A/N: I just really wanted the archangels to have a family pizza parlor, alright? I also give people my permission to make that into like a full AU because that'd be rad, just like… You know, mention me and my fic if you do. I might actually end up doing it myself if I ever finish this dang fic, because I'm getting attached to a few of these AU ideas and I'd really love to give them their own stories and flesh them out a little more. Anyway, enjoy.

Chapter 21: The Games We Play

Gabriel blinked a few times to adjust to the bright light of a kitchen that smelled oh-so-deliciously of pizza. The stuff with the handmade crust, not the shitty mass-produced frozen kind. Nearby, Michael and Lucifer were arguing about something. Michael had adopted his straight-backed, imperious 'Dad-put-me-in-charge' posture. Lucifer, meanwhile, was scowling up at him with the kind of broody expression anti-establishment emo punk bands would sell their souls to imitate.

And then, in the space of a breath, Gabriel was slammed with a wall of memories and squeezed his eyes shut.

The fake recollections dancing around in his head were just that: fake. But they were precious too, relics from the kind of world he and especially Sam would never have. Stupid high school dances that consisted of more standing by the wall than American YA media wanted to admit, splash fights in the local pool, notches in the kitchen doorframe as Sam shot up and Gabriel tried not to be jealous. May Day baskets and walnut-crusted fingerprint cookies. The mixing scents of hot dough and handmade pizza sauce, Michael and Lucifer bickering over how much cheese to use. Raphael, arms crossed, watching over the Slice of Heaven Pizzeria register. Dad teaching him to drive.

It wasn't all Sam that made his heart ache so beautifully as he reminisced over his fake life. Humanity was, in many ways, so very lucky. Gabriel squeezed his eyes shut because he liked them gold and not green and because the world itself wasn't supposed to be the point anyways. The point was Sam.

Sam, who would be at Lisa Braeden's place dutifully watching Ben while Dean and Lisa were out on a date. Sam, who was probably starving while waiting for an acceptable cheesy bribe and some company from Gabriel once the little munchkin was conked out for the night.

Then suddenly there was a person standing right in Gabriel's bubble. The archangel blinked and looked up, finding, surprise surprise, Balthazar's smug face.

"Balthazar," he greeted, attempting the put-upon look Michael doled out to younger angels so well.

If Balthazar's snort was anything to go by, Gabriel's imitation wasn't very on point.

"Don't look at me like that, big brother. I didn't kick your puppy and I sure as hell didn't suck your boyfriend's dick. I'm trying to help here; some appreciation wouldn't be out of place."

"Are you seriously talking to an archangel with that kind of attitude?" Gabriel asked, torn between annoyance and genuine admiration, as was common with people who tried to stand up to him.

"Like I told dear Raphael: bite me," Balthazar retorted with a grin.

Gabriel shook his head, but couldn't help the slight upward twitch of his lips when he pictured just what Raphael's response to that had been.

"Alright, Bal, you wanna be helpful then get me a p—"

"Got your special delivery right here, Captain Obvious," Balthazar interrupted, setting a warm pizza box in Gabriel's waiting hands. "Now hurry up and go make out with your human boy t—Oh, hell."

"Bal—"

"Gotta split, darling, or this'll get really awkward really quick. Catch you later."

With a familiar flapping of wings Balthazar was gone. Not just vanished from the scenario itself, either. Gabriel felt the blond angel's presence, the sort of prickly feeling of being watched by him, lift from the back of his mind. Only to be replaced by a slightly different but comparable feeling.

Someone else was spying on him instead, it seemed.

But though Gabriel glanced around, the other angel wasn't showing themselves. Gabriel frowned. Spectators were, well… Not what he wanted. But all the same, it wasn't as if the archangel was ashamed of his big fat crush on Sam and if Lucifer hadn't already trumpeted it from the highest to the lowest heaven, it would be a Dad-damned miracle.

