A/N Happy Valentine's Day! You're my Valentine this year (yes, you, the one reading this), and my gift to you is this chapter! If you decide you would like to get me a gift too (wink wink nudge nudge) you should go buy/stream Love Story (Taylor's Version) in my honor! It would make a great soundtrack while you're reading about the #DeanCasWedding on twitter ;)
Dean and Castiel are both lying in bed, not because they're tired but because there's nothing to do. It's been a boring few weeks, and if this endless loop of nothingness wasn't getting to him before, it is now.
"Hey Cas?" Dean says, staring up at the ceiling.
"Mm?" Castiel hums.
"Are you even aware of what today is?" Dean asks.
Castiel frowns. "No? Why, what's today?" It can't be their anniversary; that was New Year's. It can't be the anniversary of their engagement; that's in May. Is it the anniversary of when they reconnected at the Grammys after-party? Now might be around that time, but they've never celebrated that before. Why would they start now?
"I figured," Dean says. "I completely forgot until I went grocery shopping a few days ago, but today's Valentine's Day."
"That's today?" Castiel sits up. "I completely forgot Valentine's Day was even a thing. I'm sorry —"
"No, I figured as much," Dean assures him. "I did get you something, though, and I've been trying to figure out a cute and fun way to give it to you, but I'm all funned-out right now so I think I'm just gonna, like, hand it to you? Does that work?"
Castiel snorts. "What, you think I'm gonna be like 'no, I don't want this gift you got me out of the kindness of your heart despite knowing I wasn't expecting it and didn't get anything just because you're not leading me to it with a trail of rose petals' or something?"
"I dunno," Dean says. "I mean, you are a pop star. Maybe you wanted to have a diva moment."
Castiel rolls his eyes. "Fortunately I have progressed past the need for diva moments."
"And thank god for that," Dean mutters. "M'kay, I'm gonna go grab it, and you wait right here, okay?"
"Waiting here is definitely something I can do," Castiel replies.
"Cool beans." Dean says. He pushes himself to his feet with a groan. "I'm totally posting it on Instagram first to prove that I'm the superior fiancé, by the way."
Castiel chuckles. "If you insist." He knows that was Dean's subtle way of asking permission, and he appreciates it. It means a lot that despite Dean's continued activity online, he never posts about Castiel without his permission.
Dean gives him a cheeky smile and walks out. That unfortunately leaves Castiel with god-only-knows-how-long to wait. He knows the second he starts doing something, Dean's going to come back, so that means he just has to sit here and wait.
And wait.
And wait some more.
God, what's taking him so long? Granted, it's probably only been, like, two minutes, but it's been a really long two minutes.
Fortunately, he finally hears the front door open and he knows Dean is coming back. He sits cross-legged on the foot of the bed while he waits, and after about 30 seconds of suspense, Dean comes back...
With the biggest fucking teddy bear Castiel has ever seen in his entire life.
"Oh my god!" Castiel bursts out laughing. "Where did you even find that?"
"Believe it or not," Dean says, "I found it at the grocery store."
Castiel shakes his head, amused. "You know what? Only you would buy a giant stuffed bear from the grocery store."
"That is probably true," Dean agrees. "Now, here, take your new best friend." He gently places the bear in bed, and it sits right by Castiel's side. "What are you gonna name him?"
Castiel raises an eyebrow. "I'm naming him?"
"Of course you're naming him!" Dean says like he should have known that from the start. "It's your job as a responsible bear owner!"
"Fair enough," Castiel says. "I am going to name him..." He looks the stuffed bear up and down. He's a cute little guy — little being subjective, of course; he's almost as tall as Castiel is when they're both sitting down.
Castiel runs a hand through his light brown fur. He's cute and he's soft. The bear is definitely hitting all the checks on the list. Castiel gives the bear a hug, and he's pleasantly surprised to find that he can add "cuddly" to the last as well.
"I've completed my examination," Castiel says, "and I've decided that his name should be..." He pauses, thinking. What name does he want? There are so many names out there; how is he supposed to choose?
"Think long and hard about this," Dean says cautiously. "He's going to have to live with this name for the rest of his life."
"I mean, he could always change it," Castiel says.
Dean shakes his head. "Securing a name change from the teddy bear courthouse is notoriously difficult these days. You'd have to pick a really bad name for it to be worth the time and money for your bear to change it."
Castiel snorts. Only Dean could turn a conversation about Valentine's Day into a discussion about the legalities surrounding teddy bear name changes.
He decides to play along and asks, "What are some examples of names I should avoid? You know, ones that would make him want to change his name?"
"That's a good question," Dean says. "I think I'd definitely put something like... I don't know, something like Javier would make the top of the no-no list."
