"Look, can you keep an eye on him or not?"

Sam's voice was impatient. Gabriel would have been able to hear the stress he was under even if he couldn't feel and literally see it vibrating off him at every angle. He felt bad for the kid, he really did. Piled way too much weight on his own shoulders.

It was kinda hard to focus on that right now, though. What Sam was holding out to him, standing on the palm of his hand with its arms crossed, was…well. It was the sort of thing that ate up one's whole attention.

Gabriel was used to seeing Dean an inch or two over six feet. Taller than Gabriel's vessel, like a whole lot of humans were these days, having finally figured out the whole nutrition-and-vaccines thing. But right now, having been produced grumbling from a shoebox in the passenger seat of his car, Dean wasn't even a twelfth that size. Gabriel estimated him at under six inches, and everything had shrunk perfectly with him. Boots. Flannel. Freckles. Scowling pink fuck-me mouth.

"Oh, my dad," Gabriel cooed, clasping his hands together under his chin, "he's adorable."

Sam drew his hand back a little, protective. Dean wobbled with the movement, swearing as he grabbed onto one of his brother's massive fingertips for balance.

"Gabe, seriously," Sam started, "I need to know that he's gonna be safe with you. Cas is coming down to help me out on this hunt, I don't wanna get Jody or Donna involved in this, and you know Jack is - "

"Yep, yep, 'help me, Obi-Wan Kenobi, you're my only hope.' Heard it all before, Sammich. Real honored you came to me." Gabriel put his hands out, making grabby motions. "C'mon. Gimme."

Sam hesitated, face wound up in that pensive, overthinking way of his. Dean complained from his hand, voice a high little rasp: "Son of a bitch. Sammy, you kidding me? I don't need a babysitter. Just bring me along, you know I'll be - "

"You're barely bigger than a Warhammer mini, I'm not running the risk of you getting stepped on," Sam mumbled, then gave Gabriel a very tight smile. "Probably only gonna be a few days. I'll call every morning, just try not to, y'know. Sit on him or anything, and…"

"Sam," Gabriel said patiently, "you've known me how long? And have I ever hurt your brother?"

Staring at him, Sam pulled Dean a little closer to his chest. "Uh, yes. A lot. D'you not remember the Mystery - ?"

"Okay, right, fine, point Winchester, but we both know I'm a changed angel." Gabriel spread one hand over his chest, put the other out for Dean, and really wished that Sam could see the trustworthy way he was holding his wings. "I promise: your bite-sized brother will come to no harm at all so long as he's under my roof."

Sam hesitated. Gabriel could literally see him going through his options; it didn't take long.

"I wouldn't be here if I had any other choice," he started.

"I'm wounded," Gabriel answered dryly, but he was fully aware that he had earned his reputation. Seeing as the one and only time he'd been charged with looking after Jack, he'd discovered nephilim could indeed get drunk if you just gave them enough rum to drown a horse, then let the kid pop his holy cherry on an incubus. "But I know."

Apparently, Sam didn't really have anything else to say. He held his hand out and Dean, bitching as loudly as he could in that tough-guy Mickey Mouse voice, climbed over into Gabriel's, ready and waiting.

"I've killed a lotta angels," Sam stated matter-of-factly. "If anything happens to him, you know what'll happen to you."

"Mm-hm." Gabriel raised his hand to his vessel's eyes, studying Dean raptly. Glaring back, Dean made a rude gesture. Sam leaned in.

"A lot," he repeated slowly, "of angels."

He waited until Gabriel made eye contact, then finally stepped off of his porch and headed back towards the car. Dean turned to watch him go, and Gabriel could tell from the set of his shoulders that he was scowling. Gabriel waved with his free hand.

"Don't worry!" he called after Sam. "We'll be fine. Gonna have lots of fun."

He waited until the car had pulled away, a rooster tail of dust following it, then turned to head back into the house he'd claimed and fixed up. It was just on the edge of the Little Jerusalem Badlands State Park. He'd figured he should at least stay within the same state as the Winchesters, for situations a whole lot like this one. Plus…he had always had a sense of humor.

"Well." Gabriel smirked at Dean as he closed the door behind him. "Now look who's the Ken doll."

"What?" Dean screwed up his tiny face.

"Nothing, nothing. Just something Cas told me about back when you two first met." Gabriel shook his head. "So, obviously, somebody tangled with a nasty little curse, pun fully intended…and I'd say the curse won."

"No, we won." Dean kicked his way across Gabriel's hand, stomping on the folds of his palm. "It was supposed to shrink whoever it caught down into nothing, but Sammy noticed, and all that witch training with Rowena must've - look, dude, you wanna put me down? Not to put any ideas in your head or anything, but kinda feel like you're gonna just…" He squeezed one minuscule hand into a fist, making a knch noise in the back of his throat.

"Fair enough." In the entryway, Gabriel set Dean down on an end table, letting him hop out of his palm. "Okay, ground rules: no creepy Borrower shit, no messing with the stuff in my hobby room, and if you want something to eat or drink, I supervise. Just because I can bring you back to life if you literally drown yourself in whiskey doesn't mean I want to."

"Yeah, speaking of that, actually. Magical angel healing powers and all." Dean gestured to his diminutive frame. "Don't suppose there's any way you can quick-fix this?"

"Well, I could, but." Gabriel crouched, folding his arms on the table and resting his chin on them. "I'm not going to."

Glaring at him, Dean shook his head, turning away and coughing out "dick."

