Title: Come A Little Closer

Author: OpheliacAngel

Pairing: Gabriel/Dean

Genres: Romance/Hurt/Comfort

Rating: NC-17

Summary: Gabriel engages Dean in a drinking game for kicks, at least, that's what Dean thinks. Spoilers for Season 9's 'The Purge.'

A/N: Some debriel for both practice and pleasure. This was written for #hoodietime olympics on tumblr, with a combination of five out of the seven events: Hugs and Cuddling, Bed Sharing, Emotional Support, Manhandling, and Worrying and/or Mother Henning. Sorry that it's late. Title is from the Cage the Elephant song of the same name.

When Dean woke up that morning, he thought he would be drinking as much as he could get his hands on, and sprawling himself out on the bed or dragging himself into the kitchen and researching the smallest trace of any potential hunt. He had the day all to himself, unless Sam finished his solo hunt early and then decided to drive across three states just to get back to the bunker and see his brother.

Yeah, Dean knew that wasn't happening.

After another night of tossing and turning, memories - not simply nightmares of Sam looking at him like he meant nothing to him and then actually saying it, Dean was left even more exhausted than the day before, to which he didn't think possible but apparently was. A small half hour nap before dawn hadn't even slightly deteriorated the dark circles under his eyes, to his dismay, but Sam wasn't around, hadn't been around for days, and even if he had been around he probably wouldn't notice them and ignore their presence if he did.

Dean didn't blame him, in fact, he only ever blamed himself.

The morning was a successful start, waking up at dawn and managing to drag himself out of bed on an empty stomach and an even emptier head. He could hardly think straight anymore, let alone hunt. He settled down in the kitchen as he did most days now, pouring himself a drink and letting his eyes adjust to the harsh light of the computer screen. No amount of time awake would allow him to sleep, his head throbbed and his eyes burned from endless scanning of articles. When his stomach wouldn't shut up he would choke down half a bowl of cereal or a few crackers, tasteless and a chore.

He didn't know what it was that kept him going, that kept him sane, but he would rather be in pain - pain that he deserved, than lay down and die. Sam still needed him, and he would wait until the time came where he could prove that again, prove that they both needed each other.

Sam had been right, he was selfish and he was afraid. Terrified of losing Sam, of being alone himself, of knowing he had failed his father and his only responsibility. There was nothing complicated about any of this, Sam was his only reason for living, if he couldn't protect him then he didn't deserve to breathe, didn't deserve to live out the rest of his life. He had come into this world for one reason and one reason alone: Sammy.

But Sam didn't love him anymore, he hated him and thought everything he had done had been a waste. How could his brother no longer see how important he was to him, how much he was loved and needed to be protected by Dean?

Rather than hanging his head in his hands, which would bring about nothing, he poured himself another drink. Drinking away the pain was never really an option, but if he could break his body down piece by piece then he would. If Sam didn't want him in his life then he would leave, but it would be on his own terms.

"It's time to get over it already, kiddo."

Dean rubs his eyes tiredly at the familiar voice, glancing up and seeing an even more familiar face come into view slowly. There he is, leaning against the counter top, looking down at him in partial amusement but mainly seriousness. He blinks profusely, but none of it takes away Gabriel actually being alive, actually being here in the bunker's kitchen. It could be a hallucination, but he hasn't drank anywhere near enough for that.

Rather than beat around the bush and ask him how the hell he managed not to get killed, he glares at him, deciding that it doesn't really matter anyway. "What the fuck are you talking about?" He spits out vehemently, knowing better than to make eye contact with the guy, but also to give himself a second to stop the room from spinning before he gets out of his chair in order to defend himself if need be.

"Don't bother," the archangel sighs tiredly and it's clear he's annoyed with him. "I'm not here to kill you or anything like that. You should know better anyway, after I saved your ass the last time." Dean actually hadn't thought Gabriel came here to kill him, not in his rational mind, but what he's doing here still remains questionable. He sits back down and reaches for the bottle on the table, but it's not there anymore. "All your booze is gone," Gabriel chooses to inform him then, "I made sure of that."

Arguing with him isn't worth it, Dean knows that all too well, but it still crosses his mind, that and coming at him with some sharp, pointy object if he can't get his gun in time. Not that any of it would help though, he just wants to show Gabriel how much he hates him, how he has absolutely no business being here, in his life, telling him what he can and can't do. It's goddamn frustrating just looking at him out of the corner of his eye, wondering where the hell he's been all this time, all these years -

"Just get lost. I don't need to be waking up to you anyway." Gabriel shrugs at that and disappears, and Dean locks himself in the bathroom for the next hour and a half, hastily searching for the bottles he hid under the sink and coming up with nothing.

