We walked a million hills - Chapter 18
Title: Trinity Verse II. - We walked a million hills (18/?)
Author:
scyllaya
Rating: PG
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Dean/Castiel/Gabriel,
Warning(s): none
Spoiler(s): AU (characters up to S5)
Word Count: ~ 3 300 (this chapter) WIP
Summary: Dean, Castiel and Gabriel live the life they wanted to have. Their biggest problem should be synchronizing their crazy schedules, unfortunately life is never that simple.
Disclaimer: Nearly all names and characters in this story belong to CW/WB and Kripke. I’m making no profit whatsoever. It’s just for fun!Most places and establishments in the story are real, but I’ve never visited any of them, so I have no true knowledge about them. People (OCs) in the story are not real! Any resemblance to real life is just a coincidence.
AN: Second story of Trinity verse. Title from: Nirvana - The Man Who Sold The World
Unbeta-ed. Trinity Verse I: Broke our Mirrors
Trinity II - Chapter One
<< Previous Chapter || Next Chapter >>
Chapter XVIII
Castiel stretched on the bed, shaking off sleep from his mind then he blinked open his eyes when he felt empty space on his right before his hand reached a warm body. Dean slid closer at the touch, obviously waking up, but still mostly just reacting unconsciously. A moment later Castiel had a lot of his warm skin pressed up to his body as Dean rolled half on top of him, throwing an arm and a leg over his body. Always like a big puppy. The thought made him smile as he ran his fingers through Dean's short hair enjoying the quiet moment. He really liked Sundays lately.
They had this new rule: no work on Sunday. Because both Dean and Gabriel tended to do that a lot before, but now there was an “only emergency work” agreement between them and Castiel liked it. He knew there would be times when he would be forced to be away for a while and miss their new routine, but it was inevitable, he would stay home as much as he could too.
They could stay in bed late on Sundays, have all their meals together or simply just spend time together. They watched movies and stayed home. They drove down to Castle Rock every second week for a family lunch. Katrina said it would be so and no one dared to argue. She still fussed over Gabriel a bit more than before, but otherwise things were fine. Cas was actually surprised by how well his Father and John were treating well... everything they always thought would be a problem. His Dad actually laughed at him saying “You didn't really think this was a secret, right?”. John seemed a bit more uncertain, but apparently he decided on not saying anything about anything as the best course of action on his part. They all let him go with that.
'Where's Gabriel?' Dean mumbled, his head buried in the pillow above Cas' shoulder. Castiel stayed quiet for another moment listening to any noise coming from outside of the room so that he could guess.
'The TVs on,' he said then.
'How the hell is he up already? It's early.'
'It's almost nine,' Castiel said glancing at the clock on the wall.
'Freakin' early,' Dean grumbled and he shifted even closer. Castiel chuckled and turned to kiss him on the lips.
'It's late enough,' he told him.
'You're both freaks,' Dean replied. 'But seriously, he's not sleeping enough,' he added a second later.
'He sleeps fine, he's just not used to sleep too much at a time because of work,' Castiel answered. Dean seemed to think about this for moment. Even if he had time to sleep Gabriel found it hard to do so, mostly he's been sleeping only a few hours at a time for years now, so the “staying in bed late on Sundays” part of their day was not his forte.
'Yeah, ok you're right,' he agreed finally. 'He could stay in bed though.'
'Don't you think he would be bored with both of us asleep?'
'Maybe, but it would be totally worth it after we woke up,' he said with a smile and pulled closer again, putting kisses on Castiel's neck. Castiel leaned into the touches and turned towards the other man. It soon turned into a long and lazy kisses as they tangled up in the sheets. Castiel really enjoyed Sundays.
They emerged from the bedroom sometime later, but didn't find Gabriel in front of the TV in the living room, but in the kitchen and they both just stared for a few long moments to make sure they were not imagining the sight.
'Please tell me you're not cooking,' Dean said.
'Shut up,' Gabriel answered right away. 'I can cook... well, better than Cas.'
'Everyone cooks better than Cas,' Dean answered immediately.
'I'd be offended if it wasn't true,' Castiel answered calmly as he walked over to the coffee-machine. He was immensely happy that there was some already made.