"Okay, fair. Rude, but fair. That's not why, though." Gabriel did his best to gesture illustratively. "Think of yourself as a door. And this curse is…oh, I don't know. An antique padlock? Which would make my power, in this situation, kinda like a jackhammer. Meaning I could definitely get that lock off you in a jiffy, but - "

"Yeah, yeah, okay." Dean lifted his hands. "I get it."

"Mm-hm. Strong chance of you winding up wood chips." Gabriel straightened. "You'd be way better off waiting on our brothers to find the key for this particular padlock."

"Yeah," Dean muttered, "and who knows how long that's gonna be." He blew out a breath, shaking his head, then looked up at Gabriel to complain, "Man, I'm supposed to be the big brother."

"Well, not like you weren't already the short one before." Being an angel helped Gabriel see Dean's expressions, small as he was. Including the fierce scowl he was aiming his way now. "Aww, c'mon, sprout, cheer up. We're gonna have a great time, I promise. I'm gonna - "

"You try to stick a dress on me," Dean began, "or put me in a dollhouse, o-or set me up with Barbie or some shit, I swear to god, I will crawl in your ear and pop your eyeballs out from the inside."

"Hm. Your knowledge of human anatomy could use some work."

"I will make a tunnel."

"Uh-huh. Look, you don't have to be worried, I know you're not a toy." Gabriel rolled his eyes, and didn't tell Dean he'd never dream of setting him up with a Barbie doll. Not when their scales were so very different. "Not any more than you were when you were full-sized, at least. Just saying, I've shrunk myself down before, and there's lots to enjoy about it."

"Yeah?" Dean was very clearly skeptical. "Like what?"

"Uh, everything." Gabriel began to tick things off on his fingers. "Just watching TV's like going to the movies. You can do laps in the bathtub. Beds are ginormous - hell, pillows are awesome. And don't even get me started on the food."

"The food," Dean repeated, arms crossed over his chest. But he was starting to sound interested.

"Uh huh," Gabriel encouraged, and then picked Dean up by the back of his jacket. Ignoring the cursing and threats, he carried him into the kitchen, then grandly flung out his free arm to indicate the whole thing. "The food."

He could summon anything he wanted to eat at any time, could piece it together out of his own nearly-bottomless wellspring of divine energy with just a snap of his fingers. And he took nearly constant advantage of that; the sweet tooth that he'd lovingly cultivated as part of his trickster disguise hadn't vanished when he came out of hiding. But there was something delightfully hedonistic about having food on hand. That he'd bought, made, pulled from thin air, whatever.

It was grounding, in a way. Comforting. Reminded him that the old days were over, that everything was new, and if not good, then at least better than it had been. He could live exactly the way he wanted to. No hiding who or what he was from other angels or gods or really anybody but the stray human he had to interact with. Remarkable, how good it made him feel. Keeping candy around.

So, where another angel might have torn out the kitchen to replace it with a more useful room, Gabriel had filled it.

Cake stands. Platters of cookies, muffins, and brownies. Boxes of chocolate. Old-timey drugstore-style jars full of jawbreakers and lollipops and gummies, hard candy and jellybeans, marshmallows and taffy. Pastries and sweets covered every counter, filled every cabinet, and even the refrigerator and freezer were stuffed with ice cream, mousse, and pudding.

Gabriel looked down at Dean, still dangling from his fingers. He was quietly staring, slowly began nodding after a second.

"Okay," he agreed, "yeah. You've got a lot of candy."

"Mmm…I feel like you're still not quite getting it." Gabriel set Dean down on the counter. As he straightened his clothes, he opened one of the jars and took out a Hershey's Kiss, peeling the foil off and offering it to Dean. In his hands, it was about the size of a small pumpkin. "Bon appetit, yeah?"

Warily, eyes on him, Dean took a bite of the chocolate. Gabriel magicked up a small glass dish (he didn't keep cutlery or flatware on hand, because what was the point of wasting that space?) and filled it with root beer for him. He knew from experience how thirsty chocolate could make you, and Dean didn't have Grace he could flick around to stop that from happening.

Gabriel could tell, by the way that Dean had started eating the Kiss, that he hadn't intended to devour the whole thing. But that was what wound up happening. By the time he was finished with it, the level of soda in the dish had gone down noticeably, and Dean had chocolate all over his hands, his face, and his belt where he'd fumbled it open partway through.

"Okay, yeah," Dean said, sucking one thumb clean, "you might have a point here."

He belched, and Gabriel wrinkled his nose. Centuries of living with them, and some things humans did were still gross.

"Want more?" he asked Dean. He'd dragged a chair away from the table so he could sit nearby, elbow on the counter and chin in his hand. Now, he lifted his other hand, ready to snap.

"Mm." Dean rubbed at his mouth with the back of his hand. It didn't really do anything but smear the chocolate further around. "Yeah, I don't know…"

"Please. I insist." Gabriel snapped his fingers, and a cake appeared directly in front of Dean. Three tiers, whipped icing, glacé cherries liberally dotting it for decoration. One of his favorites. "C'mon, Dean-o, your brother ditched you and you're six inches tall. Think of this like a vacation, hm?"

Dean was just standing there, looking at the cake with a slight frown and one hand on his stomach. Gabriel leaned forward slightly. He hoped he wasn't going to puke, but if he did, at least it would be easy to clean up.

"Everything good?"

"Yeah, yeah. Just…" Dean glanced at Gabriel. "Think you could make it a pie?"

Gabriel blinked, then snorted, snapping his fingers again. The cake was replaced with an apple-cinnamon pie, still steaming. "Right. That's your thing, isn't it?"

