A Cardinal Affair - Chapter 1: You Don't Know You're Beautiful (2/2)
"Saaam," Misha whines from his bed. "Why am I not twenty-one yet? Why is my birthday in August?"
It’s Friday evening, Misha has nothing better to do for once, and there’s apparently a drag show at this nearby club that he really wants to see tonight, but it’s twenty-one and up only. Sam, of course, has work in the morning and assignments to finish tonight, so he can’t afford to go out, in more ways than one.
“You realize that only means you just had your birthday recently, and if it were coming up, you’d be even younger?” he points out, his eyes never leaving his laptop screen as he keeps typing.
His roommate flings a cushion at him, which he deflects easily before resuming work on his paper on the philosophy of justice.
“Hmph, I thought you were a nice person.”
Sam laughs. “So you want me to lie to you?”
“No,” Misha groans. “I want you to be sympathetic.”
“I am, Mish, I am,” he murmurs, placating, not a pause in his typing. “What do you want me to say?”
“C’mon, Sam, you have two weeks to finish that paper. Help me figure out how I’m going to sneak in instead.”
Distractedly -Where was that paragraph I wanted to quote here again?-, he offers, “I don’t know, man. Use a fake ID or pick the lock on the back door?”
Misha twists around in his loft. “Sam,” he intones seriously. “You look at me now, young man.”
Sam finishes his sentence and turns, bitchface in full force. “Fine. Fine. Are you happy now?”
Misha’s face splits into a delighted grin. “Nope, but have I told you lately that you’re brilliant? Criminal, but brilliant? Now, just tell me you have the know-how to back those ideas up.”
Shit. Sam groans internally as he realizes what he suggested, but the moment of silence is all the confession his best friend needs.
“Oh my God, you do!” Excitedly, Misha climbs down and takes his hand to tug him to his feet. “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me earlier. Now, come on, get changed. You’re coming with me.”
“What?” Sam twists his hand out of Misha’s grip and stands his ground. “The hell I’m coming with you. I told you I can’t go out tonight.”
“Then how are you going to pick the lock for me? Oh, you’re going to tell me where I can get a fake ID! Wait, how do you know where to get one around here? You haven’t even been here that long!”
Sam sighs, long-suffering, and sits back down. “I don’t. I never said I knew how to accomplish either.”
Misha curls a knee under himself to pull his chair closer and slide into it dejectedly. “But earlier...” he deflates further. “Look, I know we haven’t known each other for very long, and I’m silly and a terrible influence, but man, you didn’t have to crush my dreams like that.”
Sam takes in the sight of pouty, morose Misha, feels something inside crumble even though he’s learned by now that his roommate can be a manipulative little shit, and knows he’s been had when he finally sticks out his hand and mutters, “Let me see your driver’s license.” He’s used to having that effect on Dean, and he never thought he’d ever be on the receiving end, but there’s something about making Misha sad that feels a bit criminal.
Misha looks up in question, but hands the blue-green card over regardless, and Sam inspects it under his desk lamp. It doesn’t actually look too hard to reproduce, not compared to FBI badges anyway.
“I can’t believe you’re older than me,” he remarks as he turns back to his laptop.
Misha makes a wretched sound that’s half-snort-half-sniffle. “That’s fucked up, Sam. You shouldn’t be judging me. Why are you judging me?”
“I’m not judging you, Mish,” he replies, rolling his eyes as he looks through his old files. Aha! He even has a template for Massachusetts. “If I were, I’d ditch your sorry ass and go write my paper in the lounge.”
The other sighs, scooting closer to plant his cheek on Sam’s broader shoulder. That’s when he catches sight of the screen. “Sam, is that...?”
“I swear to God, Mish, if you breathe a word of this to anyone...”
Misha practically squeals in delight. “Scout’s honor!” he promises with a mock salute. “Seriously though, you don’t know how to loft a bed, but you can make fake IDs? Where are you even from?”
Sam laughs humorlessly. “A Chevy ‘67 Impala.”
“I still think you’re Jason Bourne.”
“What, no more Thor or Neo?” He cuts his eyes towards his best friend with a grin.
Misha giggles. “Nope, they’re flashier, and they don’t make fake IDs. But you, o’ best roommate in the universe, can be my superhero anytime~”
~*~
“Oh my God. Vicki. Vicki.” Misha grips her shoulders. “You are not going to believe this. I got Candis Cayne, Erica Andrews and Yoshiko Oshiro to sign my gluteus maximus!”
They’re at the Main Quad, and he can barely keep his voice down from sheer excitement.
“What? No way.”
“Yes way. Do you want to see?” He’s practically bouncing with glee, and people are staring, which isn’t that unusual for him.
“Here? No! How the fuck did you even get in?”
“I- No. I swore I wouldn’t tell a soul. But the point is? Sam? He’s in SHIELD, I tell you.”
Vicki rolls her eyes. “Mish. Fantasy.” She points at his head. “Reality.” She gestures around them.
“Fine. Fine, not SHIELD.” He sits down beside her. “But Secret Service. Or KGB. Or something.”
She laughs. “Okay. So your puppy of a roommate is secretly a spy. Point is he got you in.”
“Yes. No, point is he’s all kinds of amazing, and I’m going to knit him a sweater.”
Vicki looks up from her laptop to stare at him in horror. “Look, Mish, I’m only telling you this because I love you, but no. No, you are not knitting him a sweater. You have terrible taste in sweaters. This is a horrible idea.”