'It's pancakes, I can make pancakes, it's easy,' Gabriel told them.
'Cas burnt down the stove when making two eggs,' Dean reminded him.
'Again, I wish I could be offended by that,' Castiel remarked sipping his coffee and Gabriel chuckled. Dean walked up right behind Gabriel, putting one arm across his waist and resting his chin on his shoulder looking down on what he was doing.
'They look edible,' he said.
'They are edible,' Gabriel insisted. 'You don't want any, you won't get any.'
'Never said I don't want to eat it,' Dean told him and kissed his neck. 'They smell awesome. Didn't know you could make pancakes.'
'Lived on my own for quite a while,' Gabriel shrugged. Dean resumed looking down on what he was doing over his shoulder, his hand tracing idle patterns on Gabriel's stomach.
He was immensely physical with Gabriel lately. They've never been like that before, neither of them. They kissed each other hi or goodbye, but such touches only happened when it was directly leading up to sex. Now, Dean was always casually touching him like this. An arm around his waist, a hand on his leg and so on. Dean didn't really have it in him to be affectionate with words and up until recently Castiel was convinced that he didn't like this sort of display of affection either. He was obviously wrong. He also thought that Gabriel wasn't the PDA type, but he should've remembered how he was when they were kids. He just never initiated it in quite a lot of years, but he did lean into the touches, smiled in a pleased way, obviously enjoying it.
Castiel thought about doing the same, but he was sure that it would've been... awkward on his part. He was perfectly fine in the bedroom, when his touches had intent, but he was really not good with being so casual with it. He didn't mind, this was something between Dean and Gabriel, it was their way to show how they felt for each other without them having to say a word. It was like him and Dean always just sharing a look or staring at each other, it was enough to know what the other thought. He knew everything he needed to know from the way Dean looked back at him, without having to touch each other. And him and Gabriel, well, they could actually talk. Gabriel always called him during the day when he had to speak with someone. He could calm him down or reassure him even over the phone. It seemed like Gabriel found it much easier to put it in words what was going through his head, when he talked to Cas. And just like Castiel didn't try to mimic Dean's casual physicality with Gabriel, Dean didn't try to get Gabriel to talk to him if he rather wanted to talk with Cas, he just kissed him and smiled. He told Castiel that he would listen, but wouldn't know what to say anyway, so he was fine with it. They asked Chuck about it and he said it was a suitable balance with Gabriel still having issues with complete emotional surrender. And anyway, it worked, so they were fine. Castiel didn't envy Dean being the one to draw Gabriel in his arms like this and Dean didn't envy that he wasn't the one Gabriel called when he needed to hear a supporting voice.
Dean insisted that they eat in the living room and Gabriel was easy enough to convince and Cas too had to admit that it was easy to eat their food even without a table so he didn't put up too much of a fight. They just wanted to settle down when the doorbell rang. Dean and Cas shared a glance while Gabriel put down his plate and got up to open the door.
'Please tell me it's not who I think it is,' Dean sighed dramatically.
'Sorry,' Gabriel said before he disappeared towards the entryway. He came back after a few moments but this time the sound of high-heels tapping on the wooden floor accompanied him.
'Hello boys.'
'Kali,' they greeted both with equal enthusiasm. Gabriel settled back on the couch.
'Ever thought about moving to the other side of the city?' Dean asked as she settled down in an armchair. She lived only a few blocks away as they found out a little while back, Dean was less than pleased about it. Castiel wasn't delighted about it either, but they knew she was important to Gabriel so they didn't complain, much. She had an annoying tendency to drop by on her way to work, sometimes even on her way home. They dealt with it. There was only one rule they sat up, no dinner or drinks or anything of sort with her in private. Gabriel didn't argue about it.
'I swear I'm gonna leave the door open one day and we're gonna have dirty, bendy sex, that you will walk in on.'
'Go ahead,' Kali answered turning to Dean without missing a beat, completely unfazed and even smiling a little. Dean stared some daggers at her before he went back to his pancakes without replying.
'Coffee?' Castiel offered, just to move on the conversation. Dean and Kali could keep on snapping at each other for hours. Gabriel seemed more amused than he had any right to be.
'I don't drink coffee, you should learn how to make my tea,' she replied.