"Ooh-hoo-hoo, yes." Dean eagerly approached the pie, rubbing chocolate covered hands together. Reaching for it, he broke off a piece of the crust, bringing it to his mouth. As Gabriel had intended, it was golden and flaky, and when Dean took a bite, he made a noise that was way too close for comfort to the same one he made when he came, and…wait, how did Gabriel know that? "Y'know what would go awesome with this? Some milk."

Snap. "Really making yourself at home, aren't you?" The root beer was replaced with milk.

"Hey, you're the one who said I oughta treat this like a vacation." Dean popped the rest of the crust piece into his mouth, then reached for more. "That means I ain't lifting a finger."

"Lucky me." Lifting one of his own fingers, Gabriel opened a jar on the counter and levitated a sherbet pop into his mouth. He'd been on a 50s kick recently.

Sucking on it, both elbows on the counter and chin resting in his hands, he watched Dean eat. He worked his way into the pie, going from crust to handfuls of gooey filling, picking up slices of apple that crunched when he bit into them. He was making a real mess of himself, not to mention a lot of inappropriate noises, but Gabriel didn't point out either. He was sure that Dean both knew and didn't care, and truth be told, he didn't care all that much himself.

It wasn't long before Dean had to stand or kneel in the tin to eat. That meant getting out of it and leaving sticky boot prints up and down the counter when he needed a drink, so Gabriel moved the dish of milk closer. Dean quickly graduated from scooping it up to his mouth in one hand to just sticking his head out of the tin and lapping at it every so often. He needed it, with the way that he was going through that pie.

As he ate, his belly grew, and Gabriel watched with interest. He had to undo the button on his jeans, and then the zipper more or less unzipped itself. The fuller he got, the bigger he was, until finally, Dean appeared to have stuffed enough pie into his gut to sate himself for the moment. A quarter of the tin was empty, and he lay on his back among the crumbs and smears of filling, a blissed-out expression on his face and a stomach the size of a ping-pong ball bloated above him. He was so pale, and freckled.

Gabriel poked him. Gently, of course. Dean grunted, then belched.

"I don't think you guys are supposed to be able to get this big," Gabriel noted. "Side effect of the curse, maybe?"

He dragged a finger through the pie filling, bringing it to his mouth. Still warm. Scooping up another fingerful, he held it over Dean's lips, which were parted and panting. Much to his delight, a tiny tongue came out to lap at the sugary goop.

"Oh, yeah." Gabriel chuckled. "We're gonna have so much fun."

It had been a long time since Gabriel had hung out with or even met anybody who loved food as much as he did. Dean definitely couldn't eat the way that Gabriel could, but the passion, the sheer and unbridled gluttony held in check only by physical capacity, was absolutely there. Gabriel couldn't believe the two of them hadn't taken a weekend together or something before now; he was so excited.

He may have gone a little overboard. Or a lot.

The first few days, he showered Dean with sugar, stuffing him full of as many treats as he could hold as often as the opportunity presented itself. Which was very often. Dean loved eating, and especially loved eating the kind of food that Gabriel had or made or summoned. Gabriel loved feeding him. He liked watching him eat, liked watching him scurry around with that big, full belly, and especially liked it when he crashed out into a sugar coma, snoring and hiccuping after Gabriel had let him gorge himself to his heart's content on sweets.

Pretty much constantly stuffed to the gills, he was taking very well to this whole vacation thing. Sam, who kept to his word and called every day, seemed to have had a lot of his tension eased by knowing Dean was doing so well. The only negative thing, as far as Gabriel was concerned, was that it was all going to have to come to an end soon.

The hunt actually wound up taking two weeks, long enough that Gabriel had summoned Dean some comfy miniature sweats. When Sam called, Dean was fast asleep; very easily trained to piggishness by Gabriel's indulgence, he'd spent the better part of the day demolishing a platter of brownies, and had retired to Gabriel's palm. He didn't really enjoy being carried, but sometimes it was a necessity…and sometimes, when he was full and sleepy, there wasn't really anything he could do about it if Gabriel happened to scoop him up.

He was warm. And cute. And Gabriel was always very, very careful not to drop him.

"Hey," Sam greeted when Gabriel picked up. Fast, so the ringing wouldn't wake Dean. "So, imagine you already know we killed the witch."

Gabriel paused. A quick mental inventory didn't turn anything up, so he slowly asked, "How would I know that?"

Sam didn't say anything. Not for a little while, at least. "Is Dean not…big?"

Gabriel looked down at his hand. "Compared to what? I mean, relatively speaking, he wasn't all that big before - "

"Gabe," Sam interrupted with the air of somebody who was just about broke in the patience department, "did he get bigger or not?"

"Uh." Squinching one eye shut, Gabriel turned his hand one way, then another, examining Dean from different angles. "Maybe, like, a centimeter or two…?"

"Fuck." Sam said something to Castiel. Gabriel recognized the gravelly voice when he responded; fledgling really rode his vessel's vocal chords hard. Coming back, Sam asked, "Yeah, all right. Awesome. So, we're gonna be a while longer, obviously…can he stay there?"

"Well, of course he can!" Gabriel exclaimed, maybe a little too enthusiastically. There was a long pause from Sam.

"Can I talk to him?"

"Uh, he's asleep, but I could wake him up, if you want…"

"He's asleep?" Sam repeated, sounding shocked. "Seriously? He usually doesn't conk out 'til one or two, and then he's up…" He trailed off. "Uh, no. No, don't wake him up. God knows he needs the sleep. You, um…I'll talk to him later. Thanks, Gabriel. This really, really means a lot."

