My Greatest Mistake

4. Detention

Time passes quickly when you're dreading something.

All day Castiel was watching the clock, begging the hands to move slower. Yet, almost as if the hands were taunting him, the clock did exactly the opposite. In no time at all, school was over, and Cas began the walk of shame to Mr Singer's classroom. Dean was already there when he arrived, and with a start Cas realized that they were the only two in detention that day. Soon after, Singer arrived, shooting a gruff look at the both of them.

"Listen up kiddos. This door's gonna be locked from the outside for the hour, I'll come back and let you out when it's over."

"Uh, sir?" Dean raised his hand mockingly, "What if we have to use the washroom?"

"Tough luck Winchester," Mr Singer grunted, "you do the crime you do the time."

"Keep that drill sergeant act and they just might induct you into the military Singer!" The quarterback's tone was both fond and cocky, a mixture Cas found intriguing, and, though he hated to admit it, kind of a turn on.

He flushed at the thought. Dean noticed once the door had been locked, and assumed Cas was hot. He opened one of the windows lining the wall, and leaned forward.

"It's raining!" He exclaimed, before leaning towards the window, breathing in the air. "God, I love that smell."

"It's called petrichor," Cas explained. "Plants build up a store of it to replace water when they don't have access to it, and when it rains they release it. That's the smell everyone loves when it rains."

Dean looked at him then, with a peculiar sort of look. It was one of those times when you could almost tell what the person was thinking, like you were gazing into their thoughts through a frosted window. You could see the silhouette, but nothing more.

"Um," Cas stuttered, "y-you're staring at me."

"Oh. Oh, sorry." Dean blushed and looked away. Cas feelt his cheeks getting warm as well, and shifted his gaze to his desk.

The rest of detention passed uneventfully, and by the time Mr Singer let them go, Castiel had learned that his desk had twenty-three knots, fifteen whorls, and sixty-two lines altogether. Along with four couples' initials carved into the wood with a heart around them. Two of which had been scratched out. 

Ah, young love, he thought as he left the school. So fleeting, so fragile. 

He sat down on the top step to wait for Raphael, who was running late. Cas hoped it wasn't one of those nights where his brother didn't get home until midnight. All thoughts of Raphael vanished, however, when Dean sat down beside him.

"Waiting for a ride, huh?" Though Cas was looking straight ahead, he could feel Dean's eye boring holes in his cheekbone.

"Uh, y-yeah," he stuttered, and thought to himself that if he had a quarter for every time he stuttered in Dean's presence he could - well, not do much, considering he had only talked to Dean three times. I could afford bus fare to get home, at least, he mused.

"You know what dude? I'll give you a ride. Come on, my car's over here." Dean stood up and, without waiting to see if Cas was following him, started off towards the parking lot.

"Oh, no, I can't, my house is way out of your way. I couldn't possibly ask you to do that," Castiel hurried after Dean, despite what he had just said.

"So you know where I live? I gotta say Novak, that's a bit creepy." Dean shook his head at Cas, a wicked glint of amusement in his eyes.

"I-I just- it's just that- I mean- my house is out of everybody's way. I- don't know where you live. At all." Great Cas, he told himself, now you can definitely afford bus fare.

"Woah, dude, chill. I was joking. And I wouldn't offer if i didn't want to," Dean smiled, and added, "besides, I kind of wanted to show off my car."

He stepped back and revealed the beauty of a 1967, black, Chevy Impala.

"It- it's beautiful," Cas whispered. he blushed when he realized how stupid he must have sounded, yet he didn't hear any laughter from Dean. He turned to look at him and was surprised to see the quarterback smiling at him, not unkindly.

"Isn't it?" Dean said. "I built it from the ground up. My parents got in a bad car crash five years ago. It killed my mom, and my dad didn't want the car after that, so I got to rebuild it. It's mine now," at that he grinned proudly, "and it comes in handy. So," he turned to Cas, "about that ride?"

||A/N: The only thing better than writing about these two bonding over a car is reading about them bonding over a car so I hoped you enjoyed.

Thanks for reading!