Chapter Text
Summer
It’s the kind of hot that persists even into cooler spaces, that makes a person feel sweaty even when sitting directly in front of an air conditioner or fan. The whole week has been this way, all up and down the northeast coast from Maine to D.C. Ninety degree plus days with unrepentant sunshine turning the real-feel outside of the shade into at least ten degrees hotter than it is. This is why the College doesn’t start classes until the end of August, beginning of September, when this musty, airless humidity has at least burned off somewhat and walking the distance between the main campus parking lot to the nearest stuffy building won’t actually threaten your life. Days when the first tendrils of fall start creeping in, bringing with them relief from the oppressive stillness of summer and the promise of busier, fuller days.
Dean Winchester lives for fall. Fall means cooler days and chilly nights, a house that doesn’t make him feel suffocated to be inside of, even with the air on full blast. Fall means hoodies and flannel, apple cider and bonfires, and most importantly, football. Being the Head Coach of a Div I college football team is like being campus royalty and Dean revels in the privileges. Soon enough it’ll be days in the weight room, strategic play discussions with his Quarterback, and evening practices out on the field. Then there’ll be the games; crisp nights with the stadium lights shining down, the whole student body crammed into the bleachers, the roar of the crowd and the competing sounds of cheerleaders doing their best to yell over the marching band. Dean can hardly wait; he has a great feeling about his team this year, especially his new recruits.
But all that is still several weeks away. Several long, hot weeks of suffering through seemingly endless heatwaves and Dean’s shirts sticking to his upper back just as soon as he exits his car. Thank God he can park behind the stadium and dart inside to his office most days, though there are also plenty of times he has to make the sweaty trek to Main Campus to meet with the administration, sponsors, you name it. And then soon enough, practices will start and the heat will be completely unavoidable. Until then, coaching a Div I football team is a lot more than running practices and calling plays.
As such, Dean hasn’t got a whole lot of time to dwell on the fact that his life is basically football and nothing else. Even on his days off, he’s usually in the office watching tapes, running to meetings he scheduled badly, or out on the field working, because where else would he be? Maybe if he had someone waiting for him at home the brutal summer heat would be more tolerable, but as it is, Dean can barely find time for the occasional one night stand, never mind a real relationship. Sure, the team doesn’t play in the spring, but by then Dean’s on to scouting and recruiting for the next year. There just isn’t time for him to seek out and nurture a serious relationship, not right now. Maybe someday, when his coaching days are behind him. Like that’ll ever happen.
Besides, he’s gotta keep up with Sammy. Dean has a sneaking suspicion that his younger brother Sam only keeps his part-time professor job at Stanford’s Law School to piss Dean off. At least their teams don’t play each other unless they’re both in the playoffs or at a bowl or something. That would probably be grounds for a familial divorce.
The thing is, while football season is officially still weeks away, the team is already here and getting set up in their dorms and off-campus housing even as Dean waits impatiently in his office. He’s fully aware that no one is going to show up to see him until the day after tomorrow, but it feels wrong to sit at home doing nothing. Practices, workouts, and team-building activities will fill the coming days but for now, it’s hurry-up-and-wait for Dean. Worse than that, he’s done, actually done all of the work he has to do for once, until he can add his players into the mix. Dean knows he’s really done because he’s spent the last hour scraping and searching for absolutely anything to occupy his time and keep his mind busy, coming up empty again and again.
He checks the clock on his wall; closing in on a quarter past seven in the evening. Glancing out the window, Dean can see that the sun has started to set, which means it should be slightly less nightmarish to go outside. With a heavy sigh, he resigns himself to a boring night at home, since there’s clearly nothing left he can even pretend to do here. Dean grabs his bag and a stack of plays he’s looked over twenty times already, stuffing them inside before locking up and heading for his car. He slides behind the wheel of his mint-condition ‘67 Chevy Impala and winces as the stored heat from the leather soaks into his back and thighs. If there’s one thing Dean cares about as much as football it’s his Baby, but on days like this, he’d be lying if he said he didn’t feel the tiniest bit of resentment that the car is black, trapping the day’s heat like a sonofabitch.
