My Favorite Song

Chapter 4: Complications

The day after that, (I know, I'm going too slow with the times in the episodes, don't worry, I'll work on it. ;D) Castiel gave me a quick smile and then returned to his usual disinterested self as I crossed the courtyard on my way to school. *I'll bet he thinks he'll ruin his reputation if someone saw him smile for once lol.* I smiled back and continued on my way to the school. I had just reached the stairs leading to the doorway when Nathaniel came outside. He saw me instantly, and smiled. "Hi, Julia. How are you today?" He walked up to me and I replied "I'm good so far. How are you?" "I'm doing well. Thank you for asking" He gave me a warm smile, which I returned. I started towards the door, but he stopped me to say "Oh, and I talked to Amber for you." I stared at him for a moment, confused.

He then cleared my confusion by adding "Amber is my sister, the girl you...uh...had trouble with yesterday. I talked to her for you, so she shouldn't be bothering you anymore." To that, I replied "Well that's good." I was about to leave again, only to have him block me once again. "Uh-wait. That's not all." He had a sudden look of concern on his face. "What else happened?" I asked him. "Well, it's just that, her behavior this time is strange. She normally only insults people, she doesn't resort to violence often." he replied. "Well she slapped me PRETTY hard yesterday...." "I know..." he sighed. He stayed silent for a moment, and then continued while looking away, "She says that she slapped you because she saw you with...Castiel."

The look on Nathaniel's face implied that this bothered HIM more than it did Amber, but I ignored that and said "Why, does she like him or something?" and he instantly shot back at me with an almost-angry tone, "Yes, Amber adores Castiel. I think you should stay away from him....to avoid trouble with her." He looked away again. Something about the way he said that made it seem like avoiding trouble with Amber wasn't his main concern. *I don't know, maybe it's just me.* Anyway, I said "Um...okay." and when he finally looked at me again, he gave me that warm smile of his and walked me to my locker before going to the student council room right across the hallway.

I was just about to open my locker when I noticed a little white strip of paper in the little slit on the front. It read "Stay away from Castiel." I figured it was from Amber since she likes Castiel. I stuffed the note in the pocket of my sweater jacket, gathered my things from my locker and went to class. After my first class was over, I was on my way back to my locker when out of nowhere, someone tugged my sweater jacket, slamming me against the lockers. Then, whoever pulled me backwards held me there while a familiar blonde stepped out in front of me.

"So, the little klutz tattled on me..." It was Amber and her gang of bullies. "Amber." I said with a slightly-angry tone in my voice. "Did the widdle kwutz run crying to Nathey-Wathey thinking he'd save you?" She mocked in a baby voice. "No!" I shouted back at her. "It wasn't like that! He saw what you did and assumed, and he assumed right!" "Well, do you know what we do to tattletales?" She obviously wasn't listening to me. The girls holding me back snickered as she started to say "We-....oh, what's this?" Her view shifted to the white note hanging out of my pocket. She took it out and read it.

"Stay away from Castiel." "Yeah I know, it's the note you left me earlier!" She re-read the note and sneered. "Sorry to disappoint you, but I didn't write this sorry excuse for a threat." She threw the paper at me and I questioned her. "Well, do you know who DID?" I was curious now. "No." She was obviously lying. Her friends let go of me, and started to walk away. Just as they were about to leave, Amber shouted at me from down the hall "I would take that advice though, If I was you!" Even at my distance from them in the hall, I could still hear them snickering as they left. I picked up the paper, and started towards my locker again.

By the time I got there, a second note was there. This one had different handwriting, so it was obviously from a different person. It read "Slim, meet me in the courtyard after school." Just from reading it, I could tell who it was. * REALLY subtle hint there, Castiel.* Throughout the rest of the school day, I went to and from classes, Nathaniel met me for lunch and Ken kept me company during recess with that stupid grin on his face. Once school was over, I stepped outside onto the courtyard and saw Castiel grinning at me. I walked up to him and was just about to ask him what this was about when he interrupted.