"Fine!" he called to no one. "Knock yourself out. But try anything and I'll be on you like white on rice! Like low self-esteem on a Winchester!"

That said, Gabriel rolled his golden eyes and tossed his head and hopped in a dorky-looking beat up Toyota to deliver himself a pizza. Another wave of memories washed over him as he pulled out into the street and started driving. Unlike the first set, these were all about Sam. Sam picking fights with bullies to protect smaller children, Sam bringing home a shivering puppy and begging Gabriel to hide it in his treehouse until he'd convinced John to let him keep it, Sam sitting in the school library tapping a pen against his lip as he considered another student's rough draft. Sending texts to Sam every five seconds during their graduation ceremony while he was sitting up on stage being valedictorian and trying to act serious. Sam and Gabriel learning to ride bikes together. The two of them laughing as Gabriel tried, with patently poor results, to teach Sam how to draw.

Before he knew it, Gabriel was parked outside the Braeden house, staring at the door from his car like some lovelorn rom-com loser. Shaking his head, the archangel snatched up the pizza and rushed to the door. Then he rapped on it sharply before he could lose his nerve like an idiot.

By the time Sam opened the door, Gabriel had arranged himself in a casual slump against the frame, ankles crossed and pizza box balanced on the palm of one hand like a waiter at some fancy restaurant.

"Well, well," he commented. "A babysitter. You know, Sambo, what with me being the pizza man, this kinda reminds me of a porno that Cassie—"

"Gabe! Jesus. Ben's asleep, but that's no excuse," the brunette scolded, cheeks flaring red.

Trying to hold onto a scowl, Sam tugged the pizza away from Gabriel and flipped the top to check that the toppings were acceptable.

"It's Veggie Lover's, cross my heart," the archangel told him with a dramatic flourish. "Even if that's a sin against the gods of pizza."

Sam just rolled his eyes and turned to go back into the house. Gabriel stayed in the doorway, shifting his weight uncomfortably from foot to foot. After a few steps, Sam glanced back.

"So, are you coming in or what?" he demanded.

Face lit up like the sun, Gabriel scampered into the house and closed the door behind him. Then he followed Sam to Lisa's well-lit kitchen and watched the brunette just set the box on the table, open it up, and start tearing into the cheesy goodness inside. Sam, Gabriel remembered from both his faux-memories and his hundred days in Mystery Spot, would usually be the type to argue for proper eating technique, dishes, the whole shebang. But something about sitting nights and the godly scent of Slice of Heaven Pizza seemed to narrow the brunette's concerns to calculating and enacting the most efficient route between food and mouth.

And Sam Winchester cramming his face full of faux-healthy pizza was admittedly an amusing, even pleasant, sight. One Gabriel wanted to file away. When it came to the dynamic idiot duo, Dean was the one who usually went face-first into whatever sustenance was available. Seeing Sam relish any sort of food the same way did Gabriel's little angelic heart good. Chin cupped in his palms and elbows on the table like a heathen, the archangel watched Sam eat with a glowing fondness in his amber eyes.

When he noticed, Sam almost choked on the cheesy glob of pizza in his mouth, and swallowed it down harshly.

"So…" the brunette said, clearing his throat. "Did… You want any of this…?"

Gabriel just laughed.

"No, Sasquatch. I don't want any of your blasphemy pizza."

Sam nodded and scratched the back of his neck. His eyes darted between the remaining slices of pizza, Gabriel's guiltily amused look, and an empty corner of Dean and Lisa's kitchen.

"Is…? I mean, I feel bad that I'm the only one eating… I'll pay Lisa back for whatever, if you want to eat something," he offered, gesturing at the fridge.

"'s fine, really," the archangel assured him, waving his worries away. "Mike and Luci messed up on someone's order when they were tussling, so I snagged three or four slices on my way out the door."

Sam sighed, shaking his head at the brothers' antics.