'You can make your own damn tea, princess,' Dean grumbled. Kali rolled her eyes, but stood up.
'This is not how you treat a guest,' she remarked.
'You're not a guest, you're the plague,' Dean answered. Kali kissed her middle finger elegantly before walking towards the kitchen.
'Yeah, right back atcha, sweetheart,' Dean smiled at her unpleasantly. 'Can I shoot her?' he asked once she was out of the room.
'I don't think we could get rid of the body,' Castiel told him.
'She would come back to haunt you forever,' Gabriel added with a smile playing on his lips. Dean sighed and took another bite from his pancakes. 'She's baiting you because you let her,' Gabriel added. 'She won't stop until she finds it entertaining when you get all grumpy and jealous.'
'Not jealous,' Dean said.
'You almost had me fooled,' Castiel remarked, Dean shot him a look that made Cas smile. He didn't like Kali, but he had to agree that there was something in Dean being all riled up like this that was really amusing to watch. Dean leaned back to Gabriel the next moment, putting his fork down and sliding his hand down his leg.
'Not jealous, because you're in our bed and we're the ones you make pancakes for,' he grinned and kissed Gabriel just below his ear, then on the lips when the older man turned his head towards him.
'And coffee,' Castiel said as he stood up, finishing his breakfast and heading back to the kitchen needing more coffee. No he was no way addicted to caffeine in any shape or form, no matter what Dean said, he just liked it and had a high tolerance so he had to drink more than one at a time. He leaned down to Gabriel on his way for a short peck on the lips before he headed towards the kitchen to refill his mug. He passed Kali on his way to the kitchen as she was walking back to the living room with her tea.
A few moments later a surprised exclamation from Gabriel and a loud “No fucking way!” from Dean made Cas look up in surprise and he went back to the other room as soon as he could. Kali was sipping her tea, Gabriel had his head resting on his hands, while Dean was staring at a newspaper in his hand.
'What is it?' he asked.
'Gabriel's in the front page of The Denver Post,' Dean told him turning around to look at him. He had a pretty stunned expression on his face. Castiel blinked in surprise.
'What?' he hurried across the room to look at the Sunday Edition in Dean's hand. The headline caught his eyes first so he knew that it was an article about the 'Broadway Disaster', as they labeled it. He focused on the picture and his eyes widened, because they were right.
'Why would anyone take a picture like this?' Gabriel asked.
Said picture was taken somewhere around the time the sun was setting that day as the reflectors were already on, but it wasn't completely dark yet on it. On the left side the edge of one of the medical helicopters was seen and an EMT guy, who was reaching out of from it with his arms, on the right side was Gabriel in his medical coverall standing on the debris that covered the ground. He was holding a small child in his right arm, handing him over a to the man in the helicopter, while a slightly older, crying little girl was clinging to his medical bag. He was dirty and bloody, just like Castiel remembered how he looked after so many hours out in the field.
'Are you kidding?' Kali asked. 'A young handsome white doctor, looking completely dirty and worn rescuing crying kids in the middle of chaos, of course some journalist took a picture of it.'
'No, c'mon... don't they have to ask for permission for such things or something?' Gabriel asked and he sounded torn between being annoyed, embarrassed and distressed.
'I don't think so,' Kali shrugged. Gabriel just groaned and rested his forehead on the heels of his hands again.
'Oh, come on, Gabriel, this is not a bad thing,' Castiel said calmly.
'Yeah, fifteen minutes of fame,' Dean added. 'You look real heroic.'
'I wasn't,' Gabriel replied immediately.
'Don't get yourself worked up over it,' Castiel told him, again in a placating tone.
'I like it,' Dean said then, looking at the picture again. He had a hint of pride in his tone now. 'We should frame it.'
'No fucking way,' Gabriel said as he snapped the newspaper away from Dean's hand. Dean smiled up at him.
'You do realize that there's at least half a million copies of that, right?' Gabriel groaned again and this time Kali chuckled, so the man turned to glare at her.
'Don't look at me like that,' she said. 'Just like Castiel said, this is not a bad thing. It may get the hospital some extra attention and maybe even some benefactors, you could have very good advantages if you wanted to post to some medical journals. Hm?'
'I don't write to medical journals.'