Fine, if Gabriel wants to play a game, he'll play right along with him and fucking win.

It's only been two days, two days of thinking about Gabriel, about what brought him back, what brought him back to Dean.

So what if his hands are shaking? So what if Sam is gone seventy-five percent of the time doing hell knows what? So what if he wants to talk to someone - anyone other than Sam, anyone who will just listen or at least pretend to listen for his own benefit. And then Gabriel pops in less than ten minutes after he's thinking these things, holding a deck of cards tauntingly in front of his face.

"Game of cards?"

Cause really, what the hell else is there to do? He rubs a hand tiredly over his face and nods, because even though it's already one o'clock in the morning, it isn't like he'd be getting any sleep right now.

Gabriel's every motion is slow and easy to see beforehand, and Dean finds it a relief that he doesn't have to stay one step ahead of him in this. His anxiety has already hit the roof. He pulls the chair out - the one directly across from Dean - and sits down, shuffling the deck and dealing out a set of cards to Dean first. His vision is a little blurry from too few nights of restful sleep, but if he holds the cards close to his face he can see well enough.

After about two hours of this, Gabriel collects the cards and pushes them to the end of the table, concentrating once more on Dean, if he ever even stopped. Gabriel won most of the games, probably by cheating, but he had let Dean win a couple times; he knows this because he had a helluva time concentrating in order to allow him to win any games.

"Had enough?"

"Yeah," Dean nods, but still glances down at the deck of cards. He can feel Gabriel's eyes on him and he looks up as a challenge, though wishes he hadn't. The look of sympathy on his face is unmistakable and even more unwelcome. More than that though, the archangel's face is completely open, full of honesty and understanding.

While he loses himself in what Gabriel does and doesn't know, the cards are put away, and two bottles of whiskey and two glasses appear in their place. Dean looks hungrily at the nearest bottle, not sure if he can look at Gabriel again.

He's relaxed now, more than he has been in a while. Playing cards has loosened him up considerably, giving him the small reprieve he had sorely needed.

Gabriel pays no mind to the space between them and surges forward the second he lets his guard down, kissing him as he lies sprawled across his lap. His warm, wet tongue slides into his mouth so eagerly, as if it's his intention to suck all the pain out of his body and leave him breathless and miraculously healed.

But he doesn't feel that way when he kisses back, he feels weak and light-headed and his hands are shaking more now, and whether it's from alcohol withdrawal or the completely confusing urge to wrap his hands around Gabriel's arms and dig his fingers into his flesh, just to hold onto him for as long as Gabriel will allow him to, he doesn't know.

He pulls away from the archangel when he fully realizes what's going on, and can't for the life of him meet his eyes again. He's ashamed, berating himself for his actions, for giving in and letting himself have something that he never completely realized he wanted. Gabriel has never been this close for the taking and Dean is surprised at himself for wanting him. He's missed the guy, but missing and desiring are two very different things.

"How about a drinking game then?" Gabriel suggests, vacating his lap, turning his head before the human can see the hurt look on his face. Dean stares up at him in shock, barely nodding before Gabriel returns to his seat and tips back the first glass. His head isn't clear enough to outsmart Gabriel, but maybe he won't have to tonight.

He follows his lead, sliding the other glass towards him and pouring himself a drink, willing his hands not to shake in front of the archangel as he downs it. After that point, Dean loses count of how many drinks he and Gabriel have, how much time is passing him by and how many more seconds it'll be before Gabriel leaves as if he were never there in the first place.

He can remember Gabriel's eyes on him, never on the bottle, and he can remember how downright impossible it had been to avoid his gaze, to hide behind his mask. Gabriel's eyes were like Cas' so long before, impenetrable and unwavering. Yet Gabriel's eyes were also like Cas' in another way, they were soft and questioning, as if they could peel back layer after layer of Dean's soul and see what he really was all about.

The archangel seemed too quiet, too careful, but the more Dean drank the less he noticed or cared.

"You'll win," Dean mumbles after a while, somewhere in the haze of the dimly lit room, the copious amounts of alcohol and Gabriel's deep golden eyes. "This shit doesn't affect you." Maybe Gabriel's waiting until he finally gets up the guts to drink himself to death, and maybe Dean's waiting too, to see if he has the strength. Maybe drinking in front of Gabriel is better than drinking alone, then again, maybe it's a helluva lot worse and he just hasn't realized it yet.