Dean wings his bag across the bench seat and slouches, sprawling out to try and cool off as the engine works to turn the stifling air chilled. It takes longer than he’d like, especially considering he’s in suit pants and a long-sleeved button-down. Dean scowls. Meetings requiring business casual dress should be illegal when the heat index is this high.
Once Dean’s sure he isn’t going to melt or spontaneously combust during the drive home, he shifts into gear and pulls out from behind the athletic complex onto the road. His apartment building is technically within walking distance of the school, but like hell he’s hoofing it in this weather. It’s tough to find an open space when Dean pulls into the parking lot. It seems like everyone’s already home and have been for a while. That just makes Dean feel worse; bored and lonely and can’t even get his shit together to get home at a reasonable hour when he’s got no reason to be anywhere else.
In the end, Dean parks on the grass and decides he’ll just go out tonight. That way he can move his car before it draws enough attention for the property owners to make a fuss. With any luck he can drink away his moodiness at the bar, end the night by picking up someone fun and pretty to help him blow off some steam. If Dean’s really lucky, whoever the winner is will offer to take him back to their place. Then he can slip out in the morning, head back home and crash, sleep off his hangover and be fresh for his team the following day. It’s true that Dean doesn’t let loose often but when he does, he makes it worth his while. With all of his work done and a free day on the horizon, the universe seems to be sending him a series of green lights, all urging him on to put work aside and have a good time for once.
The shitty central air system responsible for cooling Dean’s entire apartment building is probably set to somewhere around seventy-eight, or as Dean likes to call it, “why fucking bother?” But when he opens the door to his second-floor walk-up and gets hit in the face with a wave of it, compared to the hallway and the baking oven outside, it feels like the goddamn Arctic. Humming with happiness, Dean strips as he beelines for the bathroom. Clothes hit the floor in a whoosh, Dean’s sweaty skin practically sighing with relief as the cooler air rushes over it. He steps into the shower after giving it barely ten seconds to become slightly warmer than freezing and then his eyes are rolling back in his head with pleasure.
If he weren’t already determined to pick someone up tonight, Dean would stay in here and whack one off, just to enjoy an orgasm while being blissfully cool. Instead, he forces his hands away from his junk and soaps up from head to toe, rinsing off slowly and hovering under the chilly water until he starts to shiver. Unfortunately, the chill is short-lived, dissipating almost the second he steps from the shower out into the bathroom.
It’s still early, so Dean makes himself some dinner wearing only his boxers to stave off getting sweaty all over again. Tonight’s menu is bleak; grilled frozen burger patties on a bagged bun that probably should have been trashed three days ago. There’s no edible dairy or produce in the fridge, but there is some mustard, probably because mustard stays usable for years. Doesn’t it? Dean briefly wonders if that’s actually true, slightly concerned when the blue printed expiration date has rubbed off the side of the bottle in his hand. Hmm. He forces the meal down anyway, not wanting to waste money on bar food or attempt to shoot whiskey on an empty stomach. By the time he’s finished and cleaned up it’s eight-thirty, and Dean thinks that’s plenty late enough.
He slips into the lightest pair of jeans he owns and pulls a tight black t-shirt over his head, spiking his hair with some gel and pulling on boots before checking his look in the mirror. Damn, Winchester, he thinks, giving himself a wink. He could pass for a student, probably, despite having crested over to the wrong side of thirty a couple of years ago. Good fuckin’ genes. With a wave of some awkward finger guns he’s immediately glad no one was here to see, Dean’s off.
It’s fully dark outside but disappointingly no less hot for it. Dean pulls at his collar as he makes his way down the small hill his apartment complex is built into. It gives him a nice view, one that makes his second floor balcony feel like a third-floor one without the hike, but Dean already knows he’ll be cursing it if he strikes out and has to walk home from the bar. The Impala is unbothered on the grass where he left it, but Dean’s still not willing to risk leaving her there overnight.
