Chapter 7: The Invitation
It was easier than I ever thought it could be to fall back into the routine of dating. Once I'd worked out what the rules of the whole thing were (that there really weren't any rules). I sometimes thought it should bother me more, that it didn't bother me that my boyfriend wore women's clothes. But there was no feeling of discomfort if Gabriel showed up in trousers or a dress, wearing makeup or without.
I had eventually pieced together enough to realise that Gabriel didn't actually identify with either gender, not on any level that counted, he said things like "Biologically male" and "gay" mostly because other people needed labels. To me he had become just Gabriel, and I was happy enough to just let that roll for now. And I can only hope nothing will ever change that.
Dean made it a point to ask if I was having sex every time he spoke to me, not out of some real desire to know the details, but to assure himself, in his own maddening way that I was happy. I'd never understood his preoccupation with sex, or how it equated directly with happiness, but I'd drop in some comments I knew would make him cringe and hadn't yet been disappointed.
As for myself and Gabriel, we'd been dating nearly six weeks, when Gabriel, curled up on my bed, wearing one of my t-shirts, tapping away on his iPad said causally.
"My uncles want to meet you."
I stilled, pen stopped dead in the middle of a word in the notes I had been, up until then, copying diligently. How long had I gone before I'd officially met Jessica's parents? Had it been different because we'd been so young?
"You don't have to." Gabriel told me, his tone making it very clear that he meant it. Gabriel was never bothered no matter what my decisions were.
I'd been learning a little about his uncles. Mostly generic things, like how his Uncle Balthazar was a small time actor in pantomimes and local plays and was a bit of flighty sort. He was, Gabriel had snorted, the most stereotypical gay man in their local area, in public at least. His Uncle Crowley was a businessman, who owned and ran no less than three separate businesses', he also managed Balthazar's little theatre troop.
Gabriel worked every Saturday in the café/bookshop his uncle owned as a way to feel less guilty over the way Crowley would just hand over any money he needed.
When he wasn't managing his impressive collection of shops and cafés and whatever else he was into, Uncle Crowley managed the household and the lives of all those within. I thoughts it all sounded very controlling, and had blurted it out once. Gabriel had just laughed and told me that it wasn't done to control; it was done because it was the only way Crowley knew how to show love.
All in all, with what I knew about his Uncles, I wasn't sure how exactly I felt about meeting them.
"Seriously," Gabriel said, breaking into my musings. "I don't mind telling them to piss off if you don't want to. Balthazar is a nosy bastard anyway."
I considered the option momentarily, before discarding it, because I knew Gabriel wanted to introduce me to them, no matter what he said. "No, that's ok. When?"
I caught Gabriel's surprised expression out of the corner of my eye, which melted quickly into his usual smile by the time I'd turned fully to face him. "Cool. Sunday ok?"
I smiled back. "Sure."
xxx
Gabriel never stayed over on Saturday. He did his shift at his uncle's café and spent the night with his uncles. So on Saturday morning, after he'd wriggled back into his blue skirt and swapped my t-shirt for his own; Gabriel leant across to kiss me, where I was sprawled, unwilling to get up so early.
"See you Sunday Sam. I left directions on your desk."
I didn't start getting nervous about the whole thing until that evening. I had to stop myself from texting Gabriel a hundred times through what I knew was a marathon of British crime dramas on Netflix. I didn't know what exactly I intended to text him about, but to save myself any embarrassment, because I knew my boyfriend and I knew the teasing that would follow, I called Dean instead.
Which wasn't the best alternative, but was at least an alternative.
"Hey Sammy!" Dean answered on the fourth ring cheerfully, which meant he was out drinking.
"Hey Dean." I said, fumbling for a second as it finally hit me how much of an idiot I was going to see, calling my big brother about this. But before I could come up with an excuse to hang up the noise I could hear in the background dropped as Dean moved somewhere quieter.
"What's up Sammy?"
"Uh… nothing really." I said.
Dean snorted, disbelieving, like I knew he would, because I sucked at lying to my brother. "Don't like to me little brother. You get dumped?"
"What?" I wasn't sure how Dean had reached that conclusion. "No! No, me and Gabriel are fine."
"So why are you calling me on a Saturday night dude?" Dean asked, as if that explained everything.
I didn't even want to grace that with an answer, so instead I carefully considered how I was going to tell Dean what my problem was without sounding completely idiotic. "I'm meeting his uncles tomorrow. For dinner."
I'd told Dean a little about Gabriel's Uncles of course, and Dean had rallied back with all manner of questions that I'd been scandalised at. All of which revolved around Gabriel's parents and why he wasn't still living with them. Gabriel would tell me when he was ready, and I wasn't about to bring it up, not when I was keeping my own secrets.
"Ok." Dean said, slowly and carefully. "And what? You worried about it or something?"
"Or something." I muttered, rolling my eyes.
Dean sighed. "Why? I mean, I thought you liked the guy."
"I do." I said.
"So don't worry about it. If his uncles are douchebags then screw'em."
"No helping Dean." I sighed.
Dean gave a short laugh. "So don't call me for stupid shit Sammy."
There was some idle chat about Dad and Cassie, and Cas and Amelia, because Dean and Cas were too terrifyingly close for either of them not to know absolutely everything about each other's lives. I felt a little sorry for Cassie and Amelia and wondered if they knew how much of their relationships were shared with someone else.
By the end of it I was feeling better.
I didn't need to worry.
