The demanding life of a teenager [Destiel AU]

Wavering

Dean bent forwards, resting his forehead on the surface of the picnic table and winding his arms around his head to hide his face. He gripped the paper in his hand even tighter, well aware that he was crumpling it and making it hard to read, though not really caring. His logic was that if he squeezed it hard enough perhaps it would go away, and his grade would be erased along with it.

"I wanna go to bed", he declared, not quite sure to whom he was talking, his voice almost inaudible due to being muffled by his arms.

Dean wasn’t one to get upset over one lone test. The problem was the fact that it wasn't the first test he had scored low on lately. Far from it. There was also the last maths, history and English tests. He had tried studying for all of them, but he just couldn't find it in him to concentrate and had just winded up staring into the air, daydreaming. He was constantly tired these days, but for some reason he still couldn’t sleep at night. It was exhausting.

Someone with small hands - probably Anna (no offence intended) - started rubbing circles into his back with her palm. "Oh come on, don't be like that”, Anna said, confirming Dean’s speculations. “It was one tiny little test. You'll make up for it on the next one." She had said the same thing about the last test.

"Yeah, she's right", Rachel agreed from the other side of the table. Dean heard her drumming her fingers on the table surface. She was clearly not finding the conversation very entertaining. Not that Dean blamed her. He hated comforting people too. "Don’t think any more about it.” There was a pause. “We're all going out to eat tonight and you should come with. A little fun won't hurt you."

Dean lifted his head just enough to shoot her a suspicious look across the table. He had to squint against the sun, thus the look turned out even more dramatic. "Is Cas coming?"

Her silence answered the question.

"No, thank you", he said in mock formality, dropping his head back down in its own little, dark hideout.

"It won't be that bad, Dean", Anna insisted. To her credit, it almost sounded like she believed it herself. "I mean, you obviously don't have to come if you don't feel like it, we won’t force you. But you shouldn't let the fact that Cas is gonna be there stop you from going. Okay, yes, he'll be there. But so will we, so you don’t have to talk to him at all if you don’t want to. Besides, I think it would be good for you to do something else than mope around in your room all day."

Dean sat up properly, feeling his spine pop due to the effort, and raked a hand through his hair. It was longer than he usually kept it, and he made a mental note to get it cut soon. He had no plans winding up like Sam.

He thought about the proposal. About Cas. They still hardly talked. Lately, Dean had finally come to realize that Cas wouldn’t run back to him, thus stopped seeking him out all the time. He didn’t want to avoid Cas - he still missed him sorely and hated being apart from him in spite their current situation - but sometimes it really hurt spending time with him as well. Especially so when he brought along his new girlfriend, who managed to make Dean sick just by existing.

Dean’s eyes found the crumpled paper in his hand where the red marker writing was standing out, taunting him. He had been up late the night before the test, he remembered, studying for hours straight. He could have spent his time hanging out with friends instead, and still gotten almost the same grade. Getting a bad grade was even worse when you had studied hard for the test, but thrash the test anyway.

He crunched the sheet to a ball, letting it fall down on the table, and sighed. The paper ball started expanding slowly under his gaze.

"Fine”, Dean said, still not sure if he looked forwards to the night out, or not. “I'll come."