“I know! But that’s the point exactly! I’ve checked. He doesn’t have any ugly sweaters!” Misha turns pleading eyes on her. “Come on, Vick, you know everyone needs an ugly sweater. What’s he going to do on Christmas?”
“Well, when you put it that way...”
“I’ll even put a giant reindeer on it!”
Vicki shakes her head in sympathy as she turns back to her work. “Oh man, I feel bad for him already.”
~*~
Sam is on the way out of his Law and Public Policy class when Brady claps a hand on his shoulder.
“Hey man, what are you doing this Friday?”
“Probably finishing another paper.” Sam adjusts the strap of his knapsack.
“C’mon, man, it’s friggin’ Halloween. The best parties happen on Halloween weekend! You’ve got to come out with us, Sam! Kappa Sigma’s having a huge party, and tons of people are going.”
Sam rolls his eyes as they step out into the late afternoon sunshine. “Brady, I don’t even like Halloween. Why in the world would I want to go to Halloween party?”
“Dude, just pretend it’s any other kind of party. Have you even been to one of these parties yet?” He only pauses long enough to catch the ‘obviously not’ look on Sam’s face. “No? Then you’ve gotta come this Friday. The booze is on free flow, and all the chicks are going to be in sexy costumes. I’ll even come pick you up.”
“Are we talking about a Halloween party?” It’s Misha, falling in step on Sam’s other side as they near Granada.
“Hey, Mish,” he greets with a smile, and Misha grins right back up at him.
Out of the corner of his eye, he thinks he catches a flash of irritation on Brady’s face before his classmate continues, “Yeah. KSig is having an awesome one this Friday night, and I’m trying to get Sam here to go.”
“Kappa Sigma?” Misha’s expression turns bemused. “Funny, Erin was just inviting me to that. Her boyfriend, Keith, is a KSig. I told her I’d check it out.”
“Hah! See? Even Misha is going,” Brady declares triumphantly, and Sam’s shoulders sag a little in defeat.
“What do you mean ‘even’ I’m going?” Misha protests, annoyed, as they reach the front door of Granada.
“I mean it’s just that awesome, and Sam, if your roommate’s going, you have no excuse. I’ll come get you at seven, and we can all walk there together. Ciao!” Brady takes off in the direction of Schiff with a wave.
“Hmph,” Misha scoffs as they walk up to their room. “What are you going as, Sam?”
Oh man, now even Misha is talking like his going is a foregone conclusion. He sighs resignedly. “Myself?”
“What?” His best friend’s scandalized face is a sight to behold. “It’s a Halloween party, Sam. You can’t not dress up.”
“Fine,” he squares his shoulders firmly. “Then I’m not going. Dude, I hate Halloween.”
“Aww, Sam, don’t give me that face.” Misha unlocks the door to their room and they step inside. “C’mon, man, it’s our first Halloween at university. Let’s have some fun together. I’ll even go in drag.”
Sam can’t help snorting a laugh even as he turns to his roommate incredulously. “What?”
“You heard me. Tell you what.” Blue eyes twinkle with glee as Misha’s voice rises in excitement. “You go as Captain America, and I’ll go as Sharon Carter.”
“What? No.” He doesn’t even like superheroes that much. They remind him of Dean telling him for years that Dad was a superhero - not only a fantasy, but an utterly ruined one.
“But but- you have the Steve Rogers height and build!” Misha whines with a pout. “Come on, Sam, my first Halloween costume that I can remember was Captain America, but something fell apart in it, and I-” His voice cracks a little. “I ended up crying my eyes out all night because I wanted it to be perfect, and it wasn’t. I couldn’t even get into trick-or-treating; I was so miserable.” His eyes tear up. “So I haven’t tried to pull it off again since, but you! You’d be a great Captain America, and there wouldn’t be any point in doing Agent 13 without a Cap, right? So Saaaam, pleeeaaase?”
And even though he knows Misha is an excellent actor and that the sob story was probably a lot less emotional than his best friend made it out to be, Sam’s never been able to say “no” to those teary, pleading blue eyes, which is how he ends up costume shopping with Misha after classes on Wednesday and showing up at the frat party as Captain America on Friday night. He’s not the least bit sorry that Misha paid for the costume -it was Misha’s idea, after all-, and he has to admit that it looks good. Meanwhile, Misha looks way too convincing as Sharon Carter -he’d never really noticed till then how easily Misha could pass as a pretty girl-, and the look of stunned disbelief on Brady’s face might well be worth the entire ordeal.
After a flurry of introductions from both Brady and Erin, through which more than a few guys flirted with Misha and not all of them stopped when they realized he isn’t female, Brady presses a glass of punch into his hands and tells him there’s someone he’d like Sam to meet. He follows his classmate through the throng of people swaying to the thumping bass of the music into another room.
“Lindsay!” Brady greets enthusiastically, and a bubbly redhead with emerald fairy wings turns.
She sets her drink down on the cocktail table before running over to give him a hug. “Hey! Brady!”
Brady gathers her into his arms and lifts her a foot off the floor before setting her down. “Sam, this is my cousin, Lindsay,” he says, leading them all over to the cocktail table where a sweet-faced blonde dressed as a Greek goddess is waiting. “And this is her roommate, Jess. Girls, this is my buddy, Sam.”