The drive to the bar is even shorter than his commute to the College. Despite being Head Coach here for three years now and one of the assistants for the six before that, Dean’s never ventured much beyond his immediate neighborhood. Thanks to the town catering to all the students, he’s never really needed to. Grocery stores, auto supply store, bar, drugstore, liquor stores--you name it, it’s all within walking distance. And the housing options aren’t terrible either, Dean’s pretty sure some of the younger professors take advantage of the convenience of the location the same way he does. He briefly wonders what it would be like to be a student and living next door to your Econ 304 professor, probably not the sexy romcom it sounds like.
His own memories of college are unfortunately similar to his current day-to-day life, mostly football and not nearly enough balance. Dean had been the quarterback for the team he coaches now, drafted in the first round to the NFL back in his junior year. He’d given up his scholarship and aspirations of a degree without a second thought, despite his mother and brother’s protests. With stars in his eyes and brand new dreams of becoming a household name, of leading his team to multiple Superbowl Championships filling his head, Dean had been naive. And he’d paid for it.
After a promising start and lots of buzz surrounding his debut, Dean had torn his ACL during game six of his very first regular season. For most athletes, that amounts to one surgery preceding a several-month recovery and then a triumphant, heralded return to the field. For Dean, it was the beginning of the end. Three surgeries, multiple re-tears, and a bunch of failed physical therapy later, his doctor had dropped the bomb. Dean would never be cleared to play professionally again. His team had dropped him shortly after that with apologies, and Dean had returned home disgraced. No career, no degree, all that work and nothing to show for it.
If it weren’t for his old college coach, Bobby Singer, Dean would probably still be moping in his childhood bedroom, the covers pulled up over his head as he contemplated the end of his very short, very pathetic, twenty-three-year-old life. But just as he had in every practice back when Dean was still his star player, Bobby showed up at Dean’s door and quite literally smacked sense into him. Dragging him by his ear out of his self-pity slump, Bobby had offered Dean not only a job but a way to stay involved with football, to pass on his gift and his love for the sport in the only way he was still able.
And when Bobby retired three years ago, despite Dean’s lack of a Bachelor’s degree, Bobby had made him Head Coach. Of course, by then Dean had proven himself time and time again, but it was still an emotional moment for both of them (though Dean has no doubt Bobby will deny that to this day). Bobby still stops by frequently, pretends he’s visiting but Dean knows him well enough to see straight through that. Bobby’s no more ready to be retired than he is, but coaching Div I out of a wheelchair is no small feat. Still, though he knows Bobby hates it, Dean’s thankful he had (and has) a role model and mentor who understands what a devastating sports injury feels like, how it fucks with your head and your self-worth. But Bobby never quit and so Dean won’t either. And not for nothing, but Bobby also never let him forget that while Dean might limp a little, he’s still got his ability to walk, and that’s more than some. Bobby’s broken back can’t say the same.
And as for Dean, he’s got everything he needs. Sure, he’s always worked hard, but his dream job had also basically fallen into his lap and that’s nothing to scoff at. He knows he should go back and finish his Bachelor’s degree, gets the third degree from Bobby about it every time he sees him, but Dean sort of doesn’t see the point. He was never a book smart person, that was all Sammy. College was always a means to an end; a way to play football and still keep his mom happy, to make her feel as if her son was working towards something besides stardom and a pro-sports career. In the end, she’d been right after all, and Dean will always be grateful to Bobby for not letting him become the loser drop-out he deserves to be.
Dean thinks about it sometimes, though. His degree, that is. And how he can’t be that much of a role model for his players if he won’t even finish it up, the way he warns them all to do. It crosses his mind at the most random moments and nearly every night when he’s trying to sleep; a reminder that he’s just a cautionary tale of a worst-case scenario and not an inspiration at all. At the end of the day, who is he to tell his star players to take a pass on fortune and fame? To turn down a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for something almost no one has a shot at?
And yet, all he can bring himself to reply with when they say, “I can always come back and finish my degree later,” is the truth. Pressing his lips into a thin line, Dean will gesture up and down his own body with an all-knowing stare and a pointed head tilt. “I didn’t,” he’ll say.