"Hey, slim. You like dogs?" I just stood there for a second and then shouted at him, "THAT'S what this is about? You left me a note asking me to meet you just so you could ask me if I like DOGS?!" He just laughed. "Well, do you?" he asked again. "Yeah, sure. Why?" He grinned and said, "Meet me at the park in 10 minutes." And with that, he left. *I DON'T EVEN KNOW WHERE THE PARK IS!* I had to ask someone where the park was so that I would ACTUALLY KNOW where to go. Once I knew where to go, I ran as fast as I could so that I wouldn't be late. *Why do I even care?*

As soon as I got there, I stopped so I could catch my breath. Castiel saw me and said, "There you are. I thought you were gonna be late." I wanted to say something like, "WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME THERE WITHOUT EVEN TELLING ME HOW TO GET HERE?!" but before I got the chance, Castiel spoke again. "Slim, this is my dog, Demon. Demon, this is Julia." I looked down at the huge dog. "Hi, Demon." The dog started growling at me. Castiel scowled at the dog, "Demon, that's not very nice." Demon whined at him and sat. "Good, now go apologize." As if Demon knew what Castiel told him, he slowly approached me and sniffed my hand before letting me pet him. I smiled at him.

"Aww..."

"Good boy, now QUICK, ATTACK HER!" Demon jumped on me, pinned me down and started licking my face. Then I shouted to Demon in-between laughs, "Hey, stop that!" Castiel was laughing almost as hard as I was. I finally managed to push Demon off me and stand up. I laugh-shouted at Castiel "What's wrong with you?" Though, I should've been angry, I couldn't get myself to stop laughing for a good minute after that. He laughed with me as Demon jumped up on both of us, trying to get at least ONE of us down again. Once we had calmed down, we just talked to each other, taking turns with Demon as we walked around the park, Demon trying to get us to run.

After a while, it started getting late. "Hey, it's getting late. I should go home." I said to Castiel as I turned to leave. "No, wait. Why don't you just stay and hang out with me a little longer?" Castiel asked while Demon whined at me for leaving. "I would, but it IS getting late..." I replied. I turned to leave, but Castiel grabbed my arm so that I couldn't. "Please?" He really wanted me to stay.

"I'm sorry, Castiel, but I can't." I started getting annoyed. "I have more important things to do, you know!" Castiel got angry. "Like what? Studying with your boyfriend?!" I looked at him angrily for a moment. "Boyfriend?!" I had no idea what he was talking about. Castiel tightened his grip around my arm and pulled me towards him. "Don't lie to me! I saw you with Golden Boy earlier!" He shouted at me. I shouted back at him, "Who? You mean Nathaniel? He's not my boyfriend!" "And just how long are you gonna let yourself think that?! Did you even notice the way he looked at you?!" At the moment Castiel said that, I just stopped and just stared at him. *Now that I think about it, Nathaniel DID have this loving look in his eyes when I was talking with him earlier today.* Castiel calmed down and spoke to me. "Julia, I know that look. He likes you. More than a friend."

Demon saw something hanging out of my pocket and grabbed hold of it with his teeth. Castiel took it out of his mouth and read the note out loud. "Stay away from Castiel." He shook his head angrily and muttered "Sneaky son of a-..." as he ripped the note up and threw it on the ground. I looked at him and questioned, "Castiel, are you...jealous?" He didn't answer, but instead said to me "You're right, it's getting late." He offered to walk me home, but I refused again. "That's another thing, why won't you let me walk you home?"

I thought for a moment. "My apartment is....messy..." He chuckled at that. "Slim, you're a terrible liar." *Was it THAT obvious?* Then I said to him, "Well, you still can't come inside. You have a dog, remember?" Castiel looked at Demon and then turned back to me. "You're just making excuses; I know what you're doing." I looked away, and he continued, "You can try to push me away all you want, Slim, but I'm not going anywhere." With that, he grabbed my hand as tightly as he could and started walking. *Push me away...someone else told me that same thing.* He said nothing during the long walk to my apartment building, but not once did he ever loosen his grip on my hand. Once we had gotten there, he finally let go of my hand and we said goodbye to each other. He started to walk away, but then turned back to me and said, "And Slim," he grinned at me. "Next time, I WILL see your apartment!" And with that, he walked off, Demon following close behind.

I stayed up until 2 a.m. doing the pile of homework my teachers had left for me that day. After that, I went to bed to try and get some rest, but I couldn't relax anyway, because no matter how much I tried not to, I just kept thinking about what had happened that day. What would I tell Nathaniel? What would Nathaniel do if he saw me with Castiel? ....Or, what would Castiel do if he saw me with Nathaniel? * Why does this whole thing have to be so COMPLICATED?!* I let out a groan, my thoughts just wouldn't stop. It wasn't until an hour later that I had finally passed out from exhaustion.