Jess smiles as she holds out her hand, and Sam thinks she does look like a goddess in that flowing white dress that hangs alluringly over her toned curves. “Jessica Moore. Nice to meet you, Sam...?”
He takes it; her hand is soft and warm. “Winchester. Sam Winchester.”
“Lindsay Manning.” He shakes hands with Brady’s cousin; her grip is firmer than Jessica’s.
Turning back to Jess, he asks, “So you’re a freshman too?”
“Yup. I’m thinking of doing Chemistry, but some of these other classes I’m taking are really interesting too, so I might change my mind.” She tilts her head, and her blond waves cascade over her shoulder. “What about you?” Her blue eyes twinkle. “Set your heart on a major yet, Captain?”
“I don’t know,” he admits, feeling inexplicably shy. “Only thing I’m sure of is I want to go to law school.”
“Oh, so you’re like Brady here,” Lindsay cuts in with a grin. Her bright green eyes match her shimmery dress.
“Yup, one of mine,” Brady agrees, slinging an arm over his shoulders. “We have Law and Public Policy together this quarter, and Sam here is too smart for his own good. Or too diligent. Whichever works.”
Sam laughs. “What about you?” He turns to Lindsay.
“Me? Management and Marketing. Dad wants me prepped to join the family business, and hey,” she shrugs. “I like it. I mean, there are other things I like more, but I can do those as hobbies.”
He can’t help squaring his shoulders a little at the words “family business,” but who is he to remark on that if she likes it? So instead he turns back to Jess and asks about those other classes she likes.
“I have Psych, Lit and Theatre History, and they’re all unexpectedly cool.”
“Gonna be one of those people who change their majors every year?” Lindsay teases.
Jess laughs. She has a nice laugh, warm and cheery. “Doubt it. I’ll bet most of them are only nice at intro level.”
“You know what?” Brady asks, surveying their empty cups. “Be right back. I’m gonna get us more punch.”
“Thanks, hun!” Lindsay calls after him as he leaves with their cups just as the music shifts into a catchy number that opens with rap.
“Oh! Crazy in Love! I love this song!” Jess says suddenly, grabbing his and Lindsay’s hands. “Let’s go dance!”
And Sam has no idea how to dance, but apparently, Lindsay says most people don’t either, and when they all join the mass of gyrating costumed bodies and Jess just starts rocking it out to the music, Sam realizes she’s right: no one cares, and he should just try to have fun.
~*~
Several hours of being hit on by Keith’s frat brothers later, Misha realizes he hasn’t seen his new best friend since Erin dragged him over to meet her boyfriend, and Brady led Sam away to meet other friends. So he excuses himself to find his roommate. After looking in a few rooms, he finally finds Sam on a couch with a shapely Wonder Woman straddling his lap. Sam is giggly and red in the face as he drains the full glass of punch in his hand before pulling her closer to mumble something in her ear that makes her laugh, and when Misha finally makes it through the crowd to their side, she’s started trailing kisses down Sam’s neck.
“Hey!” he says loudly, dropping into the couch beside them and feeling oddly satisfied with the interruption. “I was just about to leave, and I was wondering if you wanted to come with, but I’m guessing you’re not coming back tonight?”
“Well, you could always join us, cutie,” Wonder Woman offers with a flirty once over. Now that he’s closer, she appears to be Hispanic and quite attractive.
“Hey! You’re back!” Sam wraps an arm around him, and oh boy, from the slur in his roommate’s words, he’s going to bet Sam can’t even walk on his own at this point. “I think Bella here-”
“Vera,” she corrects, and now she looks miffed, as if she expected him to get her name right in his state.
“Right. Vela. I think she has the right idea! We sh-”
“Okay, okay, I think you’re coming with me right now.” Vera rolls her eyes and slides off Sam without protest when he tugs on his best friend’s arm, and he offers her an apologetic look. If Sam is proposing that they all have an orgy, he must be pretty fucking drunk. “Up now, Sam. Let’s go.” He hefts Sam’s arm over his shoulder, and Sam obligingly stumbles out of the seat, leaning heavily on him.
“Bye~” He waves at Vera, giggling as he follows Misha to the door. “I had a great time!” Okay, make that stupidly drunk.
Somehow, they manage not to fall down the stairs as they walk out into the slightly chilly night air, and Misha is eternally grateful that Sam is mostly walking by himself, because he doesn’t think he could support all 6’4” of sasquatch dead weight otherwise. It's a not a long walk to West Lag, but it is made a lot slower by Sam’s drunken meandering.
“Do you know? I didn’t always hate Halloween.” His speech is slurred and off hand. “I remember... Once, when I was a kid, I wanted to go trick-or-treating like all the other kids.”
“Yeah? What did you want to dress up as?”
“Dress... up...?” Sam’s brows furrow in confusion at the question. “Hmm... Oh!” He lifts a pointed finger and waves it vaguely. “I remember now. I wanted to be an angel.”
Misha smiles fondly. “An angel, huh? I think you’d look good with a halo.”
“Mm, I wanted to be... pure.” Sam giggles. “Dean said angels don’t exist though.”
Misha scoffed. “That’s fucked up. How does he even know? Maybe they do, maybe they don’t, but he shouldn’t try to disillusion you of your faith.”
“And Dad...” Sam continues as if he hadn’t spoken. “Dad wouldn’t let me go anywhere on Halloween. He said it wasn’t safe, and why do people want to dress up as things that go bump in the night anyway? And- and back then, I didn’t understand any of it. I just wanted to go be normal with the other kids, and I cried, and we fought, and he locked me in my room for the night. I was just so fucking angry and miserable.”
