roro

—

1992

For Sammy’s ninth birthday Mom and Dad got him a parakeet.

It was a pretty special day, considering how the kid had been badgering them about his weird bird obsession for like, ever. It was a couple weeks before school let out when Dad picked them up early for the birthday get-together–a little Winchester tradition–the sky bright blue and cloudless, carrying warmth on the wind buffeting the Impala’s open windows.

All the way home Sammy babbled about how his homeroom came together to gift him these little paper birds, the gifted dorks (somethin’ called origami, Dean didn’t pay attention too hard), and Dad smiled and nodded diplomatically like he and Mom weren’t about to blow the kid’s friggin’ mind with what they got for him.

Dean still remembers Sammy and his too-long-for-a-third-grader’s hair bouncing up the stairs and throwing open their front door, Dean in tow, revealing Mom standing by the stairs with a big cylinder-shaped thing covered in a sheet by her side. And in that split second while Dean was trying to wrap his head around why the top of this mysterious thing looked like an upside-down nipple, Sam gasped and threw his hands in the air–origami flying and fluttering in their foyeur–exclaiming, “Is that a bird cage?”

Mom, fond and smiley, put a finger to her lips, kneeling a little (even if Sam was almost to her chest by now, the freakin’ mutant). “And you don’t wanna spook him before you see him, right honey?

Sammy nodded enthusiastically, his head bobbing like a broken toy, as they started excitedly whispering about the bird. Mom kept saying the old lady at the store called it a budgie; Sammy protested and overexplained like a nerd, what’s new; Dad sidestepped all the tiny paper birds around the door and Dean was pretty neutral about the whole thing ‘cause he got a Sega Genesis for his birthday and he was pretty sure that beats a thing with feathers that squawks in an upside-down nipple cage. But he liked seeing Sammy happy, ‘cause that’s par for the course with being a big brother.

—

The parakeet was affectionately named Orpheus because Sam was doing a Greek mythology unit at the time and Dean grudgingly agreed that it was a pretty cool name for a dead dude.

Orpheus lived in a pretty sizable wire cage in their kitchen, chirping and singing in the mornings and sometimes doing random chittering at night. Dean’d be stuffing his face with all the hashbrowns he could manage before the bus showed and Sam would always give Orpheus a little handful of seeds, “Because it’s breakfast time for him too, Dean, he needs routine or he’ll get anxious.”

And in the first few months, Sammy was clearly proving Mom and Dad right with trusting him to take care of his own bird. He’d sit at the kitchen table as often as he could, talking to Orpheus or studying with him perched on his shoulder or eating sandwiches with his school friends and sneaking him breadcrumbs. In the setting summer sun, up to their arms in sudsy dishes, Sammy’d tell Dean that he’s sure he wants to be an ‘ornithologist’ and Orpheus watching from his metallic perch only solidified that dream.

Which like, yeah, cute. His brother is an adorable little dork and he couldn’t possibly be related to Dean if not for how similar their dimples are ‘cause the kid’s a freaky bird-genius.

But with how little brothers are, there’s always a hangup.

—

It started when Orpheus was getting real antsy around the Fourth of July, which they chalked up to how noisy it was in the neighborhood for a while. But then the bird started screaming a friggin’ storm and flapping his wings around like a maniac, and Sammy was a tad bit freaked but Mom and Dad assured him that the vet said Orpheus had no issues, he just needed ‘preening.’

And that made sense. At least, according to Sam. He told Dean that Orpheus didn’t have a friend or a mate or whatever in the upside-down nipple cage so he couldn’t ‘preen himself’ as well as he needed. So Dean told him to do it.

Sammy got this pinched look on his face like he was muscling out a fart and whined, “I don’t wanna.”

Which, what?

Dean could’ve throttled the kid, and he nearly did if the Singers weren’t watching them for the day and Uncle Bobby woulda torn Dean a new one if he tried that. But how can you be a wannabe or-something-gist and not wanna touch your own friggin’ bird? They had a real spitting match before the Singers broke them up so Dean, in his philanthropic and mature and very responsible ways, said he’d pick at the bird’s feathers or whatever, because nobody else was offering to get their hands all over a squirmy-shouty thing with talons.

It made a little sense when he thought about it, ‘cause he was much braver than Sammy. Booksmart as he is, the kid can be kind of a wuss sometimes. He didn’t wanna be pecked by a tiny lil’ yellow bird and that’s just fine, he’d probably learn how to deal once he’s older.