"Oh, no problem. Anytime."

Sam hung up. Gabriel set his phone down on the table, then looked down at Dean. At his stomach rising and falling with every breath. After a second, he lifted him to his mouth, and kissed his tiny, swollen belly. Dean grunted and squirmed, then relaxed.

"Know you're not a toy," Gabriel whispered against the taut skin, "buuuut…just for the next few weeks. 'Til your brother comes to get you." He cocked his head. "How 'bout a pet?"

"All righty." Turning, Gabriel offered up the petit four with a flourish. "How about this one?"

Dean reached for it, grunting as he shifted himself. He was reclining on the cushion that Gabriel had brought into the kitchen for him, up on the counter within easy reach. His shirt and the fabric around him were sprinkled with icing, cake crumbs, and powdered sugar. They'd been at this a couple of hours, as evidenced by the extraordinarily well-fed belly sinking him into the plush cushion.

"Yeah, this one's good, too," Dean agreed through a full mouth, after taking a bite. "I'd eat more of it…"

He belched, reaching for the straw that Gabriel had dangling over his spot. Led directly to a bottle of beer, for quenching his frequent thirst. Really incredible how he could swell up on that and pastries over the course of a day.

"You can definitely have more, then." Gabriel bent over the cookie he was currently crafting. "Next one coming up."

"Still don't get why you - " Dean belched again. "Need me to be a taste tester."

"You're human," Gabriel explained. "You taste things differently. And that tummy is just too cute."

He gave it a little wobble with the tip of one finger. Dean half-heartedly swatted it away with a snort.

"Whatever." He popped the last handful of cake into his mouth, contentedly rubbing at his own stomach. "Just keep 'em coming."

"C-c-c…"

Gabriel could hear Dean's little teeth chattering from all the way across the kitchen. It sounded like somebody dropping a handful of sand onto the floor. He sucked icing off his fingers, pushing the slice of cake he was halfway through back out of the danger zone (he'd never seen the point of wasting time with forks), and turned.

He'd left Dean over on the other counter, near his cushion, while he did various chores around the house. Including eating a slice of cake after every one that he completed, because obviously he needed motivation. To ensure that Dean didn't wind up squashed under Gabriel's bare foot, he'd set a carton of double-fudge ice cream out to serve as a babysitter.

"C-c-cold."

Looked like Dean had gone at it with maybe just a little too much enthusiasm.

Crouched in a good-sized scoop he'd hollowed out inside the carton, looking more than a little blue, Dean hugged himself and shivered. Gabriel picked him up, tiny vibrations traveling up into his fingers where he pinched the back of Dean's shirt. His perfect gumball gut was on display, packed so solid with ice cream it didn't move at all.

"Brain freeze?" Gabriel guessed. Dean's rapid blinking and shuddering grimace told him all that he needed to know. "Yeah, I've been there…you can't eat that much ice cream in that short a sitting, bucko. Tempting as I know it is, trust me."

"I'mmm f-f-freezing," Dean ground out. Gabriel dropped him into his other hand, and he immediately curled around his stomach, pressing as much of himself into his palm as he could. Unfortunately for Dean, the efficiency with which Gabriel's Grace powered his vessel's biological processes meant that his body temperature ran much lower than the average human's. He could feel how cold Dean's stomach was to the touch, though.

That kind of delighted him. That he was that full of ice cream, and that he'd eaten so fast, shoveling it into his mouth with both hands, that it was still cold inside him.

"I really oughta just pop you back in the carton there," Gabriel mused aloud, "let you warm up on your own. Teach you a lesson." He was big on lessons. Another vestigial holdover from his trickster days, and not one he was likely to give up anytime soon - poetic justice was like honey on the tongue and wine in the throat. "But…"

It was very unlikely Dean would freeze to death. Very unlikely he'd do anything at all but shiver and bitch. He was just so pathetic, though, that it tugged on Gabriel's heartstrings a little too hard, and he'd always found it tough to be hands-off when it came to the Winchesters.

Not to mention, Gabriel was a very responsible pet owner.

"Fine." Sighing dramatically, Gabriel snapped the fingers of his free hand. His palm was immediately filled with the bulb of a miniature turkey baster, warmth radiating down through it. The stem was filled with a milky brown liquid. Hot chocolate, hovering right in the Goldilocks zone of just warm enough to un-chill Dean while still being cool enough not to burn him. "Here we go."

"W-w-wait, what - " Gabriel cut Dean off by inserting the narrow tip of the baster (probably small enough to be called a pipette, honestly) into his mouth. His eyes widened, almost bugging out of his face, and Gabriel could hear and feel his teeth chattering against the plastic. Not for long, though. Gabriel gave the bulb a very delicate squeeze with thumb and index, the rest of his fingers fanned straight up, and sent hot chocolate shooting right down Dean's throat.

He didn't want to choke or drown him, so he went slow and gentle as he filled him up. Dean's belly swelled, both of his tiny hands on it, and Gabriel felt the weight on his palm increase. And the warmth, as the ice cream melted and was canceled out. There was an audible, rubbery little pip noise as Dean's navel popped outwards, and Gabriel bit his lip. Cute.

Sweat beaded on Dean's stomach, his forehead. A heat blush swept across his cheeks. When Gabriel withdrew the now-empty baster, Dean let out a massive belch that rattled him even harder in Gabriel's hand than the shivering had, then a hiccup. His fluid-filled gut wobbled and sloshed.

"There we go," Gabriel cooed, raising Dean to eye level and smiling at his stunned expression. "All warmed up?"

