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Wings, Rings and Interspecies Flings
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Chapter One: Bonding over Brimstone
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There were a couple of reasons why Adam Milligan wasn’t really gung-ho about becoming Winchester brother number three.
For one thing, an angel told him not to do it. He wanted to believe that he was ultimately a good person, and angels were on or even above par with cops and government officials for him. Except, apparently, even angels were not beyond corruption – just like cops and government officials – and how sad was the world for that to be true?
Secondly, Sam and Dean were pretty nice guys, as far as he knew, but that was the problem – he didn’t know them, like, at all. Of course, he blamed dear old Dad for that, but come on, he wasn’t a kid anymore – he wasn’t about to jump at the chance of being coddled by a couple of strangers.
And last – or maybe in the vein of the latter reason – his brothers were codependent on each other to the point of making dysfunctional look sane – erotically so, as Zachariah, corrupt angel extraordinaire, had very helpfully supplied. Adam was nothing if not independent. He hadn’t exaggerated in the slightest to them. He’d been walking himself home from school and clubs, feeding himself and putting himself to bed, since he was barely able to walk, still barely a baby. He no longer wished for someone – read: his father – to swoop into his life and take care of him. Maybe if they’d been a few years earlier…
So, no, Adam was perfectly fine being an average Joe-Shmoe, rather than one of the Winchesters. But he had to admit that he was touched by the fact that his brothers – yeah, he could accept it now, at least in the biological sense – came to his rescue after he was two-timed by a freaking angel. Can’t you tell, he was still just a tiny bit bitter about that?
And that was why he wouldn’t have really minded being stuck in Hell with Sam, since the only silver lining in a situation like this was that he could get to know his older half-brother, maybe even bond with him. At least for a little while, anyway, because damn, he’d never done anything so bad that he deserved to be stuck down there forever, where people like Hitler and Stalin did the eternal limbo, especially since he went out of his way to help little old ladies across the street. That should have made him a shoe-in for Heaven, right?
But, of course, God must have hated his guts, because why else would he get eaten alive, be revived only to be dicked around by the whole of the Heavenly host, and then die again, this time with no peaceful afterlife in sight? Maybe he'd cut off a voodoo priest in traffic during a past life or something. So, obviously, that – something that might have been the smallest sliver of good in Adam’s world of suck – didn’t end up happening.
Instead, it was Michael he said yes to, rather than trusting his own flesh and blood. It wasn’t his fault, really. He’d tried saying no, if only to spite that bastard Zachariah and his feather-brained goons, but Michael had employed some mind-boggling tactics that, well, boggled his mind – hence his use of the adjective mind-boggling.
Where Zachariah took sadistic pleasure in watching Adam spew his bloody guts out, Michael literally employed the kill-with-kindness tactic. The first thing he did was bear down on a cowering Adam – and the only reason he was cowering was that the archangel was the size of the freaking Earth, just so we're clear – reach out what Adam assumed to be his hand and heal him in a sudden rush of power that was like…like ecstasy or adrenaline or some other kind of chemical that pumped you up, made you feel like you were flying, as if you were Leonardo DiCaprio at the stern of the Titanic, like you were immortal and nothing could ever hurt you again.
Oh, and he was shiny.
…What, you wouldn’t pick the guy that sparkled like a trillion fireflies over the one with a million ugly mugs, one of which was a hungry lion? Adam now kind of understood the appeal of that gay Twilight vampire guy, Edwin or something.
So, yeah, Adam said yes, and then he was pushed back into the deepest recesses of his mind – what he called his happy place and what Michael referred to as his inner sanctum, or something cheesy like that. He could still see, feel, smell, taste and touch, but vaguely. It was as if he’d been rolled up into a film of bubble-wrap, which muffled every sensation till it was nearly nonexistent and yet still there, no matter how paradoxical that might have translated to.
He drunkenly watched Michael first order around his troops and then take on Lucifer, only hazily noting that the devil was wearing his middle brother like an overgrown, earth-toned jumpsuit. He felt only the smallest spike of fear when Dean, bright boy that he was, decided it would be an awesome idea to take on the Lord of the Flies himself – not to mention Heaven’s most powerful warrior. He even felt the pinching sensation of being blown up, courtesy of Castiel – not fun at all, for your information.
However, when it came right down to it, he remembered every small detail of falling into the Pit with perfect precision. Sam’s hand had felt slightly clammy when it wrapped around his thin wrist, but unrelenting as the giant man dragged him down. Michael parted Adam’s lips into a tiny ‘o’ of shock, but he would have been inclined to do something much worse, like shriek in an embarrassing, not-so-masculine manner, if he’d been in control of his own body, so he didn't really mind. Falling itself was like being sucked into a vacuum, compressed into a hole that was at once pulling him apart and pressing down on him, cracking a few ribs in the process.
And then, suddenly, Adam Milligan was checked into Hotel Hell. His roommate: the archangel Michael.
…Fun.
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Falling hurt like a motherfucker for what felt like years. Part of the reason was that Adam and Michael – because they were not, for all intents and purposes, actually one being – were literally torn apart, molecule by human and angel molecule, and unceremoniously dumped into the very lowest level of Hell – maybe even under that ninth circle Dante had written about – and there wasn’t exactly something soft to cushion his fall, mind you. Brimstone smarted like a bitch when you slammed into it from bazillions of feet above sea level.
He remembered the impact and the way spidery cracks formed around an amusingly Adam-shaped hole, something straight out of an old Loony Toons reel, and then there was nothing but darkness.
When Adam woke up, he thought the whole thing with the angels, the devil and his half-brothers must have been some freaky, excess-of-caffeine induced dream, because shit like that didn’t happen in real life, and because a bright and beautiful sun was shining hopefully into his face, while a campfire sat invitingly in front of him, which prompted him to wonder if he'd fallen asleep outside somewhere, no doubt happily wasted.
Of course, this illusion of tranquility lasted, oh, about three seconds before he realized that his reality was a gas-station toilet, fucked by every grimy freak who came in to make a rest-stop, because his whole body ached to its very core like he’d just had a throw-down with Godzilla, Mothra and all of their mutated, sexually unidentifiable friends. Obviously he’d lost.
Not to mention that, if he squinted into the light focusing on his face, he could make out huge, spanning feathers that arched into wings, flaring like wispy fire, and soon the light itself began to congeal into a more recognizable form – almost mannish, but not at the same time. And it definitely wasn’t a campfire, unless it was for Bible camp.
Adam knew at once that it was Michael, because it hulked over him the same way the archangel had in the green room, and it reminded him of that luminescent being he’d met not long ago, filling him with the same warmth – the same, probably unmerited feeling of safety.
“Are you all right?” the archangel trilled in his angel-language, which was more song than words, soft and loud all at once, the native tongue of every imaginable land. It was creepy, especially since the big, searing balls of flames that passed for Michael’s eyes bore into him hungrily, as if his body was a refrigerator and the soul inside was Michael’s midnight snack. Adam felt himself back away, his palms scraping on rough brimstone, while the archangel tilted the giant globe that was his head, actually hurt. And that, damn it, made the nineteen year old feel bad, but could you blame him for being a little paranoid? Dude looked like an alien!
He cleared his throat to battle his discomfort. “So, uh, I take it we – you – didn’t defeat the devil, huh?”
“No, unfortunately not,” Michael replied, craning his endlessly long neck.
Adam followed his gaze up and felt his jaw drop, having found another source of light, which he’d mistakenly believed to be the sun. It was a giant marble-like thing, hanging in midair, that flashed dangerously every few seconds, reminiscent of the New Year’s ball that he and his mom used to watch on TV on the eve of January first, waiting for the next year to start. Or, you know, a nuclear weapon that was waiting for some weird guy with a claw-hand and a cat to detonate it. Details, details.
“W-what is that?” he asked, hating the quiver that developed in his voice.
Michael regarded him closely for a few moments – moments that were, perhaps, years or only milliseconds in their new home – before he seemed to find whatever he was looking for, and he explained, “We are in the Pit and the sphere above us is the Cage, where my errant brother now and forever resides.”
Oh, so Lucy was the flashy thing? That made sense. Adam didn’t remember Sunday school very well, having dropped it like a hot plate as soon as his mother let him take up more desirable activities, but the devil had been an angel once, he knew, and wasn’t he ironically the angel of light?
He didn’t muse all that aloud, although Michael had been riding him long enough to probably know how his mind worked by now, but he did wonder, “And my brother? What happened to Sam?”
When Michael didn’t immediately respond, he came to his own conclusions. Sam wasn’t in Hell, was he? After all, he was one of the important ones, while Adam was only the half-brother. Figured that all of the crap he’d thought was so very important, that he done back-flips for, hadn’t been worth a rat’s ass. No, little Suzy, good grades, being a dutiful child, never going overboard with all that shitty gluttony stuff, and trying to help people will not get you into Heaven – not for long, anyway – since it might just get you a one-way ticket to Hell.
And then warmth washed over him, briefly soothing the ache in his mind, his heart and his body – maybe even his soul – and Michael’s voice was a sort of lullaby. “Sam is...in there, with Lucifer.”
Adam eyes bugged out. “What? Why? Better yet, why aren’t we in there with them?”
Michael ducked his head. If he wasn’t a glowing, vaguely human-shaped blob, Adam would assume the expression he wore was contrite, sheepish, perhaps even guilty. “It took all I had to bring you down here, to relative safety. I couldn’t risk you for Sam.” He said it with finality.
Adam frowned. Okay, so he’d kind of been mentally bitching about the universe’s blatant favoritism for his brothers, but still, he didn’t want anyone saving him at the expense of someone else, especially if it was his brother being served up on a silver platter. Come on, he might have been the descendant of Cain or Abel or whoever, but he was not about to go all Genesis on Sam's ass.
Michael’s massive frame drooped as he sighed, his wings curving and fluttering down in a waterfall of feathers behind him, and Adam couldn’t help the way his eyes were drawn to them – they were beautiful. “You are thinking like a Winchester. I don’t like it.”
Adam pressed his lips together tightly and then opened his mouth to reply. He still wasn’t a Winchester, damn it, he was and would always be a Milligan! But then a wave of pain bowled into him, so powerful that it took his breath away, leaving him unable to even cry out, to do anything but fall back and hit the hard brimstone. He tried desperately to curl into himself, though his smart-ass logic told him that doing so would do absolutely nothing against whatever preternatural forces dished out the dirty in Hell. Fuck you, logic, he screamed in his head. Fuck, now he was talking to himself…and apparently stuck on the word fuck. See, SAT vocabulary, you’re not nearly as useful as you thought!
At once, Michael’s mojo – his grace, as the archangel had referred to it – pushed back against the anguish.
“I feared that this would happen,” Heaven’s mightiest warrior murmured, when Adam’s suffering was at last manageable enough for him to pretend it wasn’t there – even though the stupid, agonizing bitch was saying, 'Here I am! Here I am! Look at me! Wanna feel like your appendix is bursting next? Or would you rather have a heart attack?' Damn imaginary bastard.
“Feared what would happen?” Adam repeated weakly, too exhausted to even be suspicious.
“I may have kept us out of the way of Lucifer’s wrath, but we’re far from safe. Not even the worst human souls can survive this deep in Hell, especially ones as pure as yours.” When Adam glared at him – because ‘pure soul’ made him sound like a nun, not a perfectly normal teenage boy – Michael clarified, “I didn’t intend to offend you. I only meant, sinning, though the principal reason human souls reside in Hell, leaves calluses on them, making them undesirable to Heaven, but protecting them from the torment within Hell. Thus, souls like yours, belonging to the side of good, truly suffer the worst when left here. Generally, this happens if they have made a deal with a demon, because even the brightest souls are not above temptation, but you have always been something of a special case – all Winchesters are – and that only means you're in more danger. Being in Hell for an extended period of time will shred your soul entirely.”
Adam bit his lips till it tore, scared more than annoyed, but now was not the time to punctuate that he wasn’t a Winchester, yet again. “So, what you’re saying is, you saved me from whatever Sam’s going through up there, but I’m still gonna die? That’s great – just freaking peachy! And here I thought getting eaten alive was as bad as it would get!”
“We will both die,” Michael emphasized, and he seemed oddly undaunted by this. “Angels, Lucifer exempted, do not belong down here, either. The Pit and the Cage were created to cater to him, specifically.” He grew silent, flaming eyes never leaving his tiny human charge, while Adam felt the humiliating urge to cry.
He tucked his face into the worn material of his jeans,wondering if the moisture would do anything against the blood and grime. He’d always been something of a neat-freak, taking comfort in looking after their house when his mom wasn’t around, but he didn’t suppose that would come in handy now.
More time passed – Adam didn’t really know how long – but Michael kept the pain, which came in too short intervals, at bay. Adam was observant, however, especially for someone who’d never known that the monsters under his bed – literally, in the Milligans' case – were real, and the archangel’s form flickered weakly each time, seeming scarcely a tint duller after each of his healing spells. This would kill Michael faster than it would him if it went on, because Michael was keeping him alive. Adam would be all alone when the angel was gone.
The next surge of agony made his teeth crack, but when Michael moved to help him, he held up a hand – not that it could do much to impede the angel, if he really wanted to get through it, but it was the thought, brimming with fierce determination, that counted.
“S-stop! If I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die, but I won’t drag you down with me.” The idea of fading away like that terrified him. His soul would be 'shredded', Michael had said, which meant no hereafter at all for him, but maybe that was better than lies from the angels who ran Heaven and being tortured for eternity in Hell. Maybe nothingness was the only escape he’d ever get, although nonexistence was a scary thought.
Michael eyed him uncertainly, but he halted as bidden. After a moment, his whole body expanded as he did something Adam didn’t even think he could: inhale. “There is another way. We could both be saved, but–”
Adam wasn’t usually impatient – if anything, he was a take-your-sweet-ass-time kind of guy – but he cut the angel off right there. “What do you mean, but? What do you have to do?” He refrained from adding, “Just fucking do it already!” because someone with even half a brain should know not to boss an angel around, unless they wanted their ass smote.
“–but the spell is not recommended,” Michael continued fluidly, as if he’d never been interrupted in the first place. “I would require your permission to even begin to assuage my guilt.”
“Dying isn’t exactly something I’d recommend, either,” Adam said, taking on the I-know-best tone his physician everywhere had perfected. He’d always promised himself he would be way less of a patronizing jackass than any of the doctors he'd had when he finished med-school, but it didn’t seem like he’d get a chance to prove it anytime soon. “Also, if I do die, you’ll totally be guilty anyway, because I will haunt you, the judge, jury and executioner. Have me.” When Michael merely stared, he flushed, abruptly realizing how it sounded like a come-on.
Michael looked away, resuming in a murmur. “It will not get us out of here, unfortunately. To free a soul from Hell requires more than merely power – grace. When that malakhim, Castiel, raised your brother from Perdition, he and an entire garrison of my brethren laid siege to Hell, and still many died. Breaching the Pit has never before been attempted.” The bare bones of the matter was, they were stuck, presumably forever, and although the archangel’s tone belied no distress, his eyes had darkened to the color of coal after a barbeque, when you took a fire extinguisher to it – dying, fading, hopeless.
Adam wasn’t a psychic or anything, and the news made whatever optimism that remained sink down into his belly, but he couldn’t resist saying, “Hey, it’ll be okay,” just because he hated seeing the all-powerful angel reduced to something as downtrodden as this, like a puppy that had been kicked one too many times. He struggled to sit up, feeling his rib-cage crackle like an aged piece of paper, ready to crumble under the pressure, and shakily touched the angel’s lustrous form. The twin coals blinked back at him, perhaps even faintly startled.
“So you would not be averse to the idea?” Michael eventually asked, still quiet, but thankfully brighter.
Adam nodded. It was stupid, the small, rational part of his brain told him, because he didn’t even know what the idea was, and it went against every conscientious part of him, that had picked apart every aspect of his college applications and acceptance letters before making a final decision. His mother had roped her friend, a corporate lawyer for Windom Memorial, into talking him through it, and she’d given him one core piece of advice: never overlook even the smallest of terms. This was a Hell of a fine-print that he was ignoring – he just didn’t know it yet.
“If you are sure, then fine.” Michael gave his own slow nod and then went entirely static, his eyes shutting behind flaring lids. He was so still that he looked more like a wall of flame than anything, so huge that he could have put the Great Wall of China to shame.
Adam set his chin down on the tops of his knees, circling them with his skinny arms, and silently watched. It was probably because of his diligent observance that he noticed how the archangel blazed more and more for every minute that passed. Eventually, the light became so intense that it overtook Lucifer’s frantic bursts above them, so Adam couldn’t bear to look straight into it anymore. And then it started.
With seemingly no rhyme or reason, Michael exploded – Adam distantly wondered if he actually liked the sensation, with how frequently it seemed to happen to him – and then all of his displaced particles closed back in on a single flaming ball, similar but not congruent to the Cage, suggestive of missiles with homing sensors. A more humanoid being, about Adam’s height, formed after that, standing before him. Its eyes twinkled.
“Uh, wow,” was all Adam could manage, musing that Michael looked almost normal. It might have been his imagination, but the shimmering ball that was Michael’s head split into a mockery of a human smile.