“And you’re doing great,” is the inevitable reply, followed by, “And no offense Coach Winchester, but I’m not you,” and what can Dean say to that? He is doing great and they aren’t him. But he’s also nobody to look up to and he’s reminded of that every day, wouldn’t wish the feeling on his worst enemy. And yet, each semester that creeps by makes his degree feel more and more out of reach. He’s old now, ridiculously old compared to the students that fill the lecture halls on campus. Dean can’t even imagine matriculating amongst them, shuffled in beside his own players--it’s embarrassing, it’s not worth it. And things are fine the way they are.
When a car honks, Dean comes back to himself abruptly, realizing he’s been idling in a parking space outside the bar with his foot on the brake for quite a long time. Whoever honked must think he means to back out, must want the space. Dean sticks his hand out the window and waves as he shuts off the car, feeling slightly guilty when the vehicle peels away in a screech of tires and obvious frustration. The bar isn’t even that busy, what the hell is that dude’s problem?
Oh well. People are impatient jerks, news at eleven.
Exiting the car, Dean locks up and pats her rear curves affectionately as he wanders by. At the door to the bar Dean gets carded because everyone gets carded in a college town like this. Short of sporting a full face of wrinkles, gray hair, and a walker but even then, no guarantees. Costume makeup has come a long way and underage kids’ drive to drink should never be underestimated.
There are definitely nicer bars in town than this, like the multi-floor one three blocks over that has a dance floor, a balcony, and rotating DJs on the weekends, but that’s not Dean’s scene. Not that drinking alone in his apartment after a long day really counts as a scene, but regardless. If he’s going out, Dean likes a good old-fashioned dive bar. Some place where the lights are low, the booze is cheap, and the idiots willing to play bar games for cash are plentiful. Dean’s years of hustling pool for food and rent money are long past, but hell, sometimes nostalgia gets the best of everyone.
Scanning the room for prospects as he makes his way past sticky tables and chairs, Dean can’t help but worry that his plan just might not be in the cards for tonight. Even for mid-week the crowd is thin, and the chances of scoring a hook-up aren’t looking like the odds are in his favor. Right off the bat, Dean catches sight of two women he’s slept with (and run out on shortly after) before, quickly detouring so they don’t catch sight of him before taking a seat at the end of the bar where the light is particularly dim.
After ordering a whiskey with a beer back, Dean continues to peruse his options but comes up less than enthused. There are a few other women besides the two he’s trying to avoid, but none of them are even remotely close to Dean’s type. He could try another bar, he supposes, or… Dean drums his fingers on the smooth bartop, sipping his whiskey slowly. Lying to himself has never been an issue for Dean, and most of the time he’s happy to pretend that certain urges he feels from time-to-time aren’t anything more than that. But if he’s being honest (and the alcohol is helping), Dean didn’t actually have a woman in mind for tonight at all.
It’s been the better part of two years since he’s indulged in that part of himself, and if it were up to Dean’s rational side, it’d be years more until he’d have to acknowledge it again. And yet, here he is, sitting at the bar and fucking thinking-- no, stewing-- about it. Because the side of Dean that sometimes wants to explore his attraction to men… that side of Dean isn’t rational at all. It’s not easily dissuaded by logic or even Dean’s own father’s voice in his head, either.
The bottom line here is, Dean’s profession of choice doesn’t always take kindly to men who aren’t manly in every sense of the word. And let’s be real, he’s come a lot of the way to where he is on luck alone. Dean can’t afford to ruin his image by openly dating men, no matter where his true preferences may lie. But that also might help explain why it’s been so hard for him to even consider “settling down,” why he’s lacking the drive or interest to so much as put himself out there to try. There’s something deep down inside Dean that knows if he did settle down with a woman, he’d always wonder. Sure, he could put on a happy face, grin and bear it, probably for the rest of his life. But would he really be happy? Fulfilled? Would he ever stop wondering what if? That seems a lot less likely.
