Most of the Novak  family goes to Maryland that weekend for Hael's birthday party. Anna just flat out refused, and Lucifer gave up arguing with her fairly quickly, obviously sick of her cold remarks, and just let her stay home. Dean and Claire were invited to go with them, because at this point, they're practically family. Dean comes, but Claire opts to stay home because someone has to watch Misha, and she doesn't trust Anna to take care of him. And, of course, Gabriel, Sam, and Adam are still at college, so they can't come, either.

Due to having way too many people around, they end up getting to the party a few minutes later than everyone else. The party is at the other Novaks' house, which means there's an old trampoline, not that the "cool" teenagers Hael knows are willing to use something so childish. Castiel is excited for it, though.

Amara greets them at the door with a kind smile. "You made it!"

"That we did," Lucifer replies.

There's a brief conversation in the doorway before everyone makes their way to the backyard with the rest of the party. Hael stops her conversation to come greet them, but skips over everyone else to reach Castiel.

"Hey!" She gives him a hug, which he returns. In his hear, she whispers, "Andrea and her boyfriend are trying to steal my crown and you're all I've got so don't let me down." She pulls away with a smile. "It's nice to see you guys again! I'm gonna go talk to my friends, so go enjoy yourselves and don't mess anything up." She turns on her heel and rejoins her friends, who are all freaking out that she got the one and only Castiel Novak to show up.

Castiel lets out a long breath. "Great," he mutters. "Well, what should we do while we wait for the party to end?" He doesn't direct the question at anyone in particular, just kind of hoping someone knows what to do.

"Wait, is that...?" Dean asks, quietly, as if just talking to himself.

Castiel follows his gaze to see a boy just about Dean's age talking to a girl who might as well be a model. Castiel can't help but feel a pang of jealousy when he hears his boyfriend's tone. If he knows that girl, there's no way he never dated her, or at least hooked up with her.

"Wanna go meet a friend of mine?" Dean asks.

Not really, no.

"Sure," Castiel replies.

"C'mon." Dean gestures for him to follow, walking up to the two. "Benny?"

He gets both their attention instantly, but only this Benny guy seems to recognize him. He gives the boy a brief man hug.

"Hey, brother."

"Hey, Benny," Dean replies. "What are you doing here?"

"My girlfriend Andrea here is friends with the birthday girl," Benny explains. "She wanted me to come along, so here I am. Now, I can only assume you're here because your boyfriend." He looks over at Castiel when he says that.

"Good call," Dean replies. "Yeah, this is Castiel Novak. Cas, that's Benny Lafitte. He plays on the Patriots with me."

"Nice to meet you," Castiel replies awkwardly. He doesn't know sports, and he certainly doesn't know Benny, which is why when he sees Balthazar, he decides he can quickly excuse himself and leave the two to talk. Andrea seems to agree, and wanders off to talk to someone else, seemingly picking up that the two have a lot to catch up on.

"Ah, the celebrity guest stars have arrived," Balthazar observes.

"Not a celebrity," Castiel replies. "Just a cousin. At least for today."

"You realize the only reason you're here is because you're famous, right?"

"Shh, let me think she just likes us," Castiel whispers jokingly. "Anyway, what's new with you?"

"My house has been overrun with teenagers," Balthazar deadpans.

"Yeah, see that..." Castiel replies. "That's rough."

"How 'bout you?" Balthazar asks. "What's up with you?"

Castiel thinks back through the last few days. He had an argument with Jim over his possible tour, he's had to deal with more online harassment than usual due to his "laziness," and he's had to put up with virtually nonstop arguing every moment of every day at home.

"It's fine."

"Well, that's good," Balthazar replies. "Hey, heard about your tour. If you don't do it, you'd still come up and visit, right?"

"Maybe I'd just fly you don't so you can visit," Castiel suggests. "We could both go down to Sioux Falls for a mini Novak party or something."

"I'm in," Balthazar agrees. "And you can take Hannah too and leave Hael and the rest of the family behind! Best family party ever!"

Castiel laughs. "I can't agree to that on Hael's birthday, but I won't say I disagree, either."

Balthazar grins. "You just got my hopes up, so this better happen."

"Count on it."

~~

"You are such a child," Dean laughs.

"You're just mad that I'm finally taller than you!" Castiel replies teasingly.

"Keep telling yourself that."

Dean returns to his conversation with Benny, so Castiel ignores him and continues bouncing. After today, he's totally getting himself a trampoline.

"Do a flip!" Lucifer says excitedly.

"You do a flip!" Castiel replies.

"I can't do a flip! I'm an old man!" Lucifer protests.

"Well, I don't want to die, so let's just agree not to do a flip," Castiel suggests.

Lucifer grins. "Ah, you just said you don't want to die."

Castiel nods slowly. "Huh. I did say that, didn't I? Well, yeah, it's true. I don't really want 'Was a horrible gymnast' on my headstone, ya know?"

Lucifer chuckles. "Yeah, I feel ya. I think it'd be funny, though. There are worse ways to die."

"True, true."

"You guys are morbid today," Balthazar observes. "Just enjoy the bouncing and don't die, for gods sake."

"Fine, whatever," Castiel replies. "As long as I can bounce higher than Lucifer, I'm fine doing whatever."