"Oh." Dean grunted. "Pretty sure you're feeding me too much, dude."

Gabriel tapped the remote with one finger, pausing the very large flatscreen TV mounted on the wall. Soon after moving into the house, he'd invested in an enormous beanbag. He could have just snapped one up, but…it was like the food. The indulgence was the whole point.

He was nestled deep in it, Dean very close by, making a teeny-tiny divot in the bag. Propping himself up on one elbow, Gabriel looked down at him, raising an eyebrow.

"I'm feeding you too much?" he asked. "C'mon. There's no feeding involved here. All I'm doing is making food available; you think it's my fault if you have no self-control?"

"Jesus, spare me the lecture." Dean groaned. "Thought you were the fun angel."

"I'm a barrel of laughs," Gabriel responded. "But why would you think you're being…overfed?"

"Well, 'cause when I lay down…" Dean demonstrated. "Can't see over my stomach."

"Is that all? That's an easy fix." Gabriel reached for Dean, who made an undignified little yelping noise when he scooped him up. He really would have thought he'd be used to this by now. Settling Dean on his own chest, so he was propped up, Gabriel gave his belly a fond little wobble, then threw his arms wide in appreciation of his own genius. "Huh?"

"Gabe - " Dean pushed himself up on his elbows, tilting his head back so that he could see Gabriel. "Look, this really ain't - "

"Can you see now or not?" Gabriel interrupted him patiently. Dean stayed where he was for a second, then settled back down with a sigh, a warm little weight on the sternum of Gabriel's vessel.

Gabriel closed his smallest pair of wings protectively over him. He couldn't see them, so they wouldn't block his view.

"Now, eat your popcorn." He dangled a piece of caramel corn above Dean, waiting until he reached up and grabbed it away from him. "Only a few pieces left, and then I'm gonna make another batch. Trust me, you haven't even seen overfeeding yet."

Gabriel knew something was wrong as soon as he opened the door. He could feel Dean's distress, and it set his downies quivering, almost enough to make him drop the bags of groceries he was carrying. All that was even before he heard the tiny voice, full of panic.

"Gabe - !"

Gabriel wasn't at all worried about something or someone being in the house. He could lay warding that would make Sam Winchester cry, having been undercover as a Norse god for centuries, and it was especially beefy because it ran off his archangel Grace. A mosquito couldn't get into this place without his say-so, which was only grudgingly given even to people he liked.

But there was all kinds of trouble an action-figure-sized Winchester could get into, all on his lonesome. So Gabriel flicked his wings open and went straight to the source of the screaming.

Dean was in the kitchen, as he usually was. Really, the layer of chub coming up all over him was kind of miraculous, considering all the energy he expended scaling the counters and clambering in and out of containers; real testament to his gluttony.

Said gluttony seemed to have gotten the best of him here, though, because he'd trapped himself inside an extra-large jar of maraschino cherries. Slicked all over with the sticky red fluid, hair and clothes matted to his skin, Gabriel could see the whites of his eyes, wide in panic. Cherries log-rolled away under his feet when he tried to stand on them. He'd managed to hook the wide part of a stem over the lip of the jar and was hanging on for dear life, but who knew how long that would have lasted. Between the glacé fragility of the stem and the trembling that Gabriel could see in Dean's biceps…

Good thing he'd gotten home when he had.

Don't say it, Gabriel told himself sternly as he hurried towards the counter and stuck his hand into the jar. Don't say it, don't say it, don't say -

"Well." Gabriel pinched the back of Dean's shirt, crispy with sugar. "Somebody got themselves into a…sticky situation, huh?"

Dean glared at him as he let go of the stem, hands stiff claws from how long he'd been holding on. The expression might have been intimidating, if he'd been full-sized. As it was, Gabriel couldn't see it as anything but adorable.

"Really?" he groused as Gabriel pulled him out of the jar, dripping.

"Think what you mean is 'thank you,' kiddo." Gabriel touched the jar of cherries with his free hand, discreetly cleaning the contents. Humans were gross, it was a fact. "What were you thinking?"

"Look, I didn't mean to fall in, I was just trying to fish a few out…" Dean flexed his hands, and his bare feet. "Ugh. Think you can put me down so I can get cleaned up?"

"And let you leave sticky little footprints all over my nice, clean house?" Gabriel stopped a few drops of syrup from falling, letting them float illustratively in the air. "I don't think so."

"Fine," Dean said, rolling his eyes and muttering "Like you couldn't just wipe it up" under his breath. "Wanna snap me clean, then?"

He held his arms out plaintively. Gabriel raised his free hand in the ready position, then hesitated, looking at the red globules hanging suspended, feeling his tongue poke out of the corner of his mouth in thought. He adjusted his grip on Dean, wrapping a finger around his chest rather than holding him by the shirt. Dad, was he ever sticky. Then he snapped his fingers, and Dean's clothes vanished.

"Whoa, hey - son of a bitch." Dean tried to cover his groin with both hands, but with Gabriel's finger right under his armpits, he just didn't have the reach. He settled for tightly crossing his legs in midair instead, which didn't do all that much. "Your aim's off, Gabe. You need a tune-up?"

"Nah. Meant to do that." Gabriel lifted Dean to face level, and brought him closer. He saw the exact second that a possibility entered his mind, and Gabriel must not have done all that great a job at ticking all the "friend" boxes in Dean's head, because naked fear and rage splashed across his face. He twisted, struggling and swearing, and it looked like he was gearing up to bite. "Oh, for the love of…calm down, marmoset, I'm not gonna eat you. That'd be disgusting."

