Gabriel stared out the window of the library, spinning from side to side slowly in his chair behind the check out desk. He still had two hours left till his shift was over and he could go home. Even though he was bored, he really wished he'd have to stay longer and avoid his house as much as he could. He had no idea how much his dad remembered of their fight, but he'd finally stumbled in that morning. If his dad did remember their fight, Gabriel would be in for it the second he walked in his front door.
"Hey, Naomi," Gabriel called to his supervisor, "Has anyone checked the racks upstairs yet?"
Naomi sighed and gestured to the stairs for Gabriel to check the racks.
Normally, no one checked the book racks during the day since they were a little too busy. The first person to tackle the racks would be at it for quite some time after letting the students have unchecked access for several hours.
Gabriel didn't mind putting the books back in order. It was busy work, easy enough if you knew the Dewey Decimal System by memory. Gabriel typically didn't volunteer for this sort of thing unless he really wanted to put more hours in.
Even if the racks were a putrid mess, even if Gabriel found somebody going down on their boyfriend again, it would be better than going home while his dad was still lurking around. He tried not to think about his brothers handling his dad alone as he trudged up the stairs to the fourth floor.
When he reached the fourth floor door, the sounds of rowdy and boisterous college kids hit his ears. Odds were Benny and Balthazar were in that group, having fun. Sometimes, that knowledge would prompt him to join them for at least a little while. Now, though, Gabriel didn't want to keep his smile going if he didn't have to. Hiding in the racks of books was so much easier than hiding behind a smile and a joke. He decided to tackle the third floor first.
The third floor was quiet, filled with students studying quietly. Gabriel found a discarded stack of books on a table that had clearly been abandoned. He scooped them up and made his way to the dark quiet sanctuary of the book racks.
The first couple of books were about Spanish colonialism, so he quickly headed for the historical section. He felt like he could disappear in all these books. It felt like getting lost in a forest, racks of books reaching almost to the ceiling. It was peaceful, a calming sort of invisibility. His face hurt from keeping up appearances anyway. He placed the first couple of books.
The next book, however, looked incredibly old and had no library code on it. After looking at the first page with its yellowed and frayed paper, Gabriel knew this book wasn't theirs, it was a relic from the archives. How the hell had that gotten mixed in with their books in circulation?
Gabriel quickly took the fragile book back to the archives. He walked through the glass doors, causing the librarian to look up. Gabriel was almost surprised that he didn't know her, but at work, he did try to keep to himself.
He plastered a bright smile on his face and sauntered over to the desk with a hop in his gait.
"Found this in the racks," Gabriel said, "Figured you might want this back."
The librarian looked at the old book, and her eyes widened. "Thank you so much," she said, gingerly taking the book from him.
Gabriel nodded and turned around to leave, knowing full well the librarians would be checking the security footage to know how an archive item got out, when he spotted a familiar trench coat draped over a chair in the archive room.
Gabriel blinked a couple of times to make sure his composure was all there. The guy had seen his bruises, and the look on his face had held enough concern to make Gabriel feel very vulnerable, uncomfortably so. The last thing he wanted to do was go near that kid without his defenses up.
Gabriel walked through the door to the archive room. "Hey, Castiel," he said happily.
Castiel looked up at Gabriel, startled. "Oh, hi," he said quietly.
Gabriel sat at the table across from Castiel and asked, "What brings you to the archives? I hardly ever see anyone in here."
Castiel cocked his head to the side and asked, "Do you normally keep tabs on the comings and goings of students in the archives?"
Gabriel shrugged. "No, not normally. I work here part time, so I do stop by a bit in case the rogue library book ends up trying to be an artifact. It's always a ghost town in here," he said.
Castiel nodded, understanding, and returned to reading what looked like a very old document.
Gabriel could tell when he was in the way. He stood up and said, "Well, I'll leave you to it."
Castiel looked up again, catching Gabriel's gaze. "I'm sorry," he said, "I'm actually doing this for fun, you're not bothering me or anything. You can stay if you want, unless you're busy since your working." Castiel closed his mouth and looked a little frustrated with himself.
Gabriel quickly sat back down more than a little curious about this guy. All he knew so far was that Castiel was friends with Jo, he kicked every kind of ass at foosball, and he poured through old documents in the archives for fun. That alone piqued Gabriel's interest.