'Which is still a damn shame, since you wrote better than anyone in our year.'
'I am not having this conversation again,' Gabriel said. Kali put up her hands in a surrendering gesture.
'What conversation?' Castiel asked.
'No,' Gabriel turned toward Castiel and Dean. 'I don't care how it's something everyone does to get forward. I don't want to be on a front page, I don't want my name in medical journals and I don't want to talk in front of an audience in conferences. I want to do my damn job, that is it. Is that too much to ask for? I don't care if I spend my entire life working on the ER, I like it, I can do it.'
'Okay,' Dean said.
'It's up to you,' Castiel added and Gabriel's shoulders relaxed as he breathed out.
'Ok, at least only those will recognize me, who know me anyway,' Gabriel said.
'Your name's on page 5,' Kali supplied helpfully. For a moment it seemed like Gabriel wanted to curse again, but then he visibly gave up on it. He pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers, the newspaper still clutched in his other hand. Castiel took a mental note to buy a new one that was not all wrinkled.
'I have to run,' Kali said suddenly looking at her watch. She put her cup down to the coffee-table and stood up. 'Digest it, I came to show you, so that you won't be surprised on Monday at work.'
'Yeah, thanks,' Gabriel said, his tone got clipped. Kali just brushed her hand down his shoulder and turned to leave. No one moved to see her out, but she was obviously not expecting it anyway.
'What's really bothering you about the picture?' Castiel asked after he heard the front door close. Gabriel crossed his arms, staying silent for a while. Cas glanced at Dean, who looked back for a second before he reached out to pull Gabriel back to the couch so that he sat between them. Gabriel huffed in mild annoyance as he flopped down. Dean draped his arm over his waist and rested his hand on Gabriel's tight. He also turned a little and Gabriel had to shift to sit comfortably, the half of his back resting on Dean's chest. Castiel kept looking at him, but waited.
'It's not me, that picture, and everyone who looks at it, will think that I am,' Gabriel said finally. Castiel saw that Dean frowned at the words, but he on the other hand understood what Gabriel meant by it. The picture really looked all dramatic and heroic, Gabriel certainly didn't see himself as any sort of a “hero”, so he probably didn't want people thinking that he was.
'You cannot expect anything less from the media than to dramatize things, but... it is you on the picture. You were helping people, it's not a lie.'
'I was doing my job, nothing else...' he took a breath before he continued. 'Pete climbed under a building in hope to save as many people as possible, dying there,' his hand moved on top of Dean's, squeezing tightly, a gesture to reassure that he was indeed there and safe, maybe it was even an unconscious movement. 'I wouldn't have done that... he should be on that picture, not me. I just happened to be the one to attend to those two injured kids, there was nothing heroic about it. I was distracting myself with work so that I didn't have to think about what could've happened to you, Dean.'
There were long moments of silence after Gabriel's words. Castiel had to think for a minute to decide what to say and how to say it. Dean stayed silent too of course, but he was a supporting presence, staying close to Gabriel, but looking at Cas.
'You could tell them about it,' Castiel said then.
'What do you mean?' Gabriel asked.
'Well, you're on their front page. I'm sure they would be willing to pay attention to what you have to say about that day. Tell them, your version, about Pete.'
Gabriel seemed to think about this deeply.
'I don't think I can talk to some journalist about him,' he said finally.
'You could write it yourself,' Castiel said.
'No way--'
'Kali just said you're pretty good at it,' Dean spoke up.
'It's still up to you, but if the photo bothers you this much, then maybe it is good to do something about it.' Gabriel fell silent again looking at Castiel, then turning his gaze away, obviously thinking. He glanced down at the newspaper in his hand.
'They'll probably ignore me.'
'Don't be so sure about that,' Cas smiled.
'Dibs on reading it first,' Dean said suddenly, even raising a hand like some excited child, and Gabriel huffed out a laugh.
Two weeks later The Denver Post published Gabriel's article in the Sunday Edition and this time he didn't protest against Dean's idea of framing it, even if he was grumbling a lot under his nose. Castiel put a copy of the issue with Gabriel on the front page behind a few books in the study, maybe they could frame that too one day when Gabriel didn't mind that much seeing it anymore.