It’d be different, maybe, if he could truly explore his bisexuality without fear of the consequences. But fear is a powerful thing. Dean’s not an idiot, he’s incredibly self-aware, just intent on keeping certain things about what he likes to himself. It’s not embarrassment over who he is, just anxiety and worry that he wouldn’t be accepted, wouldn’t be respected if he came out. And every time he considers being just a little bit braver, all it takes is a junior player faced with having to choose between his college education and his NFL dreams to remind him of what a let-down he already is. No, Dean can’t afford even the possibility of adding to that pile.
So, sparse indulgence of his cravings it is.
And lucky for him, hoo boy is there a contender here tonight. The man came in ten, maybe fifteen minutes after he did and Dean hasn’t been able to take his eyes off of him since. Awkward in his movements, the guy looks about as out of place as Dean imagines he might feel inside a lecture hall, nervously picking his way across the room to the bar, bumping into more than one table along the way. Carefully avoiding invading anyone’s space, he sits at the far end of the U-shaped bar, about as far away from Dean as he can get. His piercing blue eyes sweep the room constantly but they don’t rest on anyone in particular, and the guy seems torn. If Dean had to guess, he’d theorize that the man isn’t a “bar” sort of person at all, and that he’s here for something specific.
Please be into men, Dean prays, openly drinking in the dark, messy sex-hair the dude has going on. On top of the trim waist, gorgeous eyes, and light facial scruff, that hair drops him squarely into the box labeled “things Dean Winchester craves in a one-night-stand,” at least as far as men are concerned. And as if that weren’t enough, the guy is sporting a long-sleeved white button-down and a fucking sweater vest, despite the ninety-degree heat. He’s either an idiot or this is his only look. Either way, Dean’s into it. At least the sleeves are rolled up, revealing tan and shapely forearms that do nothing to quell his interest.
Ever since he decided to stop denying his attraction to men, Dean has been a goddamn sucker for librarian-looking dorks with hot bodies. And if the faint ripple of muscle when this guy moves is any indication, tall, dark, and nerdy is packing heat. The only thing that gives Dean even the slightest pause is that specific look combined with the nearness of the College. He’s heard through the grapevine that some of the academic buildings are chilled to sub-zero-like temperatures in the weeks leading up to the start of classes, the better for professors organizing their lecture materials to focus. This guy could be a professor on campus, though Dean’s never seen him before. And Dean prides himself on keeping track of the faculty, at least those he might need to sweet-talk to pass his struggling players and the ones who are hot enough to consider banging when he’s on the prowl. He’s not about to mix work and pleasure, especially not with a man who could blow his cover and potentially end his career.
But this guy doesn’t look familiar, and that’s nearly good enough for Dean. Just to be on the safe side though, he logs into the College website and checks his inbox. The President always sends out welcome emails regarding new faculty, and Dean skims the relevant messages while keeping an eye on the man across the bar. Seven new full and adjunct professors for this upcoming semester, five of them with pictures to accompany their introductions. The last two are late additions with no picture, someone named Dr. Castiel Novak who’s teaching Geology and someone named Dr. Rowena MacLeod, who Dean doesn’t read any further on since she’s female.
Dean glances up at the guy across the bar, sizes him up again and decides quickly that he doesn’t look like a Castiel anyway. Whoever that is sounds like he’s eighty and stuffy and should be teaching religious studies, not intro classes about rocks. Also, no way could someone so effortlessly sexy as the dude he’s looking at have a PHd in something so incredibly boring as compressed sediment.
Of course, it’s right at that moment that Effortlessly Sexy looks up and catches him staring, which Dean suddenly can’t decide if he’s panicked or thrilled about. He always has these moments after zeroing in on a potential male conquest. It’s normal, he’ll get past it, he just has to take a few deep breaths and decide how much he really wants this.
That decision becomes incredibly easy to make when the guy smiles shyly and ducks his head before glancing up again, clearly checking to see if Dean’s still looking. The little upturn of his lips widens, and fuck Dean’s life, he has a gorgeous smile, of course he does. Gathering his nerve, Dean pointedly looks from Blue Eyes to the open seat next to him, raising his eyebrows in question when he turns back. The guy blinks for moment and Dean’s theory that he doesn’t do this very often solidifies. It’s possible that Blue Eyes doesn’t even know that he’s objectively attractive, because if hitting up bars were a common activity for him, there’s no way he would be that surprised to be blatantly hit on.
