Setting up the lights takes a while, so Castiel has some time to talk to Patience and Alex. It's just small talk at first, something he's always struggled with in the past. He's surprised to find that it's easy to talk to the girls, probably because he's seen so many videos of them that he feels like he already knows them. It's a nice change.
It's Patience who reminds Castiel what he wanted to ask, though she doesn't do it on purpose. Her question is just, "Do you know when we get to tell the fans that you're on the show?"
"This weekend, actually," Castiel replies. "Entertainment Weekly is announcing it, but I don't think they're telling anyone who I'm playing." The questions they asked him for his cover story were vague, so he has to assume it's staying under wraps until Lucifer's first episode in a month or so. It would be a huge spoiler otherwise.
"Oh, god, our Twitter mentions are going to be a trainwreck," Alex says, a light-hearted complaint.
"Speaking of Twitter," Castiel says just because the segway presented itself, "I'm planning on live-tweeting a rewatch of the first few episodes next weekend. I finally convinced my girlfriend to watch the show and I figured I might as well make a big deal out of it and maybe convince some other people to watch it with us. I don't know how you guys feel about watching your old work, but if you want, you're welcome to join the live tweet party."
"I'm down," Alex says.
"That'll be fun!" Patience says. "Do you have a hashtag picked out? Maybe we can get it trending."
Castiel shrugs. "I was thinking just 'hashtag Wayward Sisters,' if that's not too boring."
"It is definitely too boring but that's okay," Patience says.
"And if Jo likes it," Alex adds, "you should invite her to set one of these days!"
Castiel smiles to himself. He's been trying to be very casual and lowkey about his pseudo-girlfriend while on set — due largely in part to Claire's comments but also because it just feels weird to bring her up more than necessary when she's not here — but if Alex is as much of a fan of hers as she seems to be, he's gotta give her something to satiate her fangirl heart.
"Well, she is about to start working on a new project in LA," Castiel tells them (though he's not sure he's allowed to but whatever), "but I'm sure we can figure out a day for her to come up here."
Castiel hadn't actually planned on following through on that, but Alex looks so excited that he decides he has to at least try. He's sure Jo will be filming weekdays at the same time the girls are, but maybe he can drag her over if they have a late shoot on a Friday night. It would mean Jo would probably have to sleep over at his apartment, but it might be worth it if it makes Alex happy.
Of course, this all hinges on Jo actually liking the show enough to want to come by set and meet the girls. Maybe Cas can somehow use her crush on him to his advantage to turn her into a genuine fan of the show. Is that manipulative? Ah, whatever. At least the show would finally give them something in common.
"Careful," Patience says with a playful smile. "If you think she's excited to see you, you don't want to know how much she'll freak out when she meets Jo."
"Hey!" Alex hisses, reaching over and smacking her on the arm.
"Hey, I don't blame you," Castiel says. "I think that's most people's reactions to meeting her — not, of course, that I'm speaking from experience." He says the last part in a way that definitely implied that he is speaking from experience, but in reality, he just didn't talk to her much when they first met. It took a couple days for Jo to catch him behind the camera to get a conversation going. He was very good at internalizing the fact that he didn't feel like a big enough star to be in her presence, and she was very good at not noticing that. She was too distracted by how much she wanted to make a friend to realize said friend was a little wary around her.
"See? Look at that!" Patience gives Alex a teasing pat on the back. "He's human, just like us!"
Alex narrows her eyes. "I hate you so much."
~~
Eventually, Castiel and Claire are called back to film. The actual content of the scene is not important, so here's a brief overview of how the shoot goes instead of a constant moment-by-moment analysis.
The scene starts with Claire's character Kathryn in bed. She wakes up and finds Castiel's character Lucifer leaning against the bedroom wall with his arms crossed and a small smirk on his face. He is incredibly dramatic while he introduced himself, being just vague enough that Kathryn has to piece his identity together. It will probably make more sense when they finish adding the special effects, but Castiel has already decided that just standing there awkwardly while they film his face to add the glowing red eyes is one of the weirdest things he's filmed just because he feels like he should be doing something.