“Wow, no wonder you hate it.” The more he heard about Sam’s father, the less Misha liked the man.
"But get this." Sam grins. "Dean? He sneaked into my room in the dead of night, brought me a ton of candy and told me, 'Sammy, I know you really wanted to go out tonight, but why do all that lame door-to-door walking, right? I got you Starburst, Reese's and Nips~' Then he put a tinsel halo on my head and said, 'And I still think angels don't exist. But you can be the first. You can be my angel, Sammy.' And-"
"Aww…" Sam’s brother sounds like a sweetheart, and Misha thinks he'd get along smashingly with Dean if and when they meet someday.
"Right, and it was really sweet at the time, but like-" Sam dissolves into giggles here and nearly walks right into a pole, but Misha pulls him aside just in time. "I'd all but forgotten about it, but then-" Sam giggles some more, almost hysterical. "Get this." He breathes deeply in an effort to stop laughing long enough to speak. "Just recently, I went with him to the bar, and he totally pulled that line on this girl he was trying to pick up," more breathless giggling, and now Misha is snickering too, "and it was so surreal?"
“Oh my God.” Misha laughs. “Tell me you didn’t let him live that down.”
“Of course not! I ribbed him about it for weeks!”
They laugh together for a long time, and Misha marvels at how enjoyable he finds the company even when his new best friend is drunk off his ass. It’s nice. Vicki is a fun and wacky drunk, and he loves her for it, but Sam’s just that: nice. By the time Sam starts speaking again, they’ve reached Granada.
“Say, do you know why we dress up in costumes for Halloween?”
Misha has to prop Sam up now because he nearly fell flat on his face climbing the stairs to the front door, and that’s probably the last glass of punch kicking in, because Sam seems just barely conscious, and he even sounds like he’s sleep-talking.
“I read that it’s to ward off the harmful spirits and fairies that were believed to cross over into this world on Samhain, the related Celtic pagan festival.”
“Mm... You’re so cool...” Sam mumbles as they reach their room. “I really... like you...”
Misha fumbles for his keys and unlocks the door. “Thanks, Sam. I like you too,” he says with a chuckle. “Come on now.” He pulls Sam into the room with him and maneuvers around the giant to shut and lock the door behind him with one hand and one foot. As he tugs Sam towards the bed, he’s glad for once that Sam chose not to loft his bed, because Misha can’t imagine how his roommate would climb the slats in this state. “Okay, here we are. Y-oof!”
He tried to drop Sam onto the bed, but somehow, that went all wrong, and now he’s pinned beneath 192 pounds of drunk Captain America, and it’s heavy. It’s also uncomfortably warm and sweaty.
“Damn it, Sam, get off me!” He flails helplessly, pushing ineffectually at the dead weight atop him. “C’mon, man, I can’t breathe down here.” But Sam doesn’t budge, doesn’t even respond, and Misha deflates at the prospect of having to spend the entire night like this. “Saaam...” He shakes his best friend. “Oh, come on...”
Sam stirs, to his relief. “Hmm?” But instead of rolling off as he’d hoped, Sam suddenly nuzzles his neck. “Mm... You smell... so good,” he murmurs.
Then Sam is alarmingly trailing kisses up the side of his neck, and Misha’s eyes widen. “S-Sam?”
Sam doesn’t answer, just traces the back of Misha’s ear with his tongue. They’re both dirty and sweaty; Sam reeks of cheap booze, saccharine cordial and three different perfumes, but more importantly, it’s Sam, his new best friend, roommate and the only person he’s ever enjoyed hanging out with as much as Vicki, and-
Oh God, it’s Sam.
The reality of it hits him like a freight train as Sam scrapes his teeth over Misha’s jugular, and instead of grounding him as he’d hoped, the thought only makes this hotter.
Shit.
“Sam?” He scrambles to push Sam’s head up and back. “Hey. Wh-”
“God, you’re beautiful,” Sam breathes reverently, olive green eyes bright in the faint illumination streaming in through the window; then he simply dips his head, and they’re kissing.
Drunk as the guy is, it’s not... clumsy, per se. It’s imprecise, but... exploring, as if Sam wants to know him, and Misha is kissing him back before it even registers in his mind. Sam’s tongue slides slow and sweet along his own, and Misha whimpers as his blood goes rushing down. Fuck, but he’s never been so turned on by a mere kiss in his life, and when he angles his head to accommodate, Sam deepens the kiss - it’s ardent now, wanting, and like slipping into familiar ground, suddenly much more practiced. Who knew Sam would be such a good kisser?
It’s somewhere between ridiculous, embarrassing and pathetic that he’s leaking in his suddenly-too-tight costume from just this, but then Sam starts rocking their hips together, and he’s moaning helplessly into the kiss because Oh God, Sam, fuck, he doesn’t think he’ll last very long. And when Sam breaks off to mouth at the other side of his neck, he pushes the face mask off to slide his hand into messy hair and tilts his own head back for better access, pulling Sam against him as he arches up into the friction.
“S-Sam,” he gasps as the other obliges with a sharper cant to his hips, and he turns to bury his face in Sam’s soft hair and inhale deeply of the other’s slightly spicy scent.