Castiel stares at him. "'Javier'?"
Dean nods. "Javier. Horrible name. Do not do it."
"You really just pulled the name Javier out of thin air?" Castiel asks, gaping at him. "Just, randomly, for no reason, you just went Javier?"
Dean shrugs. "Pretty much."
"Why?"
Dean clicks his tongue. "Well, I was going to say Kevin 'cause I had a friend named Kevin in college, but then I actually thought about it and a teddy bear named Kevin would kind of be hilarious so I didn't want to cross that off your list — but you can't use it now that I've mentioned it."
Castiel nods slowly. That's definitely weird, but it's just kind of Dean-status weird. It still doesn't answer his question, though.
Dean continues, "I'd kinda already started my sentence though because god knows I don't think through any series of words that leave my mouth, so in my lame attempt to think of a substitute name, I just picked Kevin's friend Javi."
"You are such a strange person," Castiel tells him.
Dean beams. "Thank you!"
"I do still need to pick a name, though," Castiel says, thinking.
"And it can't be Javier or Kevin," Dean adds.
Castiel waves that off. He wasn't going to name the bear Kevin or Javier anyway. What other names are there, though? (Obviously the answer is 'a lot,' but that doesn't really help.) How about...?
"Antoine," Castiel decides finally. "His name is Antoine."
Dean pats the bear on the head. "Welcome to the family, Antoine."
~~
Castiel doesn't realize he's fallen asleep until he wakes up god-only-knows-how-much-later in his bed, Antoine lying down by his side. Did Castiel put him there? He genuinely can't remember. It was a nice nap, though -- and falling asleep with his new bear made it infinitely better (though he would prefer to fall asleep next to his fiance, but still, sleeping next to a bear is better than sleeping alone).
Speaking of his fiance, where is Dean? He isn't hanging around the bedroom, and the house is silent so Dean can't be playing guitar or watching a movie. Well, it appears it's time to go on a Dean-themed scavenger hunt. He slides out of bed and heads to the door --
Castiel heads back to bed, scoops Antoine up in his arms, and then heads to the door. He can't leave his new gift alone just hours after he got it. He wants to make sure Dean knows he loves it.
The nice thing about this house is that it's tiny -- probably even smaller than Dean's Massachusetts house -- so it doesn't take long to find Dean. He's sitting on the couch in the living room, staring at his phone with a bemused smile. He doesn't hear Castiel approach, which he decides to try to use to his advantage just for a laugh. He's not sure how to use it to his advantage, though.
After racking his brain for something funny to do, Castiel decides to just stick with an ordinary "surprise, I'm here!" type of thing. He sneaks up behind his fiance, and when he's within an arm's reach, he pushes Antoine up against Dean's head, the bear's arms wrapping around Dean's face.
"Help!" Dean squeaks out, laughing his ass off as he does, "I'm being attacked!"
Castiel laughs and sits down by his side, putting Antione down on the floor in front of them. "What's going on in Deanville?"
"Well, other than the fact that I was just attacked by a stuffed bear," Dean says, "I am very much enjoying the internet today."
"Ooh, how come?" Castiel asks. Is there something fun happening online? He's not sure why anyone would pick Valentine's Day to start a weird online trend, but people are unpredictable in the best way.
"People were living for my bear picture," Dean tells him. "Ooh, actually, hold on, I gotta show you it first."
Dean keys in the password to his phone at the speed of light and opens up Instagram. Castiel has become accustomed to catching glimpses of Dean's social media -- usually Twitter -- and seeing very brief looks at what their friends are up to, so it's a little disappointing that the top post on Dean's Instagram feed is some dude he doesn't recognize. It's pretty rude of Dean not to curate his entire social media experience for the benefit of Castiel's very few looks into it.
Dean opens his Instagram story and hands his phone to Castiel, who puts a finger down to stop the story from changing. It's a photo of the impala in the driveway with a very familiar-looking teddy bear sitting shotgun. The caption, written in small letters in the bottom corner, reads, "I'm so glad it's finally Valentine's Day because this guy's been sitting in my car and staring at the door for days and it's kinda creepy."
Castiel snorts. "There is nothing about this that isn't both hilarious and incredibly weird."
"Thank you!" Dean says, beaming. "Someone else posted it on Twitter and it went viral and that just about sums up all the reactions it got."
"I wonder why," Castiel says sarcastically. "For the record, though, if anyone bullies Antoine, they deserve to be blocked."
"Fortunately, most people have been thrilled to hear of Antoine's existence," Dean assures him. "Although a lot of people did think his name was weird, which was very disheartening because I know you put a lot of time and effort into naming your son."
