(A/N): Hey! I'm really getting the hang of One-Shots, guys. I'm also mildly obsessed with Sabriel.
Let the fluff ensue once more!
As always, you lot are fantastic and your comments make my day.
Happy Reading!
~.~
If you were to ask Gabriel who his first love was, he wouldn't tell you about the girl who held his hand every day at school when they were eight. He wouldn't tell you about the girl who blushed when she shyly slipped a Valentine's card onto his desk when they were ten. He wouldn't tell you about the boy when they were thirteen, who pulled him behind a corner of the school under the pretence of bullying him and kissed him clumsily instead.
He wouldn't even tell you about the class bad-boy he fell out with his family over, when he was fourteen and sharp-witted and growing into all that wild attitude of his. He wouldn't tell you about obstinately proclaiming how much he loved the boy while Michael fumed and Lucifer raged, throwing things around in the kitchen instead of starting in on Gabriel. The night, one of many, when they screamed each other hoarse and Gabriel stormed out in a fit of teenage temper, eventually seeking shelter in the only place he'd ever been able to escape to.
The Winchesters were Gabriel's saving grace. Ever since the Novaks moved into the street, the family had practically adopted Gabriel as one of their own. A second family.
Gabriel knew he was trouble. He knew he caused his - sometimes too many - older brothers no end of grief, and he knew a lot of it was in the way he chose to express the rebellious writhing he constantly felt inside. He was the second youngest of six for Pete's sake. One of them had to turn out wild, and for all Lucifer's darker side their second oldest idolised Michael, big brother extraordinaire, so nothing evee really came of it. Gabriel knew Lucifer must have something inside of him akin to what lived in Gabriel.
The suffocating, burning urge to just defy everything.
A house with six boys, and Gabriel was the only one causing true problems.
He pranked kids at school, he took revenge on bullies on behalf of their victims, retaliation for meanness wrought. Gabriel was a force of nature, his teachers said. He's a good kid, really, under all those layers of unjustifiable anger at the world and his mean streak. He's not mean, he just doesn't know when to stop trying to be funny.
Gabriel's brothers were the long-suffering kind.
And yet even though Michael had basically raised them all while their dad worked ridiculously long and tiring hours, it was Gabriel's little brother who could talk sense into him when he was gone beyond the reach of reason. When he was plotting, when he was scheming, when he was detailing his next act of rebellion it was Castiel who could soothe him, who could calm his ruffled feathers.
Gabriel was clever and bright and bold and funny and fun and he disregarded rules and social convention and questioned everything.
By the time they moved to Lawrence, Gabriel was six and already more than a handful. Somehow even though Lucifer was the dark kid and Castiel was odd and introverted and Zachariah was an anti-social weirdo it was Gabriel who was the black sheep.
It shocked everyone when only twelve hours after moving into their new house, while being pestered by Michael to brush his teeth, Gabriel announced that he'd made best friends with the kid two doors down. Standing there on the bathroom stool, sharing both it and the sink with five year old Castiel, Gabriel told his brothers that his new best friend Sam was a genius, didn't they think?
They'd met the Winchester boys during lunch, when Michael had the inspired idea to have the meal as a picnic in their new front garden because the house was too full of moving boxes and the dining room just didn't look that appealing right then. Michael had been spreading peanut butter on Castiel's jelly sandwich for him, while simultaneously chastising Gabriel for sneaking chocolate buttons before finishing his pork pie, when the voices had greeted them from the gate.
Dean was a year older than Gabriel, the only big brother in their family, and Sam was two years younger than Dean. He'd be in Castiel's class at school. They'd come to say hello, and Michael invited them over to sit with them.
Gabriel had taken a shine to Sam straight away because the boy laughed when Gabriel made a stupid joke, one he can't for the life of him remember years later.
The Winchesters stayed to play right through till dinner time and even asked the Novak boys over to watch a DVD after, before it got late.
Michael had had to stay behind to help their dad unpack, and even though he was anything but well-behaved Lucifer had stayed too, with the excuse he was too old to watch anything they'd want to anyway.
That left Balthazar to make sure his little brothers behaved, which was a job that didn't require too much energy. (Unless dealing with the mayhem that came with Gabriel, of course.) Big family of boisterous boys or not, the Novaks had been raised right. They were polite and respectful, and Balthazar even volunteered himself and Zack to help Mary clear away the dinner table.
Sam had showed Gabriel and Castiel his room, and even though Dean hadn't wanted to he showed them his too. Even at five Sam had his big brother wrapped around his little finger, and it hadn't taken much more than a look to make Dean acquiesce.