A hand cards through the hair of his blond wig as the other cups the turn of his hip. “Get this... It sounds crazy...” Sam chuckles, and Misha feels more than hears the rumble through the body pressed to his. “And cheesy as fuck, but... y’know? I think... I may be...” Every pause is punctuated by a nip at his collarbone and a buck of Sam’s hips, and God, Misha is so close. “A little bit... in love with you already.”
Fuck.
The last has Misha curling into Sam and muffling his cry in brown hair as his vision whites out. He holds Sam to him as the other follows him with a soft groan moments later, and sighs resignedly as Sam just collapses atop him, breath evening out and deepening as sleep takes over. As his luck would have it, he’s still stuck spending the night like this, and it’s messy now, on top of hot, sweaty and heavy, but Misha has to admit, in the post-coital haze, it doesn’t seem so bad.
Misha wakes when Sam stirs to find that it is half past eight, and they both have to be at work in about two hours. He shoves at his roommate.
“Wake up, sunshine. C’mon, Sam, we need to go to work.”
Sam groans, props his head up tiredly with one hand, and cracks his eyes open blearily. “Wha- Mish?” He rolls off in a hurry and ends up falling gracelessly to the floor. “Ow! Shit.” He holds his head in his hands and grunts in pain. “Oh God, I am so sorry, how long have I been out?”
“Hmm… By the time we got back here, it was maybe one in the morning?” he answers, stretching.
Sam runs a hand through his hair. “Oh man, and I’ve been… We’ve been sleeping like that the entire time? God, Mish, I’m really sorry. Dean says I’m a miserable drunk too. I hope I wasn’t too terrible to you.”
Misha smiles at the memory, looking down at his feet. “Actually, you were uh… really sweet to me.”
Sam heaves a sigh of relief at that. “Oh. Oh, that’s good. So uh… What happened? The last thing I remember was making out with some girl at the party.”
“Oh.” Misha isn’t quite prepared for the sudden weight in his chest or the lump in his throat the words bring. It’s awfully silly; it’s not like he expected anything to come of the previous night’s events. Aloud, he only takes a calming breath and swallows before saying, “Let’s see… I came to ask you if you were ready to leave when I was, found you with Wonder Woman in your lap, kept you from embarrassing yourself further by hauling your stupidly drunk ass back here, by which point I had to help you up the stairs and into the room, and then you collapsed on top of me when I tried to drop you on your bed. Since I couldn’t move you, I naturally ended up sleeping where I was.”
“Oh. Wow. Thanks, Mish. I’m really sorry about that. I’ll uh… I’ll make it up to you somehow, okay?”
He doesn’t know why he has to blink away the sharp sting in his eyes, but that’s his cue to get the hell out before he embarrasses himself. “Well, I’m going to shower,” he says, standing and grabbing his things. “The Advil is on the desk if you need it. You should probably grab one of my granola bars first though.” With that, he hightails it out of the room without looking back and reflects on how pathetic it is that he’s crying in the shower.
~*~
Misha has to admit he doesn’t know how to deal with his newly discovered attraction to his roommate, so he’s taken to avoiding being alone in the room with Sam. It’s not that he doesn’t enjoy the company - of course he does, maybe too much. The problem is that Sam is distracting. Gone are the days when he could actually get work done around Sam. Now, even a stray lock of hair falling into his roommate’s face catches his eye till he realizes he’s staring longingly, wishing those long fingers were twirling his hair instead of the pen or up his a- No, no, no, he needs to stop thinking along these lines. He hasn’t even reached their room yet, damn it.
When he reaches the right door and unlocks it, he’s surprised to find Sam sitting on the bed, staring blankly at the cell phone in his hands. He’d chosen this time to return because Sam should be at work right now.
“Hey,” he greets with a smile. It’s too easy to smile around Sam, too hard to keep the love-struck sparkle out of his eyes.
Sam looks up, as if only now noticing his presence. Strange. Sam usually notices the slightest sounds of movement. “Hey. You cut your hair.”
“Yeah.” He sets his things down. “It was starting to be a hassle to dry.”
“It looks good,” Sam remarks with a grin, and it’s ridiculous that Misha is fighting down a blush. “I’m going to miss the scrunchies though. But I guess it’ll grow.”
He smacks Sam lightly on the arm to distract himself. “Ugh, at this rate, I’m going to have to keep it short. What are you doing here anyway? Aren’t you supposed to be at work?”
Sam blinks, then looks at the clock on the desk. “Shit. Oh God. Well, not much point going now, I guess.” His face falls, and Misha has to clamp down on the sudden urge to kiss the smile back.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, stepping closer so they’re face-to-face.
Sam looks down at the cell phone. “I called Dean,” he says simply at length.
Misha wants to ask, “Isn’t that a good thing?” It’s obvious how much Sam misses his brother. But his roommate doesn’t seem happy at all. So instead, he asks, “What happened?”
The other’s lips thin, curl into a sardonic smile. “He…” Sam sniffs. “He said I walked out on our family. And since that’s my choice, I should stick with it. I walked out, so I should stay out and,” Sam’s voice cracks, “never call again.”
“Shit, Sam,” Misha mumbles, giving in to the impulse to hug. He wraps his arms around Sam’s head and pulls him in to bury his face in Misha’s thick blue hoodie. “I’m sorry.”
To his surprise, Sam returns the embrace, trembling arms folding around his hips, and takes deep, calming breaths.