"Can't they, I dunno, get over themselves?" the brunette wondered, rolling his eyes and taking another large bite of pizza, after which he moaned audibly. "God, this is delicious."

"They're too busy giving your taste buds orgasms, apparently," Gabriel teased.

Sam glared at him, though it was completely halfhearted. The archangel tossed his head, far more pleased with himself than Sam seemed to think he ought to be.

"Dude," Sam said, after swallowing another large bite of pizza, "the last thing I want to picture is your douchey brothers giving me orgasms."

"Wow, we have so much in common!" exclaimed the archangel. "No wonder we're best friends!"

"Gabe."

But the brunette's flat expression did nothing to deter Gabriel.

"Saaaaam."

"Ok, that's it."

Sam tossed down the half-eaten slice of pizza and advanced on Gabriel. Before the archangel could even make it out of his chair, the brunette had an arm looped around his neck and was rubbing his knuckles harshly against the top of Gabriel's head, mussing his hair into an irreparable state.

"Ow, ow, Saaaam!" the angel whined, squeezing his golden eyes shut. "Not the hair! We're not in fourth grade here, you know!"

Sam released him, laughing the same way he did whenever he'd successfully pulled one over on Dean during a prank war.

"I'm not," he said, settling back in his seat and taking up his unfinished slice of pizza victoriously. "But I have a hard time believing you're any older than ten."

Then, to add insult to injury, the brunette bit off a large chunk of pizza to punctuate his statement. Gabriel didn't pout, but Sam would have said otherwise.

"Real mature, Sasquatch," he muttered, trying to fix his hair.

"Says the guy who superglued Dean's butt to the bleachers in sophomore year," retorted Sam.

A slow smile spread across the archangel's face, and he made a mental note to remind himself later that the classics were still worth using every so often, even if they were a bit overdone.

"Good times," Gabriel said absently.

And of course Sam would wait til he was off his guard to ask the hard-hitting questions.

"Hey, Gabriel, is… Is something wrong?"

The archangel choked on his breath and spluttered ungracefully for a few seconds.

"Why do you ask, Sambo?" he retorted once his airways were clear.

Sam shrugged, and Gabriel fixed him with an accusing golden stare from across the table.

"Alright, alright," Sam acquiesced. "So, I just think you've been a little quiet lately, that's all. I mean, look, if it's something you wanna keep to yourself I get it, but…"

Standing and pacing somewhat agitatedly, the brunette trailed off.

"But?"

"But, I'm here for you, man! I mean, whatever it is…"

Gabriel stood too, finding only afterwards that he wasn't quite sure what to do with his hands. He slicked his hair back just to keep them busy, and tried to decide about whether to lie or not. Lying was easier, certainly. Especially with all the fake memories creating a pit of nervous warmth in his chest. Truthfully, Gabriel had never really had a friendship close enough to make him worry about ruining it with sex or romance. But apparently tropes were tropes for a reason.

On the other hand, he had created this scenario specifically to facilitate asking Sam on a date. And what kind of idiot would he be if he couldn't at least get the words out when he honestly had nothing to lose?

"Look, Gabe, you're my best friend," Sam assured him. "You can tell me anything."

"Yeah. I… I know."

Sam's big, warm hands were heavy on his shoulders. Heavy, but comforting. It was a kind of weight Gabriel hadn't felt in millennia, not since he had stood side-by-side with his three fellow archangels, his brothers. It was the weight of someone saying I'm here for you, I'm here to take care of you. It was the kind of thing Gabriel knew that he didn't deserve, or that he should have been strong enough to go on without. That he, the archangel, the protector, should be the one offering support.

But it was so soothing to be fragile and human and vulnerable when Sam looked down at him with shimmering tenderness, flecks of brown dancing in the blue-green of his irises.

"But, uh… Really, you don't have to," Sam backpedaled earnestly. "If you don't want to."

"I think I," Gabriel blurted out, before he realized what he had done and faltered, the rest of the sentence falling flat.