“Thank you. I took this visage so you might be more comfortable during the ceremony. I am glad it is to your liking.” That was all the courtesy the angel had time for, as he clapped his hands – now equipped with five flashlight-beam fingers each – and began to chant. It was beautiful, to say the least, but the words – if they even were words – passed through Michael’s lips too fast to comprehend. It sounded more like humming – that of a thousand hummingbirds. Finally, the angel clasped his hands together once more, thunderous in comparison to his sing-song mantra, and said what phonetically sounded like, “Parakleda, allar, a-m-ipzi,” but could have just as likely been gibberish.
Adam gaped at him. “Is it... Are you done?”
Instead of answering him, Michael simply said, “This will hurt,” and lurched forward before Adam could do anything to defend himself, one of his hands searing into Adam’s back, just to the side of his left shoulder-blade, dissolving right through his clothes, while a single finger traced rapidly over the pale expanse of the his forehead, forming something star-shaped.
It did hurt. It hurt a fucking lot, thank you very much, burning away his skin, his muscles, his bones, his organs – everything. It hurt so badly that all Adam could think about was how much it hurt – how hurt he was that yet another angel, that this angel, had betrayed him all over again. He was probably going to die no matter what Michael had promised.
The archangel in question caught him when he slumped forward, moving his other hand to mirror its twin, doing more of the strange, ninja-like gestures. Adam fainted.
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“U-um, are you okay? Adam? Er, Mr. Milligan?” Adam shot up like a bullet when a timid hand touched his shoulder, whipping his head around wildly. He was sitting on a rather unsanitary, sagging couch, and he fought the urge to spring away from it in disgust.
Instead, he looked up at the man who’d been calling his name. He was short – very short – with messy brown curls, nervous, constantly shifting eyes and a rough three day beard.
The room behind him, the majority of it taken up by a giant writing desk, suited him entirely, scattered with beer bottles and loose sheets of paper as it was. There was an aged desktop on the scarred mahogany antique, bookshelves filled with loosely-bound books behind it.
“W-where am I?” Adam asked, clearing his throat. Had Michael managed it somehow? Was he out of Hell?
“You’re dreaming,” the man said, not unkindly. Adam let his face fall, unable to hide his disappointment. The man hesitantly dropped a hand on his shoulder again. “Hey, it’ll be okay, okay?” Adam distinctly remembered saying something similar to Michael, a lie then and now, so he snorted. “No, really, it’s true. Wouldn’t have left him alone if I didn’t know Mike was a resourceful guy.”
Adam looked up at the quirky man again. “Mike?” He frowned, jerking his shoulder out of his grasp. “Who the Hell are you, anyway? How do you know me? You an angel or something?”
The man kneaded his fingers together skittishly, biting his lip, as his eyes floated from one corner of the room to another. “I-I’m Chuck Shurley, a-a friend of your brothers… Or, at least, I hope they consider us friends. And I’m not an angel, I promise.” Adam was still somewhat leery, since fun-times with Zack had taught him not to believe everything he heard straight-away. If he wasn’t an angel, how the Hell did Chuck know all the crap that he did? As if reading his mind, the man answered, “I know you – everything about you Winchesters – because I’m a prophet. But, um, don’t worry – we don’t have any scary powers or anything. We just watch.”
“Dude… Chuck, that’s voyeurism, man. Totally creepy's what it is,” Adam punctuated slowly, watching as Chuck’s shoulders drooped.
“It’s not on purpose!” the man exclaimed, face going red. “You guys aren’t exactly easy on the eyes. For me, anyway.” He began to mutter unintelligibly to himself – something about fangirls.
“Hey, don’t feel bad,” Adam replied, not bothering to protest. “I totally get what you mean, but…if you’re a prophet, then tell me, will I be stuck down there forever?” A cold pit formed in his stomach at the very thought.
Chuck brought his hands down to pick at the wrinkled material of his shirt, doing and undoing a worn button on it. “I really am sorry, Adam. I didn't mean for you to draw the short lot, I’ll admit,” he said quietly, seriously, and Adam didn’t know what to make of his sudden change of demeanor. Then, the man blinked and continued, “But don’t give up. Like I said, things will get better.”
Before Adam could ask him to clarify – really, was an answer too much to fucking ask for? He wasn’t above throttling the little guy to get one, if it came to that – a chirping call resounded from an outer room.
“Chucky, are you in your study?” a bouncy feminine voice inquired. “I have marzipan!” She sounded as if she thought that the sweet confection was the answer to every last mystery in the universe. If only that was true, Adam would have taken up baking years ago.
Chuck’s already huge eyes widened dramatically. “Y-you should go now! You don’t want her to get her hands on you, trust me,” he advised, dry lips twitching as if he wasn’t sure whether to smile to whimper. Adam tried to protest, but the small man grabbed him by the arm, abruptly imposing and strong. “Don’t worry, though, okay? It was an interesting choice he made, but I approve. He’ll do right by you.”
Before Adam could voice his thoughts, which mostly consisted of the theory that Chuck was drunk off his ass, he was gone.
Damn, that had to stop happening.
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Adam woke up in Hell – for the second time – feeling really, really awesome. Nothing hurt anymore and his whole body tingled with the pleasantness he associated with only a couple of things: a good night’s sleep, a better night’s tumble in the sack, and the sort – which was weird, seeing as dreaming about jumpy little men wasn’t exactly the stuff of fantasies. The fact that no brimstone poked into his skin was an added bonus.
Of course, when he noticed why, exactly, that was, he scrabbled off of a very confused Michael’s lap as if spiders had been crawling all over him. The archangel was once again huge enough to comfortably situate his former vessel, he noted, and Michael’s heated skin had felt nice, almost soothing – more of a balm than the nuclear bomb you’d usually take him for.
“I am glad to see you’re feeling better,” he said to a scowling Adam. “The pain should be all but gone by now.”
It was, but still… “Damn it, that hurt, you ass!”
Michael didn’t bat an eyelid. “And I believe I informed you that it would, did I not?”
Adam pursed his lips together and turned around full circle, so he didn’t have to look at the angel anymore. Okay, so he was sulking and it wasn’t exactly mature, but whatever. “You suck,” he sniped.
“It wasn’t my intention to harm you, Adam, neither physically nor emotionally,” the archangel murmured, almost pleadingly. However, when Adam looked at him out of the corner of his eye – it was hard not to catch sight of something so massive – he was resplendent like the human had never seen him before, even in the green room. Huh, so they were both feeling better, were they?
Despite that, they sat in silence for what felt like decades, with Adam counting cracks in the brimstone ahead of him while Michael scrutinized his profile, probably reading from the stubborn set of his mouth and chin that he wouldn’t respond to attempted amiableness.
Finally, finally, Adam got fed up with giving the only other sentient being in the Pit the cold shoulder. He sighed, turned back around, and declared, “I guess I can forgive you,” somewhat reluctantly.
“You’re very kind,” the archangel replied, the faintest hint of amusement coloring his tone. “Your mercy knows no ends, it seems.”
Oddly enough, he was teasing. Whatever, Adam didn’t care. He was bored out of his mind and he had a trillion year old warrior angel in front of him. Why not make use of that, right?
“Could you, I dunno, tell me stories or something? You must have seen some epic shit in your life.” He tried – and failed – not to sound too eager.
Michael hummed thoughtfully. “You like stories,” he stated at random. “Your mother…she used to hold you in her lap when you were upset and spin great tales for you.”
Adam almost regretted ever making the request, but all he said was, “Yeah, and don’t get any ideas,” remembering how – and where – he’d woken up. He’d go pretty far for entertainment down here, but not so far as to become easy prey to the predatory being before him.
Michael smiled that weird not-quite-smile again. “You’ve heard the tale of Adam and Eve, have you not? Of your namesake?” At Adam’s nod, he continued, “Well, let me tell you the true story…”
And that was the start of a beautiful friendship. Fucked up, but beautiful, nonetheless.
-
After that, Hell got better. It wasn’t quite up there with Heaven – both literally and metaphorically – because, while Michael fascinated him to no end, he wasn’t a hot chick whom Adam could make out with. All the same, rampant teenage hormones aside, Adam wasn’t about to get choosy so soon after begging.
Every day, Michael would tell him stories. They took epic to a whole new level, as promised, with prose better than Homer’s Iliad or Odyssey, though Adam had always been a fan of ancient myth.
They were about everything: from Lucifer’s fall to the last time the true vessels had appeared on Earth and angels had walked alongside mankind. Michael told him about his battles, but also about life in Heaven for angels, the every day and the extraordinary. He even spoke, somewhat warily, of the Winchesters and their adventures, which Adam couldn’t help feeling enamored with, if only because, no matter how much he wanted to hate them, they were his brothers and his father – his family.
Thankfully, Adam managed to condition the habit of telling more, what could he say, intimate stories, out of Michael. Some things, you never wanted to know, even about – especially about – people you were supposed to unconditionally love.
Hence, Adam eventually grew so comfortable looking into those sun-bright eyes that he told Michael some stories of his own. He told him about his life with his mom, how awesome she’d been, and how hard she’d tried to raise Adam on her own. He told him about what family they’d had outside of each other, and what friends had become something like family over the years. He told him about John Winchester’s imposition on his life, and how much it had hurt him when the man had to leave, particularly now that he knew how John had better sons to get back to, no matter what Adam did to win him over.
Of course, he realized that they were probably stupid by comparison, since the angel had the abridged version of his life simply because Adam was his – or one of his – bloodline vessels, but they meant a lot to Adam – they were him, these stories. Michael, for his part, seemed to sense that, and he always listened with a serious sort of patience and dedication that left Adam feeling both proud and immature, similar to a little kid who went up to a soldier and told him about the make-believe adventures of his action figures.
Sometimes, disregarding how far they’d come with each other – how Adam could almost consider Michael his friend – they didn’t really talk at all. Instead, Adam sat watching the Cage, whispering softly to Sam, and Michael sat watching him, somehow never losing interest in this doe-eyed human boy with a sweet face and a sharp tongue.
Adam hadn’t forgotten about his brother – not by a long shot – but he didn’t know what to do for him, either. He honestly was a nobody – not as strategically brilliant as Sam nor as righteously heroic as Dean – so he couldn’t do anything but talk to Sam, hoping against hope that his giant brother would hear him, and that it would somehow help him forget his ordeal. He wasn’t exactly the go-to-guy when it came to supernatural creatures, but he knew in his gut that he’d lucked out with Michael where Sam surely hadn’t with Lucifer. A guilty part of him was happy about it, but he stamped it down whenever it reared its ugly head. Mostly, he wished Sam was down here, with him, so he could rant and rave about being yanked down with the big idiot, but he could do it while certain that Sam was safe and sound.
Of course, it was looking more and more likely that Sam couldn’t hear him. After all, he couldn’t hear Sam, and he didn’t want to think that it was because Sam would rather not answer. He’d been all for the dewy-eyed bromance crap earlier, after all, but that was before Adam had stepped into Benedict Arnold’s cowhide boots, so who knew? Maybe Sam was giving him the silent treatment? Either way, it was so damn unfair that he sometimes wanted to throw masculinity to the wind and bawl like a baby.
One day, after another of his failed communicate-with-Sam ploys, Michael said, “Your mother…her Heaven is the day you were born.” He said it so calmly, as if he was only commenting on something mundane, on something like the weather, yet Adam felt anything but composed. He just listened, though, as the angel continued in his soft, lilting voice. “You were so fragile, reminding her of a precious doll she’d had in her youth. She’d been very afraid for the whole eight months she knew about you – she hadn’t known she was expecting the first month – but all those anxieties left when her doctor-friend wiped you clean and handed you to her in a blue fleece blanket. You were small and perfect, all tufts of soft blond hair and sleepy blue eyes, and she thought you were a little angel.” There was affection in his tone, and amusement, too, at this ironic comparison. “From what I know, you were a beautiful infant, ten little toes and ten fingers always eager to touch, but you inspired new fear in her. She was afraid of everything that could hurt you – imaginary threats, criminals who targeted children, animals, even your father – and she was right to be, wasn’t she? She loved you very much.”
“I-I loved her, too…” Adam finally whispered. “So fucking much – I love her so fucking much.”
The tears leaked out as if some dam broke. She was up there, holding baby him forever, and it was the happiest moment of her life all over again, but it wasn’t really him. They were the farthest two people could possibly be from each other. He’d kept himself from thinking about it for so long, knowing it’d destroy him if he did, but he could acknowledge it now: he wasn’t ever going to see her again.
“I am truly sorry,” Michael said, evidently penitent, and Adam let himself break.
After that, the archangel learned to pick at less raw wounds. Sometimes, to break the rhythm of their conversations, he told Adam about the afterlives of the people whom he’d once loved, who’d died and left him behind.
He told Adam about his first best friend, a little girl called Lily, who’d just stopped coming to kindergarten one day – “She was really sick, baby. Cancer,” his mom had later informed him – who now spent her days on a ranch in Texas, happily riding the ponies she’d always loved. He told Adam about Grandpa Max, Kate’s only living parent upon Adam’s birth, who used to take the little boy fishing every summer, till a severe stroke had left him immobilized. Now, however, he married the beautiful woman of his dreams each and every day, his Eva, Kate’s mother. He even told Adam about John, whose Heaven was unlike anyone else’s: a day playing toss-the-football with three year old Dean; kissing his wife Mary after Sam’s difficult birth, the squirming baby held lovingly between them; and, against all odds, watching a baseball game with Adam on his thirteenth birthday – he agreed that their second visit was better, because the first, during his twelfth birthday, had been nerve-racking for both of them.
Hearing these stories hurt, but it was a good kind of hurt – the kind that eventually scabbed over and healed.
And then the day came when everything changed.
-
It started out like any other day in Hell. After those first two knock outs, Adam never slept or dreamed, so it wasn’t much of a start at all – only an endless continuation.
It was another Sam-day, and those weren’t as rare as you’d think they’d be, considering the Sasquatch never replied. Adam had always been an imaginative, thoughtful person, and it was almost fun to take what he knew of Sam to piece together replies to the things he said. Yeah…so it was kind of pathetic, but he didn’t really care.
He was in the middle of explaining the plot of a book-series he’d read a few years back, Percy Jackson and the Olympians, but he took Sam as more of a Harry Potter kind of guy, for whatever reason – he just had a Hagridish feel to him, that was all. And then, suddenly, the air above them combusted into a billion pieces, Michael immediately surging to Adam’s defense, so he let thoughts of prepubescent heroes trickle into nonentity.
The thing about Hell was, its sky was mostly blocked by the Cage, and everything over that, contrary to popular belief about hanging bats and ceaseless night, was daylight, although there was no sun that Adam could find – or maybe it would be more apt to say that the Cage was the sun and old Lucy was its core. So, yeah, it was a pretty big thing when lighting – fucking lightning, of all things – burst out from behind the Cage, long as the encircling arms of a lover, and filtered into the shape of an angel – something like Michael, but not.
Adam thought it was an angel, anyway, but he could barely see, what with how Michael held him so close to his massive body, his huge wings wrapped protectively around them both.
The archangel only pulled away when the new arrival barked, “Michael,” sharp and maybe even slightly relieved.
“R-Raphael?” Michael asked, and it was the first time that he was ever truly caught off guard, in the years that Adam had known him.
Adam used this distraction to his own advantage, squirming away from the archangel to analyze the newcomer. Where Michael was the pure embodiment of fire – his eyes, his wings and his very form comprised of white hot flames – this guy was all storms, electric blue sparks of lightning molding together to shape him, perfect lightning bolts shooting out to create the skeletal structure of his wings.
“Yes, brother,” he began, and even his voice clapped like thunder, making Adam’s knees go so weak that he had to cling to Michael for support – not that the angel noticed, since he’d been all eyes for this Raphael guy since he’d got here, which left Adam feeling unexpectedly jealous. He told himself that it was normal, since anyone would feel that way after going from the apple of someone’s eye to absolutely nothing in a New York minute, but it wasn’t reassuring. It didn’t help that Raphael passed his spark-plug eyes over him disdainfully, as if he was a little fly stuck in Michael’s honey, waiting to be scooped out and swatted. “I am here to free you from this loathsome place, Michael. Heaven has been in shambles since you left. That foolish child, Castiel, tries to claim what could never be his.”
Even though the archangel ignored Adam – and quite purposefully – he suddenly felt giddy. “All right! We’re finally going to get out of here!” he said, his face splitting into a brilliant grin.
“We?” Raphael laughed outright, growing first loud, then silencing gradually, as thunder did when a storm drew farther and farther away. “There is no ‘we,’ boy. You Winchesters… Well, I certainly don’t mind you rotting here, though I’m surprised you haven’t already withered away. Like roaches, you brothers are.”
Adam’s stomach dropped. He now knew how Winston McNaughton felt when he was picked last during gym every single day of sophomore year. But then he sensed Michael’s wings brushing along the length of his body, offering him comfort.
“I understand that the risk to free Samuel Winchester might be too high, as Lucifer might also be liberated with his vessel, but I will not leave mine,” the archangel said, determined, and Adam felt so damn grateful.
Raphael’s eyes bugged out in what might have been a comical way, if he wasn’t so shit-your-pants scary. “What? This boy – you would persist in Hell for this boy? I cannot even believe this has come into question!” The look he gave Adam made his skin crawl. It was official – he never wanted to meet Raphael in a dark alley, although frying Adam till he was extra crispy could probably light up even Sutherland, Africa, let alone a graffiti-tagged backstreet.
Michael stepped a minute distance away from his charge, but before Adam could panic, the archangel said to his brother, “Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t leave him. You asked how he was still alive. Don’t tell me you cannot sense what I have done?”