That didn't do a whole lot to put Dean at ease. Gabriel guessed he could understand that, considering how close he was holding him to his mouth. Still, he rolled his eyes, figured he'd better set the record straight sooner rather than later, and stuck his tongue out to flick the tip against one of Dean's feet.

Despite what Gabriel had had to do to the cherry jar for sterility's sake, Dean really wasn't dirty. He'd apparently liked hot baths to begin with, and being able to use a sink like an onsen had just made water all the more appealing to him. The flavor on Gabriel's tongue reflected all the time he spent splashing and scrubbing. Mostly just maraschino syrup, with the faintest hint of salt and that very human musk.

Gabriel smacked his lips, concentrating on the taste, as Dean yelped and bicycled his legs in midair, like that would somehow keep them out of licking range.

"What the fuck are you doing?!" he demanded. Gabriel raised his eyebrows.

"What's it look like? Cleaning you up." He brought Dean in closer, even as he struggled against his grip. "Keep squirming like that, and I'm just gonna pop you in my mouth and suck it off you."

He licked him again, despite Dean's best efforts. This one was a proper lick, a long, full-tongued swipe up one leg, over knee and thigh to groin. Tiny dick and balls felt proportionally large against the sensitive sponge of Gabriel's tongue. He flicked it up off the crown of Dean's stomach, mouth full of sweet red syrup, and then pulled him back so he could get a look at him.

Dean had stopped kicking and squirming. There was a slightly stunned expression on his face, like he'd just bitten into something he'd expected to be disgusting and found it delicious. Gabriel could see how wide his little pupils were thanks to angelic eyesight. Not to mention the fact his cock was starting to chub up, even with the chilling effect of air on wet skin.

Gabriel chuckled. "Ooh. We like that, don't we?"

"You ever tell Sam about this," Dean said, voice gone all deep and husky with arousal, "I will rip your wings out through your chest."

"Ooh, the reverse Blood Eagle. Duly noted, pipsqueak." Gabriel licked his lips, bringing Dean back in again. "Now. Why don't we get you cleaned up?"

Gabriel bathed Dean from head to toe with his tongue. He wound up letting go of him and letting him just sit in his hands, both palms held together so he wouldn't tumble out of one. The syrup had started to dry on him, making for a very tasty candy coating, so stubborn areas took more than one lick. Gabriel wound up sucking on Dean's arms and legs as he panted against his lips, lapping at his round belly over and over again to set it bouncing, tonguing delicately between the cheeks of a very plush ass.

He also paid a lot more attention to Dean's groin than he strictly needed to, going back between his thighs over and over again even after he was completely clean there, as Dean tried not to rut against his tongue and utterly failed.

He hadn't been able to taste cherry syrup for quite a while, but Gabriel only considered Dean fully clean when, on one of his passes, he heard a sharp gasp from him, and then a bitter saltiness bloomed across his tongue in a little patch. Gabriel swallowed, then pulled back, grinning down at Dean. Dean lay chubby, pink, and damp in his hands, flat on his back and panting.

"There we go," Gabriel cooed encouragingly, "clean as a whistle. That wasn't so bad, was it?" After a second's thought, he cocked his head. "Don't suppose you'd feel like taking a dip in the honey jar later?"

It was a little after midnight, maybe around one in the morning, when Gabriel realized that he hadn't seen Dean in a while.

Not that that was unusual. Dean slept, Gabriel did not. He did have a very large and comfortable nest in what had been intended to be the master bedroom, but Dean didn't go in there. Nobody who wasn't Gabriel could even see the door. Dean had a shoebox full of flannel, foam, and cotton in the hall closet, so as not to be disturbed, and that was where he slept when he wasn't dozing in Gabriel's hand or lap. He'd dropped him off there a couple hours ago so that he could tool around in his hobby room. Dean had been totally zonked from his usual evening pie overload; Gabriel didn't really feed him a whole lot that wasn't sweet.

He had a hunch, though. So with a deep and long-suffering sigh, he put down the tweezers, sealed up the bag of hand-painted tombstones, and left his hobby room. And looked like he'd been right: when he opened the closet door, Dean's box was empty.

It wasn't like he was locked in. The gap beneath the door was more than big enough for him to scoot out through. The house wasn't that large, and there was really only one place that he could have gone.

Gabriel knew that he was right even before he turned on the lights in the kitchen. Not only could he see in the dark pretty handily, being an angel and all, but the low groan and hiccup that came from the counter was sort of a dead giveaway.

Still. He flicked the switch, and the lights came on to reveal a scene of carnage.

Dean hadn't done as much damage as he could have, if he'd been full-sized. A couple of jars had been tipped over to spill their candy contents across the counter. (Gabriel was a little shocked that he hadn't heard the commotion that that would have caused, but then again, he had been wearing headphones while he worked, podcasts playing loud - he loved those McElroy brothers.) Some of the ready-made pastries had been uncovered, cookies half-eaten, doll-sized handfuls scooped out of cakes and especially pies. The little hamster-bottle style dispensers of soda, milk, and other beverages that Gabriel had attached to the wall for Dean, kept magically chilled and fresh, had seen their levels decrease, messy little puddles accumulating and running together underneath them.

In the middle of all of it, starfished out flat on his back, Dean huffed and moaned. He was surrounded by crumbs, chocolate and icing on face and hands and the pajamas Gabriel had put together for him, and his drum-tight stomach was all but vibrating with fullness. He'd gorged himself so thoroughly that not only was the skin red and shiny, but his navel had popped from an innie to an outie. Like the timer on a turkey that was done cooking.