“You have me,” he longs to say, twining his fingers in Sam’s soft brown hair, because he wants to be, and a small part of him is glad that he’s here - not Brady, not Sandy, not that amazing girl Sam made out with at the party. He’s here for Sam even when no one else in the world is, not even Dean. “You’ll always have me.”
~*~
It’s Thanksgiving, and they have the week off. Sam, of course, doesn’t have a home to return to, which is how he finds himself in Boston with Misha, who was appalled at the idea of him spending Thanksgiving alone. Sam is disinclined to inform him that even if he had somewhere to go, Dad and Dean don’t really ever do anything for Thanksgiving. In fact, they’re likely to be out hunting the monster of the week anyway, and he can either join them or spend Thanksgiving alone regardless.
Rebecca is as sweet and wacky as her son, whom she sometimes calls Mish the Quiche (Misha says he used to be chubby, which is hard to imagine, so he even looked a bit like a quiche once), and it doesn’t feel like there’s even a generation gap to speak of. Sitting here in their small apartment waiting for the turkey to finish roasting seems an incredibly intimate affair, but he’s never made to feel like he’s intruding. Rebecca proudly shows off the wooden furniture and knitted throws that Misha made; Misha tells him that his mother quilted all the seat pads and sewed all the cushion covers herself. Misha has a modest Marvel Comics collection in his room, and he says he couldn’t afford to get every issue, but he has read them all, and the ones he bought are his favorites. Misha has a twin bed, so Sam will have to take the couch, but the couch is longer than the bed anyway, so that suits Sam just fine. It’s just them tonight, because Misha’s parents have been divorced for years, but his father will be here tomorrow.
Dinner is turkey, potato salad, and green bean casserole, and it’s possibly the best Thanksgiving dinner Sam’s ever had. Mostly, Misha talks about life at Stanford or growing up here in Boston, and they both listen, but occasionally, Rebecca will ask Sam something Misha hasn’t already told her about him, and he’ll answer what he can without mentioning the monster hunting. After dinner, feeling especially useless, Sam insists on doing the dishes.
Suddenly, Misha shows up in the kitchen, hands behind his back. “Hey~”
Sam turns to glance at him as he rinses a plate. “Hey. I’m almost done, don’t worry.”
Misha shakes his head and chuckles. “Take your time. Want a beer?”
He nods. “In a minute, sure. Just let me finish here.”
He rinses off the last few plates and cutlery, before wiping his hands on a hand towel hanging from a hook beside the sink. He turns to find Misha holding out a paper bag. “Here. Happy Thanksgiving, Sam.” His grin is at once cheery and shy as he bounces on his heels, and Sam suddenly feels like a terrible person.
“Oh my God. Mish. I- Uh… I didn’t get you anything, and you’ve alr-“
“Well, if you help me thoroughly clean the apartment this week, I’ll consider us even. Deal?”
He smiles and takes the paper bag. “Deal.”
Misha goes to the fridge to pull out two beers. They’re El Sol; he even drinks the same beer Dean does. “Go on. Open it.”
Obediently, Sam opens the bag and reaches in to pull out a large fuchsia and orange… sweater. It’s a sweater with a… “Is that a moose?”
Misha scowls as he hands him a bottle. “A reindeer, Sam. It’s a reindeer. Moose antlers don’t look like that.”
“Uh. Oops?” Sam tries sheepishly as he takes the beer.
The scowl fades. “I hope it fits. I made it a little bigger than your shirts, but it’ll probably shrink in the dryer, so I hope it’ll still fit after a couple of washes.”
The alternating fuchsia and orange yarn is a somewhat garish combination, and he still thinks the brown reindeer looks like a moose, but it’s the sweetest gift Sam’s ever received, and the thought of Misha secretly knitting it whenever he wasn’t around has him pulling his roommate in for a hug. The other stiffens momentarily, then returns the hug warmly.
“Thanks, Mish. It’s the best present anyone’s ever given me.”
“I-I’m glad.”
“Happy Thanksgiving to you, too.”
~*~
For Misha, Thanksgiving week is spent going on morning runs with Sam (which is not too different from life at Stanford), cooking or discreetly salvaging either lunch or dinner (Sam is a disaster in the kitchen when it comes to anything but the cutting board, and he'd eat it, but Sam would feel terrible), cleaning the apartment (which is easier with Sam) and jerking off in the shower (which is harder when the object of his fantasies is outside the door waiting for his turn).
His father came the day after Thanksgiving proper. They finished the rest of the turkey with turkey noodle soup made from the bones and a salad with homemade honey mustard, then spent the evening singing old songs as his father played the guitar. Sam keeps trying to write his paper on the role of education in the pursuit of justice. Misha keeps trying to get him to do fun things because they’re on vacation.
They play Scrabble, and Sam beats him soundly two thirds of the time. Since it’s Sam’s first time in Boston, they do touristy things like the Freedom Trail, Union Oyster House, several museums and the Swan Boat on the lake in the Public Garden. They watch Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, which doesn’t live up to the book, of course, but that doesn’t stop them from being absurdly happy about the movie. Sam finds the basilisk really cool and still thinks the casting is great - everyone looks a lot like how he imagined them. Misha can’t get over Hamlet being Gilderoy Lockhart, and if the entirety of Harry Potter were rendered in a Shakespearean play, he’d be the first in line to watch it if he couldn’t act in it himself. He also wants to hug Dumbledore and Hagrid. They got a ton of popcorn, and Sam let him pick the flavors, so half was covered in caramel and apple cinnamon while the other half had white cheddar and parmesan garlic. By the end of the movie, he was surprised they’d almost finished it. Then again, Sam must have grown to that height somehow. Sam has also won even more points in his book for loving many of the same things in the series -heck, Sam’s even fond of Moaning Myrtle- and Misha really needs Sam to be a little less perfect.