"It could," Gabriel admits, shooting back his next drink and grinning, "if I allowed it to."

Dean smirks, but he looks down at the bottle to avoid the archangel's gaze momentarily, "And would you?" It's an innocent question but a stupid one, and Dean finally hates himself for losing himself in this maze that the archangel's set up.

"I might do just about anything for you, Deano." He glances up then, forgetting about his half-full glass entirely. There's a challenge in Gabriel's eyes that Dean feels the urge to live up to. There's a fire in those golden depths too, and he hurries up and takes his turn - the alcohol burning his throat as it goes down - before he can successfully drown himself in what Gabriel's offering.

He doesn't let it go, it's hard to let things go around Gabriel.

Especially since he feels that even though the kiss was too much, too soon, it was nowhere near enough. Gabriel in his lap, pushed up so tightly against him - he had needed that and still needs it. He doesn't know how to ask for it though, and it's not like he deserves special treatment anyway; Gabriel has to know that, specifically because of all the shit he's dragged so many innocents into.

His head turns toward him, but he doesn't dare let himself move closer.

"I can beat you," he knows he's slurring, "and you know that I can. So cut the bullshit, Gabriel." He's drunk and he has no one to blame but himself, no reason why Gabriel shouldn't just take advantage of him - kill him - right here and now, while he has his guard down, while he's so far gone that he doesn't care.

The archangel leans forward, speaking nonchalantly, but Dean can see easily enough that it's faked, that Gabriel's voice is dangerously close to shaking and betraying his true intentions. "If you're going to drink yourself to death, kiddo, then you're going to do it here, right in front of me, where I can make sure that you don't face plant and throw up all over the nice carpet."

Nice carpet, my ass. "Why?"

"So you won't leave your brother alone." So you won't leave me sitting here looking like an idiot, Gabriel thinks, trying not to show the hurt in his eyes, the pain he feels on Dean's behalf. He doesn't want to come across as being too sympathetic; he doesn't want to push Dean away when he's gotten this far in reeling him in. Jeez, kiddo. You have no idea how much I missed you. How much I want us.

It's time to skip ahead some.

"You can have another drink or you can have me, your own guardian angel."

He doesn't let the words sink into Dean Winchester's thick skull longer than a few moments before he questions him again. "So what'll it be?" He holds the remaining bottle up, taunting Dean, almost hoping he'll choose it just so Gabriel will know what he wants, know that he hasn't changed, that the two of them are nothing more than simple and predictable, that the two of them will never be more than what they are now: an archangel sneaking a kiss in between drinks. Gabriel trying and trying not to at the same time show everything in his eyes and all over his face.

Is it too much to want this, is it too much to want Dean Winchester? Apparently it is.

Dean could wallow in denial and label it as a joke, as one of Gabriel's tricks, but it's definitely not. He can feel his heart stop, can feel the entire world shift around him, catching him off balance. "You're offering yourself up to save me?" Again?

"Anyone do that for you before, sweetheart?" Dean's mouth opens but no words come out, not even to snap at the archangel for the nickname. Barely another minute passes before the table separating the two of them disappears, and Dean is left feeling vulnerable, unprotected from the wrath Gabriel could easily unleash on him. "It's your move," he shakes the bottle of whiskey, liquid sloshing around inside, but Dean knows he's not talking about that.

Dean is fucked.

"Gabe..."

As if that's the word, as if that's the go ahead, Gabriel breaches the space between them - catching Dean remarkably off guard again - and pulls him up out of his chair, holding him upright when Dean's legs threaten to buckle from exhaustion. It's downright embarrassing, all of this, but he can't focus on anything else but the choice Gabriel is giving to him. And he's panicking because he knows what he wants, knows what he's wanted ever since Gabriel stupidly listened to him and got killed because of it.

"You have time, Dean," the archangel gives in. "Just give me a sign for tonight. Give me something," and Dean has never seen an archangel plead before. He has never seen Gabriel beg him for something, beg Dean to let him in. Dean doesn't deserve this, doesn't deserve him, and it's completely beyond the human why Gabriel would want something so damaged, so broken.

Gabriel is still holding him like he is precious, preventing him from falling, successfully stopping him from leaving. Dean looks up, knowing he will never be able to come back from it, and gazes into Gabriel's startling amber eyes, which had seemed gold from a distance. There is such want and love there that has Dean reeling, unable to understand but also at a loss as to why his heart starts beating faster.