Raphael made a snorting sound, but leered closer curiously, and Michael allowed him to. It didn’t take long at all for the temperamental angel to pull back, a hole the size of Adam’s head splitting his enormous face into an alien expression of terror and disgust. If you looked close enough, Adam thought you could see Jupiter’s eternal storm within it.
“You didn’t,” the angel gasped, revulsion palpable between them, not really much of a question.
“It was the only way,” Michael answered calmly.
“Ha! You know that isn’t why,” Raphael scoffed, his eyes burning with hate, though Adam couldn’t fathom who the brunt of it was directed at: the human or his archangel kin. He was pissed the fuck off, that was for sure, his entire body sizzling, his wings especially, in response to his anger. For a second, Adam thought he might attack them, and he worried over Michael, but then Raphael eventually muttered, “I wish I could dump you here, traitor that you are, to suffer with that cretin Lucifer for eternity. In spite of this, it wouldn’t be wise of me. There is no one more powerful than you, so only you can handle Castiel, no matter how I wish I could tear the wings off you both. Come.”
With that, the archangel turned and began to flap his massive wings, wind sweeping around him like a cow-tipping cyclone in Kansas. He flew up toward the Cage, sparing not a single glance over his shoulder, and Michael paused to bend down to Adam's level, peering into his eyes.
“With Raphael’s aid, we should be able to traverse through the Cage without alerting Lucifer or incurring his rage,” the angel explained, his huge hands, almost as tall as Adam’s torso, on either side of the boy, lingering. “I will have to hold you. I know that makes you uncomfortable, so I’m providing – what do the humans call it? – ‘fair warning’.”
Adam frowned. Yes, it did make him pretty uncomfortable to be held by the angel – mostly because he was to Anne Darrow as Michael was to King Kong – but he had his priorities straight, analogies aside.
“What about Sam?” he asked, stuck on what the archangel had told Raphael. “You aren’t seriously going to leave him, are you? You’re gonna – I don’t know, swipe him when your brothers aren’t looking?”
Michael’s wings drooped. “I am sorry,” the angel said and that was answer enough. “If you stay, I will stay with you, but I beg you to come away with me.”
Adam didn’t know how to reply. Could he leave Sam behind? What would Sam do in his place? Was he any help to his brother even if he stayed? Could he really let Michael suffer alongside him without knowing any of that, definitively? It really came down to that – to Michael.
Eventually, he sighed, curling his comparatively tiny hands around Michael’s long fingers, so huge that he couldn’t even wrap all five of his digits all the way around one, even though he’d never been what could be considered small – for a human, anyway. He nodded.
Michael made a sound of relief that helped Adam believe that he was making the right decision, even as the angel’s colossal palms cradled him close to his warm chest, where the core of his grace pounded, and his luminescent wings began to mimic Raphael’s, cutting through the tepid air of the Pit with ease. Still, Adam was glad that he couldn’t see the Cage very well – glinting more and more, faster and faster, so that he had to wonder if, perhaps, Lucifer knew that his brothers were there, abandoning him yet again – because he didn’t want to think about Sam. Lucy wasn't the only one about to be left behind.
“He’ll get out,” he murmured against Michael’s body, uncaring of whether the archangel heard him or not. “He’s Sam Winchester, for fuck’s sake. This is what they do, isn’t it?”
Too bad he couldn’t quite make himself believe.
-
Hell was sort of like a hill: going up it was considerably more difficult than simply dropping into it. Even held gently against Michael’s powerful body, Adam felt the air of the underworld rip away at him, trying to force him back down as the clinging arms of a horror-movie boyfriend who made threats cliché like, “If I can’t have you, no one can!” would.
When they broke through the atmosphere that barred Hell from Earth, Adam found his breath stuck in his throat, unwilling to get out. He wished he had an astronaut’s helmet, because surely leaving Earth for space was a similar sensation. Man, he had to wonder why three-year-old him had thought being a space-traveler would be so epic. It really wasn’t.
Eventually, he shut his eyes and passed out, the whoosh-whoosh of the archangels’ wings something of a lullaby to alleviate his discomfort.
-
Chapter Two: Hansel In The Gingerbread House
-
The gentle tap, tap, tap of raindrops against Adam's cheeks, nose and cracked lips brought him back to his senses. He gratefully swept his tongue over what he could reach of the cool liquid, deprived from water for so long – deprived from everything, actually – and stared blankly up at a slate-gray sky, streaked with wispy white clouds.
A few feet away from him, Michael and Raphael stood, facing each other down like desperadoes in an old western. Adam almost expected to see tumbleweed rolling up past their feet, but all around them, there were nothing but graves. The words Stull Cemetery popped into his head, unbidden, and he thought he remembered being here, once upon a midnight dreary.
“There, I’ve freed you,” Raphael said petulantly. He was now attired as a well-dressed black man, but Adam, if he squinted, could see shadowy tendrils of that other being, the angel made of storms, and the huge, huge wings that dwarfed his human form. “Will you come back with me now, to put Castiel in his place?”
Michael stood taller than ever, if possible, regarding his brother as one would a gnat. “And what of the boy?” he finally asked, sounding what would be exhausted on anyone else, but he was Michael and he didn’t do tired.
Raphael seemed surprised by the inquiry, while Adam forced himself to sit up straighter, since he was the topic of their scrutiny. Finally, a sardonic smile curled on the other archangel’s face. “I’m sure we can think up…suitable arrangements for your precious, hairless mud-monkey.” His words drew an unwilling shiver from their subject.
“No!” Michael flared suddenly, his eyes burning so that rain sizzled and smoked when it touched him. “I will not allow you to hurt him.”
“Who said I’d hurt him?” Raphael asked, shrugging nonchalantly. “I can feel your connection – hurting him would harm you, in turn. I wouldn’t do much, anyway.”
“Until I’d handled Castiel’s troops for you, and then he’d be fair game, correct?” Michael spoke calmly, but his wings were agitated, barely restrained against his back, and this revealed more than his speech possibly could.
Raphael’s smile was positively wicked. “You know me too well, brother,” he drawled.
“Then, while I thank you for freeing us, you know I cannot let you go, right? Not when you will only fly back and share my weakness with the rest of the Host.” Michael’s change in stance was subtle, one leg pushing back against the ground, burning up the bits of grass under his feet, while his wings barely shifted. This was his battle pose.
Raphael’s nostrils flared. “Oh,” he began, tone dripping with contempt. “You’d kill me – your own brother – to protect the boy?”
“Regretfully,” Michael answered, as a sword blazed to life in his hand. It took Adam’s breath away, this sword, snaked by red, orange and blue fire, its pommel adorned with igneous rock and glinting diamonds. “You understand, I cannot spare the brother who’d do away with me as soon as my use was up.” He sounded genuinely sad.
“You understand,” the other archangel returned mockingly, his own blade in hand, reminding Adam of a light-saber, “I cannot spare the weakling, the traitor, who may even be more of a shame than Lucifer. I’ll make it quick, since we loved each other once, but I cannot say the same for your little human bitch.” Despite how his vessel stood so small, he was completely undaunted against his colossal brother.
Michael growled, sounding more beast than man – well, angel, in his case – and charged. Their weapons met in an explosion that would have made Hiroshima look more like a burst bubble in a child’s bubble-wand. An oddly metallic clanging filled the otherwise quiet cemetery, along with the occasional eerie howls made by inured angels, still somehow beautiful in their morbidity.
If anyone was wondering, ‘the little human bitch’, as Raphael had so eloquently put it, currently had his back pressed against a grave-stone that read ‘Here lies Ezekiel, dear brother, whose fate rests in the hands of angels’. Adam knew how old Zeke felt, he thought bitterly, and he fought the urge to run away screaming. It was the smart thing to do.
Unfortunately, A+ student or not, he was rapidly coming to the conclusion that ‘Winchester’ and ‘stupid’ were synonymous, and both coursed through his veins, keeping him there, his eyes locked on Michael, actually worried about the dick, when he should be worried about himself. After all, all powerful angel definitely trumped helpless little human.
When Raphael’s blade sliced through Michael’s arm and the sharp noise of Michael’s pain rang out acutely, odd blood that resembled melted gold more than anything pouring out of his wound, Adam sprang up from behind his flimsy shelter.
“Leave him alone, you bastard!” he shouted at the cruelly smirking archangel, picking up a stone the size of his palm and throwing it at him. It exploded upon contact, doing nothing except drawing Raphael's attention away from Michael and to Adam. Whoops.
“My, aren’t you just eager to die?” Raphael asked in a pleasant hum, the eyes of his vessel popping out the way his true visage’s had in Hell, as he shot toward the boy like a bullet-train, faster than freaking Superman.
If Adam was either Sam or Dean, he might have rolled out of the way, and if that didn’t work, he would have gone down both cursing and shooting, like heroes did. Unfortunately, Adam was a scared teenager who’d died too young, solely because of his unfortunate shared paternity with the aforementioned heroes, so he stood there, caught like a deer in the headlights. His mother had always said he had such big, blue Bambi eyes, which only made things all the more fitting.
His life did start to flash before his eyes, but mostly he wondered how he could be such a dumb-ass? First, he’d been zombie-food, then a jail-bird in Hell, and now he was about to play target for an angel. And Dean had thought Adam was so fucking lucky to get his once-a-year baseball games. Screw you, Dean, and all your stupid, unnecessary angst!
He hardly had time to finish the thought before he was being pushed – no, thrown, because someone didn’t know his own strength – out of the way, across the entire length of the cemetery. He hit his head hard against the already serrated edge of a grave-marker, ironically shaped like an angel, on the tiny cherub’s wing, as Michael used the distraction to sweep his sword down into Raphael’s stomach, curving it out through the vessel’s upper back.
“I’m so sorry, brother,” the archangel whispered – or did he shout it? Raphael’s mouth opened in response and searing, electric-blue light ruptured out of every one of the angel’s orifices, coupled with his ear-drum shattering screams. Even Adam couldn’t bear to watch the archangel die, but maybe that had more to do with a possible concussion.
He screwed his eyes shut for only a second, hearing Michael take a shuddering breath in the otherwise silent graveyard, and found that he it was too difficult to open them back up.
Huh, that was bad, wasn’t it?
-
Adam was in Heaven again. He had to be, because the face that was floating in his vision was hot – mentally bolded, italicized and underlined. Yeah, that hot. Except Michael had said that Heaven was basically a compilation of a person’s greatest hits, so this guy, both literally and metaphorically, didn’t apply – though Adam was perfectly willing to rectify that situation, like, ASAP.
The mysterious Adonis had light caramel skin, a thick head of dark, curly hair, somewhat scruffy, unshaven cheeks, and panty-wetting hazel-gold eyes.
Oh, and he was saying, “Adam, Adam,” over and over again in his deep, husky voice. Yup, this was Heaven, no matter what anyone said. It didn’t help that Adam was lying back on a soft, silk-sheeted four-poster bed and the guy was practically straddling him, so they could instigate a steamy make-out session if he only found the strength to lift his head in the slightest. It was the stuff of dreams – wet kinds.
“Uh…who’re you?” Adam slurred, coming off some kind of a glorious high. His tongue felt like cotton in his mouth, too heavy to maneuver and nasty to taste, but the words tumbled out all the same.
The man blinked, apparently surprised that Adam was surprised to have an unknown person sitting on top of him.
“You do not recognize me?” he asked, the barest hint of a shy smile crooking his mouth, so that one of his cheeks dimpled.
Adam pushed back with his elbows, trying to prop himself up, and the man fell to sit on his haunches. Adam considered him seriously, but it wasn’t really all that hard to guess now that he’d shaken off his sleepy stupor. The signs were all there, anyway: how those hazel eyes flashed with inhuman light, the regent shadows that phased right through the man’s clothes and up past their bed’s canopy, and even the way his smile, though appealing, looked out of place, uncomfortable, as if he didn’t quite know how to do it properly.
“Michael?” Adam pressed, for clarifying purposes, and the archangel nodded.
“Do you like this vessel?” he asked, lightly grasping and tugging on the plain shirt his host wore. He had a boyish bright twinkle to his eyes that reminded Adam of the junior scouts that were put under his charge during camping trips, always eager to show him their newest craft project and delighted by any compliment he offered. “I tried to find someone you would. He looks, somewhat, like your father in his youth, but also like Kristen McGee. She was your first love, was she not?”
Adam’s cheeks grew hot at the mention of Kristen. She was his first something, all right. “Dude, asking me if I like the meat-suit of some poor sucker that you nabbed is creepy. Picking him because he looks like a mesh of my father and my ex…well, that’s just down-right rapey.”
“Rapey is not a word,” Michael said simply, seemingly disappointed by his disinterest. “In any case, this vessel belonged to a pious young man who happened to pass into Heaven several months ago. His body, however, was comatose, useless, and the doctors were ready to let him go. He has no family to mind my employment of him.”
Considering the other options, Adam figured that was probably as good as it would get. He sat up straighter and crossed his legs, digging his elbows into them, and scrutinized his companion with a cocked head.
“How’s this work, anyway – you having a body? I mean, don't you need some cursed bloodline?” He didn’t know much about this angel business, but if Michael could just pluck any old schmuck off the street and into his service, then all the sacrifices the Winchesters – including Adam – had made would be pretty pointless.
Guilt passed over Michael's face, setting off warning-bells in Adam’s head at once. “It is because of the bonding – our bonding. My grace is connected to your soul, which ranks higher than any necessary link to your blood. Thus, this–” He held a hand against the pious man’s chest, “–is acceptable.” After a moment of analysis, he added, “Are you feeling better? The bond is responsible for that, as well.”
“Yeah...” Adam narrowed his eyes. After spending the better part of twelve years nagging at his mother about John, he could recognize a diversionary tactic a mile away, and he was too old to get distracted by the promise of shiny new toys anymore. “You know, I keep hearing 'bonding this' and 'bonding that', but I don’t actually know what a bonding is. Funny, huh?”
Michael's eyes strayed away. “I…” He stopped to pick at the sleeve of his vessel's shirt, then tried again upon realizing what he'd been doing. “Perhaps it would be better if you saw for yourself. This room is five-star, which is evidently quite high by tourist-human standards, and you will find a full-length mirror through that adjoining door.” He indicated ahead, his arm as straight as an English pointer's back.
Despite having some kind of weird bond to heal him, Adam’s legs wobbled when he tried to stand up, but he still shook off the archangel’s attempt to help him. The carpet under his wiggling toes felt plush and soft, accented the same dark burgundy-red as the rest of the suite, and he trekked through it to the room Michael had mentioned: a bathroom.
It was easy to see why it was rated five-stars, because it looked like it could comfortably belong to foreign royalty, with a Sam-sized hot-tub to Adam’s right and, as promised, a wall-length mirror just out front. He could already imagine the sort of kinky things honeymooners got up to in front of the monstrosity, but that was beside the point.
At first glance, there was nothing too different about him. His hair was a mess, and not the attractive kind that he usually went for, but rather all over the place. He’d lost a bit of weight, too, and his blue-green eyes were far too huge in his face, slightly sunken and smudged from worrying way more than your average nineteen year old should. He was also considerably paler – so pale that the light freckles that had dusted his face since childhood stood out more starkly, though he'd believed them gone years ago when camping and outdoorsy stuff had become a regular thing. But it wasn’t really a big difference. Heck, he could pass for any other college student during exams week, wearing himself ragged with all-nighters. Other than his dragged-through-Hell clothes, of course, but maybe the bum chic look was in right now?
“Take off your shirt,” Michael commanded as he came up behind him, in a tone that brooked no argument, usually reserved for his underlings, and Adam wouldn’t have been startled enough to shiver if it had been anyone else. Anyone else would have been caught prowling a mile away, reflected in the mirror, but even the inanimate object seemed to defer to Heaven's Sword, waiting until the last possible second to display him.
“You really should buy me dinner first,” Adam joked, to cover up how uncomfortable he actually felt. Hell roommates or not, it was just plain rude to ask someone to strip out of the blue.
Michael tilted his head ever so slightly. “The bonding mark is on your back. Remove your shirt if you wish to see it,” he said again.
Bonding mark? Oh, if he'd gotten a holy-hickey of some sort, there would be literal Hell to pay, boys and girls, no matter how hot Michael was at the moment. A man's body was his temple, you know.
Adam nimbly unfastened the buttons on his gray shirt, borrowed from Dean once upon a time, while trying to quell his panic. It came away, hanging loosely around his forearms, and he released it with a last look at Michael, letting it pool around his ankles and feet.
His first reaction was to wince, because man, 'a little weight loss' had been the understatement of a century – he was more bones than boy right now – but nothing else seemed out of place.
However, Michael made an amusing twirling gesture with his fingers, as a judge at a beauty pageant might, a contrast to his somber face. Adam turned around and craned his neck to look down at his back.
There was a mark between his shoulder-blades, as promised, about the size of a human head and raised like a long-healed scar. It was an angry bronze-red, almost a burnt orange, and shaped like a ring, displaying a circular patch of unblemished skin in the center. Cookie-cutter shapes, letters of some kind, dotted the fiery ring, and outside the otherwise blank pool were two man-sized handprints, facing away from each other, so that they looked like tiny, skeletal wings – the kind a kindergartner might create by dipping his hands into paint and smacking them against paper.
“What the fuck is that, man?” Adam exclaimed, trying to reach back his arm to touch it. He gasped and nearly fell to his knees when Michael stretched to do exactly that, spreading the flat of his palm fully against the circle. It was hard to explain how it felt, except that it sent a soothing wave of heat pulsing throughout Adam's body, settling in his chest and...no, just his chest and nowhere else. And it didn't feel good, either. Really!