Sam is waiting outside when he exits the restroom, so he sneaks up behind him and grasps his shoulders. “Hey~”
Quick as lightning, Sam drops and flips him overhead, lets out a surprised shout, and catches him by the waist before he hits the ground. “Jesus Christ, Mish!” he swears, setting Misha down and backing away. “I could have killed you.”
“W-wow.” That is the least of Misha’s immediate concerns, the primary of which is how much he wants Sam to do that all over again. “You are so definitely a spy,” he says, looking over his shoulder with a grin because he can’t turn around. “But you wouldn’t though.” It’s a little uncomfortable, but he makes himself walk to his car and wills his hormones to calm down. The cold air helps, and by the time Sam climbs in beside him with a scowl, he’s fine, bar a few extra fantasies of being manhandled.
“That’s not the point, Mish.” Sam runs his hand through his hair. “Please don’t do that again.”
Well, he won’t, but not for the reason Sam’s warning him. He flips on the music, and Sam looks at the iPod jack with a bemused expression as they drive home, as if there’s something distinctly incongruous about driving around Boston to Peaches and Goldfrapp.
“What?” he asks with a sideways glance when they stop at a traffic light.
Sam grins. “Just marveling at how your taste in music manages to be so different from Dean’s, and yet not any better.”
“Hmph.” There, he’s found one minus point, finally. “Too bad~ It’s my car.”
He turns up the volume, but Sam only chuckles. “Seriously? I’ve been stuck in cars listening to music I don’t care for longer than you’ve had a car, Mish. Dean always says driver picks the music, and shotgun shuts his cakehole.”
“Your brother has the right idea.”
“Yeah. But he likes most of Dad’s music anyway, so he never had a problem with that policy.”
“You clearly need to rethink your musical tastes.”
Sam snorts. “Or you guys do.”
By now, they’ve reached home, so Misha parks and climbs out. “What’s not to like about Peaches and Goldfrapp?”
“Nothing,” Sam replies, joining him outside and slinging an arm around his shoulders. “For you.”
Misha sticks his tongue out at Sam as he unlocks the door and steps inside. His mother’s home, so he runs over to give her a hug in the kitchen. “Momma! How was work?”
“Mostly business as usual, but remember the guy I was telling you about that keeps trying to hit on me?” Her eyes twinkle, and they look just like Misha’s.
“Yes! What did he do today?”
“So he was trying to get my attention as usual, and then as he was walking, he slipped on something and fell backward, right into someone’s cart?”
Sam snorts, but manages not to burst out laughing hysterically. Rebecca is just barely reining in her laughter, though, and Misha is abuzz with excitement.
“Oh. My. God.”
“Wait, wait. Anyway, he got stuck, so a couple of guys had to help get him out of there, right? But as they were pulling,” she cracks up, “they ended up pulling his pants down!” There are tears in her eyes, and she has to take a deep breath between giggles to stifle her laughter long enough to finish with “And he had these bright pink Hello Kitty boxers on?”
Misha howls with laughter, falling back against Sam, who musses his hair.
“Which were actually kinda cute, but-”
“Well, I don’t think he’ll be back any time soon after that,” Misha concludes as he calms down. “Which means some peace for you.” He wraps an arm around his mother. “Poor guy, though.”
“What did you boys do?”
“We went to catch the new Harry Potter movie.”
“Without me?” Rebecca gasps in mock horror.
“Ta-da! My excuse to re-watch it!” Misha sings with a twirl between them. “And I still think Sam is a spy.”
“I still think your son has no sense of self-preservation.”
Misha smacks Sam on the shoulder. “Do too! I just didn’t expect you to do that!”
Rebecca turns to her son. “Do what?”
“He flipped me over his head and caught me like a princess~”
Sam snorts. “I nearly threw you halfway across the street. Would have if you hadn’t yelped. Silly Mish.”
Rebecca wraps her arms around Misha protectively. “No throwing my Quiche around.”
Misha beams sunnily, and Sam can’t help feeling a little envious. If only his family were more like this. He feels so much more at home here than he did all those years growing up with his own.
“Oh, I need eggs and cream for dinner, but we’re all out. Be a dear and run down to the store across the street, a-”
“I’ll go,” Sam offers before she can finish.
“Oh, I’ll go with you,” Misha says, disentangling himself from his mother’s arms.
“Nah, you should stay and help with dinner, since we both know I’m no good at that.”
Misha has the good graces to blush at having been discovered salvaging meals Sam tried to cook, as Sam grabs his keys and heads out the door with a sheepish grin.
“What a nice young man,” Rebecca remarks, not for the first time that week, as she puts the Dutch oven on the stove.
“Isn’t he?” Misha turns to start setting the table. “Best roommate ever.”
Rebecca tosses in several slices of bacon. “Well, here I am waiting for you to finally bring Vicki home, and instead you bring this gorgeous hunk of a sweetheart back here. Warn a mom, now, wouldja?”
Misha pauses momentarily as he sets the cutlery down. “What?” He smiles wistfully to himself. “It’s nothing like that.”
