairs tumbling down to deserted docks. Dean has his tie off and his tux jacket hanging on a post, watching the dark water ripple with moonlight. The night smells warm and green.  

At some point the music cuts out, and Dean glances up. The windows are still lit, but now that the hard bassline is gone, he realizes he can’t hear people talking. Nothing but crickets.

There seem to be a lot more steps coming up than going down, and he’s hot and sweaty and winded by the time he reaches the top. There’s confetti on the floor but the lights have all come up, illuminating tattered crepe paper and half-eaten steak plates. Nobody in taffeta or their dad’s suit. No harried vice principal bearing down on him, ready to bundle him back onto the coach bus that got them out there. Probably missed it then, but it’s not like that’s a fucking hardship.

As Dean ambles past the stage to where he vaguely remembers the bathroom being, someone comes trudging out from a side door and nearly sideswipes him with a high-held broom.

“Whoa there,” he says, leaning away, and the boy jerks back in surprise.

“What— Dean?” he says, blue eyes wide. “What are you doing here?”

“Uh, do I know you?” Dean asks. He looks him up and down: pretty face, baggy dress shirt, and a tie on backwards. About Dean’s age. Probably not a janitor, then.

Surprise turns to confusion, then annoyance. “Really?” Mr. Blue Eyes asks skeptically. “I— we have most of our classes together. Our lockers are across the hall from each other.”

“I feel like I’d remember that,” Dean says, then blinks at him. “Wait a second, Novak?”

“Yes, Winchester,” Castiel Novak says with a scowl. “I’m so glad we could sort that out.”

“You really…” Dean trails off, staring.

“What?” Castiel says, holding the broom higher.

Dean just can’t believe he linked pretty face and Cas Novak in the same thought, is all. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you without glasses,” he says lamely. Or with his hair gelled, or not in a grungy hoodie. “It’s really, uh. Noticeable.”

Castiel touches the bridge of his nose self-consciously, then drops his hand to glare at Dean. “What are you still doing here?”

“What are you doing here?” Dean asks, eyeing the bristles pointed at his chest. “Oh, let me guess—”

“I volunteered,” Castiel says stiffly. “The whole student council was supposed to stay. No one else,” he adds with a pointed look.

“Yeah, well, time just slipped away from me,” Dean says. “Everybody’s gone?”

“Um,” Castiel says, and suddenly he looks awkward. "Well. Your girlfriend was looking for you, but.”

“Sure she was,” Dean says with a half smile, looking out towards the trashed dance floor. “Man, you don’t have to lie to me. I know people heard us.” It’d be tough not to. Cassie had some goddamn lungs on her when she was pissed.

“It wasn’t really that loud,” Castiel lies, badly.

Dean looks back at him. “Uh huh.”

“Just. She started dancing with the football team and telling everyone you, ah. Were bad at,” Castiel wiggles his fingers in a meaningful way. “Oh, and that your car smelled weird.”

“Oh, nice, hate on the car!” Dean says, genuinely offended. “And what do you mean,” exaggerated finger wiggling.

“I wasn’t really paying attention,” Castiel lies again, still badly, and Dean opens his mouth to snap back at him. But really, what’s the fucking point?

“Whatever,” he says, and holds out a hand for the broom instead. “Give me that thing.”

Castiel actually holds it away from him, like he expects Dean to steal his dustpan and run with it. “Why?”

“Seriously? You said no one’s here. Are you planning on cleaning the whole place by yourself?”

Castiel frowns at Dean’s outstretched hand, then at the ballroom’s general chaos. “It’s not that much,” he says, though it sounds like he’s trying to convince himself instead of Dean. “We were just supposed to collect the decorations and clear up the floor a bit. ”

“Then we’ll get it done twice as fast,” Dean says, gesturing again. “C’mon, Cas, broom me.”

“But there’s only one,” Castiel says stubbornly, which is when Dean really does steal the dustpan and run with it.

After a brief chase around the room— Dean meant to trip on that chair even if it did give him a split lip— they work it out: Castiel will continue to man the broom, and Dean will get the ladder and start unpinning the miles and miles of pastel crepe adorning the walls and ceiling. The sound system is silent, but Dean has his phone in his pocket and finds a playlist called Prom Night. Every other song is by Katy Perry and they’re all about sex. It’s hilarious and terrible and Dean sings along at top volume as he peels tape off the walls with his fingernails.

“Let’s go all! The way! Tonight!”

The back of Castiel’s neck is turning red, and he glares as he makes a pass by the ladder with the broom.

“No regrets!”

“Oh my God,” he mutters, loud enough for Dean to hear.

“Just love!”

Blue eyes flash in his direction. “You’re going to fall off the ladder, you know.”

Dean just points a finger at him and sways. “We can dance, until we die–”

“Which in your case will be sooner rather than later!”

“You and I! Will b— hey, c’mon, my hands are full!”

“I’m just trying to find the off switch,” Castiel explains, and swats him with the broom handle again. “This station is awful.”

“Be nice to me,” Dean whines, “my girlfriend dumped me in front if the whole school. At prom.”

And then he goes quiet, because yeah— that’s exactly what happened. He’s been trying not to think about it, but it’s not going away and suddenly he just feels tired. His stomach hurts. His car doesn’t smell weird.