"I'm technically on the clock, but they never actually check what I'm doing," Gabriel said, "Easiest job ever, really."
Castiel smiled, but his eyes quickly drifted back to the document in front of him.
After a couple minutes of silence, Gabriel asked, "Are you sure I'm not in the way? You seem kind of busy."
Castiel's face flushed, and Gabriel honestly had no idea what was going on anymore.
Castiel pushed the document to the side of the table and said slowly, "I'm not good with people. I don't really have friends, I don't socialize hardly at all, and I am really, very bad at carrying a conversation."
"So, you want my company, but you don't know what to do with it?" Gabriel asked, making sure he had this right.
Castiel nodded, his gaze focusing on the table. Castiel's quiet nature did make much more sense knowing that he had some form of social anxiety. For a psychology major, Gabriel really should have figured that out earlier.
"Well, I'm not much for company, but I'm pretty good at getting people to talk. You sure you want me here?" Gabriel asked.
Castiel nodded and looked at Gabriel like he wanted to say something.
When he didn't say anything, Gabriel asked, "So, of all the things you could do for fun, why the archives?"
"I like learning about people," Castiel said, eyes lighting up in a way that made Gabriel know how passionate he was about reading these decaying documents, "The documents I read are the pieces of someone's life, and I love putting the puzzle together and getting an idea of who these people were. It's sort of the reason I'm a history major."
Gabriel grinned. It was nice to see someone excited about something. Gabriel couldn't remember the last time he felt like that. He wasn't entirely sure he could get excited anymore. He could act like it, sure. He was incredibly convincing when he had to be, but actually feeling something was another story. Gabriel felt a weird sort of wonder at Castiel's enthusiasm for pieces of paper. It was cool to see.
"What sort of stuff are you interested in?" Castiel asked. Gabriel paused. He hadn't expected for Castiel to want to know anything about him, let alone actually ask him a question.
"I don't know," Gabriel said, "Normal stuff."
Castiel fixed Gabriel with a piercing gaze that gave Gabriel the urge to dive under the table and never let that kid look at him again. He felt unbearably vulnerable with those blue eyes staring at him.
"I'm not sure why you feel the need to hide all the time," Castiel said honestly, "But you don't have to do that around me."
"I don't know what you're-" Gabriel started. Castiel cut him off, saying, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said anything. It's just that I know what it looks like when someone's pretending for the sake of others. But it's none of my business, and I really didn't mean to-"
"It's fine," Gabriel said quickly, "Listen, I gotta get back to work. See you around, Castiel." He got up and left the room before Castiel could say another word.
Castiel was a cool guy, and Gabriel wouldn't mind having him as a friend, but he was way too perceptive for his own good. He felt kind of bad for just leaving Castiel there by himself, but that was how Gabriel had found him. It was fine. He was really doing Castiel a favor by leaving. The guy seemed to want friends, and literally everyone on the planet would be a better person to be friends with. Friends were supposed to care about you, be honest with you. Gabriel wasn't capable of that. He was damaged. He was poison. He was broken beyond repair in ways Castiel couldn't ever know about. He'd just drag the poor guy down with him. He wasn't even sure if he knew how to be a friend anymore. All he did was pretend with Benny and Balthazar. If they noticed his act, they didn't care. He just felt so damn hollow. He wished it could just stop.
Out of nothing if not a desire for self-preservation, Gabriel left the archives entirely and went back to placing books.
After his shift was up, Naomi came upstairs and found Gabriel kneeling in the book stacks. "I know how much you love cleaning up after illiterate rodents," she said, "But I took the liberty of clocking you out. Go home, Gabriel."
Gabriel stood up and tried to take this information as the gesture of kindness it was meant to be. He couldn't go home. He didn't want to go there and fight and claw and hit and break. He wanted to do literally anything else. "Thanks, Naomi. See you tomorrow," Gabriel said.
He walked to the stairs and took as much time as he could getting back to the ground floor. He needed to something, something to keep him from going home to his sad excuse of a parent.
Once he got to the first floor and exited the stairwell, he spotted a cascade of black hair framing slender shoulders in a blood red jacket. Kali. Perfect.
Gabriel sidled up to her and said, "Hey, beautiful."