If you were to ask Gabriel Novak about his first love he wouldn't tell you about girls who held his hand or gave him Valentine's or the bad boy he liked or even that one guy he'd dated the whole summer he was fifteen.
He'd tell you about the time four months after moving to Lawrence, when he was nearly seven and Sam had just turned six. He'd tell you about Sam showing him off to cousins who came for the party, of the way Sam proudly announced how cool Gabriel was and how funny and how wicked his jokes. He'd tell you about a flippant, sharp-eyed second-cousin called Ruby who had rolled her eyes and said Sam was dumb to play with someone like Gabriel because Gabriel was stupid and sad. He'd tell you how much he's always disliked Ruby right from that moment and how that day was the first time Gabriel ever saw Sam get mad.
Not mad like he did with his brother, indignant and annoyed while still somehow being Sam. No. If you were to ask, Gabriel would tell you about how Sam had raged, telling Ruby on no uncertain terms that she was the one who was stupid, if she didn't like Gabriel like Sam did.
If you were to ask Gabriel, he'd tell you about that night, when the party guests had left and Mary invited Gabriel and Castiel to stay for a sleepover. He'd tell you fondly of Castiel sneaking to stay in Dean's room because Dean had read a new comic book to him a week before and Castiel had fallen in love with the way Dean's voice grew quiet and soft when he read out loud.
He'd tell you of being cocooned within a sleeping bag inside Sam's Batman and Robin tent, set up on Sam's bedroom floor instead of outside. He'd tell you about the ghost stories they told each other long into the night. He'd tell you about one of Sam's stories scaring him stiff - his best friend had a helluvan imagination even then - and he'd tell you about Sam wriggling closer to comfort him.
He'd tell you about Sam showing him how to zip their sleeping bags together into one really big sleeping bag. He'd tell you about Sam putting one small arm around him and pulling him closer clumsily. He'd tell you about the mumbled apologies that tried to hide the fact that Sam was laughing at him, just a little. He'd tell you how much he didn't mind, even though he hated people laughing at him, because it had been Sam.
He'd tell you about Sam brushing his hair back from his face and he'd tell you about how warm it was, tucked up against Sam's side in the dark, the thrill of sleeping in a tent all by themselves even if it wasn't outside. He'd tell you about the candy they'd hidden from the party so that they could have a Midnight Snack. He'd tell you about Sam telling him a different story instead, about brave knights who slew a monster that was attacking a village.
He'd tell you about lifting his face to look up at Sam's smile, about how he knew right then that Sam was the best friend he was ever going to have. He'd tell you about loving him even then.
If you were to ask Gabriel Novak about his first love he'd tell you about the night Sam turned sixteen, when Gabriel stayed the night as was tradition and they built a fort, having long outgrown the tent they still loved so fiercely. He'd tell you about attacking each other with pillows and about the raid they'd pulled on Dean and Cas, as Gabriel's brother had come to be called, about how they were both dying for their brothers to just man up and admit they belonged together.
He'd tell you about the end of the night, when it was dark and they were lying side by side atop Sam's covers, staring at the old plastic stars on the ceiling and musing about their lives. He'd tell you about Sam teasing him with a scary story, a running joke still ten years later, and he'd tell you about propping his head on Sam's chest so that the much taller boy could brush his hair from his face.
Gabriel would tell you about lifting his head to look up at Sam's smile and about how he knew, as he always had, that Sam was the best friend he would ever have. He'd tell you about knowing he was in love him.
He'd tell you about how, when Sam finally looked at him with those clever hazel eyes when Gabriel was nineteen, when he bit his lip softly and looked on the precipice of something huge, his heart had known.
He'd tell you that the kiss they shared that night, when Sam was ready, was only a formality because Gabriel had known thirteen years that Sam would be his.
If you were to ask Gabriel who his first love was, he wouldn't tell you about the girl who held his hand every day at school when they were eight or the girl who blushed when she gave him a Valentine's card when they were ten. He wouldn't tell you about the boy who pulled him behind a corner of the school at thirteen and kissed him clumsily. He wouldn't tell you about the bad-boy he screamed at Michael about or the boy he dated for a summer.
He'd tell you about the best friend he made when he was six, who bested even his imagination and told him a story so frightening they fell asleep tucked against each other for comfort.
He'd tell you about thirteen years of knowing that boy was the best thing ever to happen to him.
He'd tell you about the kiss Sam finally had the courage to initiate, and about how everything fell into place right in that moment. He'd tell you about the house with the blue picket pence, about the golden retriever and the ridiculously tall man he married.
He'd tell you about Sam Winchester, and he'd smile.
~.~