AN: Written for Sabriel Week's Day 3 Prompt: General Domesticity. Crossposted to Tumblr and Archive of Our Own
Those Saturday Mornings
The sheets were soft, well used; they smelled like fabric softener, like them. Sam's aftershave, the coconut shower oil Gabriel likes to use, the faintest trace of their mingled sweat.
Gabriel lay curled around him, trying to turn Sam into the little spoon; the angel's skin was bed warmed, almost too hot to the touch. Sam turned onto his back, slipped his arm around Gabriel, moved the angel's head to lie on Sam's chest.
"M'rning, Sammy." Gabriel's voice was sleep-thick, gravelly. Angels didn't need sleep (and maybe most of them couldn't sleep from what Sam gathered), but Gabriel liked to indulge. Sam supposed thousands of years following one's baser desires was hard to break.
Gabriel stretched, threw his arm over Sam's rib cage; his right leg came up to wrap around Sam's thighs. "Dream?"
"Mm." Combing his fingers through the fine hairs at the nape of the angel's neck, Sam licked his lips and started to speak. It was a familiar ritual. Something they'd started doing before the apocalypse. They'd picked it back up, with relish, when the world didn't end. Telling each other their dreams. Well, Sam's dreams, Gabriel's memories. For an angel, dreaming was less strange neurochemistry putting together images that may or may not have some meaning and more a meditative recap of their existence, sometimes beautiful, sometimes terrifying, not always within their control.
Last night, Sam had dreamed about pie.
He'd talked to Dean yesterday afternoon; his brother and Cas were coming for a visit next week.
"Believe I'm the one who's supposed to be having sweets-related dreams, Winchester," Gabriel murmured against Sam's skin, punctuating it with a lick along Sam's clavicle, another over a hardened nipple and Sam closed his eyes, sucked in a breath that was startled back out of him by the sound of the bedroom door creaking open, the bowling-pin clatter of feet against the hardwood, a weight launching itself onto the bed and a knee hitting his crotch.
Sam's arms went around Isabel in an instant and he twisted, plopping her on the mattress next to him. Gabriel, who'd rolled out of the way of danger, grinned from his perch at the foot of the bed.
"What're you doing up so early?" Sam asked, running his fingers through their daughter's hair; dark and down soft, it always felt like feathers against his skin, which, considering her parentage—one night stand between an Archangel-Trickster and Crow—wasn't too surprising.
Big brown eyes looked up at him accusingly. "Don't you know what today is?"
Sam widened his eyes. "Is it your birthday?"
"No!"
"Is it my birthday?" Gabriel asked.
"No!"
"Christmas?" Sam said.
"Uh-huh!"
Gabriel snapped his fingers. "Guy Fawkes Day!"
"No!" Isabel crowed while Sam raised an eyebrow at the angel.
"Well, I'm stumped," Gabriel said.
"Daddy," Isabel's voice was on the edge of a whine, "it's Pancake Day."
"Ah! So it is," Gabriel said, scooping her up. "How could we have forgotten such an important day?"
"She's definitely your kid," Sam murmured as he grabbed his shorts, followed the two down the stairs and into the open and airy kitchen.
As Gabriel snapped the ingredients for pancakes from the pantry to the counter (he would've preferred to just snap the pancakes together, but Isabel liked to mix the batter, watch it bubble on the skillet) and got Isabel started on their weekly ritual, Sam checked his phone. A message from Dean confirming when he and Cas would be in; a message from Gabriel that bordered on X-rated and had Sam saving it to the archives while sending a pointed glare at the angel who just smiled, licked batter from his fingertips; lastly, a message from Bobby about a possible hunt.
As Isabel set the table and Gabriel piled an ungodly amount of pancakes onto a platter, Sam pulled the details up on his laptop. Looked like a simple salt and burn in a town about two hours away.
"Papa," Isabel frowned, voice thick with pancake and syrup, "You're not supposed to work on Pancake Day."
"You're right," Sam said, closing the laptop and setting it aside. "I'm sorry."
"Forgiven," Isabel said, holding out her fork for Sam to take a bite.
The pancake was light, buttery and melted against his tongue; the flavor of strawberry tingled in his mouth, even as Gabriel grabbed him, pressed a kiss to Sam's lips as if he were chasing after the flavor. Maybe he was.
Gabriel pulled away, made a face at Isabel that had her giggling into her milk and Sam helped himself to the platter of pancakes, thinking that these Saturday mornings weren't like the ones he used to dream about when he was teenager, waking up in stale motel bedrooms to the sound of Dean and Dad's snores.
They were better.
End