“Dean,” Castiel says, too softly.

“Yeah?” Dean says, a little aggressive. “What?”

“… the streamers are landing in my dust piles,” he says, and gestures at the latest mess.

“Oh,” Dean says, like he hasn’t been trying to aim them at Castiel’s head. “Oopsie.”

Castiel sighs deeply. “You’re such a…”

“Dick?” Dean says helpfully, smirking down at him. “Douche?”

“All of the above,” Castiel chooses. “Come on, we’re nearly finished.”

They leave the dishes piled for the cleaners that start trickling in around one in the morning and take two overflowing boxes of mangled crepe out to the dumpster. There are some giant glittery stars and things Castiel insists the student council will store for future events, or whatever, and they haul those out to Castiel’s shitty, shitty Continental. It turns out the council members all got to drive to prom. Fuckin’ nerd privilege.

“They trusted us to stay and work,” Castiel says, glowering at all the empty parking spaces around them. He has to yank a few times to open the trunk, which is inexplicably full of blank canvases and pinecones.

“Yeah, I could have told them how that was going to go,” Dean says around a yawn. “What the heck is this stuff?”

“Nothing,” Castiel says hurriedly, and dumps an armful of gold plastic letters on top of them. “I’m— I’m in art class.”

“Dude, we’re all in art class,” Dean says, and drops the glittery stars on top of them. “A.K.A. the easiest elective this school has. Whatcha working on?”

“None of your business,” Castiel says, and nearly shuts the trunk on his fingers. “Get in the car if you want a ride.”

Dean backs away with his hands raised. “Okay, Bob Ross, no need to get violent.”

The Continental is so shitty that Castiel has to get, then lean across to manually open the passenger side door. The seats are set so low that Dean’s chin-level with the dashboard, and there’s a strange chemical smell hovering around the inside that actually makes Dean cough a little, going for the window crank as soon as the engine turns over. “God, what is that?”

“It’s turpentine,” Castiel says, either used to it or having burnt out his sense of smell long ago.

“It reeks!”

“Yes, wood turpentine is like that.”

“And people say my car smells weird,” Dean mutters. Castiel gives him the stinkeye.

“Put your seatbelt on.”

“Seriously?” Dean says, but the Continental only lumbers forward once he has the belt buckled in. “At least my car smells like a fucking car, not a meth lab.”

“Turpentine is a paint fixer, and Cassie said it smelled like ass and forty years of fast food,” Castiel points out, then looks immediately regretful.

Dean laughs a little at the look on his face. “Cas, it’s fine,” he says. "We had a fight, she was a bitch about it, so what.”

Castiel comes to a complete stop at the exit onto the country road, even when there’s nobody coming from either direction, because of course he does.

“I mean, I knew she was going to dump me sometime soon,” Dean says. “She’s going to Wisconsin in September. Marquette. Got a scholarship and everything.”

The turn signal is pulsing steadily on the dash, left for going back to town.

“She didn’t ask where I was applying. I don’t think it even occurred to her. I mentioned the drive from here to Milwaukee was pretty long and she just gave me this totally blank look. Like, why would she care?”

He shakes his head a little, tries a smile.

“So anyway, I’m not sad or crying or whatever. I just thought… I thought I’d be getting some action, you know? It’s prom,” he says, looking over at Castiel. “Katy Perry fucking lied to us, Cas.”

Castiel puts the car in park.

“What’s—?” Dean asks, and then Castiel’s sweaty palm is on the back of his neck and dry lips meet his, one lingering brush and a soft exhale that locks up Dean’s entire body and makes him break out in a rush of goosebumps.

“Dean?” Castiel asks, almost against his mouth.

“What?” Dean croaks.

Another kiss, slightly firmer than the last one and Dean grabs convulsively at his shoulder and his brain sort of stalls out there because Castiel fucking Novak is slipping him tongue and it’s so hot his skin feels crisped. Dean makes a noise he immediately wants to disown, then does it again when Castiel’s hand slides up into Dean’s hair and tugs a little.

A car roars by them on the cross street, and Castiel abruptly lets him go and sits back, hand dropping to the seat between them.

“Holy shit,” Dean says dazedly, slumped down like the kiss had started to melt him. “Holy shit.”

“Well?” Castiel asks. Rasps, really. His voice cracks a little as he says, “Is that sufficient action, Dean?”

“What the fuck,” Dean says, staring at him. “Cas, Jesus.”

Castiel is staring right back, still leaning across the seat. “Dean. Do you want more?”

“I…” Dean says, and licks his lips. “What does more mean?”

Castiel sits back, apparently satisfied. “We can figure it out,” he says, and flips the turn signal the other way. They turn right and start driving parallel to the river. Away from town.

“Fuck, okay,” Dean says with a totally winded laugh, flopping back in the seat. “Fine. Take me to makeout point and Archie my Veronica.” He’s still shivering a little with the surprise of it, heart knocking hard against his ribs.

“I have no idea what that means,” Castiel says, foot steady on the gas. The tall grass whips by, faster and faster, wind blowing wildly through the Continental’s open windows.

Dean doesn’t, either, but he’s suddenly sure it’s going to be great.