Something Like Family

“Care to explain what’s happening?” Anna turned to him after making sure Balthazar and Gabriel were engaged in their conversation about skin mags. Castiel swallowed, even though there was nothing in his mouth.
“Care to elaborate?”
“Don’t take that tone up with me, Cas.” He had to smile at the new nickname he’d been given by his friends.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“There’s something going on between you and Dean Winchester, of all people.”
“Is that something I should be aware of?” Anna hit him playfully on the arm.
“Don’t act like you’re not crushing on him!” Anna hissed, abandoning her soup and turning her chair around to face him. Cas murmured something under his breath.
“Excuse me I couldn’t quite hear that Castiel.” Anna leaned closer, putting her hand to her ear.
“Fine!” He whispered, drinking from his glass.
“I knew it!” She clapped her hands but then stopped at the worried look in his face. “Hey, it’s nothing to be ashamed of. If I were straight I’d be riding that ass too.” Castiel choked on the water in his mouth and nearly spat it all over his plate. He shot her an embarrassed yet surprised look. She shrugged slightly. “Yeah, I know shocker. Why did you think I could tell from the first moment he sat down?”
“You could?” He whispered, turning around and looking at Dean who was digging into the pie with relish.
“Yeah.”
“Hey, Anna are you going to eat this lollipop?” Gabriel grabbed the lolly that had been by Anna’s plate, placed there like on every table infront of everyone.
“You’ve already eaten yours and Balthazar’s?” Anna turned around, her mouth open.
“And Cas’.” Gabe seemed pleased with himself as he tore the wrapping off and threw it on the table before him.
“Your love for candy is unbelievable.” Anna mumbled as Gabriel winked at her. She turned to Castiel and softly said, “We’ll talk later.” The she turned around and carried on eating.

Back inside the safety of his room, Castiel used his five-minute break to open his suitcase and start making his new room his own. He placed his laptop on the desk, quickly finding the plug socket and plugging it in to charge. He entered his ensuite bathroom and was surprised to find everything gleaming like a model bathroom in an advertisement showing off a new cleaning product that fought limescale. Placing his toothbrush in the pot by the sink, he looked at himself in the mirror. Taking a deep breath, he brushed his fingers through his hair and wondered when Anna was going to continue their conversation. Not that he minded ofcourse. It was somewhat pleasant being able to talk about things no one had ever bothered to ask Castiel about. As if in answer to his question, he heard a quick rap on his door. He opened it to find Anna pushing inside.
“Anna? Are you even allowed near the boys’ bedrooms?” He closed the door after checking the stairs to see if she was in trouble.
“Nope. But I’ve got news.”
“What kind of news?” Castiel was weary as he studied her, sitting down on his bed next to her. She was practically bouncing.
“They’re mixing the houses for the classes!”
“Weren’t they going to do that anyway?” He raised an eyebrow, fixing Anna with a look.
“No. Well, I’m not sure. Look, the point is you’ll probably have classes with Dean!” Castiel ignored the flutter of excitement in his stomach as Anna forced their hands together for a high five. His mind ran wild with the possibility of getting to know Dean better. Maybe even working out how he felt. Shaking his head, he cleared all of these thoughts from his head; they were just hopes, after all.

~

“Alright Winchester get your ass down here! Lessons start it five minutes!” Pamela shouted up the stairs, watching Dean as he jogged down to her.
“I’m coming Pamela.” He tugged his arm into his jacket as they rounded the corner and came into the main room of the dormitory building that housed all for houses. “What do we have the pleasure of experiencing first, I wonder?” He said as Pamela snatched his timetable from his fingers, her face turning into a smirk.
“Lucky you. You have Chemistry first with me and Adam.”
“Wait...Adam? Doesn’t he have a brother in Angelus?”
“Yeah, he does.” Pamela walked out of the building, followed by a confused Dean.
“Then why wouldn’t they put them in the same house?” Pamela shrugged at that and headed towards a building nestled on the edge of the woods.
“Beats me.”
“I mean if Sammy were here, I’d do anything to make sure he was with me.” Dean walked through a glass door, and realised straight away that the Science block was built in a different way to the rest of the grounds. The floors were free of the luxurious carpet, and the walls were considerably blander, decorated with cold colours. Pamela dragged him up a flight of stairs to the second floor, which had a sign reading ‘Chemistry’ on the wall. Dean looked around at the glass doors and windows showing each classroom and his friend lead the way to a door marked ‘C3’. He scoffed and turned to her. “Looks like they ran out of fancy names.” Turning around, he realised most of the seats were already taken. There were a couple next to some guys from the house of Infernum, but they looked intimidating even to him. Pamela stood next to a spare seat by Adam, a frown crossing her features.
“Why are there no goddamn seats?” In answer to her question Dean shrugged and looked around the room. Reaching a corner at the back, he saw the same dark-haired boy he’d talked to by the table at lunch. By this time, he’d learned from Ash that his name was Castiel. He didn’t even know where that guy got all his information from, but he preferred not to ask. His stomach leapt with hope when he thought there was a spare seat next to Castiel, but then someone moved their head and he saw a girl sitting next to him. She looked like she was trying to strike conversation, but it wasn’t working. Chuckling to himself, he told Pamela to sit down and wandered over to the desk next to Castiel, which had a guy sitting on the end of it. He didn’t look too bad, but Dean hadn’t seen him around, so he couldn’t tell. He sat down next to him, holding out a hand.
“Hi. Name’s Dean.” The guy looked at his hand before answering and shaking it.
“Benny.”