So under Mom and Dad’s supervision, Dean read a coupla Sammy’s books about parakeet ownership and gingerly evacuated Orpheus from his cage before the thing’s 10 A.M. screaming wakeup call. And, oddly enough, it wasn’t that bad. Maybe it was ‘cause Dean washed his hands or he’d held the bird before or it recognized him or whatever, but he was able to cradle its delicate pudgy body in his palms and pluck–“pluck, don’t stroke, Dean”–at all the nasty feathers he could find.

After maybe 10 minutes of Mom, Dad, and Sammy holding their breath over Dean’s shoulders, Orpheus was deemed fit to go. They watched him for a bit before confirming that, yes, all he needed was some preening, and Dean did a great job, and oh God, he shoulda acted incompetent and been a different sort of older brother because now this chore is totally his freakin’ responsibility.

—

“What do you mean I hafta to clean him again?”

“Because, Dean, your brother doesn’t think he’d make it out of there with all his fingers.”

“That’s ‘cause he’s being a baby. And his fingers are too small, but he could still friggin’ learn!”

“See, you proved my point, you’re clearly capable of preening the bird!”

“Mom!”

“Don’t ‘Mom’ me, young man, that bird is just as much as yours as it is Sammy’s–”

“That’s doesn’t even make any sense, it was his present–”

“–you two spend the most time with him and it doesn’t take long to preen him–”

“Mom! Stop saying preen!”

“You’re gonna go preen that bird right now, mister!”

—

Despite being as academically far away as he possibly could be from ornithology, Dean ended up taking the role of the Winchester household’s ‘parakeet preener’ for the foreseeable future. Though Mom and Dad could just get a second parakeet to do its nature-given role, their reasoning against that magnificent idea was that another parakeet would mean a bigger, fancier cage, more acclimating and feeding and chirping (now times two), and if Dean could just do it then the bird would be more trustworthy, anyway. Some crap.

And thus it became routine for him, just like Orpheus’s breakfast time, to periodically remove the bird from its cage and preen him when he started to get a little rowdy.

It was almost therapeutic at times. With summer practice, Sammy being away at science camp for a few weeks, and Tiffany from a few doors down taking Andy Weberman to the drive-in showing of Candyman instead of Dean, a brief moment of respite and methodically petting a bird for a few minutes managed to soothe him. It was like an empathy thing, Dean would guess. Caring for the animal in his hands would make him feel a lil’ better, too, and he got real good at it.

Sammy could still shove it, though.

—

1993

It’s only fitting that a little after Sammy’s tenth birthday, the course of Dean’s life would be altered forever after he was awoken by a muted crash just outside his bedroom window.

He remembers that he was roused from his pretty awesome dream about befriending the Ninja Turtles, quickly sitting up and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He looked over at the source of the noise, some soft scuffling and stumbling on the roof alerting him to a presence, and carefully climbed out of bed to inspect the noise. It had sounded hefty, like maybe that big fat owl that’d always hoot on the tree branch right next to his room finally miscalculated its landing. But when Dean padded to the windowsill and leaned forward, trying to peer down at the slab of shingles protruding from below, something tall and distinctly person-sized stood up and almost scared the friggin’ pants off of him.

“Woah!” Dean fell backwards and landed on his ass, blinking up at the figure standing at his window–standing, standing on the roof!–and tried to scramble his brain back into working order. ‘Cause the thing’s silhouette was pretty damn obvious even in the midnight blue of the sky; that was a person-sized thing with huge wings and yeah, those were glowing eyes too, looking right down at him.

He remembers how his heart was thundering, chest heaving with shocked breaths, and he just stared at the winged creature and it stared back. Instantly the instinctive thought of “Oh my God, I gotta tell Dad” shot into his sleep-addled head, and he was almost about to shoot to his feet and make do on that idea before the creature, in the most polite way imaginable, quietly rapped its knuckles on the window.

And that gave Dean pause ‘cause, like, if you’re an actual monster or a drugged-out serial killer with a crazy idea for a calling card, you’d probably just shatter the window and go straight for the incapacitated teenager on the floor, right?