Michael blinked at the reaction, letting his arm drop slackly to his side, much to his human charge’s not-disappointment. “That,” he explained plainly, “is the bonding mark.” He began to walk away, as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred.
“Wait just a damn minute!” Adam barked, grabbing for his hand. “Don’t just say it’s a fucking bonding mark, then leave! What's it for? Why does it feel like that?”
“Like what?” the angel asked innocently, a mischievous dimple hollowing half his face as he smiled, belying his harmless tone. Adam glared at him, not in the mood for playing around, and Michael sighed. “Bonding is an angelic ritual that joins mates. It connects their graces – or, in your case, your soul to my grace – in order to add to their collective reserves of power. It was sometimes done in war-time, to save those who were dying, as it was in a sense for us, but that is a rare scenario. Usually, it is exploited by angels marked by...cupids.”
Adam’s fingers loosened on Michael’s, then tightened again, almost unconsciously. Luckily, the angel wasn’t prone to pain. Adam, on the other hand…
“Couples?” he cried. “Angel couples do this to eternally tie them together? …To mate their souls?”
Michael regarded him hesitantly for a moment, before nodding. “The closest thing I can think of, in human terms, is a marriage. Except that is not permanent.” He went on and on to explain about symbolically exchanging marks and powers, but Adam wasn’t really listening, even though he knew it would soon become pertinent. How could he, when his whole word had just been rocked like the Titanic?
His soul was mated. He was married to an angel – an archangel – and not just any, but the archangel Michael. He couldn't believe this.
Adam released Michael and sprinted over to the toilet precisely in time to throw up. He didn’t stop spewing up the bile stuff until he felt Michael’s intruding hand on his back again – on it – and then he abruptly felt good enough to run a marathon cross-country.
“Are you all right?” the angel probed gently, and Adam realized that he was crying, his cheeks and face wet with humiliating tears.
“What did I do?” he whispered. “What did I do that was so bad? What did I do to deserve this?” What did he do that got him stuck with a busy, workaholic mother, a deadbeat father, two brothers that had each other and no use for him? What did he do that made him deserve getting murdered and eaten by something wearing his mother’s face, when he loved her so much? What did he do that got him ripped out of Heaven and dragged into Hell? Why him?
“You didn’t do anything,” Michael soothed, somewhat bewildered by his sudden bout of depression. He took a step closer, but Adam reared away from him, nearly tripping over the toilet in the process, and he got the hint. “I had to bond us. If I hadn’t done it, you would have died. You didn't deserve that – I didn't want that for you.”
“But you wouldn’t have, would you? You’re an archangel! You would have survived till Raphael staged his little rescue, am I right?” Adam spat. When Michael merely nodded, he continued coldly, “Then you should have left me to die. It would have been better than this.”
The angel stared him down, a frown etched deeply into his features, then nodded. With that, in a flurry of displaced wind, he disappeared, leaving Adam alone in a bathroom with shower-heads that probably could have terminated the mortgage his mother had leapt through flaming hoops to pay.
Adam’s legs gave away and he buried his face in his knees, sobbing into them helplessly. He didn’t know how much later it was when he finally managed to end his pity party and drag himself to the sink, splashing water on his grimy face before heading to bed, but Michael still wasn’t back. He didn’t know why he cared so much – why the idea of the angel leaving him was so terrifying – except that it was.
And, as if this perfect day couldn't get any better, he found that he stank like vomit. Awesome.
-
Adam had only been half asleep when he heard the muffled flutter of wings, but despite his insomnia, he still wasn’t quite ready to get up. He listened from the bed as Michael bustled about without really bustling, the angel’s steps quiet as a cat’s, though Adam had gotten used to his mannerisms in Hell well enough to pinpoint them now.
The door to the bedroom creaked open and Michael stepped into the room cautiously, as if fearing it had been transformed from a classy flat to a war-zone in the time he'd been away. Knowing the angel, it wasn’t entirely implausible.
“Adam?” he murmured, surprisingly kind. A creature that could end the world in a quick fit of temper shouldn't have been able to manage such a tone. “Are you feeling better?” He didn’t ask, 'Are you awake?' Adam noticed, but he was Michael, so he didn’t really have to.
“What are you doing?” Adam returned, purposely avoiding having to answer the archangel’s question. He rubbed a hand across his eyes, embarrassingly heavy and itchy from his time spent as a human water fountain.
“Will you come with me?” Michael requested, shifting uneasily, his coin-like eyes hopeful in his pleasant new face. He could have made Adam do whatever he wanted – Zachariah had certainly proved that angels weren’t averse to this method – but he didn’t, and Adam had to give him brownie points for that, so he nodded and got up. Michael beamed and proffered his hand, which Adam accepted, feeling only a little bit girlishly foolish. He allowed the angel to lead him into their suite’s kitchenette.
When they arrived, Adam gaped at the sight of the table, which was decked out in a scarlet silk tablecloth, many extravagant dishes of sweets laid across it, the mouthwatering scent of sugar, butter and fresh-cut fruits wafting their way.
“What’s all this?” he asked, sweeping his hand in its general direction. Now that he was looking at it, he realized that it had been a long time since he had last eaten – a century, if not more.
“Well, you told me I should buy you dinner. However, it is now morning and I seem to recall from your memories that you dislike eating anything 'too filling' early in the day, as it makes you nauseous.” Michael nodded proudly, happy to recall this minute detail about his human friend. Yup, friend, because Adam wasn’t going to think about marriage just yet.
“So you brought pancakes?” Adam took in the circular treats, piled atop each other into a precariously leaning stack. Some had pieces of fruit embedded in them, like blueberries or strawberries, while others were drizzled with syrups or chocolate, waffled and smooth.
“You like these fried flat-cakes,” Michael reminded him earnestly, wedging his hand into the small of Adam’s back, thankfully nowhere near that overly sensitive mark, and effortlessly pushing him into one of the two available chairs. Adam complied without protest, staring down a particular pancake, which had a cute chocolate-chip smile and eyes. “They are special. One of my brethren, who enjoyed consuming human foods while sharing messages and holy texts with earthly prophets, once told me that those from Belgium were the very best. That was a long time ago, upon the flat-cake’s initial creation, but I hope they still are to your liking.”
Adam picked up a silver fork and nudged a fat blueberry that was sitting on the corner of his plate, blackish liquid beading out of it.
“I don’t get why you’re doing this – why you’ve done so much for me,” he said quietly, watching the tiny fruit bleed.
Michael frowned. “And why shouldn’t I? You’ve done much for me, as well, and…I like you.”
“My question is why you like me? I’m nothing special – as Zachariah said, I’m the half-brother, that's all. I wouldn’t even give up Heaven for me. That’s what you did, right, when you fought Raphael? You've completely denounced yourself from all your feathered friends, haven't you?” Not to mention, he was willing to keep healing Adam at the risk of his own life. Not of it leveled equally.
“Zachariah is what your brother would call an ass,” the archangel declared irritably, to which Adam quirked a brow. Note to self: Winchesters weren't the best angelic influences. Not-quite-flustered, Michael continued, “I like you. I would like to imagine we became friends during our time together, although they were admittedly unfortunate, as far as circumstances go.”
“Really?” Adam inquired, his second eyebrow joining its twin, deservedly dubious.
“Yes, really,” Michael insisted. “Now, eat your flat-cake.”
Adam stared at him a moment longer, before allowing himself a smile. “You know, this–” He jerked a finger toward his now clothed back, which still emitted a pleasant warmth from the mark, “–isn’t what Beyonce meant when about putting rings on what you like.”
Michael responded to his teasing with a baffled expression. “I am not sure I understand this reference. What is a Beyond-Say?”
Adam rolled his eyes, choking back a smart retort. Instead, he carefully cut up the pancake, put a small piece in his mouth, and promptly moaned in wanton pleasure. “Holy fuck, this is the best pancake ever! It’s like a syrupy sweet slice of Heaven in my mouth!” He proceeded to shove more bites in, making his cheeks puff out like a chipmunk’s, as Michael watched in bemusement.
“I’m glad you are enjoying this. Yet, I don’t know if a dessert can taste like Heaven,” the archangel mused. Adam grinned. Michael looked like such a creeper, hunching over him and staring, but confused was a good look on him – kind of, sort of adorable.
He kicked out a long leg toward the other chair, knocking it away from the table, and said, “Take a load off, man. Try it for yourself and tell me.”
Michael was visibly hesitant. “I acquired the flat-cakes for you.”
“Yeah, and I know I’ve grown up as an only child, but I am capable of sharing.” Adam made an impatient, long-suffering gesture, about ready to seat the man himself. Okay, so it wouldn’t exactly be easy – far from it. He and Mr. Pious Man were about the same height, but Michael had a good fifty pounds on him, probably all muscle, if what artfully disheveled clothes hinted at was anything to go by. The dude could probably kick Adam’s ass even if he wasn’t in the possession of an almighty archangel.
Luckily, Michael was the one angel who hadn't ever hurt him, at least purposefully, and he did as Adam bid, sitting on the very edge of the chair with undue caution. He picked up a free fork and, with a last trustful look at Adam, who nodded encouragingly, speared some pancake off the dish, seeming almost fearful as he brought it up to his lips and smudged honey across them. Adam lazily drank in the expressions that passed over his face, amused by the novelty of them, and took slow sips of the orange juice Michael had poured earlier for him.
Of course, he regretted watching so carefully when Michael finally reached his goal, because his face twisted into something right out of a porno – pleased, surprised and straight-up erotic. Adam choked a little on his juice, then cleared his throat and wiped the back of his hand across his face.
“My vessel likes this flat-cake,” the angel declared delightedly. His eyes crinkled into a brilliant almost-gold, miniature suns in their own right.
Adam couldn’t believe he was here, eating breakfast with an angel of the lord in a fancy hotel-room, somewhat turned-on and, well, not happy so much as content.
“Good,” he replied, when he’d swallowed down the last of the fluttering butterflies that had been caught in his OJ pulp. Maybe this bonding thing wouldn’t be so bad, after all? Then again, maybe he’d just enjoy the moment without letting any of that supernatural stuff bog it down. Baby steps, Adam, baby steps.
-
After their impromptu breakfast, Adam piled together the last of their dirty dishes for the hotel staff to pick up and said, “I think I'll go check this place out. You coming with?” He was secretly hoping the answer would be 'no', because he'd spent his every waking moment with Michael for some very long lifetimes, and his sleep-cycle hadn't been what you could call normal even then. There was a point where a lot became too much, and what better way to amend the situation than by making full use of this place that Michael had booked?
The archangel appraised him for a moment, then displayed his approval with a terse nod, apparently sensing his human charge's desire for space. “If you must.”
“Oh, I‘m too curious not to,” Adam answered, before reluctantly tacking on, “I can't yet, though.”
“Why not?” Michael blinked.
“Well...” Adam fidgeted, staring down at his bare feet and soiled clothes. “Um, it's just, I haven't bathed in a while. It's kinda gross, 'specially considering how I've been wearing this same outfit the whole time – this dirty outfit.” It wasn't unhygienic to the point of his first revival, when he'd been covered head to toe, nook and cranny, in mud and earth, but he still didn't make for a pretty picture yet.
“I hadn't considered that,” Michael admitted, a small frown materializing between his eyebrows. He scrutinized Adam's entire body for a few drawn out, uncomfortable minutes, before murmuring, “I haven't done it before, but I believe it wouldn't be impossible to create a wardrobe for you.”
Adam listened incredulously, and when the angel didn't explicate immediately, he began clapping his hands, loud in the otherwise quiet room. “Wow, a warrior of the Lord and a fashion designer? I'm impressed,” he jibed.
Michael frowned. “I do not make couture. Not in that way, in any case. Truthfully, I don't understand the use of human garments. There was a time you felt no shame in displaying your natural state.”
“Me, specifically?” Adam asked. “Because, in my defense, I only ran around naked when I was a baby and back then I didn't know any better.” Michael opened his mouth to counter, but the teenager cut him off, not feeling tolerant enough to engage in a repertoire with him. “Dude, I upchucked my stomach lining yesterday, then didn't so much as gargle before I ate. I feel like something on the bottom of a shoe right now, but if it'll make you feel better, I'll return to my 'natural state' as soon as you zap me some clean clothes to wear for after. It's kinda necessary, you know, if you're gonna shower.”
Michael eyed him with annoyance, but eventually relented with a sigh. “If I'm not mistaken, the proprietress of this establishment has books filled with fashionable images. I can use them as my inspiration.” Before Adam could say anything else, the angel disappeared in a assault of wing-flaps, and only returned, coincidentally, after he had already snapped his jaw shut. What a hint. “Here they are,” Michael said obliviously, motioning with his chin to the formidable armload of magazines he now carried. He offered the one at the top of the stack to Adam, who glowered from him to it, as if they'd somehow affronted him, before grumpily receiving it..
It was the sort of glossy publication that department stores everywhere gave out like water, with apparel and accessories for all genders within it, so Adam said, “This is perfect,” after only a perfunctory flip through it, nowhere near the adequate amount of patience he needed to compare it to all the others. Judging from the seemingly endless pile, the angel had visited every newspaper stand in the city and wading through them would take hours, anyway.
Michael blinked at his hasty reply, but nodded, carefully retaking the magazine and holding it between both of his open palms. He shut his eyes and began murmuring, while Adam watched him with three parts awe and one part paranoia, recalling what had happened the last time the angel had chanted. Right before his eyes, the book exploded in a puff of talcum powder smoke, and then Adam's vision was impaired by a pair of boxer-shorts that had landed directly on top his head, other articles of clothing raining down around him, appearing from seemingly out of thin air.
When he’d pulled off the underwear, he noticed that the floor was now completely covered, and a couple of socks even hung from the rafter. “Huh,” he mused. “I think this is more clothes than I had in the first place.”
“Shall I get rid of the excess?” Michael offered, somewhat earnest under his infamous calm.
Adam bit the inside of one cheek, before he shook his head. “No, it – it really was nice of you to do this in the first place. I couldn't ask for anything more. Besides, the closet in the bedroom is complete empty. Now it can have something more to entertain it than Narnia, while we're here.” More shyly, he added, “I'm sure it feels grateful.”
“Does it?” Michael asked, canting his head to an intrigued angle.
“Yeah,” Adam affirmed, and skillfully avoided having to look at the angel by wading through all the clothes, only standing back up when he had a pair of loose jeans, a baby-blue t-shirt with, of all things, Fonzie on it, and a white button down with a single gold stripe along each arm – not to mention the boxers he still held. “I think I've got everything I need. Luckily, it's pretty warm in here. I hate the cold, you know.” It wasn't a question, but Michael still nodded. Adam gave him a last, strained smile, more like a grimace, and began carrying his light bundle back through the bedroom to the bathroom. When the door finally shut behind him, his breath whooshed out in hushed relief.
Sure, it was true that one door, even if it did have three locks – heck, a thousand locks – stood no chance against Heaven's mightiest warrior, but he could at least trick his mind into believing he was alone, if only for a little while.
His unease receded, anyway, by the time he'd stripped off his clothes and stepped into the shower, shivering at first because the porcelain tub was chilled, then relaxing when hot water from the tap made his toes curl.
It was unbelievable how many mundane things – which you'd probably never spared a thought to previously – you could come to miss when you didn't have them. For Adam, water was one of those things, and he sat on his hindquarters for a while, running his hands under the faucet till they'd wrinkled, before he halfheartedly picked one of the many comfort settings the shower-head offered and stood under the scorching spray.
The jet feature, aptly called masseuse, hit his body so forcefully, and in just the right way, that he groaned aloud, feeling his muscles relax – muscles that he hadn't known were tense in the first place. To add to that, both the shampoo and the body-wash, probably more expensive than a healthy man's kidney, smelled sweet and soothing, like vanilla ice-cream straight from the truck, which immediately reminded him of nights spent cuddled up in his mother’s arms, her hair emanating that same scent. He smiled unconsciously at the memory, before grabbing one of the hand-towels the hotel had issued to soap himself up, scrubbing so hard that his skin felt pink and new, as if all the Hell had melted right off of it. He could almost let everything go for the transient period of time he spent in there.
Of course, even that didn’t last. After he'd wiped away all the residual suds from his torso, and the shampoo in his hair had settled for the three to five recommended minutes, he hung the small towel up over the pole that held the shower-curtains and ran his fingers through his scalp, his hair standing up in amusing, slicked spikes of gold. Using his palm, he flattened all the protruding locks down past his neck, feeling the soapy water rush along his back, and twisted around, hopeful that the spray could wash off whatever he couldn’t get to.
Instead, it felt as if he’d suddenly been thumped hard between his shoulder blades, as if he’d been choking and some good, if ignorant Samaritan – who was completely off beat about the Heimlich maneuver, by the way – had decided to try and help him clear his airway.
The worst part was, it didn’t feel bad. Yes, it made his vision blur, his eyes welling with tears in response, and it jellied his legs so that he had to prop both arms against the wall in front of him, but intermittent, hot pulses from his back also made his whole body flush, and he choked up more than one shameless moan. If anyone was directly outside, they’d probably assume that some old, horny John had picked up an especially slutty hooker, and he was oddly okay with being the whore in question.
Unfortunately, there was someone right outside, and he had no problem with mojoing himself in.
“Are you well?” Michael inquired, as he did just that, his suitably worried facade at odds with his actions.
