Chapter 7: Are You For Real?
Living with Gabe was different. The silence at night was deafening but refreshing, no longer having to worry about my father shouting for Bobby was like lifting a mountain off my shoulders and throwing it half way across the world.
After the first two weeks Gabe and I fell into some sort of routine. I'd make breakfast while Gabe got ready work, then we'd head out to the Roadhouse to help Ellen with inventory or I'd meet up with Dean at the cliff near the outskirts of town. Then we'd get home at around 3am.
I liked this routine, now that I had graduated I had decided to take a gap year before I went to college, just to save up money and anyway, I honestly had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. I was perfectly content with working at the Roadhouse for the rest of my life.
I noticed that Gabe had the tendency to try to take my phone and read my texts to Dean, but Gabe was a horrible thief and an even worse liar.
"Gabe, what the hell are you doing?" I asked one day as I saw him trying to fish my phone out of my coat's pocket, while I was still wearing it. He froze, half his hand sticking out of my pocket.
"Uh, sorry, I wasn't looking what I was doing; I thought it was my pocket." Now that would have been believable if we weren't sitting at his kitchen island and he was almost a foot away from me, and if he was wearing a coat, which he wasn't.
"Gabe, please get your hand out of my pocket and leave my phone the hell alone. I know you're just aching to read my texts or whatever, but the day I let you do that, is the day hell freezes over." I said, trying to sound as menacing as I possibly could.
"Well, I'd stop trying to read your texts if you would just let me meet the guy. I just wanna get to know him is all." Gabe said, promptly removing his hand from my pocket and returning his attention to his cereal.
"I've told you already, Gabe, you'll meet him, just not yet, okay?" I didn't want to make Gabe feel more uncomfortable than he already did with my sexuality. "I don't want to make it weird for either of you, that's all."
"Okay, okay, I get it, all I'm saying is that I want to meet him. It's been a long time since I saw you this happy, Cas, and I just want to meet the guy who's making you feel like this." Gabe gave me half a smile and shoved a spoonful of cereal in his mouth.
"Gabe, Dean isn't the only reason I'm happy. Ever since I left home, ever since I came here I've felt like I'm finally allowed to be happy. Gabe, you're part of the reason why I'm happy, and I want you to be happy too, okay? But I don't want to rush things with Dean either, I don't want to make him feel like he's being forced to meet you. He's told me that he wants to meet with you, but I just think that we should wait a little longer, just until things are solid with me and him, and with me and you. Okay?" I understood where Gabe was coming from, I understood why he wanted to meet Dean, but maybe that wasn't the problem. I was nervous, What if he didn't like Dean? What if Dean didn't like him? Dean's three years older than me, what if Gabe disapproved? In all honesty, I just didn't want them to meet because I was terrified.
"Okay, Cas, I understand." Gabe gave me an apologetic smile and that was about the end of that for a while.
My not wanting Dean and Gabe to meet didn't stop Dean from making his nightly visits, coming through my window in the middle of the night from the fire escape and crawling into bed with me and holding me and sometimes humming Metallica songs in my ear while I slept. Of course he'd always be gone by the time I woke up, always leaving with a kiss on my forehead and a whispered "I love you."
If Gabe knew anything about Dean coming to visit then he didn't say anything, which was a relief. Gabe still tried to steal my phone every now and then, but I'd either catch him, or he'd look for it in the wrong place and I'd just let him fumble around and let him think he was on to something.
What surprised me was one day when Gabe actually succeeded in stealing my phone. I'd gone out to get some groceries and forgotten my phone on my bedside table. I walked into the kitchen to find Gabe standing there with a puzzled look on his face, scrolling through my phone.
"Gabe! What are you doing? Give me my phone." I demanded. Shit.
"Cas. Cas what's going on?" Gabe looked up at me, he looked genuinely worried. What the hell?
"Gabe, what are you talking about? Give me my damn phone back." I held out my hand and took a step closer to Gabe.
"Cas. Are you okay?" Gabe shook his head and looked at me like I was going crazy.
"Gabe, what the hell is going on? Will you stop joking around and give me my goddamn phone?" I took another step towards Gabe and he recoiled, almost as if I was some psychotic killer ready to stab him.
"Cas, your texts. Look at your phone, there aren't any replies from Dean. Only your texts to him." Gabe showed me my phones screen from where he was standing. What the hell. He was right, there were no texts in reply to mine. What's going on?
"What? Gabe, are you joking with me? This isn't funny. Did you delete all his texts?" I swear if Gabe was screwing with me, there would be hell to pay.
"I'm not screwing around, Cas, I swear this is how I found your phone. Cas, what's going on?" Gabe dropped his hands to his sides and looked at me like I was sick, like I was demented.
"I don't know, Gabe. Maybe my phone deleted his texts, maybe it ran out of memory or something." I had to stay calm, even though I had no idea what was going one, there had to be an explanation.
"Why would it only delete his messages if the memory ran out? Why wouldn't it delete yours too?" Gabe kept giving me that look.
"I don't know, Gabe. I don't know. But there's nothing wrong with me." I grabbed my phone and went dropped the groceries on the counter, making my way to my room and slamming my door as hard as I could.
What the hell was going on? What was Gabe talking about? Why would my phone be doing this? Was it broken? What the hell?
I sat on my bed and looked at my phone again. By now the screen had gone black. I swiped the unlock button and almost threw my phone across the room, because there on the screen, were all the replies Dean had sent me.