And even as Gabriel watched, Dean wearily tossed a crumb up into the air and caught it in his mouth, chewing and swallowing with exactly zero enjoyment. Still eating.

Hands squeezed tightly together, Gabriel trilled in the back of his throat, a noise he hadn't made in decades. No need to explain to Dean exactly what it meant.

"Uh-oh." Gabriel's voice was sing-song, and a little more smug than he'd strictly meant for it to come out, as he approached the counter. "Did we overdo it? Make too much of a pig of ourselves?" He approached. "How are you so greedy?"

"Fuck off." Dean grunted. "Lea'me alone."

"Now." Gabriel planted his elbows on the counter, put his chin in his hands as he stared raptly down at the beacon of over-indulgence that was Dean's gut. "Why would I do that?"

"Gabe - " Dean huffed out a hiccup that, judging by his squirming, was very painful. "Jus' lemme…die in peace, huh?"

Gabriel rolled his eyes. "Stop being a drama queen, you're not gonna die. Not with me around." He squinted down at Dean. "You're not even gonna pop, much as it might look like it - how much did you eat?"

Dean just grunted. Gabriel had become pretty fluent in "overstuffed Winchester" the past few weeks, and translated it easily in his head: Why don't you take a look around? You got eyes, don't you? Pretty obvious.

Gabriel sniffed. Rude.

"You know, I really ought to just leave you like this," he told Dean. He wasn't sure how much of this he was processing, based on the fuzzy way that he was blinking, but he continued anyway. "Let you learn a lesson about restraint. But…" He sighed dramatically, and saw Dean wince, as if even the touch of breath on his overwrought tummy was too much. "Oh, I just can't bear to see you in so much pain, dumpling. Poor thing."

Gabriel snapped his fingers, then touched the tip of one very delicately to Dean's stomach. Instantly, the redness dissipated, and the shape changed, navel sinking back in and belly no longer so painfully, tightly round. It slouched, soft and squishy once again, and Dean raised his head, staring at it. He touched his middle experimentally with one hand, and then looked up at Gabriel, accusatory.

"What the hell'd you do to me?" he demanded.

"'Thanks, Gabe.'" Gabriel mimicked Dean's voice. "'I really appreciate it, Gabe. I don't feel like I'm going to burst like a water balloon any second because of my own runaway gluttony and that's just real swell of you, Gabe.' You're a brat, you know that?"

Dean didn't say anything, just glared, so Gabriel heaved a sigh and straightened up.

"I took away your capacity," he said. "Now you can eat as much as you want without any kind of pain or discomfort."

Dean stared down at himself, hand still on his stomach, then swallowed a little before looking back up at Gabriel. "Uh. I-I don't know, dude, that seems - "

"Awesome?" Gabriel guessed, interrupting him. "Like the best present you've ever received from anybody? Yeah, I know, you're welcome."

Dean hesitated a second longer, then blew out a breath, quickly followed by a huge belch. "I…yeah. Okay, sure, that's pretty cool." He frowned. "Probably better put me back to normal when Sam comes to pick me up, though."

"Oh, don't worry, I hitched it to the curse you've got on you." Gabriel waved a hand. "Soon as it's broken, this goes away, too." He shrugged. "Just thought you ought to be able to enjoy yourself to the fullest for whatever amount of time we've got left. Huh?"

"Well." Dean gave a little shrug. "Guess I can't argue with that."

"Of course you can't." Gabriel scooped Dean up. He grunted a little, but otherwise leaned comfortably back against Gabriel's fingers, more than used to being held by this point. "Now, since you don't have a limit anymore…" He reached for one of the cakes that Dean had eaten a hole in. "You're gonna finish what you started."

"Gabe - " Dean began. Gabriel arched an eyebrow.

"Can't let anything go to waste, can we?"

He nudged Dean's belly, soft and jiggly, with his thumb as he passed a chunk of moist chocolate cake to him with the rest of his fingers. Dean grunted again, but didn't put up any sort of a fight as he took a bite.

Not when we could let it go to "waist" instead.

Gabriel frowned. The paintbrush held between his teeth, a very fine one for detail work, bobbed up and down with the motion of his mouth, speckling the surface of his work table with brown dye. One elbow rested on it, chin on his fist.

"Hmm."

Dean was very nearby (in fact, Gabriel's attention was fixed on him), but he didn't respond to the noise. He probably couldn't hear him, stretched out on a folded-up polishing cloth between the earcups of Gabriel's spare pair of Beats, listening to Moby Dick on tape. He couldn't watch TV all the time, had been using the opportunity to get caught up on the kind of books he said he'd missed out on in school. He seemed surprised by how much he liked a lot of them.

His eyes were closed, chest rising and falling, head pillowed on the arm that he had underneath it, but Gabriel knew that he wasn't asleep. A bag of white chocolate morsels was spilled out inside the halo of the headphones, a bottle cap of Coke within easy sipping reach, and every so often, he'd reach up to grab a chip or roll over to get a drink.

Frown deepening, Gabriel reached out, and rubbed and squished at Dean's stomach with one knuckle. He was halfway between being on his back and being on his side, and it spilled out in front of him, resting on the cloth, pale and soft and freckled and fully uncontained by his T-shirt or his sweats. The size and shape reminded Gabriel of a very generous ball of cookie dough dolloped out onto a baking sheet.

Dean barely reacted. By now, he was trained to expect and very much enjoy belly rubs at any time and from all directions, Gabriel just could not leave that tiny gut alone. He did, however, crack open one eye, appraise Gabriel's expression, and mutter, "'S wrong?"