But the creature had just stood there patiently, blinking down at Dean and waiting to be let inside. In the bright summer moon it looked bathed in white, its hair ruffling in the breeze and feathers following in a mosaic pattern, and man, that was cool. Dean gaped, now in awe rather than fear, and slowly rose to his feet, logic working overtime to reason that the thing might not have been a threat. Its wings were even doing that kinda tittering motion like Orpheus’s would whenever he was feelin’ friendly. And what would Mom and Dad have even done, call the cops? It wasn’t doin’ anything!

And he would never admit this if anything bad were to happen, but Dean’s eyes did flick to the poster of The Monster Squad on his wall before he made his decision.

Since he wasn’t a total dimwit, Dean grabbed for one of his bats without breaking eye contact with the winged dude before unlatching the window and giving the thing a generous breadth to be let inside. Another brief moment of tense silence had followed before the creature tilted its head down and picked at the seam of the frame, pulling it open and maneuvering its way in.

“Woah,” Dean echoed, albeit much quieter that time.

It was a tight fit, but it looked like the thing was about the same size as Dean, if a little overencumbered by the massive appendages on its back. It had crawled inside on all fours before resuming a bipedal position, and with the new proximity Dean confirmed it was mostly white, covered in sleek plumage (mostly around the important bits). It took no time in shuffling curiously around Dean’s room–allowing him time to study the thing’s humanesque body, its decidedly nonthreatening behavior.

Dean remembers how his shoulders relaxed defeatedly, how he let the bat fall to his side, turning on his feet to observe how this winged boy-thing sniffed his stuff, how it bent down to inspect Dean’s action figures and its reflection in the box TV. It–or he, Dean guessed, so sue him–had a head of messy Magneto-white hair just as ruffled as its wings, and Dean let out another reverent “cool” under his breath before bravely clearing his throat.

“So, uh, do you know… English?” The creature was stepping over the comic books he hadn't picked up off the floor yet, focused elsewhere, paying Dean no mind. “I’m– I’m Dean. What’s your–” he watched as the thing abruptly faceplanted on his bed, “–name?”

Dean blinked down at the creature now sprawled out on his Star Wars comforter, his jaw hanging wide open, before one heavy wing shifted and flopped its primaries right at Dean’s feet. He wouldn’t admit that he made a startled, sorta embarrassing noise and scooted his feet back, though that movement had drawn his eyes to the stray white feathers that were then fluttering around his room.

Upon closer inspection–which was the only kind of inspection available at the time, considering how the guy’s wings were practically all over his bed–he was sorta in rough shape. His primaries looked a little raggedy, the down closer to his spine dirtied with dust; there were even some sticks and leaves poking from the converts, which likely were to blame for the thing’s uncertain landing. It was like if Orpheus spent a coupla months surfing the air in a war-torn country.

Dean found his voice again and whistled, “Jeez, what happened to you?” before setting the bat down with a soft metal thud. He had awkwardly, hesitantly shuffled closer to the wing closest to him, glancing up to find the creature blinking up at him from his position. The boy-thing cradled his head on crossed arms, blinking slowly at Dean like a cat. “Do you… are you–?”

Long, elegant flight feathers lifted and tapped at Dean’s arm, and even in disrepair he was still struck dumb by the... like, majesty of this thing. Which apparently, ‘cause Dean’s life must be some kind of comedy, wanted him to clean his wings.

Beside himself, Dean let out a baffled snort, shaky hands rising to sift at the nearest feathers. He hysterically thought that the whole thing was some kinda Fanta-induced stomach bug dream.

“Just my luck, huh,” he had mused in the quiet air of his room. The wind outside brought in the smell of night, mingling with whatever storm-sparkly aroma was attached to this creature. It smelled nice.

He let himself idly pick at some of the twigs nestled in the barbs, and he thought hard about all the crap he’d have to do for Sammy’s bird. Before he spoke again and second-guessed himself, he reached out and carded his fingers through the thing’s messy hair, giving him the head-scritches he knows for a fact birds go crazy for. The creature had tilted its head into the motion, like oh yeah, that’s the stuff. “You come in peace, right?”

The guy just stared up at him.

“You just want me to help you out? Uh, help?” Dean overenunciated, and thought if he extracted his hand from his hair and picked at one of the most bent-outta-shape feathers nearest to him it’d demonstrate his point. The boy-thing had blinked even slower and settled deeper into his comforter. He draped his wing over Dean’s forearms with a fwoosh.

And that was. Well. Okay.