Adam squeaked in reply, though he’d before never known making such a squirrely sound was even possible, and grabbed at the shower curtains like a prude woman in those old cartoons, whom the comic lead hastily apologized to after bursting in. He pulled them around him so that only his angry face showed.
“Get out of here!” he barked, hands too occupied to make accompanying shooing gestures.
Michael was unperturbed and made no move to listen. “I heard strange sounds,” he explained, remorselessly deadpan. “I thought you were in pain.”
Adam’s ears flared hotly again, and he felt as though he could crawl in a hole and die from the mortification alone. “I-I’m fine, okay? I was perfectly fine before you came! So just leave! Go!”
When Michael nodded and vanished again, an unreadable expression on his face, Adam felt guilty, so he resolved to apologize after toweling himself off, since his self-consciousness had attributed to his snapping in the first place. Before that, though, he had to deal with one remaining problem: he was still painfully horny.
Damn.
Ultimately, he ended up taking care of business, so to speak. It wasn’t that difficult – he was determinedly not going to use the word ‘hard’ – especially since his personal Heaven had been doing the dirty with a particularly hot girl. He was practically an expert.
Or, anyhow, that was how he wanted to feel – casual and confident. In reality, his culpability still gnawed at him, not just because he’d bitten off Michael’s head, while that was a good starting point, but also because visualizing the faces of all his exes hadn’t worked for him at all. Visualizing Michael, on the other hand…
Again, damn. He was going back to Hell for sure.
He didn’t quite know whether to be relieved or bummed when he called the archangel’s name and he didn’t appear. In the end, he decided to go with his initial plan to explore the hotel, mostly because he still had too much excess energy to stay in a huge suite all by himself, no matter how many nice things it boasted of having.
-
Chapter Three: The Suite Life of Michael and Adam
-
The name of the hotel was The Lady of Lawrence, monogrammed on practically everything Adam came across. In any case, at least he now knew why LL had been embroidered on his towels.
It was a huge, sprawling estate that, according to a brochure he’d found at the empty front desk, doubled as a resort, as well, and it was smack in the middle of some tiny Kansas town. Yet, when he looked out of a giant window that could practically pass for a door in itself, he couldn’t immediately locate any cows, tiny dogs or air-headed girls. Adam was slightly disappointed.
However, he was soon distracted by the boxes slowly trudging across the lobby toward him, so he decided to cautiously meet them halfway. First angels and now sentient cardboard – what was next, friendly schoolboy aliens?
Despite that, he was somewhat surprised when the boxes cursed quite explicitly, the stubby legs under them shaking, but he was close enough now that he could see at least the top of a woman’s braided head. He felt a little bit silly for not noticing in the first place, but self-deprecation could wait.
“Can I help you with that, ma’am?” he quickly asked, easily taking the boxes from her grasp without waiting for a reply, leaving her holding only a big, gaudy purse under one arm. Now he could actually see her face, which was dark and weathered with kind laugh-lines, her smile stretching wide, though she wore an enormous pair of black shades that hid her eyes from sight. Even standing with her back squared, she only came up to his chest.
“Thank ya, sugar,” she said, beaming up at him. He began to shake his head, to insist it was no problem, but she raised her now free hands to cover her mouth in surprise. “I knew it, I knew it! You really are Sleepin’ Beauty, ain’t ya?”
Adam blinked. “Uh, excuse me?” He gave her a subtle once over, wondering if she'd hurt herself before happening upon him. Last he’d checked, there were no Disney princesses about.
“Don't ya gimme that look!” she scolded, and he ducked his head on instinct. “I know I ain't gettin' any younger, but my vision's just fine, thank ya. 'Sides, I'm still a woman, and I wouldn't have forgotten such a handsome boy!”
“Oh, well, um, thank you, ma'am,” he stammered, but she didn't miss the lost expression on his face.
“I'm Vivian Weldes, but just 'bout everybody calls me Viv, and I own The Lady of Lawrence, finest lodgings this here side of the Midwest,” she explained, her braids clacking as she bobbed her head.
Adam nodded, understanding starting to dawn, and honestly said, “It's very beautiful. I've been having a look around.”
Viv snorted. “Maybe so, but it can sure get borin', leastwise till you and Prince Charmin' arrived.”
“'Prince Charming'?” Adam repeated, somewhat apologetic. “I'm not really following, ma'am.”
“Viv,” the old woman clarified, her hands on her hips, and she only went on after he nodded his compliance. “It's just, Lawrence's such a wall-flower of a town at times. Sure was different when that good-looking fella of yours carried ya in, actin' all chivalrous, like you was precious.”
“R-really?” Adam asked, cursing himself not only for losing his composure so easily, but also for not asking earlier how it was that Michael had managed to pull this off, since he'd been knocked out at the time. The money was probably no obstacle, since he could counterfeit money faster than Leonardo DiCaprio in Catch Me if You Can, but Michael had to have made a pretty funny picture, clumsy with money that even human children were comfortable with, lugging around human deadweight, and it was surprising that no cops had come knocking on their door, suspecting a serial killing in progress.
Then again, he was an archangel and mind-whammies were always a good plan B. It probably wasn't the best time to snigger and imagine Michael reaching out his arm and saying, “These are not the droids you are looking for!” though he had a feeling it probably did go down that way.
Viv nodded solemnly, looking up at Adam. “Cross my heart, baby boy,” she promised, before her wide lips quirked in mischief, taking years off her face. “The maids're the ones who call ya Sleepin' Beauty and Prince Charmin', by the way, and they haven't once stopped whisperin' about it. Gotta say, though, I saw the way he was holdin' ya, and I remembered my husband, God rest his soul. Carried me over the threshold just like that, he did, and when he came home from the second war. It warms the cockles of my little heart to see you two.”
“You think me and Michael–” Adam began, before hastily sputtering, “We're not like that, ma'am – Viv. He just doesn't understand, uh, social boundaries, is all. He handles all his friends like that.”
“Oh, so you're friends,” she replied, eyebrows raised pointedly high. With the amused smile still plastered on her face, she said, “I see.” Adam sucked in a breath and silently counted to ten, because she obviously didn't see, but Kate Milligan had drummed manners into him from day one, so his tantrum was completely mental, contradicted only by a small pout. Viv laughed, booming and bright, when she noticed the way the intake of air made his cheeks swell. “Why don't ya set those over there, sugar?” she directed, indicating from the boxes he still bore to the top of the reception desk. “Then, I'd like to know the name of the gentleman who's doin' all my bell-boy's work, before givin' him a real tour.”
Adam blushed. “I'm Adam – Adam Milligan – and you really don't have to do that. You're probably busy.”
“Nonsense. It's always nice to meet such a polite young man. My grandson, Charlie, is 'round your age, but he's always been a wild thing. His brother's more sensible, though. He's my partner – handles all the money stuff, since it always slips through my fingers like green water, while I take care of this pretty Lady.” She prodded him with a sharp finger till he did as she'd dictated, albeit reluctantly, then smiled victoriously, hooking her arm in his, not noticing how he had to hunch to make up for their height difference.
For such a sweet looking old lady, she was surprisingly strong, and Adam stumbled over his new sneakers trying to stay apace with her, dutifully nodding whenever she stopped her inane chatter about her family and work to show him something significant in the hotel – “This is the library. Ya like to read?” or “That's the kitchen. You can just call 'em when you're peckish and they'll come right up to your suite.”
“This here's the spa,” she eventually said, stopping in front of an open door that permeated steam, on the Lady's basement level. “Gotta be honest, baby boy, you look like ya need to visit it.”
He frowned, supposing it was true. Unfortunately, he wasn't really a spa kind of guy. Once a year, for as long as he could remember, his mom would have a self-proclaimed Kate-day that she'd spend at there. When he was really, really small, Adam had no choice but to be forced along with her, sitting with other kids in a blocked off playpen corner, and it had always been so boring. He didn't begrudge her for it – working while taking care of a little kid by yourself was nothing if not a laudable accomplishment – but he’d jumped at the opportunity to stay behind as soon as he was old enough not to need a babysitter anymore. The stigma of the experience, however, was forever seared into his brain, hence his disinclination to answer now.
Viv laughed, apparently reading his reaction for what it was. “It's okay if ya say no, silly thing. I ain't gonna hit you or nothin', but your lil' friend did pay up front for every doggone thing, so you should try and relax while ya can, get some meat on those bones. Noticed y'all didn't order any food yet.”
“No, Michael, uh, cooked for us, I guess you could say,” he explained, trying to put her at ease. He had no idea why every older woman he'd ever met wanted to mommy him – perhaps his instinct to be as independent as possible somehow conflicted with their own intrinsic maternal qualities – but it wasn't so bad, even if it was sometimes bothersome.
Viv cupped her wrinkled hands together over her heart. “Aww, ain't that just the most darlin' thing? Come here, come here!” She suddenly grasped his wrist, running past the resort area on too quick legs, and dragged him along until they'd climbed spiraling stairs back up to where most of the guest suites were. One particular door had a well-polished silver plaque on it, proclaiming in sloping script that it belonged to a 'Miss Vivian Weldes', rather than the identifying numbers that the others had. She tugged the knob till it swung open, not yet releasing Adam, and pulled him in after her, shutting the door behind them.
All this time, he'd been forced to trail her like a puppy that had been threatened by a rolled-up paper, and now he stared suspiciously at the locked door, wondering if he was in the presence of an ax-murderer due to his own bad judge of character. It wasn't completely unfounded, considering he'd believed in Zachariah not long ago. Viv must have noticed how he'd shifted into fight-or-flight mode, because she made an eager gesture with her hands, guiding him to her soft, flower-printed couch, where he uneasily took a seat, glancing around.
The elderly woman's quarters weren't bad, per-se. The walls were the same cream as the rest of the hotel, and the carpet was the same crimson, but her furniture was all over the place. Apart from the ugly but comfortable couch, there was a Victorian era tea-set on a serving cart, as well as a fireplace topped with pictures of her family and a sixties style lava lamp, shifting from bombastic color to bombastic color. Viv now stood in front of the cart, pouring equal portions of tea into two small cups and uncovering platters of croissants.
“Don't be lookin' so scared,” she chastised with a laugh, setting a doily and a steaming cup down on top the small mahogany table before him. “Before I gotta call sayin' Ernest, my bell-boy, wasn't gonna be in, I was preppin' for some tea. Since you was so nice as to help me, I thought the least I could do was have ya join me.”
“You really didn't have to,” Adam said, in part because she honestly didn't, but also because tea, in his experience, tasted like sweaty balls. He preferred coffee. Viv's tea, though, smelled subtly of cinnamon, and the desserts she laid out looked better than the Dough Boy's.
“'Course I did,” Viv replied, staring at him unnervingly from behind those unfathomable sunglasses till he'd carefully plucked a croissant off the dish and dipped it into his piping hot drink. She smiled when he proclaimed his pleasure with a happy moan. “That's right, eat up while it's still warm. 'Sides, baby boy, I can help you, too, if ya let me.”
He swallowed his current bite and asked, “How?” Nice as she was, unless she knew some magical way to annul supernatural unions, she wasn't in his required neck of the woods.
“Well, that sweet blighter of yours wanted to cook just for you, even though we've gotta five-star kitchen right downstairs and he's obviously no pauper,” she said, emphatic enough to make him bristle again.
“It's not like that!” he started defensively, but she cut him off with an upraised palm.
“I know you might not see it, but I do. I was there when he brought ya in, and I can see that he cares about you. All my kids and three of my grand-kids are already married, ya know, so I've got a handle on what I'm talkin' 'bout. Can't ya throw that poor child a bone?” She smirked at him when he sagged, crossing her arms over her chest triumphantly, and he scowled down at a freshly baked chocolate chip cookie.
It was true, Michael had shown that he obviously did care about him, if not in the way her romantic heart wanted to perceive it, and he had been something of an asshole to the archangel lately – meaning pretty much always – despite how he'd gone out of his way to make sure Adam didn't die – again.
“Maybe you're right,” he admitted reluctantly, before muttering, “but not about Michael being in love with me,” when he caught the way her eyes sparkled. “I guess it wouldn't hurt to be nicer to him, though.” 'Much,' he quietly added, because his pride, at least, would smart for a while.
Viv clapped her hands together delightedly, bouncing on her seat cushion. “Oh, goodie!” she childishly exclaimed, leaning forward as if she was about to divulge the answer to one of the universe's greatest mysteries. “Well, here's what ya gotta do...”
Adam sighed, left with no other choice but to comply with her demands, and angled forward, hearing the bell she wore around her neck tinkle as she began whispering in his ear.
-
By the time Viv's staff were done readying their suite, Adam was feeling more nervous than he had since prom. Then, it had been because his date's father, a snobby insurance broker from the uppity side of town, had made it apparent that he didn't want his innocent princess associating with the son of an impoverished nurse, no matter how Adam excelled in and out of school, and completely ignoring how sweet little Kristen had been around the block a time or two. If anything, Kate had more of a right to be upset, since Adam was the one who'd lost his virginity that night. Fun times, those.
Now, he had no idea why butterflies were doing back-flips in his belly, but they were and there was no ignoring it, so he sucked in a huge breath and called, “Michael!” Before his teeth had even clacked fully shut, the angel was there.
“Hello,” Michael said, eying the two uniformed men who edged out of the room, pushing a cart.
The intensity of that single look could make the bravest man wet himself, Adam thought, so he quickly diverted Michael's attention by stepping fully into his line of sight, grinning sheepishly at him, while the Lady's employees speedily thanked him for blocking the scary man from view. If they only knew exactly how much danger they'd just escaped, they might have named some fancy dessert after him – pie-a-la-Adam, maybe.
“I'm sorry for snapping at you earlier. I've had a bad temper lately,” Adam murmured, scuffing his shoe against the carpet.
“I accept your apology,” Michael replied. “I've known you to be capable of glumness since I first occupied your body. It ceases to bother me any longer.”
Absorbing that, Adam refused to give into his glower, since that would only prove the angel's point. Instead, he said through gritted teeth, “You're no peach yourself,” but Michael's unexpected response made him feel like an ass again.
“I...know. I am always unintentionally upsetting you,” the archangel murmured sadly. “I apologize, as well.” He hung his head, curly dark hair obscuring his vivid hazel eyes.
“No,” Adam said, borderline frustrated because he honestly hadn't meant to make Michael feel bad. He tugged on a stray blond lock thoughtfully, then picked up where he left off with, “You know what, we both suck sometimes. Let's just forget about it.”
He figured that sounded reasonable enough, especially since the angel nodded agreeably, even wearing a tiny smile, happy to simply stare at Adam now that they were once again on amiable terms. “If that's what you wish.”
“I do,” Adam stated, satisfied to let him gaze to his heart's content, despite how vexing it was, if it really meant that much to him. “But I didn't think it'd be so easy to get back into your good graces, so I do have a surprise for you. Another surprise, other than my ability to be complacent, for once.”
“Why?” the archangel asked, befuddled again. “Your soul hasn't once left from within the shelter of my grace, to my knowledge.” He seemed truly bothered by this prospect, so Adam resisted the urge to roll his eyes, not wanting to be insensitive toward any true fear Michael felt, humorous as it was.
“Don't be so literal,” he chided gently, reaching out to take Michael's hand. It felt inexplicably warm and dry in his own, soothing against his incessantly cold digits, as he curled their fingers together. Only to keep Michael from straying, he silently justified, because the angel wasn't that different from a baby at the mall sometimes, with his unfortunate habit of pulling a Houdini whenever he was spooked in the slightest. He began to draw him forward, out of the huge living room and into the dining area, where they'd spent their morning.
Michael eyed the fully stocked table. “Did you get very hungry?”
Adam smacked his arm. “Even I couldn't eat this much unless I had a stomach worm – which I don't, in case you were thinking of actually checking. No, this is for you,” he said, beginning to feel anxious again.
“I do not require sustenance,” the archangel reminded him, not at all helping to abolish his discomfort.
“I know, I know,” Adam replied. “Doesn't mean you can't eat. I even saw you do it before, so no excuses! Now come on!” He yanked on Michael's arm till they were close enough to smell all the exquisite food Vivian had suggested for the night.
“I don't understand,” Michael muttered, the closest thing to an actual whine Adam had ever heard from him, but he did take a seat, admittedly hesitant. Adam felt his mood uplift, knowing that the angel was at least sharing in his unspoken discomfort, if nothing else. It was weird how vindictively happy he could get over that, but Michael already knew he could be a bitch at times – 'glum' was the word he'd used – and there had to be a reason he hadn't yet flown for the hills, right?
“Well,” Adam explained, “I thought I'd repay you for breakfast, except I can't just flap on over to Belgium to do it. Thankfully, you apparently dropped enough cash to book this place six times over and the hotel manager insisted I order something off their menu.” It was the God's honest truth, as Viv had truly gone so far as threatening him, though she'd also pushed for him to make it up to the angel in some other, unmentionable ways – ways that he was never thinking about again, if he could help it. Instead, he'd opted to let her order for them and got her off his back that way.
“You shouldn't have listened to her, then. I don't wish for you to go out of you way for me,” Michael answered quietly, his mouth overturned in displeasure.
“I wanted to,” Adam huffed, annoyed that the angel was so against what he'd been hoping was a well-intentioned gesture. “Besides,” he quipped slyly, “you can't walk around like you've been living under a rock anymore. I don't want to be seen with you if you don't even know the difference between chocolate and vanilla. Unless, of course, you're scared?”