“But you want it to be?’ The bacon sizzles, and she turns them over. “I’ve seen the way you look at him.”
Misha laughs. “Sam’s straight as an arrow, Momma.”
Rebecca takes the bacon out of the pot before coming over to kiss him on the temple. “My poor baby. You’ve asked?”
“No, I’ve seen. He’s only ever checked out the ladies.”
“Maybe you just haven’t seen him checking out the boys.” She moves away to put the onion into the pot.
“Nope, even drunk, only girls.” Or what looks like one, but Misha doesn’t want to think about that. He hadn’t needed all those things to be true until Sam said them, hadn’t needed Sam until he had him. As before, he’ll get by just fine without him. “Not getting my hopes up.” He skips over to the sink to drain the vegetables soaking there. “Ooh, we’re having kale!”
“Of course, dear. I know it’s your favorite.” He adds the kale to the pot, and she stirs it a bit before covering it. “Well, you’ll always have me,” she adds, squeezing him to her in a hug by the waist.
He leans in to rest his head on her shoulder. “I know, Momma, I know.”
~*~
Misha sighs. Christmas is coming, and he wants to invite Sam home again, but he doesn’t know if he can take a longer round of Thanksgiving break - many, many more days of his mother watching him moon over his off-limits best friend. As it is, he doesn’t know how he’s going to last the rest of the year sharing a room with Sam. He’d try the “getting over someone by getting under someone else” trick if he could even look at someone attractive without wishing it were Sam, but it really doesn’t work that way. He sighs again.
Vicki pokes his cheek over the table. “Hey. What’s with you? You’ve been moping all day.”
He pouts at her and takes another bite of his salad. “Have not. It’s lunch, Vicki. That’s scarcely half the day.”
She snaps a finger at his wrist. “Not the point. C’mon, Mish, what’s wrong?”
He sighs for the third time and decides to start from the beginning. “I think I’m in love with Sam.”
“You think?”
He glares at her, then deflates. “It’s that obvious?”
She rolls her eyes, eating another spoonful of pasta. “He’s all you’ve talked about since you moved in together. Yeah, it’s pretty obvious. I think we’ve all noticed. Heck, I can’t believe he hasn’t.”
“Y-yeah. My mother noticed over Thanksgiving, too.” He pokes dejectedly at his lunch.
“What I want to know is why you haven’t told him.”
“He likes women, Vick. Contrary to popular belief, I don’t qualify.”
“Prefers,” she corrects, waving her fork sternly. “And you don’t even know that. Besides, if he’d switch teams for anyone, I daresay it’s you.”
He stabs at a pepper. “Don’t get my hopes up.”
“I’m not. Seriously, Mish, just tell him. If he says no, you’ll know for sure, and you can move on. For fuck’s sake, he thinks the world of you. I highly doubt it’d put that much of a dent in your friendship if it doesn’t work out like you want it. Sure, it’ll be awkward for a while, but he’s not going to up and leave just because you had a phase.”
“It’s not a-”
“I know. But he doesn’t have to.” She tilts her head pointedly.
All right, fine. When he gets back, he’s going to t- No, he’s going to tell him about what really happened the night of the party, drop it casually like “Yeah, we made out, and it was kinda nice, actually” just to test the waters, see how Sam reacts. And if he doesn’t freak out, maybe ask if he’d do it again, if he’d be opposed to “more than friends.” Yes, that sounds like a safer plan. That way, if Sam does freak out, he can pass it off as a joke or a drunken mishap. He spends the rest of the day planning out the conversation in his head, preparing for any eventuality, and when he finally makes it back to his room, he’s relieved to find that Sam’s already there.
“Hey,” he greets, closing the door behind him and setting his bag down by his desk.
“Oh my God, Misha, get this,” Sam gushes, too excited to even stand still. “Remember that party we went to on Halloween night?”
“Y-yes, of course.” He definitely wasn’t expecting Sam to bring up the party first. Sam doesn’t even like Halloween.
“So while we were there, I met this girl. Her name’s Jess, and she’s gorgeous and really cool, and we ran into each other again today, and she just asked me out?”
And Sam’s obviously waiting for his reaction, but it feels like his stomach just dropped out, and it takes probably far too many seconds for him to recover enough to force a smile and manage “Th-That’s great.”
“I know! So we’re grabbing coffee this Saturday at three, and if that goes well, we’ll probably meet for dinner and a movie next week. I can’t wait for you to meet her, Mish. I think you’ll like her. She’s a-”
Fuck, his eyes are stinging. He turns away and grabs his things. “Amazing, I bet. Listen, I really need a shower, so hold that thought, and you can tell me all about her when I get out.”
“Oh. Sure. Yeah. I’ll probably have to leave for work soon though.”
Yes. That’s exactly the plan. “Well, uh… tomorrow then. I’m sure you’ll think of even more things to tell me by then.”
With that, he all but runs out of the room before Sam can reply, and by the time he reaches the communal showers and locks the door to a stall behind him, he feels like a pathetic jerk. He leans against the door and wipes his eyes.
Sam’s happy.
He should be happy for his best friend. And he is. He really is. It’s just…
He really needs to stop crying in the shower.
~ Navigation ~
Chapter 1: Part One | Part Two
Chapter 2: Part One | Part Two
Chapter 3: Part One | Part Two
Chapter 4: Part One | Part Two
Epilogue