<< Previous Chapter || Next Chapter >>
Author:
scyllaya
Rating: PG
Character(s)/Pairing(s): Dean/Castiel/Gabriel,
Warning(s): none
Spoiler(s): AU (characters up to S5)
Word Count: ~ 3 300 (this chapter) WIP
Summary: Dean, Castiel and Gabriel live the life they wanted to have. Their biggest problem should be synchronizing their crazy schedules, unfortunately life is never that simple.
Disclaimer: Nearly all names and characters in this story belong to CW/WB and Kripke. I’m making no profit whatsoever. It’s just for fun!Most places and establishments in the story are real, but I’ve never visited any of them, so I have no true knowledge about them. People (OCs) in the story are not real! Any resemblance to real life is just a coincidence.
AN: Second story of Trinity verse. Title from: Nirvana - The Man Who Sold The World
Unbeta-ed. Trinity Verse I: Broke our Mirrors
Trinity II - Chapter One
<< Previous Chapter || Next Chapter >>
Chapter XVIII
Castiel stretched on the bed, shaking off sleep from his mind then he blinked open his eyes when he felt empty space on his right before his hand reached a warm body. Dean slid closer at the touch, obviously waking up, but still mostly just reacting unconsciously. A moment later Castiel had a lot of his warm skin pressed up to his body as Dean rolled half on top of him, throwing an arm and a leg over his body. Always like a big puppy. The thought made him smile as he ran his fingers through Dean's short hair enjoying the quiet moment. He really liked Sundays lately.
They had this new rule: no work on Sunday. Because both Dean and Gabriel tended to do that a lot before, but now there was an “only emergency work” agreement between them and Castiel liked it. He knew there would be times when he would be forced to be away for a while and miss their new routine, but it was inevitable, he would stay home as much as he could too.
They could stay in bed late on Sundays, have all their meals together or simply just spend time together. They watched movies and stayed home. They drove down to Castle Rock every second week for a family lunch. Katrina said it would be so and no one dared to argue. She still fussed over Gabriel a bit more than before, but otherwise things were fine. Cas was actually surprised by how well his Father and John were treating well... everything they always thought would be a problem. His Dad actually laughed at him saying “You didn't really think this was a secret, right?”. John seemed a bit more uncertain, but apparently he decided on not saying anything about anything as the best course of action on his part. They all let him go with that.
'Where's Gabriel?' Dean mumbled, his head buried in the pillow above Cas' shoulder. Castiel stayed quiet for another moment listening to any noise coming from outside of the room so that he could guess.
'The TVs on,' he said then.
'How the hell is he up already? It's early.'
'It's almost nine,' Castiel said glancing at the clock on the wall.
'Freakin' early,' Dean grumbled and he shifted even closer. Castiel chuckled and turned to kiss him on the lips.
'It's late enough,' he told him.
'You're both freaks,' Dean replied. 'But seriously, he's not sleeping enough,' he added a second later.
'He sleeps fine, he's just not used to sleep too much at a time because of work,' Castiel answered. Dean seemed to think about this for moment. Even if he had time to sleep Gabriel found it hard to do so, mostly he's been sleeping only a few hours at a time for years now, so the “staying in bed late on Sundays” part of their day was not his forte.
'Yeah, ok you're right,' he agreed finally. 'He could stay in bed though.'
'Don't you think he would be bored with both of us asleep?'
'Maybe, but it would be totally worth it after we woke up,' he said with a smile and pulled closer again, putting kisses on Castiel's neck. Castiel leaned into the touches and turned towards the other man. It soon turned into a long and lazy kisses as they tangled up in the sheets. Castiel really enjoyed Sundays.
They emerged from the bedroom sometime later, but didn't find Gabriel in front of the TV in the living room, but in the kitchen and they both just stared for a few long moments to make sure they were not imagining the sight.
'Please tell me you're not cooking,' Dean said.
'Shut up,' Gabriel answered right away. 'I can cook... well, better than Cas.'
'Everyone cooks better than Cas,' Dean answered immediately.
'I'd be offended if it wasn't true,' Castiel answered calmly as he walked over to the coffee-machine. He was immensely happy that there was some already made.
'It's pancakes, I can make pancakes, it's easy,' Gabriel told them.