He loves Gabriel, he had loved Gabriel all along really. It just took one little push from the archangel to make Dean come face to face with it again, just when he needs him the most. He breathes deeply, wanting to give in so badly - "I think..."

"Think?" Gabriel cuts him off, amusement written all over his face but such deep disappointment in his eyes. Dean can't lie to him, not while he's here, not while he's still miraculously alive.

"I need you," Dean admits, his eyes starting to water at the thought of rejection, his heart racing faster now that he sees the happiness Gabriel is exuding. He licks his lips and goes on, realizing the alcohol isn't helping one bit. "I love..."

Gabriel, still holding him fiercely - protectively, puts a hand over Dean's mouth and manhandles him into the bedroom. Getting him into the bed comes next, and Dean looks at the piece of furniture, dreading another restless night, but he nonetheless subjects to the archangel's hands forcing him down onto the soft surface.

"Not until you're ready," he tells Dean after he sees the startled look on his face. Dean pulls his lips into a pout, but he lets Gabriel undress him slowly and carefully, lifts his hips so he can slide his jeans off. He feels safe here, protected with Gabriel leaning over him, treating him like a broken toy, a broken toy that he has the intent to fix.

Dean really wants the archangel to make everything better, really wants Gabriel to fix him.

"Gabe...," he says as Gabriel walks away, as Dean painfully watches him walk away.

Within a flash, Gabriel is back at his bedside, running the back of his hand down Dean's cheek. He smiles, "Just getting you some extra blankets, kiddo." Dean nods and closes his eyes, sensing when the archangel leaves and trying to get his racing heartbeat and nearly crippling anxiety under control before he comes back.

It doesn't work, but when Gabriel returns he feels a helluva lot more steady and levelheaded. He opens his eyes as Gabriel pulls several blankets on top of him, taking a while to adjust them. He takes so long that he ends up pushing Dean back down when he tries to get up, feeling embarrassed and unworthy again. "Don't, Dean. Relax." His warning stills the human and causes him to burrow under the blankets, watching the archangel carefully.

Gabriel can't get over how small and fragile he looks, like he's just a little kid who's half expecting Gabriel to smite him on the spot. He smiles gently at him, not wanting to spook him. This is where Gabriel wanted to get Dean, to the point where he would let down his barriers just a little, but he's never seen this side to the human before and he's terrified that he's going to fuck all of this up.

He starts by moving around to the other side of the bed and sitting down, pulling Dean up into his lap a little. Dean looks much smaller now than Gabriel and he takes advantage of it, wrapping his arms around him, tilting his head down to kiss him.

And then he says, "I love you too."

Dean's warm when he wakes, comfortably warm under the blankets and basking in the sun coming in through the window.

He wracks his head, trying to remember the nightmare last night, trying to remember what happened afterward. Someone stirs in the bed and Dean looks over, and suddenly he remembers. He remembers screaming himself awake, thinking no one was in the room with him, thinking no one cared, but then Gabriel's voice had risen above his screaming and a strong pair of arms had wrapped around him, holding him tightly, pulling him back into a warm and solid chest. Dean had screamed until his voice had gone out, trying to pull himself back down to reality with Gabriel's confident voice and his soothing touch.

When he pulls himself out of the memory, Gabriel is looking at him carefully. "You slept better than usual," he remarks, turning on his side towards the human and pulling himself closer. Dean forces himself not to flinch when Gabriel brushes up against him; Gabriel doesn't deserve to be pushed away, not after what he did for him last night.

"Yeah," he throws him a smile and Gabriel grins broadly in return, bringing a hand to Dean's face, cupping his cheek.

"How's your head?" Gabriel asks, fingers carding through Dean's damp hair.

"Better," Dean swallows, trying to remember just what had happened last night, trying to understand why his hangover would be gone entirely. Gabriel doesn't let him think about it for long, bringing up the one other thing he doesn't want to think about other than the fact that an archangel's in his bed and has somehow wormed his way into Dean's heart.

Gabriel whispers like Dean is prone to break on the spot at his words, "You can talk about it, you know. If you want." Dean only swallows and tries to ignore him, tries to tell himself that Gabriel doesn't really care and even if he did, Dean doesn't deserve someone to talk to and he most definitely doesn't deserve a shoulder to cry on, not that he would anyway. "About Sam." Saying his name makes it a thousand times harder, cements Dean's presence in this moment. He can't run away when Gabriel says it, he can't even melt into the bed anymore and pretend he's not here.