Their conversation is sometimes serious and sometimes sarcastic. Claire does a good job with that. Kathryn is obviously rattled, and her wariness doesn't go away when she makes a sarcastic quip. It's her defense mechanism, something he's noted before while watching the show but even more so now that he sees it in person.
Eventually, Lucifer sits down on Kathryn's bed with her. Castiel was a little unsure about that when he first read the script; it makes a lot more sense now that he knows about the strong, unspoken bond between them. That's why she's not pushing him away — and, unfortunately, that's something he really has to play into if he wants the viewers to understand, so he gets uncomfortably close during their conversation.
The conversation ends with Kathryn declaring — albeit not very confidently — that she'll never agree to be his vessel, and Lucifer replying — much more confidently but gently, too; playfully, even — that she will and that it's only a matter of time. Just for kicks because he feels it in his bones that it's something Lucifer would do, he boops her on the nose at the end of the scene before the director calls "Cut!" and the show continues on to Claire waking up from this dream.
They have to film it a few times, getting all the different angles the editors will need to piece it together into a coherent scene. It all goes pretty smoothly, and he's pleasantly surprised to see that this is a fairly professional environment where shit actually gets done — though not so professional that he feels like he's going to get shot if he messes up. Fortunately, he and Claire get through every take with no errors, and finally, the director lets everyone know they're moving on to the next scene.
"Thank god," Claire mutters, shoving Castiel away and taking off.
Castiel cocks an eyebrow. Well, at least she was mature enough to get through the scene. Just watching this, the viewers are going to have absolutely no idea that she apparently hates his guts. It'll be interesting to see how she talks about him at conventions and during interviews, though. Is she going to give him the Dean treatment, peppering in passive-aggressive comments every chance she gets? Because that would get annoying really fast.
Claire heads towards her friends — Patience and Alex both stuck around to watch the scene and Kaia must have joined them at some point — so Castiel decides his time is probably better spent literally anywhere else.
He purposely takes a longer-than-necessary way around to get his phone just so he won't have to walk by Claire. If Patience and Alex try to talk to him, Claire (and presumably Kaia as well) will leave, and he doesn't want anyone to feel unwelcome on their own set.
He's so distracted checking his phone — Charlie, Dean, and Jo have all texted him since he last put it down — that he doesn't even notice his new follower until she speaks.
"I'm sorry about Claire."
Castiel looks up to see Kaia standing a few feet away with her hands clasped in front of her. Her head is ducked, her gaze only staying on him for a few moments at a time. He can't tell if she's this quiet because she's starstruck or if she's just shy, but something about her makes him think it's the latter.
Castiel waves her concern off. "It's fine. I don't have to be friends with everyone." He's already made more friends today than he has on day of any other project so he's pretty content with that.
"Still, I'm sorry," Kaia says.
"I appreciate that," Castiel says. "It's nice to finally meet you, by the way! I know this is pretty unprofessional of me, but I'm a big fan." He wouldn't usually say that to an actor if they didn't say it first, but he can tell Kaia's shy and he hopes it will ease her mind at least a little to know that Castiel already likes her.
"Oh, thank you," Kaia says, a small smile on her lips, but that's the only response he gets which obviously isn't much to build a conversation off of.
Castiel decides now is probably a good time to excuse himself, but there's one last thing he wants to ask before he does. "I promised a friend I'd call when I got the chance, but before I go, I just want to let you know that I'm going to be rewatching the show next weekend with my girlfriend and I figured we could livetweet it together and make it a whole big thing. I don't know if that's something you'd want to join us in?" He pauses, then adds a quick, "Patience and Alex are gonna join but obviously you don't have to," just to clarify that this is a big group thing but not a mandatory one.
Kaia thinks about that for a moment. "That could be fun."
That's a good enough answer for him. "Alright, awesome! Now, I gotta run but I'll see you later and it was really nice to meet you!"
Kaia gives a shy wave, and Castiel's off, ready to head back to base camp while he waits for his only other scene of the day. He's not sure whether today has been really good or really bad, but it sure has been a day.
A/N Don't forget to listen to Fearless (Taylor's Version) tonight at midnight EST (also That's When ft Keith Urban is going to be so freaking good it's my fav unreleased song AND Keith Urban is on it now and I can't wait)