Michael gave him a look that could have withered a leech faster than a whole bucket of salt. “I am not afraid,” he said decidedly, seeming not to notice how Adam smirked, or maybe ignoring him for the sake of his own pride, before he lifted the lid off of the biggest platter, which sat at the center of the table.
“Ugh!” Adam cried, while Michael's eyes widened, after being faced with a fully roasted pig. It's dead, beady little eyes stared at them, its teeth grinning around the shiny red apple in its mouth. “You don't see that everyday.”
“No,” Michael permitted, scrutinizing the bristling creature for an entire minute, then turning to Adam. “I can sense that it has died, but it continues to appear alive.”
“You mean it looks like it's about to kill you!” Adam shuddered, taking the lid from him and concealing Babe once more. “Jesus, and Viv thinks this is romantic?”
“Is this meant to be romantic?” Michael inquired, fixing onto his words.
“Uh, no, that's not what I meant!” Adam answered, unnecessarily loud, and drooped with relief when the angel let it go, allowing him to steer the conversation back to the subject of their meal.
The next dish was a lot better, something folded in handmade pita bread that tasted like potatoes and many unidentifiable spices when Adam took a bite, its aroma poignant and saliva-inducing. There were two, one for each of them, about as long as the area from his palm to his tallest finger, and there were some freshly diced, soupy tomatoes on the edge of the plate, to dunk the wrap in.
“This is good,” Adam informed Michael around his mouthful, truthful though he'd been incredulous at first when Raj, Vivian's talkative head chef, had recommended this particular recipe. He didn't think his palate was refined enough to enjoy it, since he generally preferred a burger and a beer, or something else he could either whip up himself or pick up from Cousin Oliver's. When Michael didn't move to take his own Indian roll, Adam sighed and waved his in front of the angel's mouth, allowing him to bend forward and take a nibble with an easy chuckle.
“It is good,” Michael said upon swallowing, his eyes lighting up. Instead of picking up the one without a bite in it, however, he carefully plucked Adam's from his grasp.
“I can't believe you just did that,” came the complaint, moderately disbelieving, to which Michael, now shamefaced, attempted to hand it back. “Nah, it's okay, you can keep it, Fido,” Adam laughed, refusing him so he could take the untouched roll and dip it into the accompanying tomato chutney, watching as the angel mimicked his actions.
From that point, lunch went off without a hitch, save that Michael, perhaps because of the disastrous moment with the pig, refused to try a single iota of meat. The desserts, on the other hand, two tall glasses filled with raspberry white-chocolate mousses and topped off with chocolate covered strawberries, were met with a pleased hum.
Adam thought it was a little bizarre, sure, that his angel-friend could be both the most merciless warrior in Heaven and a vegan, but Michael's sweet-tooth more than made up for the contradiction. He would always look back fondly on the memory of Michael with cream dripping like a beard from his chin, mouth and nose, still managing to look as stern as ever even with his passing resemblance to Gandalf the Grey.
Besides, it was probably a good thing that the confections kept the oblivious angel from realizing just how close to a date all this had been, because it wasn't. Really.
-
They ended up staying at the Lady for the better part of a month, partly to recover from the invisible but no less painful scars Hell had left on them, but also because Vivian had welcomed them both into her already thriving brood and Adam found that he loved that – belonging and being wanted somewhere, for nothing but being himself. It was ironic that he couldn't have that with his own flesh and blood.
It helped that the hotel was the epitome of sumptuous, its property going on for miles and miles, and they could do just about anything there – in fact, Adam, at least, was pestered near daily till he'd tried every single listed bullet-point of activities on the Lady's brochure. While Viv threatened him with her impending wrath, otherwise, she let Michael be.
Her reason was, “For a youngster, that fine child knows what he wants. I like that.” Adam almost wished he could tell her just how many years of seniority the 'child' in question had over her, in response.
That was one small ripple in an otherwise perfect reality, however, and Michael joined him for almost all the 'adventures' she planned for him, anyway, because Adam had taken it upon himself to teach Michael new things about humanity and he wouldn't let the angel off the hook. It was for his own good, so attempted human genocides via Apocalypse was never a plan that gained second wind, but Adam admitted, if only to himself, that spending time with Michael wasn't so bad.
When they weren't riding horses around the trails that wound around the hotel or lounging and swimming at the immense pool area, Adam was catching up on his reading. The Lady had a vast, impressive library to boast of.
Soon after the first time Vivian saw him browsing through its nigh endless shelves, she turned up at his suite with an armful of comic books and the most bashful smile he'd ever seen the spirited woman don.
“These were actually my grandson's,” she informed him gruffly, showing him a well-thumbed edition of Captain America, along with a few other Marvel hits. “And I asked our librarian 'bout what was 'hip' nowadays. He suggested some of these graphic novels. I thought ya might like to have a first look?”
It was such a nice, unexpected gesture that Adam immediately replied, “I can't accept this,” unused to things like that.
“I was gonna let ya, but it's not like ya have to keep 'em,” was her exasperated response, as she all but pushed them into his arms. “Tell me what ya think, baby boy. Oh, Damon used to talk my ear off 'bout all these heroes, 'fore he became more interested in girls. Nobody wants to tell grandma about their love lives.”
“Thank you, Viv,” he told her, feeling equal amounts of flustered and grateful, because he knew she wouldn't back down, otherwise. He watched her traipse off with a small, bemused smile, and it took him only a few hours to devour the stack. As soon as the last book's last page flipped to join the others, he decided to return the favor, standing at her doorstep the next morning.
It wasn't a hard choice to make, even if he didn't think he'd tell her about his love life anytime soon. Vivian was amusing, generous and, if that wasn't already enough, she completely doted on him. Plus, the delighted, surprised beam she wore when she opened the door and saw him made the whole endeavor worth it. It was impossible not to like the vibrant little woman.
Michael didn't. Whenever Adam asked the angel to join him – which was to say, whenever he made said offer on Viv's behalf – Michael politely declined, and whenever she visited, he drew further and further into his cold, indifferent shell. More often than not, he didn't even bother to stick around, choosing instead to sequester himself behind closed doors until he could disappear to who-knows-where again, only returning the second Adam was alone again.
It wasn't that Adam didn't see it, but he allowed it to go on. Who would it hurt, after all, if fly-boy wanted to be an antisocial dick? No one but Michael – certainly not Adam. Except, someone was hurt.
In the middle of her wild tale about how she'd met a real life Wonder Woman on her trip to the Amazon, Vivian paused, and Adam followed her gaze in time to catch Michael's back just in time to see the angel close their bedroom door behind him.
“Where's he go?” she asked softly. “I never see him comin' back, but lo and behold, he's always there when I'm not.”
Adam hesitated, then said, “He's just shy, that's all. Uh, he's not used to having ladies around.” In part, it was true. Michael always called 'God' his father so, in a way, he'd grown up in a 'household' opposite to Adam's and Adam had plenty of awkward moments with paternal figures to know that it wasn't completely unwarranted for Michael to feel weird around the fairer sex.
Vivian snorted, shaking her beaded head. “He just don't like me, ya mean,” she muttered, before standing up.
“Don't go,” Adam answered imploringly, but she paused only to pat him on the cheek.
“We give our customers what they want, here at the Lady. If he wants to spend time only the two of ya, I certainly don't blame him. I know I'd be annoyed, too, in his place, stuck with a nosy old woman instead of the cute boy I dug. Night, sugar,” she said, before gracefully taking her leave, her many skirts fluttering colorfully around her.
As if he'd been summoned, the undulation of wings announced Michael's arrival. “Hello,” he murmured, unperturbed by how his chilling attitude had scared Vivian away.
“You're ageist,” Adam said, glowering at him from the couch. “I can't believe you were such a dick to a poor, helpless old lady.”
He expected the archangel to hang his head and immediately become sheepish, like he generally did whenever Adam berated him. Instead, Michael frowned back at him, barking, “I cannot believe you still choose to be so naively trusting after everything.”
“Dude...” Adam pursed his lips together disbelievingly. “Yes, she's a little snoopy, but she's seventy years old. What is she going to hurt me with, her hair rollers? Get real, man.”
“If you spend enough time with her, she can hurt you,” the angel said darkly, and the expression he wore plainly revealed that he was ready to take flight again.
“Wait!” Adam exclaimed, patting the spot on the sofa next to him until Michael reluctantly sat down. “Maybe it's true, what you're saying. Maybe I'm stupid, but... It's nice, you know, that someone cares about me for no reason – that she doesn't want to make sure I've eaten only to, I dunno, ensure my meatsuit is healthy enough for some jerkbag angel to ride around in. No offense, of course.”
“I do not have a reason," Michael protested quietly. “Not anymore. I simply wish to see you happy.”
“And I am,” Adam said, searching his face, finding only sincerity there. “I'm happy partly because of you, but also because of Vivian, who reminds me of my mom and takes some of the edge off. I'm...always going to miss her, and this helps, just a little bit. Can't I have that, for now?”
Michael seemed to reflect on this for a moment, before conceding. “You may spend all the time you'd like with her. I will not come between you,” he murmured, defeated.
“Hey,” Adam pressed, “this doesn't mean that I don't want you around, man. We're having this discussion because I do. I want you to lurk and be your charmingly creepy self when she's here, and I want you when she's not, too. Her visiting doesn't mean we can't keep being friends.”
“You don't have to say that,” Michael protested, as close to self-conscious as he could ever get.
Adam offered him a heartfelt, fond smile. “I know I don't and you know I only do what I want. I want you to be nicer, yeah, but I'm selfish. It's not just for Vivian or anyone else – it's for me, for when we're together, okay? I don't like us fighting.”
“Yes,” Michael agreed, returning his smile. After a moment of mutely staring at Adam, he continued, “So...when would you like for us to spend time together – alone?” and Adam sighed. He should have known Michael would latch onto his words like a barnacle.
That was how he ended up spending half his nights snuggled down in a puffy sofa, across from an attentive archangel whose eyes never left his face, reading quietly aloud, even though he'd always been more of a mental reader before. It was also what he ended up doing on their last night at The Lady of Lawrence, at least to the point when he shut The Lovely Bones, the latest must-read he'd found at the library, after feeling disquieted by its concept.
“I somehow doubt all ghosts are as sweet and vulnerable as Susie Salmon,” he began dryly, to hide his wrangled nerves, but Michael saw right through him.
“She reminds you of yourself,” the archangel murmured, tone gentle, as if he was probing a still-sore wound with it.
Adam pursed his lips, then sighed. “I guess so. I mean, I can see why it was so hard for her, killed too soon, when she was far too young, by a force she couldn't control, but then being unable to move on from the world she was ripped from. Even knowing that depraved bastard died doesn't make up for her family's loss.” Damn, he'd gotten all unintentionally Poe in his post-afterlife, and he couldn't stand the idea of Michael pitying him over his now misty eyes. “Whatever, it's just a book, no big deal,” he proclaimed with false cheer, changing the subject and ignoring Michael's knowing look. “Wanna catch another movie, instead? I asked Vivian to see if she could get one off her two year old great-grandson, 'cause it's an epic.”
“All right,” the ancient warrior answered, deciding to let the book issue go for now, to Adam's great relief. “What is it?”
Grinning more authentically, Adam beckoned him into their bedroom, where the DVD sat on the nightstand. “Ta-da!” he exclaimed, lifting up a slightly battered copy of the first Shrek.
It didn't garner the reaction he'd hoped, since Michael only inspected the two ogres on the cover and nodded, but that ceased to matter when he popped the DVD into their entertainment system, pausing it on the introduction, and left the angel sitting on their bed so he could microwave some popcorn.
During the entirety of his childhood, he and his mom had a movie night, usually on Friday after Kate's shift ended, a tradition he'd carried on with his roommates and friends in college. In Hell, it was hard to even think about the woes of fictional characters when yours were a billion times worse, but it was still yet another thing that Adam had longed for that he could now do with Michael.
It had been peculiar at first, as all new experiences with his supernatural friend were, because of the dimmed lights, their proximity to each other, the way the knees of their folded legs touched around the huge bowl of popcorn that was propped between them, and the intense manner with which Michael deviated his attention from the screen to Adam, eager to learn from the goofy flicks that the human chose in order to please him. It was very reminiscent of Adam's first date.
All the same, it was never so bad that he wanted to stop doing it, so here he was again, offering Michael a lopsided grin as the movie started, before focusing once more on the antics of Shrek's colorful cast.
Eventually, almost too soon, it came time for the two ogres on the screen to share a last kiss, raucous music, funny jeers and other immature scenes following.
Adam stretched his arms up above his head, cramped from sitting in the same position for too long, and turned to look at Michael. The archangel was still staring at the screen, where the movie’s credits now rolled, with excessive concentration, and Adam shrugged, pegging it as an holy thing.
Michael read the last credit, then quietly inquired, “They lived happily ever after?”
“Yup,” Adam replied, exultant because this movie would never not rock.
“But why?” the angel demanded. “They were so different. She didn’t find her own ogre form beautiful, so what drew her to his?”
Pale blue eyes regarded him skeptically, then furled up to the ceiling in exasperation. Leave it to Michael to take a kid’s movie and turn it into some philosophical debate about the nature of love and beauty.
“Because,” Adam answered at length, “because he always found her beautiful, no matter what, so he made her love herself a little. It’s easy to requite someone's feelings if they make you feel special, as if you’re perfect when you’re not, when you feel really ugly inside, so she didn't mind staying an ogre to make him happy, too. Besides, beauty’s supposed to be in the eye of the beholder, isn’t it?” As an angel, he thought Michael would slurp that sugary crap right off the plate, but his vessel’s face twisted in a way that was almost pained. Adam frowned. “Why? Are you really that bothered by it? Geez, Mike, it’s a freaking movie, not Shakespeare!”
Michael didn’t reply, instead glowering obstinately at the screen, disregarding the fact that the credits had ended and it was now a blank blue. Adam scowled at him, then told himself it didn't matter. Sometimes, Michael was endearingly sweet, and other times he was an asocial bastard, but that was just Michael and if he wasn't used to it yet, then he was the only one with issues.
He jabbed his hand almost viciously into the bowl of popcorn, making some of the still-warm kernels spill over the edge, and this seemed to jar the archangel out of his stupor. He blinked at Adam’s unhappy face, then down at his hand, before he cautiously immersed his own into the bowl. Instead of taking some popcorn, however, he touched his fingers to the human's, slippery from too much butter, then interlaced the digits together, lifting their conjoined hands out of the bowl. With his remaining appendage, he cupped Adam's cheek, his grip tender but impossible to escape, and maneuvered his head till their eyes met.
“Wha-what are you–?” Adam began to stutter, but Michael's mouth was on his before he could finish the sentence.
The archangel's lips were unexpectedly soft against his, if a little bit clumsy, knocking their teeth together for a second, but too insistent and powerful to ever be described as delicate – nothing at all like how making out with a girl had ever been. He tasted like buttered popcorn – they both did, really – because he'd been trying the snacks slowly, picking them up between two careful fingers, while Adam stuffed whole handfuls at a time into his mouth. It wasn't a bad taste.
Michael pushed Adam back with very little of his strength – still too much – till his back hit the bed's headboard and the bowl between them upturned, slopping the greasy snack all over the once-clean sheets. Adam made a quiet groan of distress as the antique body of the wood rubbed up roughly against his bonding mark, which Michael had been kind enough to avoid since his initial explanation of it had resulted in a freak-out of heroic proportions. Adam wasn't sure whether, now, the archangel did it on purpose or not, but when Michael finally pulled away, he found himself too busy sucking in hungry gulps of air to question his motives. It was plainly obvious, anyway, that he'd forgotten that Adam was mortal and, consequentially, needed to breathe.
“You,” Michael gritted out in a low growl, while Adam blinked dazed eyes of a cornflower shade at him, “are the most infuriating human being I've ever met. You are stubborn and temperamental, you refuse to see the obvious, and you respond to anything that daunts you with insults, even when you know that it will be counterproductive. You stupidly care little for yourself and too much about others, you needlessly put yourself at risk, and you provoke me as no one has since Lucifer.”
He paused in his tirade and Adam felt his eyes start to sting humiliatingly. Sure, he'd known he wasn't exactly Michael's best-friend – couldn't be, really, since he now knew how lowly humanity measured on the Heavenly Host's scale of importance – but for Michael to compare him to Lucifer – the holy adversary, the arch-nemesis, the fucking devil – was kind of harsh.
“Jesus, Michael, tell me how you really feel!” he snapped, attempting to turn his head away, but the angel held his chin in place.
“You didn't let me finish – yet another peeving quality you have,” Michael went on smoothly, no hint of his supposed irritation coloring his inflection.
Adam scowled at him darkly, wishing he could lock himself in the bathroom, but that wouldn't work – firstly, the angel wouldn't let him go, and second, he'd just zap in, no respect for Adam's personal space whatsoever. Even now, his husky, unremitting voice wouldn't let his prisoner focus on all of his deprecating thoughts, the son of a bitch.
“As I was saying – despite all that, you made and make me rethink things.” Michael spoke so softly, in a whisper, that Adam frowned at him, disoriented by his sudden flip of the switch. “I used to wish to let my brothers smite your entire race, if only because I was upset, but when I inhabited your vessel and became privy to your thoughts, I found that your presence was surprisingly enjoyable, even desired. I-I was selfish, in Perdition, for I grew so attuned to it that I wanted to keep you with me, so I bonded us, knowing you wouldn't approve if you truly knew. And then, we talked more than I've ever spoken with even a fellow angel, with anyone, and you made me see that...perhaps humanity is worth preserving, if it means those like you and your mother can live, because I never realized, but you are beautiful. Wingless, powerless, unable to shield your fragile souls, but beautiful. And I want to hold you all the time, kiss you even though I used to find the gesture wet and disgusting, but I cannot even begin to express why, not even to my Father.”