'Cas burnt down the stove when making two eggs,' Dean reminded him.
'Again, I wish I could be offended by that,' Castiel remarked sipping his coffee and Gabriel chuckled. Dean walked up right behind Gabriel, putting one arm across his waist and resting his chin on his shoulder looking down on what he was doing.
'They look edible,' he said.
'They are edible,' Gabriel insisted. 'You don't want any, you won't get any.'
'Never said I don't want to eat it,' Dean told him and kissed his neck. 'They smell awesome. Didn't know you could make pancakes.'
'Lived on my own for quite a while,' Gabriel shrugged. Dean resumed looking down on what he was doing over his shoulder, his hand tracing idle patterns on Gabriel's stomach.
He was immensely physical with Gabriel lately. They've never been like that before, neither of them. They kissed each other hi or goodbye, but such touches only happened when it was directly leading up to sex. Now, Dean was always casually touching him like this. An arm around his waist, a hand on his leg and so on. Dean didn't really have it in him to be affectionate with words and up until recently Castiel was convinced that he didn't like this sort of display of affection either. He was obviously wrong. He also thought that Gabriel wasn't the PDA type, but he should've remembered how he was when they were kids. He just never initiated it in quite a lot of years, but he did lean into the touches, smiled in a pleased way, obviously enjoying it.
Castiel thought about doing the same, but he was sure that it would've been... awkward on his part. He was perfectly fine in the bedroom, when his touches had intent, but he was really not good with being so casual with it. He didn't mind, this was something between Dean and Gabriel, it was their way to show how they felt for each other without them having to say a word. It was like him and Dean always just sharing a look or staring at each other, it was enough to know what the other thought. He knew everything he needed to know from the way Dean looked back at him, without having to touch each other. And him and Gabriel, well, they could actually talk. Gabriel always called him during the day when he had to speak with someone. He could calm him down or reassure him even over the phone. It seemed like Gabriel found it much easier to put it in words what was going through his head, when he talked to Cas. And just like Castiel didn't try to mimic Dean's casual physicality with Gabriel, Dean didn't try to get Gabriel to talk to him if he rather wanted to talk with Cas, he just kissed him and smiled. He told Castiel that he would listen, but wouldn't know what to say anyway, so he was fine with it. They asked Chuck about it and he said it was a suitable balance with Gabriel still having issues with complete emotional surrender. And anyway, it worked, so they were fine. Castiel didn't envy Dean being the one to draw Gabriel in his arms like this and Dean didn't envy that he wasn't the one Gabriel called when he needed to hear a supporting voice.
Dean insisted that they eat in the living room and Gabriel was easy enough to convince and Cas too had to admit that it was easy to eat their food even without a table so he didn't put up too much of a fight. They just wanted to settle down when the doorbell rang. Dean and Cas shared a glance while Gabriel put down his plate and got up to open the door.
'Please tell me it's not who I think it is,' Dean sighed dramatically.
'Sorry,' Gabriel said before he disappeared towards the entryway. He came back after a few moments but this time the sound of high-heels tapping on the wooden floor accompanied him.
'Hello boys.'
'Kali,' they greeted both with equal enthusiasm. Gabriel settled back on the couch.
'Ever thought about moving to the other side of the city?' Dean asked as she settled down in an armchair. She lived only a few blocks away as they found out a little while back, Dean was less than pleased about it. Castiel wasn't delighted about it either, but they knew she was important to Gabriel so they didn't complain, much. She had an annoying tendency to drop by on her way to work, sometimes even on her way home. They dealt with it. There was only one rule they sat up, no dinner or drinks or anything of sort with her in private. Gabriel didn't argue about it.
'I swear I'm gonna leave the door open one day and we're gonna have dirty, bendy sex, that you will walk in on.'
'Go ahead,' Kali answered turning to Dean without missing a beat, completely unfazed and even smiling a little. Dean stared some daggers at her before he went back to his pancakes without replying.
'Coffee?' Castiel offered, just to move on the conversation. Dean and Kali could keep on snapping at each other for hours. Gabriel seemed more amused than he had any right to be.
'I don't drink coffee, you should learn how to make my tea,' she replied.