"Thought you told me to get over it already?"

Gabriel pauses for a while then, and he's hesitant when he starts talking again. "I meant...," he sighs, running a hand through his hair, deep in thought. "Anything you need to move past this, to feel better about it, then I'm all ears, Dean."

He scoots away from Gabriel, not able to accept the attention he's receiving, but he expects the archangel to go right after him and he does, his smaller form wrapping around Dean and his grip convincing and somehow stressing to Dean that he belongs here. He feels like he does too, which makes it worse.

"It doesn't matter what you meant." Dean turns his head towards him slightly, the temptation of basking in the archangel's warmth too tempting to resist when he feels cold nearly all the time now. "This is how it has to be, I guess," his lips draw together into a pained grimace and he tucks his head back down into his chest, away from Gabriel.

"You can fuck me again if it'll make you feel better."

Memories from last night come back to him in a rush: Gabriel insisting he rest but Dean wanting to take his mind off of the nightmares, the nightmares that were half-memory and half terrifying daydreams; Gabriel caving and giving him one of the best nights of his life.

There's a deep silence then because he hadn't been the one to take the lead. He had let Gabriel push him down to the bed and he had let Gabriel top, had simply laid back against the sheets and breathed in the archangel's kisses and captured his cotton-candy lips as often as he could. He had let Gabriel take care of him, in a sense, only for that one moment in time, only because he felt lost and needed someone to take his weight -

"You don't have to go through this alone," Gabriel murmurs, just like he had breathed into his neck last night while Dean was drifting down from his orgasm.

"That why you came back?" He doesn't answer and Dean knows the truth, knows that the one thing he never thought could happen has happened.

"Talk, Dean," Gabriel insists, skirting the subject. "I won't make fun of..."

"And what the hell am I gonna say?" Dean snaps at him, but then he realizes the bed is warm because Gabriel's still in it, and his head is remarkably clearer than it had been last night because Gabriel's at least trying to help, because he's hasn't left - yet.

Dean turns into the archangel's embrace and breathes a sigh into his skin, swallowing back a sob and trying not to wrap himself around Gabriel too much, trying not to show how desperate he is for attention, for warmth, for everything that Gabriel is offering to him even though he doesn't deserve a damn thing. "I can't do this."

Gabriel looks at him in despair then. "You can't or you just think that you shouldn't be the one getting it? From all that I've seen, you're the only one who deserves anything, and while I'm not exactly a giving person, something about you is irresistible enough for me to offer it all up." Dean smiles at his words, an accompaniment to the sharp pang in his chest; he can't help it, prevent the way he feels about Gabriel.

"Your brother loves you, Dean," he insists. "But he had no right to say what he did and then just up and abandon you." He shakes his head in disbelief, more so over the fact of Dean believing he's a bad person. "You are not selfish," Gabriel continues, "everything you do, everything you have ever given was for Sam and if not him then someone else. You made me into a good person, Winchester. Your strength and your faith in me, not to mention your inability to take any of my bullshit gave me another chance, a chance I needed."

"One that almost got you killed," Dean reminds him, reminds himself, reminds the whole damn world of his mistake.

"And you think I blame you for that?" He takes one hard look at the human and sees the truth, a truth that grips him so tightly all he can see is red. He breathes out and comes down. "You think that's all I can do," Gabriel nods, understanding and accepting - for the time being. "Well," he admits, "I can do something else then too, something that is real."

Dean looks up at him, "What's that?"

"I can love you. I can treat you as you deserve to be treated, with respect and with gratitude. I can stay with you, make you believe that you are worth something." Gabriel gets up, sheds the blankets he's encased in and pushes Dean deep into the bed, just like last night. "You'll be making it up to me someday, kiddo. But for right now, just enjoy." He wants to protest just for the heck of it, wants to give Gabriel something in return, but the archangel seems sure of himself and Dean is all too happy to obey someone who knows what they're doing.

"You," Dean mumbles, continuing his sentence from the night before, and Gabriel looks up at him from where he's positioned in between his legs. "I love you."

Gabriel leans up to kiss him, tongue seeming to caress the inside of his mouth and he moans at the taste of him, at how good his life is in this moment. "And you already have my answer, sweetheart."

The human smiles, knowing he has and also knowing that this is his archangel.

FIN