For a long minute, Dean thinks he’s going to be turned down. While it’s definitely happened before, he can’t say that it’s common and for whatever reason, he really doesn’t want this guy to reject him.
The guy doesn’t reject him. What he does do is pick up his drink (and the damp napkin it’s sitting on, what an unbelievable dork), carry it around the bar, and set it down in front of the seat next to Dean. Up close, Dean can see his suspicions about what the guy is hiding underneath that ridiculous outfit are definitely on point; his thick thighs are self-explanatory, but the muscle in his upper body isn’t concealed as well as he initially thought. The white fabric of his button-down is damp from the heat outside and sticking to his skin, especially at the back of his arm and where it disappears under the sweater vest at his shoulder.
“Hello,” the man says, his voice low and gravelly and making Dean’s tongue stick to the roof of his mouth because holy shit, whatever he was expecting, it was not that. The dude’s sex appeal was already pretty damn high, but with that voice Dean’s chances of backing out of this just dropped to zero.
“Uh, hi,” Dean stammers back stupidly, leaving the guy blinking and confused.
“I’m sorry,” he says, the words rolling out of his mouth like honey-soaked whiskey poured over gravel or some other dumb, cliched euphemism Dean’s way too turned on to parse out. The guy looks around and his expression changes. He seems embarrassed. “Did I… did I misunderstand? I thought you were gesturing for me to join you. I can go.” He moves to slide off of the stool and somehow Dean gathers enough of his scattered wits to stop him with a hand on his arm. His extremely beautiful, tanned forearm that flexes under Dean’s grip. It’s all he can do not to actually whine, at least outside of his own head.
“No,” Dean manages, though it sounds strangled even to his own ears. He decides he better throw caution to the wind or he’s clearly gonna lose this guy who’s already got one foot out the door. “I’m sorry, I don’t do this very often,” he says in a rush. The admission immediately causes the man to relax and he sits back down on his stool, the small smile returning to his face. With some reluctance, Dean lets his hand slip back down to his own leg.
“That’s somewhat of a relief to hear,” the man tells Dean. “Neither do I. Perhaps we could start with names. You are?”
Dean hesitates for just a moment too long and the man’s eyes narrow. “M-Michael,” he spits out, because he always gives a fake name to his male hookups, just in case. As the guy stares back, Dean regrets the choice but it’s too late now. Averting his eyes, Dean sips at his whiskey, down to the dregs. He quickly signals to the bartender for another. In the meantime, Blue Eyes continues to stare quizzically, as if he’s evaluating something in Dean’s face, his posture, his words. Dean realizes he’s probably exactly as transparent as he thinks he is, but if so, the guy doesn’t seem to mind.
“Alright,” he says finally, a note of amusement lacing his voice. “I’m James.”
“James,” Dean repeats. “Can’t say that you look like a James.”
“Can’t say you look like a Michael,” James returns pointedly and Dean raises his newly refilled glass.
“Touché,” he replies with a smile, and James grins back.
“So then, Michael,” James continues, tracing the rim of his glass with a deft finger that Dean is already imagining sucking into his mouth. “Admittedly, I’m not the best at reading social cues, but I’d like to go out on a limb here if that’s alright.” Dean bites back the elated grin that threatens to overtake his face, this guy and his overly professional speech are his every wet dream all wrapped up in an ugly sweater vest. If he turns out to be an actual librarian, there’s a chance Dean’s gonna finish in his pants. He grimaces a little at that thought and tries to reel his enthusiasm back in. Blue Eyes-- James-- doesn’t seem to notice, though, and keeps talking. He gazes up at Dean in a way that’s far too sincere and earnest for this particular conversation and it makes Dean’s mouth go dry. “Is there any chance you’d consider coming back to my place?”
Dean’s pretty sure he’s died and gone to Heaven.