'You can make your own damn tea, princess,' Dean grumbled. Kali rolled her eyes, but stood up.
'This is not how you treat a guest,' she remarked.
'You're not a guest, you're the plague,' Dean answered. Kali kissed her middle finger elegantly before walking towards the kitchen.
'Yeah, right back atcha, sweetheart,' Dean smiled at her unpleasantly. 'Can I shoot her?' he asked once she was out of the room.
'I don't think we could get rid of the body,' Castiel told him.
'She would come back to haunt you forever,' Gabriel added with a smile playing on his lips. Dean sighed and took another bite from his pancakes. 'She's baiting you because you let her,' Gabriel added. 'She won't stop until she finds it entertaining when you get all grumpy and jealous.'
'Not jealous,' Dean said.
'You almost had me fooled,' Castiel remarked, Dean shot him a look that made Cas smile. He didn't like Kali, but he had to agree that there was something in Dean being all riled up like this that was really amusing to watch. Dean leaned back to Gabriel the next moment, putting his fork down and sliding his hand down his leg.
'Not jealous, because you're in our bed and we're the ones you make pancakes for,' he grinned and kissed Gabriel just below his ear, then on the lips when the older man turned his head towards him.
'And coffee,' Castiel said as he stood up, finishing his breakfast and heading back to the kitchen needing more coffee. No he was no way addicted to caffeine in any shape or form, no matter what Dean said, he just liked it and had a high tolerance so he had to drink more than one at a time. He leaned down to Gabriel on his way for a short peck on the lips before he headed towards the kitchen to refill his mug. He passed Kali on his way to the kitchen as she was walking back to the living room with her tea.
A few moments later a surprised exclamation from Gabriel and a loud “No fucking way!” from Dean made Cas look up in surprise and he went back to the other room as soon as he could. Kali was sipping her tea, Gabriel had his head resting on his hands, while Dean was staring at a newspaper in his hand.
'What is it?' he asked.
'Gabriel's in the front page of The Denver Post,' Dean told him turning around to look at him. He had a pretty stunned expression on his face. Castiel blinked in surprise.
'What?' he hurried across the room to look at the Sunday Edition in Dean's hand. The headline caught his eyes first so he knew that it was an article about the 'Broadway Disaster', as they labeled it. He focused on the picture and his eyes widened, because they were right.
'Why would anyone take a picture like this?' Gabriel asked.
Said picture was taken somewhere around the time the sun was setting that day as the reflectors were already on, but it wasn't completely dark yet on it. On the left side the edge of one of the medical helicopters was seen and an EMT guy, who was reaching out of from it with his arms, on the right side was Gabriel in his medical coverall standing on the debris that covered the ground. He was holding a small child in his right arm, handing him over a to the man in the helicopter, while a slightly older, crying little girl was clinging to his medical bag. He was dirty and bloody, just like Castiel remembered how he looked after so many hours out in the field.
'Are you kidding?' Kali asked. 'A young handsome white doctor, looking completely dirty and worn rescuing crying kids in the middle of chaos, of course some journalist took a picture of it.'
'No, c'mon... don't they have to ask for permission for such things or something?' Gabriel asked and he sounded torn between being annoyed, embarrassed and distressed.
'I don't think so,' Kali shrugged. Gabriel just groaned and rested his forehead on the heels of his hands again.
'Oh, come on, Gabriel, this is not a bad thing,' Castiel said calmly.
'Yeah, fifteen minutes of fame,' Dean added. 'You look real heroic.'
'I wasn't,' Gabriel replied immediately.
'Don't get yourself worked up over it,' Castiel told him, again in a placating tone.
'I like it,' Dean said then, looking at the picture again. He had a hint of pride in his tone now. 'We should frame it.'
'No fucking way,' Gabriel said as he snapped the newspaper away from Dean's hand. Dean smiled up at him.
'You do realize that there's at least half a million copies of that, right?' Gabriel groaned again and this time Kali chuckled, so the man turned to glare at her.
'Don't look at me like that,' she said. 'Just like Castiel said, this is not a bad thing. It may get the hospital some extra attention and maybe even some benefactors, you could have very good advantages if you wanted to post to some medical journals. Hm?'
'I don't write to medical journals.'