Adam gawked at him for more moments than he'd want to admit, feeling like a fish out of water, opening and closing his mouth dumbly as he attempted to articulate a coherent response. Finally, he babbled, “U-um, I really have to pee,” and Michael sighed, moving away at once.
“It is late. Perhaps you should begin your nighttime routine and rest,” he acquiesced, gracefully slipping out of the bed and to the middle of the room, where he stood with his back bared, his already glamored wings even more imperceptible in the darkness.
Adam hugged himself with his arms, feeling a chill that hadn't been present in the room when they'd first entered, and nodded wordlessly, starting for the bathroom. He locked the door behind him, ineffectual though it may have been, and frowned down at the cold, tiled floor. Why did everything always have to be so stupidly complicated?
When he abandoned his ceramic sanctum at last, Michael was already gone. He thought he might have heard the muted beating of the angel's wings not long ago, but with the running water and his own screaming thoughts, he couldn't have been sure.
Adam went to bed as Michael had advised, but the Sandman, exactly like every other supernatural creature he'd ever met, decided it would be hilarious to screw around and leave him hanging, so he spent the remainder of the night staring up at the plain white ceiling, feeling more lonely than he had in years.
-
By the time the sun rose, Adam was a man on a mission. Thankfully, Michael wasn't yet home to impede said mission, so he crept out of his room and to Vivian's door without getting caught.
He only realized how early it was when the old woman opened the door, wearing rollers in her undone hair and a half-open robe around her stout frame, and then he cut off her sleepy curses with a quick apology.
Viv grimaced up at him, missing her ever-present spectacles for once, and something – perhaps the frantic expression of panic on his face or maybe some sixth sense she had – motivated her to invite him in. Even as the door shut behind him, he began telling her what he'd have to do. She was visibly upset and he had to make her some tea before she even started to accept it, but she soon nodded.
“You're right. I love having ya here more than I should, but you're right,” she acknowledged, as she ushered him out her door, forcing him to bend down so she could give him a final kiss on the cheek. “Don't you forget to call, baby boy, 'specially since I'm gonna get it from the maids 'cause of you. They are all half in love with one of you or the other.”
“I will,” he promised, even invoking his honor as an Eagle Scout, before insisting he could never forget her, when she gave him a knowing look. He left and found Michael sitting in their kitchenette, after eventually convincing the mettlesome elderly lady of his sincerity.
“Good morning,” the archangel greeted, without looking away from the orange he was meticulously peeling. He seemed unaffected by his recent rejection, and while Adam hadn't exactly been expecting serenades or love poems, he was somewhat offended by how Michael seemed to already be over him. For all he knew, Michael had been with a pretty girl angel this whole time, while Adam had been sorting through his conflicting feelings – the feelings the citrus-eating douche had caused.
Trying not to fume, Adam stalked over to the cupboard, which was readily stocked with all kinds of instantly made food, and took out a half-finished box of Lucky Charms cereal, his personal favorite. He grabbed some milk, then sat at the table, pouring the concoction together into a bowl and ignoring Michael.
Finally, after glaring down at the tabletop for a minimum of five minutes, Adam said, “I-I think it's time we left here. I already told Vivian.”
Michael set his partially eaten fruit down, licking his lips for any errant drops of fresh orange juice, and inquired, “Why? I was of the assumption that you liked it here.”
“You can't imagine how much I do, but we can't stay. No one stays at hotels forever.” It was hard for him to say so, because he really did love it here, with the ease of no responsibility after spending almost twenty years trying to be the best he could, but at the same time he knew, deep down in his heart, that their leaving had been inevitable straight from the get-go.
“Zack and Cody do,” the warrior of God replied, unaware of his charge's turbulent emotions and unruffled by the fact that he argued his logic through the employment of shows for children. This past month, he had realized his affinity for those, especially if they were animated.
Adam dropped his head onto the tabletop, the light collision making his cereal quiver inside its milky depths, and moaned loudly, secretly happy to at least have his frustration to distract himself from everything else he didn't want to dwell on.
“That, you dweeb, is fiction – and stupid fiction, at that. I don't want to stay here forever, no matter how cool it would be. The Lady might be amazing, but it isn't home.” He struggled to explain the abstract concept to a creature who, in Heaven, existed in a vast collective consciousness, wherein other angels reached out tendrils of grace to contact one another. Heaven was infinite, parallel to the never-ending universe, so how could Michael understand how important it was to have a small space to call all your own?
Of course, he really did owe the archangel more credit since, after a few lifetimes together in Hell, he probably knew Adam better than anyone – better than Adam did himself. Thus, with only the slightest reluctance, a line forming between his furrowed eyebrows, Michael asked, “Would you like, in that case, to go to Robert Singer's salvage-yard?”
Adam stabbed a green clover marshmallow with the curving head of his spoon, skillfully slicing it in two. “Why do you say that?”
“Your brothers consider his whereabouts their home. I thought, perhaps, you'd liken to them,” Michael explained patiently.
This time, a magically delicious toasted oat was crushed under his metallic eating utensil, and he watched the dusty particles float around with a malicious sense of glee. It wasn't nearly enough to satisfy him, however.
“I don't 'liken to them', no,” he said, then took a bite out of his bland breakfast. Michael frowned at him, injured by his barbed tone, and he thawed slightly. It wasn't that it was a bad suggestion. In fact, it might have even been the most sensible thing to do, but Adam couldn't bear the thought of seeing Dean again – not when he'd obviously feel betrayed by how chummy his half-brother and former enemy angel were, and especially because he knew Dean would only be disappointed that Adam was free and Sam was not. Besides, if he was asked to choose between them, he knew he'd probably choose Michael again, and while there was no love lost between him and his estranged brothers, he didn't want Dean to hate him, either. “I just mean... Well, you're an angel – an archangel – so why limit ourselves, huh? We could go anywhere, literally.”
Michael processed this for a few minutes, then nodded, handing Adam a beautiful yellow banana, not a brown spot in sight. At his human companion's questioning glance, he explained, “Potassium is good for you.”
Adam honestly couldn't find a effective argument to counter that, and his cereal had already become a soggy, unappealing mess by now, so he accepted the fruit with a small, gracious smile.
“Thanks, Michael,” he said, and meant it.
-
Chapter Four: Goldilocks Goes Global
-
Translations:
1. Thank you for choosing Hermes' Son. Have a nice day.
2. Thank you. You as well.
-
Adam smiled tightly at the mustached man behind the hotel counter as he handed back his latest room key.
“*Sas ef̱charistoúme pou epiléxate Gios tou Ermí̱. Kalí̱ sas méra,” the man said, beaming back just as falsely.
“Um, you too,” Adam replied, because the only languages he knew, other than English, were two semesters' worth of Spanish and some Latin in college. Greek was a little out of his league.
Michael, however, added, “*Sas efcharistó. Boreíte epísis,” as if it was no big deal. It actually wasn't, for him, and his tongue rolled the vowels so perfectly that the hotel manager actually clapped.
“You're such a show off,” Adam teased, when they exited the stifling lobby and were welcomed by sweet Mediterranean air. He was used to it by now, since he'd already witnessed Michael working his magic in most of Asia, quite a bit of Europe, some of Africa, and a couple of other places. They'd touched on a few of the major sights in America, too, in Washington and New York and Vegas, but seeing the big cities he'd never thought he would get to visit only made Adam long for the home of the Windom Eagles that much more. With so many to wade through, finding a nice town to settle in was harder than finding a needle in a haystack – a more accurate challenge would be trying to find a specific needle in a pile of needles.
Michael had decided, instead, that if Adam didn't have a particular place in mind, he wanted to show the high points of human culture, and who in their right mind would turn down a trip with a guide who knew the exact coordinates to the ruins of Camelot, Atlantis and Troy? That's right, no one, and especially not Adam, who Michael knew had minored in Classics back at the University of Wisconsin.
Laughing and half-hanging out of a rickshaw as it roller-coastered through the Great Wall of China, getting seasick on a gondola in Italy, or winding through the tombs of pharaohs – it would never be not great, but it might not always be right, especially for Adam. He was a small town boy, through and through.
“You are frustrated,” Michael said simply, glancing at him now out of the corner of one tawny eye.
“I guess so,” Adam replied. “I just thought...it'd be easier, you know? Am I really asking for too much?” In a carry-along bag that was slung over his shoulder, he lugged some clothes and a little notepad. It had some emergency information that he'd already all but memorized, but also featured a neatly penned list on the third page – a list to help him on his search for home sweet home. When he took it out and flipped to the page, it read:
1. A nice place to stay.
2. Decent people.
3. A good college nearby.
Only those three things, nothing more, and it was still impossible to meet the requirements, perhaps because they were too simple. Adam wasn't just frustrated – he was nearly to the point of defeat.
“I'm to blame, aren't I?” Michael mused, which drew a look from his companion.
“Why do you say that?” Adam asked, because it seemed random. Michael had been nothing but kind since they'd left The Lady of Lawrence – since before that – so what gave him the idea that he'd done something wrong?
“Because I enjoy our travels,” the angel explained slowly. “I haven't had the time to see the Earth this way, nor have I wanted to prior to now, but it's somehow better with you, anyway. I like to watch the wonder on your face when you see something new.”
“No,” Adam muttered, feeling oddly warm and fluffy inside, “I don't blame you. It's okay to have fun. And, you know, just because we find permanent residence doesn't mean we can't come back. Air angel does cut the travel time back soundly.”
“Okay,” Michael accepted readily, considering what he'd heard. “That must mean it is your fault.”
“What?” Adam squawked. “How's it my fault?”
Michael blinked at him, then took the notebook from his grasp, frowning down at it. “Because you haven't yet noticed how Lawrence meets your qualifications,” he said. “It isn't comprised of only a hotel on a hill. There are well-structured houses there, you already find the townsfolk 'decent', and the Lawrence campus for the University of Kansas is the largest in their state. If we lived there, you could arrive to your classes in a matter of minutes, and I can perceive no difference between the Universities of Kansas and Wisconsin.”
Adam opened his mouth, then shut it again, sucking in his lips with a pop. What Michael was saying, it actually made sense. Lawrence was a great place, from what he knew of it, and he'd already met a few of his potential future neighbors during runs with Vivian. Also, it wasn't huge – it had that everybody knows everybody level of friendliness – but it wasn't quite as small as Windom. As much as he missed his hometown, he wasn't simply after a replacement.
“I guess you're right,” he begrudgingly admitted, snatching back his notepad and tucking it into the unzipped bag. “Can't believe I didn't realize.”
The archangel shrugged. “You can be rather obtuse. In any case, I had help. Mrs. Weldes asked me what you desired in real-estate. I merely informed her and she said she'd 'tan' you when next she saw you, because you are an idiot.” He spoke plainly, the deduction unsurprising.
“You're such a jerk,” Adam fumed, knocking his shoulder against Michael's. All this resulted in was him slipping slightly in the damp sand and having to be righted by the angel, who carried on without pause.
“Shall I call you a 'bitch' now?” Michael wondered, smiling bemusedly, as if Adam's ineffectual bout of anger had never happened.
The world stopped spinning from his near-tumble and Adam demanded, “Why would you call me that?”
He was thrown for a loop by the sudden insult, unsure whether or not to feel offended, but Michael assuaged him with a quelling glance and a, “Never mind,” wrapping the fingers of one hand fully around Adam's skinny arm. “To make sure you don't hurt yourself,” he rationalized, doing yet another one-eighty.
“Well, okay,” Adam allowed, “but only 'cause you were right this time. Still doesn't mean you can be an ass.”
Michael relented with a nod, observing his pout, and said, “I'm sorry, Adam.” His tone suggested he wasn't finished, and when the blond head turned in his direction, he continued, “Worry not. I would never let anyone harm you – not even Miss Weldes.”
“As if a little old lady could hurt me,” Adam scoffed, laughing, but when the angel's earnest expression fell, he shook off his grip and took his hand. “It's okay, you'll always be my knight in shining armor.”
Michael brightened, then suspiciously inquired, “Was that sarcasm?”
Honestly, it was, but Adam shook his head, giving the archangel's hand a reassuring squeeze before tugging him forward.
“It's our last day here,” he said, at Michael's questioning glance. “Before I call Viv, I am determined to make it the best, so we're definitely heading to the beach.” Sandcastles, seashells and swimming filtered into his vision, making him grin. Heck, if they had time, he wanted to scale Mount Olympus again.
“You are very childish,” Michael commented, but there was only affection, no heat, behind his words.
“You love it,” Adam huffed, unperturbed, to which the archangel smiled indulgently, letting himself be dragged until the gorgeous shoreline closed in, painted by the slowly reddening sun.
-
A few hours later, Adam found himself with an armful of squirming old lady.
“You greet all your visitors like that?” he teased, ignoring the giggling maids and other hotel patrons in favor of blinking down at Vivian's head, now with her hair piled artfully on top.
“Hush, you!” she chided, pulling just far enough away to smack his arm a few times. “It took ya this long to mosey on back? Ya dummy!”
Adam rubbed the now sore spot and gave her the evil eye. “Jesus, woman, that smarted,” he complained, sullenly adding, “Not to mention, there was probably a better place for it than the entrance. I know what I'm putting in the suggestion box.”
Vivian snorted. “Don't be such a baby, and certainly don't take the Lord's name in vain.”
“I tell him that all the time,” Michael piped in, breaking his silence. He was taken aback when the old woman offered him a huge, partly toothless grin and latched onto him, somehow rocking his larger frame in a humorous parody of a dance.
“'Cause you're a good boy,” she said, muffled into his shirt, and Adam rolled his eyes, mouthing, 'Kiss ass,' noticeably enough to incite a frown from the angel.
“You gonna leave us poor, jet-lagged souls hanging out here?” he asked, even though they hadn't actually flown in the conventional sense. Just to rile her, he threw in another mumbled comment about the suggestion box.
“Like ya left me hangin' while ya had your little honeymoon, ringin' not a single time,” she returned, before caving and gesturing for them to follow her in, directing them to a new room that was almost exactly like the last one they'd occupied. “Gonna have to tell Luan to set out the things you'll need,” she grumbled. “Now, if you'd called before droppin' in–”
“–You'd have done something insane, I know. I'm so sorry for depriving you of that chance,” Adam finished, rolling his eyes again, then breaking out into a smile. “It's okay, Viv, really. You don't have to go overboard for us, and if all goes well, we won't be here for much longer.”
Her face fell. “Ya'll are leavin' so soon?” she tremulously inquired.
Michael glanced over at Adam, who was fighting to keep a straight face, before setting down their bags at the door. Vivian would only whine if they didn't leave something for the staff to do.
“Yes, very soon, if possible,” he answered, before shooting Adam a confused look when the elderly woman glowered at him.
Adam shook his head at the two and decided to take pity on them. “Only because we're taking your advice,” he informed Vivian. “We're thinking of sticking around for a while.”
The old woman gaped at him for a moment, then jumped up and grabbed him, nearly knocking him to the floor, if not for his hurried grip on the arm of the sofa.
“Oh, ya won't regret it!” she cried. “Lawrence is the best place on the planet and I just know the neighbors are gonna love ya – 'specially if they came outta me or outta someone who did! Gotta a lot of kin here, I do.”
Both men smiled indulgently at her, and when Michael added, “We will go home hunting soon. You may join us, if you wish,” she really did end up bodily dropping Adam.
“You could have waited till she was a little calmer,” he grumbled from the ground, rubbing at his tender diaphragm as Vivian squealed. Michael shrugged his shoulders sheepishly, but retained the smile.
-
That night, after Vivian was assured enough that they wouldn't ghost away in the darkness, the two men slept soundly – or, well, Adam did, while his archangel roommate sat at the bedside table – easily falling back into their old routine.
When she knocked on the door at exactly five in the morning, however, even Michael lost his placid attitude, having been thwarted in his usual activity of watching Adam sleep and skimming through his dreams for the first time in weeks.
“Good mornin',” she chirped, when a bedraggled Adam opened the door, as if she hadn't just woken the sleeping dragon.
“It will be,” he replied between yawns, glancing at the wall-mounted clock, “in another five hours.”
“Oh, hush,” she said. “A young man like you should not be bothered by somethin' so trivial – not when he holds it up to gettin' his own place.”
“Viv-ee-an!” Adam whined, stretching each syllable. “We can do this later, can't we? Michael and I were–?”
“Were what?” she replied, face now gleaming like a child's on Christmas morning.
“–Were sleeping,” Adam finished easily, used to her antics by now, though he and the angel in question did share an exasperated look.
“Well, okay,” she said, obviously disappointed, before brightening again. “Now, why don't ya get cleaned up. I'd say your boy, too, but for someone who was sleepin', he sure looks polished.”
“He used to be a model,” Adam explained dryly, slipping in another fake story about the archangel's past for her to report to the maids. “The perfect posture is still there, even if it's no longer his schtick.”
Vivian applauded in delight, beaming at Michael, who smiled back shyly. “If she's already so excited, we may as well go,” he inputted.
Adam sighed and relented with a nod. “You stay with pretty boy while I go get cleaned up,” he directed the elderly hostess, to her immediate agreement.