"Yeah…?"

And though it wasn't what he intended to say, something else equally as scandalous vacated Gabriel's mouth without permission when Sam stared him down with that puppy-dog gaze.

"I wanna kiss you."

There was a long silence. Gabriel's heart was pounding in his chest and though he was an archangel and a trickster and something to be feared, he was coiled like a terrified rabbit. Waiting for the slightest indication of negativity from Sam, any sign he should snap his fingers and jump ship while he still could.

"You want to kiss me?" Sam asked softly, gently.

The brunette shifted slightly, so he was curled at Gabriel's side, hands still on the angel's shoulders to keep him at ease. His tone was simply asking for confirmation. There was nothing threatening, nothing disgusted.

"Yes," said Gabriel, who was having a hard time remembering how to lie with 6'4" of pure American sex god looking at him from the right and smiling encouragingly.

"Why?"

Just like he had when asking the question before it, Sam kept his voice level and soft. He wasn't giving anything away, and Gabriel hated that even as somewhere in the back of his brain he found himself impressed at Sam's poker face.

"Wh- I… I want," the angel struggled, gesturing between the two of them to expend some of his nervous energy. "I want us to… I want to be…"

Sam didn't interrupt, didn't try to interpret, and Gabriel let out a frustrated huff. The brunette continued to smile, though it looked a little more teasing.

"I like you, idiot," Gabriel blurted out. "And I mean the way Castle likes Beckett, or the way your brother likes his car, not the way Captain America likes Black Widow."

That at least broke Sam's wall of silence, sending him into peals of laughter. And though the phrasing and the jab at Dean were funny enough, Gabriel could be forgiven for being a little impatient for Sam's response to the revelation that his best friend was super bi for him. As if sensing this, though Sam having empathetic spidey senses wouldn't be exactly surprising, the brunette quieted his laughter and moved so he was facing Gabriel again.

"Is this," Gabriel asked, having regained his ability to ramble, "the part where I backpedal wildly to try and save our friendship?"

Sam chuckled and rolled his eyes.

"No."

And then, without further preamble, he ruffled a hand through Gabriel's hair and pecked him on the lips. It felt like a spark, zipping from the archangel's lips to his brain to his heart and back.

"Oh," he managed.

Something at the back of his mind was nagging him that his coherency and suaveness had taken a serious nosedive and he really ought to get on that, but the look in Sam's eyes was impossibly disarming. Which was of course totally unfair, when he thought about it. No one should have gazes that potent, they were too much power for any one man.

But, Gabriel considered, he might as well take advantage of his good fortune. So he leaned up and kissed Sam again, for longer.

"So… You've known me for how long now?" the brunette asked quietly when they parted. "And you were that scared of having a… A crush on me?"

"Don't be a dick," Gabriel muttered, sticking out his tongue.

"No," agreed Sam with a nod, "that's your job."

The archangel laughed.

"Touché."

And if they moved to sit on the living room to couch, deserting Sam's half-eaten pizza on the kitchen table, that was no one's business. It was especially no one's business if Gabriel indulged in human vulnerability one more time and asked Sam to hold him.

Gabriel just tried to block everything out except the sound of Sam's heart and the support of his arms, especially the encroaching presence that had scared Balthazar out of the picture. It was an experience he wanted to file away, in case he failed spectacularly when he managed to find the balls to talk to Sam for real. Which, given the circumstances of his first attempts was completely likely.

But hey, Gabriel was a master at beating the odds, right?

He consoled himself with that until the sound of a car in the driveway jostled him from his thoughts. Even though he'd only heard it a few times, that particular rumble was unmistakable: the Impala. Dean and Lisa were back.

Sam released him to go box up the pizza. Silent, Gabriel watched the muscles in the brunette's back and shoulders shift and flex beneath his shirt as he moved. The lock on the front door clicked.

Taking that as his cue, Gabriel snapped his fingers.