'Which is still a damn shame, since you wrote better than anyone in our year.'
'I am not having this conversation again,' Gabriel said. Kali put up her hands in a surrendering gesture.
'What conversation?' Castiel asked.
'No,' Gabriel turned toward Castiel and Dean. 'I don't care how it's something everyone does to get forward. I don't want to be on a front page, I don't want my name in medical journals and I don't want to talk in front of an audience in conferences. I want to do my damn job, that is it. Is that too much to ask for? I don't care if I spend my entire life working on the ER, I like it, I can do it.'
'Okay,' Dean said.
'It's up to you,' Castiel added and Gabriel's shoulders relaxed as he breathed out.
'Ok, at least only those will recognize me, who know me anyway,' Gabriel said.
'Your name's on page 5,' Kali supplied helpfully. For a moment it seemed like Gabriel wanted to curse again, but then he visibly gave up on it. He pinched the bridge of his nose with two fingers, the newspaper still clutched in his other hand. Castiel took a mental note to buy a new one that was not all wrinkled.
'I have to run,' Kali said suddenly looking at her watch. She put her cup down to the coffee-table and stood up. 'Digest it, I came to show you, so that you won't be surprised on Monday at work.'
'Yeah, thanks,' Gabriel said, his tone got clipped. Kali just brushed her hand down his shoulder and turned to leave. No one moved to see her out, but she was obviously not expecting it anyway.
'What's really bothering you about the picture?' Castiel asked after he heard the front door close. Gabriel crossed his arms, staying silent for a while. Cas glanced at Dean, who looked back for a second before he reached out to pull Gabriel back to the couch so that he sat between them. Gabriel huffed in mild annoyance as he flopped down. Dean draped his arm over his waist and rested his hand on Gabriel's tight. He also turned a little and Gabriel had to shift to sit comfortably, the half of his back resting on Dean's chest. Castiel kept looking at him, but waited.
'It's not me, that picture, and everyone who looks at it, will think that I am,' Gabriel said finally. Castiel saw that Dean frowned at the words, but he on the other hand understood what Gabriel meant by it. The picture really looked all dramatic and heroic, Gabriel certainly didn't see himself as any sort of a “hero”, so he probably didn't want people thinking that he was.
'You cannot expect anything less from the media than to dramatize things, but... it is you on the picture. You were helping people, it's not a lie.'
'I was doing my job, nothing else...' he took a breath before he continued. 'Pete climbed under a building in hope to save as many people as possible, dying there,' his hand moved on top of Dean's, squeezing tightly, a gesture to reassure that he was indeed there and safe, maybe it was even an unconscious movement. 'I wouldn't have done that... he should be on that picture, not me. I just happened to be the one to attend to those two injured kids, there was nothing heroic about it. I was distracting myself with work so that I didn't have to think about what could've happened to you, Dean.'
There were long moments of silence after Gabriel's words. Castiel had to think for a minute to decide what to say and how to say it. Dean stayed silent too of course, but he was a supporting presence, staying close to Gabriel, but looking at Cas.
'You could tell them about it,' Castiel said then.
'What do you mean?' Gabriel asked.
'Well, you're on their front page. I'm sure they would be willing to pay attention to what you have to say about that day. Tell them, your version, about Pete.'
Gabriel seemed to think about this deeply.
'I don't think I can talk to some journalist about him,' he said finally.
'You could write it yourself,' Castiel said.
'No way--'
'Kali just said you're pretty good at it,' Dean spoke up.
'It's still up to you, but if the photo bothers you this much, then maybe it is good to do something about it.' Gabriel fell silent again looking at Castiel, then turning his gaze away, obviously thinking. He glanced down at the newspaper in his hand.
'They'll probably ignore me.'
'Don't be so sure about that,' Cas smiled.
'Dibs on reading it first,' Dean said suddenly, even raising a hand like some excited child, and Gabriel huffed out a laugh.
Two weeks later The Denver Post published Gabriel's article in the Sunday Edition and this time he didn't protest against Dean's idea of framing it, even if he was grumbling a lot under his nose. Castiel put a copy of the issue with Gabriel on the front page behind a few books in the study, maybe they could frame that too one day when Gabriel didn't mind that much seeing it anymore.
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