"Fight me, bruh!" Lucifer says in a somewhat joking challenge, starting a jumping war between the two of them.

"Hey!" Hael interrupts after a minute or so, sounding upset.

"Hi!" Lucifer says, waving.

"Castiel!" She gestures for him to come closer, so he bounces on his butt and crawls over, so they're closer to eye level. "You're supposed to be making me look good!" she hisses.

"And?"

"And the fact that my adult cousin is using a trampoline is not helping!"

"Okay, first of all, I'm only twenty-one. That's not even four years older than you. And second, I showed up when I could be back in Sioux Falls with my boyfriend, so it could be worse. At least I came."

"But this is not what I meant!" she snaps. "You look like a child. You're killing your reputation at my school, which is going to kill my reputation, too. At least Benny knows how to be normal."

"Well, maybe you shouldn't be using me as a popularity stunt," Castiel replies. "I'm not just going to sit still and look pretty for the next few hours, if that's what you're expecting."

She groans in frustration, as if that's unreasonable and a huge inconvenience to her. "Fine, but if you're going to do something, do something that'll help me out. There's a guitar in the basement. Go do something with it."

"But —"

"It's my party, and it's my rules," she interrupts. "Go make yourself useful." She walks away, throwing her cousin a warning glance over her shoulder.

Castiel sighs. "Hey, Balthazar?"

"Yeah?"

"Can you show me where the basement is?"

~~

Castiel sits down inside by an open window, the guitar in his lap. She probably wanted him outside where people can see and stare, but he'd rather just sit inside, away from the scary people that are high schoolers. He plays a chord, then realizes how majorly screwed up the tuning is on it. Has anyone even used this thing? Does anyone in this family even know how to play a guitar?

It takes a few minutes to tune it, and then he begins playing. It's just random chords at first, practicing switching between different ones so he can remember what options he has. He closes his eyes, not letting the unfamiliar surroundings distract himself as he falls into a pattern of sorts, just playing the same chords at first, then adding dynamics. Within ten minutes, he has essentially written an entire acoustic karaoke version of a presently nonexistent song.

"Well, now I wanna head you sing something."

Castiel opens his eyes to see Hannah standing in front of him. He stops playing, giving her a smile as a greeting. "Hey, kiddo. Where have you been?"

"My bedroom, hiding from these guys." She gestures to the high schoolers in the yard. "But I heard guitar and knew it had to be you. Figured it was worth coming out of hibernation early for."

"Well, I'm glad you did," he replies. "I was getting kinda bored, but Hael doesn't want me embarrassing her, so she stuck me doing the one thing I'm good at."

"Guitar?"

"Shutting up."

"Ah, right," Hannah replies as if she sees it a lot. "But hey, we're out of her way in here. No need to actually be quiet. Let's sing something."

He raises an eyebrow. "You want to sing?"

She shrugs. "Might as well. You've already got the guitar out. Pick a song, any song."

Castiel think about this for a moment. "Alright..." He begins playing the introduction he's become so familiar with since he started listening to pop stations, even if it is technically a country song. Hannah's face lights up immediately at the sound.

There's no cue for them to start; no silent countdown for the lyrics to begin. They just both start singing at once from knowing the song so well.

"You're on the phone with your girlfriend, she's upset. She's going off about something that you said. She doesn't get your humor like I do." They finish the song together, then burst out laughing.

"Beautiful!" Hannah announces.

"Best performance so far!" Castiel adds.

"Another one?" she asks hopefully.

"Hell yeah!"

And that's how, half an hour later, they find themselves singing Shawn Mendes' "Stitches" and trying not to laugh because they're having so much fun. It's during the bridge that Hannah points out, "Hey, people are looking at us."

Castiel follows her gaze to the open window behind him, where he sees a few people quickly look away. The only two who don't are Benny, who seems entertained as if it's just a normal live band, and Dean, who gives his boyfriend a silent round of golf claps. Castiel gives him a small wave before returning his attention of his cousin.

"They're just jealous," Castiel replies. "Everyone wants to sing with us."

"Well, duh! You're famous, Castiel. They're just jealous they aren't gifted in the cousins area."

"You are pretty lucky," Castiel agrees. "Everyone would kill for a YouTuber like Lucifer to be their cousin."

She giggles. "Not him, Castiel. You! You don't even know what it's like, with everyone at school knowing I know you. It's insane."

"Which you don't seem to thrive in like your sisters," he observes.

"Popular's not my thing," she replies. "I'll just have to hope I can stay like that when high school hits next year."

"Just do you and it'll be fine," he assures her. "And if you're ever feeling down, call me. And if anyone pisses you off, call Lucifer and he'll murder them."

"Lucifer?" she repeats incredulously.  "But he's so... Fluffy."

Castiel laughs. "Believe it or not, he's actually very good at hurting people, so your classmates better watch their backs. Michael can track them down, and Luci can kill them." It's a bit of an exaggeration, of course, but he's actually very intimidating when he wants to be.

"Hey, what's up with Michael, anyway?" Hannah asks, glancing at her cousin, who's talking to Amara outside. He's never been the most excitable person, but he's especially monotone lately, and it shows, even from afar.

"Don't ask," Castiel replies. "Just... Don't. I don't think we want to know."