—

1992

For Sammy’s ninth birthday Mom and Dad got him a parakeet.

It was a pretty special day, considering how the kid had been badgering them about his weird bird obsession for like, ever. It was a couple weeks before school let out when Dad picked them up early for the birthday get-together–a little Winchester tradition–the sky bright blue and cloudless, carrying warmth on the wind buffeting the Impala’s open windows.

All the way home Sammy babbled about how his homeroom came together to gift him these little paper birds, the gifted dorks (somethin’ called origami, Dean didn’t pay attention too hard), and Dad smiled and nodded diplomatically like he and Mom weren’t about to blow the kid’s friggin’ mind with what they got for him.

Dean still remembers Sammy and his too-long-for-a-third-grader’s hair bouncing up the stairs and throwing open their front door, Dean in tow, revealing Mom standing by the stairs with a big cylinder-shaped thing covered in a sheet by her side. And in that split second while Dean was trying to wrap his head around why the top of this mysterious thing looked like an upside-down nipple, Sam gasped and threw his hands in the air–origami flying and fluttering in their foyeur–exclaiming, “Is that a bird cage?”

Mom, fond and smiley, put a finger to her lips, kneeling a little (even if Sam was almost to her chest by now, the freakin’ mutant). “And you don’t wanna spook him before you see him, right honey?

Sammy nodded enthusiastically, his head bobbing like a broken toy, as they started excitedly whispering about the bird. Mom kept saying the old lady at the store called it a budgie; Sammy protested and overexplained like a nerd, what’s new; Dad sidestepped all the tiny paper birds around the door and Dean was pretty neutral about the whole thing ‘cause he got a Sega Genesis for his birthday and he was pretty sure that beats a thing with feathers that squawks in an upside-down nipple cage. But he liked seeing Sammy happy, ‘cause that’s par for the course with being a big brother.

—

The parakeet was affectionately named Orpheus because Sam was doing a Greek mythology unit at the time and Dean grudgingly agreed that it was a pretty cool name for a dead dude.

Orpheus lived in a pretty sizable wire cage in their kitchen, chirping and singing in the mornings and sometimes doing random chittering at night. Dean’d be stuffing his face with all the hashbrowns he could manage before the bus showed and Sam would always give Orpheus a little handful of seeds, “Because it’s breakfast time for him too, Dean, he needs routine or he’ll get anxious.”

And in the first few months, Sammy was clearly proving Mom and Dad right with trusting him to take care of his own bird. He’d sit at the kitchen table as often as he could, talking to Orpheus or studying with him perched on his shoulder or eating sandwiches with his school friends and sneaking him breadcrumbs. In the setting summer sun, up to their arms in sudsy dishes, Sammy’d tell Dean that he’s sure he wants to be an ‘ornithologist’ and Orpheus watching from his metallic perch only solidified that dream.

Which like, yeah, cute. His brother is an adorable little dork and he couldn’t possibly be related to Dean if not for how similar their dimples are ‘cause the kid’s a freaky bird-genius.

But with how little brothers are, there’s always a hangup.

—

It started when Orpheus was getting real antsy around the Fourth of July, which they chalked up to how noisy it was in the neighborhood for a while. But then the bird started screaming a friggin’ storm and flapping his wings around like a maniac, and Sammy was a tad bit freaked but Mom and Dad assured him that the vet said Orpheus had no issues, he just needed ‘preening.’

And that made sense. At least, according to Sam. He told Dean that Orpheus didn’t have a friend or a mate or whatever in the upside-down nipple cage so he couldn’t ‘preen himself’ as well as he needed. So Dean told him to do it.

Sammy got this pinched look on his face like he was muscling out a fart and whined, “I don’t wanna.”

Which, what?

Dean could’ve throttled the kid, and he nearly did if the Singers weren’t watching them for the day and Uncle Bobby woulda torn Dean a new one if he tried that. But how can you be a wannabe or-something-gist and not wanna touch your own friggin’ bird? They had a real spitting match before the Singers broke them up so Dean, in his philanthropic and mature and very responsible ways, said he’d pick at the bird’s feathers or whatever, because nobody else was offering to get their hands all over a squirmy-shouty thing with talons.

It made a little sense when he thought about it, ‘cause he was much braver than Sammy. Booksmart as he is, the kid can be kind of a wuss sometimes. He didn’t wanna be pecked by a tiny lil’ yellow bird and that’s just fine, he’d probably learn how to deal once he’s older.