"Our son," Castiel corrects him, "and yes, yes I did. I think you should inform everyone that he was actually named after a brilliant 16th-century scientist and that bullying Antoine for his name comes very close to discrediting his namesake."
Dean cocks an eyebrow. "Was he actually named after a 16th-century scientist?"
Castiel scoffs. "God no. It was just a random name." For the sake of showing off the random useless facts he's retained from high school, he adds, "But there was some old sciencey guy named Anton Van Leeuwenhoek. I don't know what century he's from, but he sure did exist." He's also not sure who the guy was or what he did, but admitting that would ruin the illusion that he's smart.
"Oh god," Dean whispers, "I feel like I'm back in high school."
"At least you kinda liked high school, right?" Castiel says with a shrug.
"Meh." Dean waves that off. "Ooh, but I do like teasing you over the interwebs but I gotta ask permission first, so..." He takes his phone back from Castiel and opens his photos app, choosing the most recent photo before handing the phone back.
While it doesn't answer the question of whether Dean put Antoine in bed with Castiel or if he did it himself and forgot, it does answer the question of whether Dean knew — and the answer is "yes." The picture is Castiel fast asleep in bed, his head resting on one of Antoine's arms with the other one holding him like they're snuggling. It would admittedly be a very cute picture if Castiel wasn't left wondering how it happened.
Dean explains it briefly with, "You guys looked so cute together that I had to take a pic — and if you'd woken up when I put his arm around you I would have made you pretend to be asleep just for the photo op."
Castiel chuckles. "Of course you would have." He's just that much of a dork.
"Can I post this one?" Dean asks. "I already have a great caption — 'guess I'll have to find somewhere else to sleep.'"
Castiel shakes his head, amused. "Knock yourself out."
"But I can't do that because I don't have anywhere to sleep yet," Dean reminds him.
Dean posts the picture on Instagram first — not his story this time, though; an actual post that will stick around for longer than 24 hours. He uses the caption he'd just said, then copies it to his phone to paste on Twitter with the same photo.
Of course, Lucifer does pretty much carry this entire fic, so he gets a cameo in today's Valentine's Day update just for fun.
A few minutes after that post, Dean nudges Castiel to tell him that Lucifer replied to his tweet. Castiel rests his head on his fiance's shoulder so he can look over at his phone as Dean unlocks it, and Twitter is conveniently already open. Dean heads to Lucifer's profile and takes a look at the replies.
"There's always room at my place 👀"
"Imagine if I actually posted that picture while you were asleep," Dean says, "and I did take Lucifer up on the offer and you woke up and I was just gone."
"I mean, I think that's how normal couples live their lives?" Castiel says uncertainly; he and Dean haven't been a 'normal couple' for a very long time so he can't know for sure. "I would definitely be confused, though."
"I would hope you'd be confused if I mysteriously disappeared," Dean says. "I'd hate to mysteriously disappear for real only to find out that no one even questioned it."
"Fair point," Castiel says. "But you're actually not allowed to mysteriously disappear for real. It's actually against the law."
Dean shrugs. "That's okay. My brother's a lawyer."
"Your brother is in his, what, first year of law school?" Castiel guesses. "That does not make him a lawyer."
"Eh, same thing," Dean says.
He types out his response to Lucifer — "ngl this pic is from like two hours ago and I was just waiting for Cas to wake up for permission to post it lol" — and looks to Castiel for the seal of approval. When he gets a nod, Dean sends the tweet.
"I love that you just flat-out admitted that type caption was a lie," Castiel remarks.
"I don't know," Dean says. "Maybe I'll get stuck on the couch tonight because you decided Antoine is a better snuggle buddy."
"I can tell you right now that that's not going to happen," Castiel assures him.
"You say that now, but just you wait," Dean says. "Just. You. Wait." He pauses. "You know, I could make a Hamilton reference out of that, but I'm going to spare you."
He refreshes Lucifer's Twitter page to find a new reply.
"In that case I will add a plus one to your invitation (or plus two if you wanna bring Antione?)"
"He spelled it wrong!" Castiel points out. "He spelled Antoine's name wrong!"
"Even I know how to spell Antoine's name," Dean adds. "Hang on, I'm gonna tell him off."
"it's Antoine, thank you *very* much."
"Do you actually wanna go hang out with Lucifer, though?" Castiel asks.
Dean shrugs. "Do you?"
"If you want to," Castiel says, which is his polite way of saying "of course I want to hang out with Lucifer, and you better want to hang out with him, too."
"Alrighty, I'll text him and make sure the invitation really does still stand," Dean says. "And, knowing him, it probably does, so you, me, and Antoine better get ready to hit the road."