"Well…" Gabriel let the paintbrush fall out of his mouth, placed it telekinetically in the jar of rinse water he had handy. His own eyes roamed up and down Dean's form as he dragged his teeth slowly over his lower lip. Dean eyed him right back, impatience growing. Gabriel could swear he knew how fluffed his wings were right now.

Dean's belly was practically groaning under the weight of all the sweets in it. As usual, Gabriel had been feeding him nonstop since he woke up this morning, and it wasn't like it was an unwilling throat he was cramming all that sugar down. Dean ate plenty on his own, prettily as he might allow Gabriel to hand-feed him these days, now that they were past the biting and bitching stage.

But he didn't think that it was only bloat giving that pampered gut its delightful heft and jiggle. Dean had grown considerably since arriving at Gabriel's place, and not in the way that would signify the breaking of his curse. The arm under his head was meaty. His shirts now acted as bras for a luscious pair of breasts. His thighs were thick and plush. His cheeks were round and chubby, his second chin running right into his thickened neck. His love handles complemented his wide hips. His ass had grown extraordinarily plump, cushiony when he sat in Gabriel's palm, rivaling his belly in size. He was soft. Spoiled. Overindulged. His gluttony had grown with every treat Gabriel had stuffed him with, become a nigh-monstrous thing.

In other words, Dean had gotten really fucking fat under Gabriel's care.

"Somebody…" Gabriel drew his hand back, and steepled his fingers in front of him, pressing his mouth against his thumbs. "Has been overfeeding you."

There were no meals anymore. Just one unending day-long binge. And midnight snacks were a near-constant occurrence now. Dean would gorge until his belly was too large and heavy for him to drag around on his own anymore, then lazily call out for Gabriel to bring him more. Gabriel didn't even remember the last time he'd fed him something other than candy, or pastries, or some other kind of baked good. He didn't think cream counted.

Dean blinked at that, then fumbled for the button on the side of the headphones, pressing it to pause the playback. He heaved himself up into a sitting position with a grunt, belly spilling fluidly forward to fill his lap, and looked up at Gabriel. Hands behind him to hold his weight, he raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah," he agreed dryly. "'Somebody.'"

"Seriously overfeeding you," Gabriel went on. "Shockingly. Criminally, even."

"Uh huh." Dean yawned. "You really beating yourself up about this?"

Gabriel sucked his teeth, eyes on Dean's belly. Dean sighed.

"Look, man, it ain't that bad. Little bit of a spare tire." He took a handful of his own middle. Gabriel chose not to point out that the tire in question probably belonged to one of those huge excavators they used for strip mining. "Probably not even an ounce. Won't be able to see it, once I'm not fun-sized anymore."

Gabriel didn't respond. Picking up his bottle cap, Dean brought it to his mouth, then drained the Coke. Roughly the equivalent of a small bucket for him. His belly swelled even bigger as Gabriel watched, and he belched when he lowered the cap. The force of it jiggled his tits.

"Now." Dean gave his gut a pat. It rippled, and he audibly sloshed. "You feel like overfeeding me a little more, I could use a lift to the kitchen. Some pie'd really hit the spot."

Gabriel bit his lip. Dean raised his eyebrows hopefully. A second passed then, with a deep sigh, Gabriel scooped him up. He was heavy and soft in his hand.

"Dad, you are so spoiled." Gabriel scoffed. "I can't say no to you."

He dropped a kiss on top of Dean's head as he got up to carry him into the kitchen. Dean grumbled, wiping at his hair, but it wasn't like there was anything he could actually do about it.

Especially not if he wanted Gabriel to hand-feed him that entire pie…which Gabriel knew that he did.

Some months after Dean had originally been cursed, Sam finally figured out how to break it. The only problem was that he couldn't do it from a distance. He had to get Dean and take him back to the bunker so he could work his magic.

Sam had not called before he came to pick up Dean. Gabriel really, really, really wished that he had.

Standing in the house's entryway, Sam stared down at what Gabriel had just deposited into his hands. And he did need both hands; there was no way he could have held his brother otherwise.

Gabriel probably should have stopped feeding Dean a few weeks back, when he'd first gotten too fat to walk around on his own or even get up, but he hadn't. So here they were.

Dean was practically a perfect sphere, except where the demands of gravity dictated otherwise. Mostly belly, all told, but his ass and moobs made a good showing. His legs had been all but swallowed up underneath him, and his arms were on their way there, already completely useless and unable to be moved where the size of him forced them up and out like chubby little chicken wings. His plump face sat on top of it all, head wildly out of proportion. It was a miracle his fat didn't cover his mouth.

Dean gave a little hiccup, then groaned, blinking slowly. Just because he no longer had any real limit to speak of on how much he could eat didn't mean he couldn't get stomachaches when he was this full. Full enough that Gabriel wasn't totally sure he even knew Sam was holding him; he definitely hadn't reacted to anything but the motion.

He shouldn't have fed him so much. He absolutely should not have. But Dean had just kept on begging for more, melting Gabriel's heart, because if he'd thought Sam had puppy dog eyes -

Sam spent a solid several minutes just looking at the blob of lard that Gabriel had fed his older brother into. He drew in a long, slow breath, and Gabriel recognized the characteristic sound of a Winchester walking himself back from planting a foot in an ass as Sam raised his eyes to Gabriel.

"You got anything to say for yourself?" Sam asked him.

"Yeah." Gabriel clasped his hands under his chin and bounced his eyebrows hopefully. "Can I keep him?"