So under Mom and Dad’s supervision, Dean read a coupla Sammy’s books about parakeet ownership and gingerly evacuated Orpheus from his cage before the thing’s 10 A.M. screaming wakeup call. And, oddly enough, it wasn’t that bad. Maybe it was ‘cause Dean washed his hands or he’d held the bird before or it recognized him or whatever, but he was able to cradle its delicate pudgy body in his palms and pluck–“pluck, don’t stroke, Dean”–at all the nasty feathers he could find.

After maybe 10 minutes of Mom, Dad, and Sammy holding their breath over Dean’s shoulders, Orpheus was deemed fit to go. They watched him for a bit before confirming that, yes, all he needed was some preening, and Dean did a great job, and oh God, he shoulda acted incompetent and been a different sort of older brother because now this chore is totally his freakin’ responsibility.

—

“What do you mean I hafta to clean him again?”

“Because, Dean, your brother doesn’t think he’d make it out of there with all his fingers.”

“That’s ‘cause he’s being a baby. And his fingers are too small, but he could still friggin’ learn!”

“See, you proved my point, you’re clearly capable of preening the bird!”

“Mom!”

“Don’t ‘Mom’ me, young man, that bird is just as much as yours as it is Sammy’s–”

“That’s doesn’t even make any sense, it was his present–”

“–you two spend the most time with him and it doesn’t take long to preen him–”

“Mom! Stop saying preen!”

“You’re gonna go preen that bird right now, mister!”

—

Despite being as academically far away as he possibly could be from ornithology, Dean ended up taking the role of the Winchester household’s ‘parakeet preener’ for the foreseeable future. Though Mom and Dad could just get a second parakeet to do its nature-given role, their reasoning against that magnificent idea was that another parakeet would mean a bigger, fancier cage, more acclimating and feeding and chirping (now times two), and if Dean could just do it then the bird would be more trustworthy, anyway. Some crap.

And thus it became routine for him, just like Orpheus’s breakfast time, to periodically remove the bird from its cage and preen him when he started to get a little rowdy.

It was almost therapeutic at times. With summer practice, Sammy being away at science camp for a few weeks, and Tiffany from a few doors down taking Andy Weberman to the drive-in showing of Candyman instead of Dean, a brief moment of respite and methodically petting a bird for a few minutes managed to soothe him. It was like an empathy thing, Dean would guess. Caring for the animal in his hands would make him feel a lil’ better, too, and he got real good at it.

Sammy could still shove it, though.

—

1993

It’s only fitting that a little after Sammy’s tenth birthday, the course of Dean’s life would be altered forever after he was awoken by a muted crash just outside his bedroom window.

He remembers that he was roused from his pretty awesome dream about befriending the Ninja Turtles, quickly sitting up and rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He looked over at the source of the noise, some soft scuffling and stumbling on the roof alerting him to a presence, and carefully climbed out of bed to inspect the noise. It had sounded hefty, like maybe that big fat owl that’d always hoot on the tree branch right next to his room finally miscalculated its landing. But when Dean padded to the windowsill and leaned forward, trying to peer down at the slab of shingles protruding from below, something tall and distinctly person-sized stood up and almost scared the friggin’ pants off of him.

“Woah!” Dean fell backwards and landed on his ass, blinking up at the figure standing at his window–standing, standing on the roof!–and tried to scramble his brain back into working order. ‘Cause the thing’s silhouette was pretty damn obvious even in the midnight blue of the sky; that was a person-sized thing with huge wings and yeah, those were glowing eyes too, looking right down at him.

He remembers how his heart was thundering, chest heaving with shocked breaths, and he just stared at the winged creature and it stared back. Instantly the instinctive thought of “Oh my God, I gotta tell Dad” shot into his sleep-addled head, and he was almost about to shoot to his feet and make do on that idea before the creature, in the most polite way imaginable, quietly rapped its knuckles on the window.

And that gave Dean pause ‘cause, like, if you’re an actual monster or a drugged-out serial killer with a crazy idea for a calling card, you’d probably just shatter the window and go straight for the incapacitated teenager on the floor, right?