Kali rolled her eyes but smiled. It wasn't a genuine smile, Gabriel knew. He'd seen enough fake smiles in the mirror to know an impostor when he saw one. He knew why, though. While he and Kali were still technically dating, things had been strained for a while, and lately, Gabriel had just been waiting for her to break it off. There was a small part of him that hoped Kali still loved him, but the rest of him knew it'd be incredibly stupid on her part if she did. If he couldn't even be a decent friend, being a half way decent boyfriend was definitely off the table.
Still, there were benefits to not having been dumped yet.
"You want to grab a drink with me?" Gabriel asked with a coy grin, "I'm buying."
Kali looked at him for a moment and some real happiness filtered into her smile. "I would love to, sweetheart, but I'm not in the library for you. I have to study. Maybe some other time," she said.
He nodded and said, "Okay, well, if you change your mind, I'll be at the Roadhouse."
She kissed him on the cheek, and Gabriel was sure they both felt absolutely nothing from it. She glanced away and waved halfheartedly before walking upstairs.
Gabriel grabbed his bag and jacket from behind the check out desk and headed out into the cold.
Once he walked through the door, he almost walked straight into Castiel. Gabriel stopped just in time to miss colliding with the guy's shoulder.
"Hey, sorry, didn't see you," Gabriel said.
Castiel asked, "Can I talk to you for a second?"
Gabriel sighed. Whatever Castiel was going to say was going to be too personal, too blunt, and completely uncalled for.
He braced himself and said, "Sure, go ahead, but I'm heading to the Roadhouse, so walk and talk?"
Castiel followed Gabriel towards the Roadhouse without complaint.
"I'm sorry about earlier. I realize that I don't know you and really have no right to have said any of the stuff I said," Castiel said, "I hope I didn't make you uncomfortable."
Gabriel looked at how sad the guy looked, like he was feeling guilty. Castiel hadn't done anything but be honest with him. He shouldn't feel bad about that.
Gabriel grabbed Castiel's arm and pulled him behind a building.
"It's fine," Gabriel said, dropping his smile. He knew Castiel could see the difference when the guy got that concerned look back on his face. "It's fine," Gabriel said again, "I know you were trying to be nice, telling me I could be myself around you. I get it."
Castiel looked Gabriel in the eye, and Gabriel knew he was seeing too much.
"I just-I have a lot going on, a lot that nobody can really do anything about," Gabriel said, "The last thing I need is people worrying about me. So, if I have to slap a smile on my face around my friends, then that's what I do."
Castiel nodded but didn't say anything.
Gabriel put his smile back on, and he didn't care if it was only for defense or not. "Now, let's go inside and see what everybody's up to," he said.
Castiel asked quietly, "You're not mad at me, though?"
Gabriel chuckled and said sarcastically, "Yes, Castiel. I'm mad at you for being a caring person. How dare you."
Castiel seemed confused for a moment.
Gabriel sighed, "I'm not mad. Tell you what, if I ever have a personality transplant and feel like talking about my problems, I'll come to you. In the meantime, I hear you have a lack of friends and social confidence. I'm not your best option, but if you want a friend, I'm here."
Castiel smiled brightly. It would've felt nice to know he made someone so happy if it weren't for the nagging knowledge that Gabriel was a worthless piece of shit and that it was only a matter of time before Castiel caught onto that fact like everyone else. After all, why would anyone else like Gabriel if he couldn't even like himself?
"C'mon, let's go inside. I'm starving," Gabriel said, grinning.
Castiel followed.
The night consisted of drinks, cheese fries, foosball, laughs, and a general good time. Apparently, someone else was capable of beating Benny at foosball. Earlier in the day, Benny's new coworker had bested him in three consecutive games. Benny was still grouching about it even as he won games against Balthazar and Gabriel without hardly even trying. They really needed to get that guy and Castiel together and see who the real foosball champion was.
At the end of the night, Benny, Balthazar, and Castiel headed off to their own places, each of them saying goodnight to Gabriel.
It had been a good night, but he knew what was probably waiting for him at home. He'd managed to avoid going home all day, and it was much later than he normally came home. Last time he stayed out this late, he'd had his father's hands wrapped around his throat. He deserved what he had coming to him.
Gabriel walked home alone, hoping that he would actually get mugged one of these days. Wouldn't that be a nice distraction from everything else. Gabriel went home knowing that no matter if his father's fists were waiting for him or not, he was a dead man walking.