Title: Memories I Wish I Didn't Have
Author: confetticas
Rating: PG-13
Genre and/or Pairing: Sam/Lucifer/Adam/Michael, angst
Spoilers: like the rest of this 'verse, nothing past Swan Song
Warnings: current and past mpreg, discussion of past miscarriage, language
Disclaimer: not mine.
Word Count: 1,158
Summary: Lucifer has a slight breakdown. First Sam, and then Adam and Michael, help him through it. That's what flock is for, after all.
Author's Note: Look, you guys, I wrote angst! I'm baaaaaaaaaaack! :D
“Luce?” Sam asks hesitantly, hovering in the doorway.
Lucifer makes a noise somewhere between a sob and a growl and snaps, “Get. Out.”
Sam bites his lip, and then shakes his head, determined. “I’m not going anywhere,” he answers stubbornly, walking over and sitting down on the floor next to Lucifer. “I told you that before and I meant it. I’m not leaving you. Ever.”
“Go. Away,” Lucifer tries again, but his voice breaks a little and he buries his head in his hands. “Sam, please, just leave me alone. This isn’t a big deal, I’ll get over it.”
Sam sighs and bumps his knee into Lucifer’s. “It’s obviously a big deal, I’m not a complete idiot, Luce. I don’t know what it is, but it’s hurting you and that isn’t okay with me. Tell me what I can do.”
“Just…” Lucifer releases a shaky breath and shakes his head, despondent. “I don’t. Can we just pretend this didn’t happen?”
“I’d say yes, but you and I both know that never ends well,” Sam counters quietly. “I’m not trying to be pushy, it’s just that I hate seeing you hurt and it’s obvious that this is tearing you apart.”
Lucifer sighs tiredly and glances over, meeting Sam’s eyes for a second. “It’s ancient history,” he murmurs regretfully. “Talking about it isn’t going to fix anything, and I don’t want to dredge things up like that.”
“Talking about things helps them hurt less,” Sam replies softly. “And if it’s affecting you like this, it’s already been dredged up. Maybe if you talk, you’ll be able to bury it again, or better still, heal from whatever it is.”
There’s a long moment of silence, and Sam holds his breath, hoping. “This is not the first time I’ve been pregnant,” Lucifer finally says, voice flat and emotionless, eyes trained firmly on the floor.
Sam sucks in a surprised breath, and almost asks you have a kid? before it occurs to him that Lucifer didn’t say anything about having a kid. He said he’d been pregnant, not that he has a child. “What happened?” Sam queries gently, reaching over to grab hold of Lucifer’s hand, lacing their fingers together.
“I lost the baby,” Lucifer murmurs. “It’s incredibly rare for angels, we aren’t like humans. It’s so rare that it’s practically unheard of. There are probably angels who don’t even know that it’s possible. But it is, and I did.”
“Who…”
Lucifer smiles ruefully. “Who else? Michael.”
Sam considers this for a second, and has to ask, “Does… does he know?”
“No. We were… I didn’t have the chance to tell him before I lost the baby, and after, I couldn’t bring myself to tell him,” Lucifer explains quietly. “Like I said, though, it’s ancient history, and I’ve moved on and I don’t know why I’m even - ”
“I do.”
Sam and Lucifer both look up in shock at the interruption. Michael and Adam are standing in the doorway, Michael looking absolutely miserable. “Of course, this is my first time actually experiencing it, but you know better than I do that pregnant angels tend to experience a lot of nostalgia, as well as uncontrollable fits of extreme emotion. Lucifer, I…”
“Don’t,” Lucifer says flatly.
“I have to,” Michael counters, pained. “Lucifer, when?”
Sam glances at Adam, seeing his pain mirrored in his little brother’s eyes. It amazes Sam on an almost daily basis, the things that Michael and Lucifer have been through, and somehow they still manage to put on a brave face and seem relatively well-adjusted every day. The thought of losing the twins makes Sam sick to his stomach, and Lucifer’s been dealing with this on his own for literally millennia. It’s heartbreaking.
Lucifer sighs, closing his eyes briefly. “It was towards the end. Michael, it’s ancient history and you don’t… we don’t need to dredge it all up now. What we have here… it’s amazing, and it shouldn’t be…” tainted by the past goes unsaid, but is heard nonetheless, “Just, let it go. Please.”
“This is hurting you,” Adam interrupts, looking at Lucifer compassionately. “Let us help you carry it. You’re the one who keeps insisting that flock means that we’re there for each other, so let us be here for you. It’s going to hurt, Lucifer, you lost your child. No one is going to hold it against you that it hurts.”
Lucifer shakes his head, standing up and shrugging off Sam’s hand. “I am not broken because of this, and I am not going to sit here and whine about something that happened millennia ago. Just… leave it be. I can’t do this.”
“Damnit, Lucifer!” Michael snaps, looking desperate and pained. “We know you aren’t broken, no one is saying that you are. We’re saying you have every fucking right to hurt, and to miss the child we didn’t get to have, and that it’s okay to talk about it. Look at what we have now, we have each other, and we have our humans, and we’re having children. We are flock again. We’re together, and it’s amazing. You aren’t going to chase us away by bringing this up.”
Silence reigns for several minutes. Lucifer hesitates, conflicting emotions crossing his face, and finally, he manages, “I was going to have our child, Michael. We were going to have a fledgling. And when I… I blamed myself, and I blamed Father, and it tore me apart, and we were fighting all the time. I’d never felt so alone, and it made it so much easier to… Our child would’ve been beautiful, Michael. He’d have been amazing, but I…”
Michael looks devastated. “It wasn’t your fault, you know that, right?” he asks desperately.
Lucifer smirks ruefully, “I had a lot of time to think about it, believe me. I know that it wasn’t my fault, that rare as it is, it just happens. I tried to tell you, I’ve dealt with it, I’ve moved on, it just hit me like it was yesterday, and… I got scared.”
“Your child would have been amazing,” Sam murmurs, wrapping his arms around Lucifer and smiling fondly as Adam and Michael join in the hug.
Lucifer makes a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “You are all saps,” he accuses, but the smile in his voice is impossible to miss, and Sam can feel the stress sliding away as Lucifer relaxes into their touch. “Terrible, pathetic saps. All three of you.”
Adam snickers. “Sam started it.”
“Sam always starts it,” Michael counters affectionately.
“Hey!” Sam protests, grinning at the good-natured and frankly, completely truthful teasing. If nothing else, Lucifer looks a little less broken, and there’s genuine happiness in the fallen archangel’s eyes. This talk isn’t a fix-all, Sam knows, but at least Lucifer doesn’t have to carry this burden alone anymore. It’s still there, still hurts, but they’re flock, like Lucifer keeps saying, and together there isn’t much they can’t accomplish.