But the creature had just stood there patiently, blinking down at Dean and waiting to be let inside. In the bright summer moon it looked bathed in white, its hair ruffling in the breeze and feathers following in a mosaic pattern, and man, that was cool. Dean gaped, now in awe rather than fear, and slowly rose to his feet, logic working overtime to reason that the thing might not have been a threat. Its wings were even doing that kinda tittering motion like Orpheus’s would whenever he was feelin’ friendly. And what would Mom and Dad have even done, call the cops? It wasn’t doin’ anything!

And he would never admit this if anything bad were to happen, but Dean’s eyes did flick to the poster of The Monster Squad on his wall before he made his decision.

Since he wasn’t a total dimwit, Dean grabbed for one of his bats without breaking eye contact with the winged dude before unlatching the window and giving the thing a generous breadth to be let inside. Another brief moment of tense silence had followed before the creature tilted its head down and picked at the seam of the frame, pulling it open and maneuvering its way in.

“Woah,” Dean echoed, albeit much quieter that time.

It was a tight fit, but it looked like the thing was about the same size as Dean, if a little overencumbered by the massive appendages on its back. It had crawled inside on all fours before resuming a bipedal position, and with the new proximity Dean confirmed it was mostly white, covered in sleek plumage (mostly around the important bits). It took no time in shuffling curiously around Dean’s room–allowing him time to study the thing’s humanesque body, its decidedly nonthreatening behavior.

Dean remembers how his shoulders relaxed defeatedly, how he let the bat fall to his side, turning on his feet to observe how this winged boy-thing sniffed his stuff, how it bent down to inspect Dean’s action figures and its reflection in the box TV. It–or he, Dean guessed, so sue him–had a head of messy Magneto-white hair just as ruffled as its wings, and Dean let out another reverent “cool” under his breath before bravely clearing his throat.

“So, uh, do you know… English?” The creature was stepping over the comic books he hadn't picked up off the floor yet, focused elsewhere, paying Dean no mind. “I’m– I’m Dean. What’s your–” he watched as the thing abruptly faceplanted on his bed, “–name?”

Dean blinked down at the creature now sprawled out on his Star Wars comforter, his jaw hanging wide open, before one heavy wing shifted and flopped its primaries right at Dean’s feet. He wouldn’t admit that he made a startled, sorta embarrassing noise and scooted his feet back, though that movement had drawn his eyes to the stray white feathers that were then fluttering around his room.

Upon closer inspection–which was the only kind of inspection available at the time, considering how the guy’s wings were practically all over his bed–he was sorta in rough shape. His primaries looked a little raggedy, the down closer to his spine dirtied with dust; there were even some sticks and leaves poking from the converts, which likely were to blame for the thing’s uncertain landing. It was like if Orpheus spent a coupla months surfing the air in a war-torn country.

Dean found his voice again and whistled, “Jeez, what happened to you?” before setting the bat down with a soft metal thud. He had awkwardly, hesitantly shuffled closer to the wing closest to him, glancing up to find the creature blinking up at him from his position. The boy-thing cradled his head on crossed arms, blinking slowly at Dean like a cat. “Do you… are you–?”

Long, elegant flight feathers lifted and tapped at Dean’s arm, and even in disrepair he was still struck dumb by the... like, majesty of this thing. Which apparently, ‘cause Dean’s life must be some kind of comedy, wanted him to clean his wings.

Beside himself, Dean let out a baffled snort, shaky hands rising to sift at the nearest feathers. He hysterically thought that the whole thing was some kinda Fanta-induced stomach bug dream.

“Just my luck, huh,” he had mused in the quiet air of his room. The wind outside brought in the smell of night, mingling with whatever storm-sparkly aroma was attached to this creature. It smelled nice.

He let himself idly pick at some of the twigs nestled in the barbs, and he thought hard about all the crap he’d have to do for Sammy’s bird. Before he spoke again and second-guessed himself, he reached out and carded his fingers through the thing’s messy hair, giving him the head-scritches he knows for a fact birds go crazy for. The creature had tilted its head into the motion, like oh yeah, that’s the stuff. “You come in peace, right?”

The guy just stared up at him.

“You just want me to help you out? Uh, help?” Dean overenunciated, and thought if he extracted his hand from his hair and picked at one of the most bent-outta-shape feathers nearest to him it’d demonstrate his point. The boy-thing had blinked even slower and settled deeper into his comforter. He draped his wing over Dean’s forearms with a fwoosh.

And that was. Well. Okay.