okay i’m putting this under a readmore because it’s embarrassing to talk about in front of 20k people. this is my cockles manifesto:

i am, as a rule, not into rpf shipping. i have no problem with people who are, it just feels kind of weird and invasive to me so i generally avoid it.

however, i have been here since 2012, and the sheer level of unabashed shenanigans that have been beamed into my eyeballs, paired with my intuitive understanding of body language, have convinced me that misha and jensen do in fact have a private romantic/sexual relationship.

BUT i have to make it clear that i don’t mean that in a “cheating on their wives” way, but in a polyamory way - which isn’t much of a stretch, considering that we know misha and his wife are poly, and vicki literally wrote ‘the threesome’s handbook’. almost every single cockles shipper loves vicki and danneel, we are not about disrespecting or hating them whatsoever. 

now, i KNOW that saying that i believe the actors who portray my otp are in a secret relationship makes me sound insane, believe me i’m aware of that, but i’m not saying it lightly or without evidence. those of us who’ve been around a while know that it’s treated as basically an open secret in the spn fandom and among the spn cast, who very frequently make comments and allusions to them being together. jared has made SO many comments that people make posts collecting them, like this one and this one. like i said, it’s basically an open secret (like that time the show said “they’re a couple in real life”). here’s some Highly Suspicious Stuff: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14/15, 16, 17, 18, 19/20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30

i mean... 

but it’s important to make clear that if either of them EVER seemed uncomfortable with us shipping them and making jokes and comments, i would absolutely stop. i respect them and i don’t ever want to make them feel creeped out or like their privacy is violated. but the thing is, they not just ‘not uncomfortable’, they very deliberately egg us on. misha loves to make ‘cockles’ puns, they happily do silly photo ops implying they’re together, and they both love to post photos of themselves together, knowing quite well how we go crazy for it. 

like the above selfie, where they posed chest to chest, and this actual ‘anniversary’ photo jensen posted, celebrating ten years of the first time he took misha out to dinner, actually tracking down the same restaurant and the same table.

or these really adorable photos of the boat trip they took with both their families:

and of course the beloved sunset photo:

every time they have a panel together (which usually only happens at the yearly roman convention known as jibcon), their antics get wilder. the first time i went “wait...” was in 2013, when they dry-humped onstage.

and by 2019, we have jensen eagerly throwing himself down on the stage (to reenact a scene between castiel and sam) so misha could get on top of him and mime choking him, and then pretty obviously getting a boner because of it. oh and i can’t possibly leave out the kissing (bonus gifs, and more), or the panel where jensen got drunk and opened his pants to show misha his underwear.

their body language around each other is so different from how they are around anyone else (except their wives). like, you can see how jensen and jared love each other and what good friends they are by how they play off each other and have an easy camaraderie, but as soon as jensen gets around misha, he can’t take his eyes off him. he stares, he giggles like a fool over not-that-funny jokes (we call it his unicorn laugh), he looks absolutely besotted, and they’re constantly gravitating to each other and touching each other in really intimate ways: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19

honestly, there have been so many Shenanigans over the last 12 years that i can’t even remember them all, or find them all in my archives. there’s been clothes sharing/swapping, there’s jensen’s inexplicable kink for misha’s bad accents, the time misha reenacted the fake orgasm scene from when harry met sally and jensen, um, liked it, their matching bracelets and rings (and another ring), how very enthusiastic jensen is about calling misha “dmitri”, how jensen grumpily insists he can’t remember last week but jumps at the chance to tell the story of how he met misha and the first time he went to dinner with misha and misha told the server to bring them “the three least ordered dishes on the menu” (seriously, they tell the story of how they met all the time), the number of times they’ve been suspiciously late to their autograph and photo op sessions...

here are a few more adorable examples: gag reel compilation, resume battle, “i love you”, best moments compilation, really bad dancing, gently bullying, jensen praising misha, jensen gushing over misha, lowkey hand-holding, “i’d take jensen home”, bickering, the time misha tried to sneak up but jensen could see him in the monitor, knock knock, supportive jensen, “you drew the black penis?”, destiel or cockles??,

and look, despite all that, it’s honestly not about fantasizing about two hot guys fucking, or anything sexual at all. whatever they actually are, they love each other, they make each other happy, and getting to see it makes me happy. it’s something good in the world, these two sweet idiots loving each other and letting us see the fact that they love each other. 

so, uh, i guess to answer your question, i’m serious. but i do try not to cross the line between what happens publicly and what’s private. from what’s shown in public, i draw these conclusions, because, well,