“If anythin',” he could hear her say, as he ducked into the bathroom, “you're handsome. He's more pretty.”
The whir of the shower stream drowned out their gossip.
-
The mansion complexes that Vivian wanted to visit were only a few minutes' walk from the hotel, as both the gated neighborhood and the Lady occupied the hill over Lawrence city.
Adam stumbled to a stop when he saw the row of manors, while the old woman continued without pause, explaining, “A realtor will meet us there. He'll get ya a good deal for sure.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” Adam replied, not quite able to pick his jaw off the floor yet. Vivian quirked a patient eyebrow at him. “You seriously want us to buy a freaking mansion?”
“It's not like Michael can't afford it,” she answered, picking up her pace again.
“I can,” the archangel clarified, waiting for Adam to fall into step beside him, “but only if you want one.”
“Why wouldn't he?” Vivian asked, evidently surprised. “Ya like the hotel, don't ya? It ain't much different.”
Michael recalled what Adam had told him before and said, “Normal people do not live in hotels,” which only served to offend the Lady's mistress.
“You sayin' I'm not normal?” she screeched, wheeling around with her hands on her hips.
Adam held his own out in placation. “Of course not. It's just...I'm kinda small town, Viv, that's all.”
“And these are small town mansions,” she returned, not frazzled in the least. “C'mon, just give 'em a chance. Ya might like 'em,” she added more pleadingly.
“Okay,” Adam relented with the utmost reluctance. “I guess there's no harm in looking.”
Two hours later, he retracted his statement. The harm laid in the fact that he ended up not liking any of the fancy, pre-furnished places the realtor droned on and on about, and he was dead on his feet from having to tour them, especially since he knew he wouldn't end up picking a single one. At least then the sacrifice might have been worth it.
The first two homes had previously belonged to rich politicians who had either moved or died. This one was different, as the former property of a famous photographer and author whose works were still plastered on the wall.
“He captured street images of disasters around the world,” the real estate agent explained, pointing to a framed picture of a McDonald's that had been ravaged by a storm.
Michael canted his head at it, then said, “I believe we've been there before.”
The agent laughed. “I'm sure it wasn't the same one.”
“All of these seem a little morbid,” Vivian interjected, frowning. “Maybe we should move on to the next one?”
“If you wish,” the realtor replied, turning to Adam expectantly. “What do you think, sir?”
Adam pursed his lips, considering the covered walls. “It's...interesting. How many more are left?”
“Seven,” the agent answered. “Shall we go?”
Adam barely restrained a sigh, watching Vivian nod in his stead. Knowing her, she'd want him to see them all, and what real estate personnel in their right mind would be opposed to more business? He'd get no rescue n that front.
“I...guess,” he muttered unhappily. He was screwed, anyway.
Both the realtor and Vivian smiled, heading for the exit, and Adam hunched after them like a man heading to the gallows. Shopping had never been an activity he'd enjoyed.
Michael blinked at their receding backs, dragging his eyes away from the picture of the decimated eatery, and said, “We should stop.”
Everyone did, simply because the archangel hadn't offered much input before, and Adam arched an eyebrow at him. “You wanna go to McDonald's or something? I'd rather check out the diner on Sixth Street. Viv's chef thinks it's awesome.”
“No,” Michael answered, “but I would rather not continue with this feral pursuit of fowl. You won't like any of them.”
Adam started to explain that he meant wild goose chase, not whatever it was he'd said, but Vivian set her fists on her hips and demanded, “How do you know? He just might pick one! You might like it.”
“He won't,” the angel declared with an easy shrug. “I can take you to what he will.” As an afterthought, he added, “And I will be fine with whatever Adam wants.”
The old woman scowled, but Adam mouthed a 'thank you' at him. Aloud, he said, “He means he can drive, but you're license isn't valid in this state yet, Mike.”
“I'll drive,” the agent offered. “Just tell me where to go.”
“Well, fine then,” Vivian huffed, crossing her arms. “I suppose it's your place, so whatever ya want goes.”
Mentally, Adam shot another thanks to Michael's dad, if for nothing else but creating his archangel son. Maybe today could be over before blood was shed, after all.
“You're amazing,” he told the angel conspiratorially, gifting him with a grin, as they ducked into the backseat of a bright green VW Bug. Michael smiled back, though his gold eyes flecked from one shut door to the other, discomfited by the constricted area.
“Where to?” the realtor asked, looking politely away from the fidgeting warrior of the Lord.
Michael settled back into his seat at Adam's behest, allowing him to reach over and click his seat-belt shut, even though most supernatural creatures were invulnerable to such things as car wrecks, because the position allowed him to murmur right into Adam's ear. “There is a street called Minnesota with an unsold house. It isn't the same, but...perhaps you'd like to see it, anyway?”
Adam's hand tightened on the strap of the belt, but after a moment he glanced up, shot his angel a quick, meaningful smile, and said, “Minnesota Street. Can you take us there?” to the agent, who immediately nodded and started up the car, choosing not to comment on the slight hitch in his voice.
“Ya lived in Minnesota, didn't you?” Vivian inquired, breaking the silence with uncharacteristic gentleness.
Adam nodded and murmured, “Yeah...before.”
He could see her face pinch in the rear-view, weathered and lively all at once, but she didn't broach the subject any further and the tiny Bug fell into an amicable quiet until they reached the row of homes on the small street. The one Michael had mentioned stood out like a sore thumb.
The windows were boarded up, the door was bolted shut, its white paint was peeling gray and the lawn was overgrown, as opposed to the perfect cookie-cutter houses on either side of it, which had trimmed yards full of prize-winning rose bushes, toys for children and creepy lawn ornaments that probably passed for classy.
“It used to belong to a Mr. and Mrs. Smith,” the realtor explained. “The husband relocated his business to China last year, however, and my firm hasn't been able to find occupants.”
“Maybe it'd be easier if ya kept it in shape,” Vivian muttered snidely, but Adam cocked his head at it, taking in the small house from all angles. Wouldn't it be epic if it belonged to assassins?
“I like it,” he finally decided, ignoring two pairs of dubious looks sent his way.
“It does come furnished,” the agent said hesitantly. “If you're certain you want it, I'm sure the firm will pitch in for the upkeep we previously failed to do, after purchasing it from the Smiths.”
“Nah, it's cool. Michael can fix it,” Adam replied, bumping shoulders with the archangel, who seemed pleased.
Vivian lowered her sunglasses and squinted over her shoulder at them. “You're a model and handy, huh?” To the realtor, she said, “Ya better not think you'll be rippin' them off today.”
“Don't listen to her,” Adam broke in, glaring at the back of the old woman's seat because she was too short for more than a few wisps of white hair to reach over it. “Look, Viv, the place has character. Broken things can be fixed and that's how you make them your own.” The Milligan house in Windom had experienced quite a lot in its forty years of life. By the time a young mother and her little boy moved in, it was already pretty banged up, though it was hard to recall a time before Kate had decided green was a bad look for her enough to tackle it with Spackle and tough love. Who said this had to be any different? More firmly, Adam insisted, “We'll take it.”
Vivian practically melted into the Bug's leather interior, a foiled sulk in place, but the real estate agent nodded, likely relieved that the roller-coaster ride this day had become was almost over.
“Okay,” he said, unlocking all the doors from a switch on the dashboard. “Now that that's decided, shall we go take the grand tour?”
And thus the process began again, but with a more recognizable end result. By the end of the day, Adam and Michael – despite the angel's maintaining that it wasn't necessary – were the co-owners of the little house of Minnesota Street, number four-nineteen.
-
Unfortunately, Casa de Milligan was falling apart at the seams, so it took a lot of work before it tangibly became anything more than a scrapheap.
“But what if people are here and there's a blackout?” Adam inquired worriedly, craning his neck to watch Michael as he drew a brush over the ceiling, like he'd done in the last three rooms of their new house. Only two more to go. “What will they think of this honking, glowing, devil-worshiping symbol?”
Michael frowned down at him disapprovingly. “They are not devil-worshiping symbols. They are devil's traps, which are quite the opposite. You are lucky we found this phosphorescent paint in the crafts store. It's bad enough where I have to put the banishing sigils.” That was to say, behind their wallpaper, which would have to be peeled back if they were needed to activate the marks.
“They're made of blood!” Adam exclaimed, not admitting how watching Michael cut into his own palm had made him squirmy. That wasn't the best thing to spread around, being pre-med and all. “The neighbors are gonna think we're serial killers. Just a pair of Dahmers, since we're gay, to boot.”
Michael added a final stroke to the devil's trap and jumped off the ladder, defeating its purpose entirely, only to land on his feet. That would be a perfect ten, if judges were around to gauge him for it.
“You're only upset because all the visiting ladies talked about how cute a couple we make and how perfectly comfortable they are in our presence,” he said, smirking wanly.
Adam glowered at him, then answered, “Yeah, well, at least we have enough home-cooked meals to last a while, now. What do you want tonight: Miss Baker's potluck surprise or Mrs. Sullivan's macaroni salad? I'm always partial to mac-n-cheese, myself.”
“I don't like surprises,” the angel replied, in full agreement, before moving onto the next room.
Adam trailed after him and said, “Maybe I should get started on heating that up? You gonna be okay on your own? Not gonna splatter gore on the walls, will you?”
“No,” Michael muttered. “I'm not a child and, as such, do not require constant supervision. If anything, I am worried you will drench our food in ketchup in my absence, as you are wont to.”
“Will not!” Adam stuck his tongue out childishly, but the archangel zapped his ladder into the room to begin working again, so he backed out. “I mean it, though, Michael,” he added, in a tone that brooked no argument, “I don't care if they're better on exits and entrances, absolutely none of those angel banning things where people can see them!”
When the archangel replied with a quiet, sarcastic, “Yes, dear,” he hid a smile behind his palm and ducked into the kitchen. That backtalk only meant, truce or not, there would definitely be ketchup on the salad.
Not an hour later, Michael joined him and, as expected, grimaced down at their dinner. Adam cackled at his offended expression and most of the meal was spent flicking spoonfuls of excess tomato sauce at each other. After that, the supernatural touches were crossed off their renovation list, which left only the normal ones. That leaky roof wouldn't patch itself up, after all, and Michael's efforts would be in vain if stray water somehow washed his sigils away.
-
They didn't want to make the repairs seem too fast, lest anyone get suspicious, but Adam figured it would be okay to invite Vivian over three days later. She had been calling him to probe for information every day, ever since he told her that she couldn't visit until after the renovations were done, and he'd been plying her with news of his school application status to appease her.
The University of Kansas was happy to have him and made the process nice and simple. He couldn't help but worry, all the same, that they would discover how most of his documentation was fake. Half the time, Adam almost wanted to quit while he was ahead, before they could investigate, or start school from scratch, rather than with all of his previous credits transferred.
Whenever he brought that up, though, usually when wild-eyed after a night of insomnia, Michael would patiently say, “You are merely nervous, which is silly because you're the smartest human I know.” Every time, with interchangeable kindness and vexation, Michael comforted him, and now it was too late for Adam to back out – not if Vivian already had it in her head that this was his returning to school party, meaning she'd happily join Michael and get on his back about the issue.
“I don't know what them college kids are readin' nowadays,” she began, as soon as he let her in, her head already turning to survey the room, “but I gotcha a present.”
Adam blinked down at the object she thrust into his arms, a newish copy of The Catcher in the Rye, and immediately replied, “You really didn't have to, Viv,” while mentally adding that Michael also didn't have to fly over to China when he said he'd wanted Chinese food. There was a perfectly good restaurant about two blocks away, but of course Adam was stuck with melodramatics. Secretly, he thought both gestures were sweet.
“'Course I did,” she huffed predictably, patting him on the arm and continuing with the tour. “I remember when my kids read that book. Heard the boy in it's a real snarky brat, just like you.”
“Then he will enjoy it,” Michael added, entering the living room with a tiny smirk.
Adam glowered at the two of them, wondering why they always had to gang up on him, before setting the book down carefully on top of their coffee table and asking, “So, what do you think, Mrs. Snob? It meet your approval?”
“Hey, I ain't a snob!” Vivian rebuffed, before reluctantly adding, “But the place does look...decent. Ya fixed everything so quick.”
Adam puffed out his chest, eyes sweeping over the room. The couches were plush and new, he'd polished the hardwood floor himself, and fresh new wallpaper adorned the walls. It was comfy and cozy without going overboard. It reminded him of home – it was home.
“I did everything,” Michael said, raising his hand slowly, then leaning back to avoid Adam's fist.
Adam pursed his lips to keep from grumbling about how, while the archangel had done the handy work, usually via mojo, he'd been the one to clean up all the paint splotches and residual wood-chips left behind, with no powers whatsoever.
Instead, he ignored Michael and offered Vivian his arm. “C'mon, I'm starving. And, uh, before you ask, Zen Zero changed their recipe. That's why the food might taste a little different. No other reason.”
“Well, okay, 's'long as it ain't too spicy. That's no good for me no more,” she replied, beaming up at him when he pulled a chair open for her. She spent the rest of the night admiring the furniture and the meal, drawing Michael into the conversation by asking about the wallpaper he'd picked for each of the rooms – some with cartoon images, some with raining feathers that Adam found amusing, and some solid layers of color.
Adam sat back and watched the two, occasionally joining in to poke fun at one or the other, taking pleasure in their reactions. Mostly, he thought about how they must look to anyone watching through the windows – how they could pass for a family, if a slightly unconventional one.
Time passed and the hands on the wall-clock, a creepy cuckoo bird with huge, roving eyes that Michael had carefully picked out from the kid's section of a furniture store, which he claimed reminded him of his youngest archangel brother, migrated closer to the midnight hour.
Vivian, her sunglasses currently unnecessary and thus tucked into her huge purse, squinted at it and sighed, her chair scraping back along the tiled floor. “I should be headin' home, baby boy. Ya have school tomorrow, and Lord knows it's just as important at your age to get a good night's sleep as it is for my little ones.”
Adam blinked, then sheepishly admitted, “I sorta forgot.”
“Shame on ya!” Vivian said, wagging her finger, but she was smiling.
Adam smiled back, pushing away his finished plate. “Shall I walk you to the door, milady?” he asked, offering her his elbow coquettishly and throwing in a wink.
He pouted when she replied, “I'd rather have him do it,” and pulled Michael to his feet. The archangel blinked, but allowed her to drag him. “Don't ya keep him up with all that funky stuff tonight, ya hear?” she advised, when they reached the door, and Adam groaned, dropping his head into his hands.
“Keep it up and you won't be invited back, lady,” he warned her.
“I won't,” Michael promised solemnly. “Would you like me to escort you home?”
Vivian giggled like a schoolgirl, stepping up onto her toes to pat his cheek. “That would be nice, but I can drive, dear.” She smirked over her shoulder at Adam, who was still sulking, and added, “Goodnight, both of ya.”
Adam waved as the door shut behind her, then dropped his head back to hit the wall, emitting a sigh.
“You're still nervous,” Michael observed. After accepting that no answer was forthcoming, he nodded sagely. “I can escort you to the bedroom, if you'd like? Putting you to a dreamless sleep shouldn't be difficult.”
“Okay,” Adam said, not having to think about it long at all. It was something Michael did often enough, and while it sometimes made Adam uncomfortable to have someone playing around in his brain, he knew he'd shared himself with the archangel too long for him to suddenly become prudish. “Just don't try anything 'funky', man.”
Michael made a face, before reaching out with two fingers to brush against his human's forehead and transport him out of the room.
That night, Adam dreamed in wild swirls of colors and, unsurprisingly, bright archangel grace. Michael almost always reverted to his true form in dreamland, and that was probably why the crisp, pungent smell of smoke didn't initially set off any mental alarm bells, so evocative of Michael's own scent.
Their literal alarms, however, blared loud enough to wake up the entire neighborhood, and Adam shot up off his bed in a panic, running out to look for Michael even if he rationally knew a fire wouldn't do him much damage. For all the knowledge he had about supernatural creatures, it just might.
His bedroom, the bathroom, the free rooms and living room were empty, but in the kitchen, he was met with the sight of Michael's back as the archangel stood over the stove, a thick line of smoke building from whatever pot he was stirring.
He heard Adam's heavy breathing and turned. “Oh, hello.”
Adam stared at him incredulously. “You're burning down our new house and that's all you have to say? Hello? How about, hey, the last two times you died were kinda boring. This time, I'm gonna fry you to a crisp, and won't that be fun?”
“Your witticism astounds me,” Michael returned dryly. “I am not plotting to murder you. If I wanted to do that, I wouldn't have to waste time with useless schemes.”
“Okay, tough guy,” Adam said, rolling his eyes, “I get it, you can pack it back into your pants. If you're not doing that, what are you doing?”
Michael turned away again, his back stiffening, and said something illegible. When Adam prodded him further, he muttered, “I am cooking for you,” in an almost bashful way.
Adam scrutinized his discomfort, then smiled. “Aw, Michael, you're adorable,” he finally replied, in a teasing tone.
“On second thought, I may attempt to be rid of you, after all,” the archangel grouched.
Adam laughed, only to intake some billowing smoke and choke on it. “I-I believe you,” he said between coughs. “Why else would you be brewing poisons?”
Michael frowned from Adam to the concoction, then said, “It isn't poison. I made eggs – scrambled – but they didn't come out quite as planned.”
“Oh really?” Adam inquired, after clearing his throat and wiping away the tears that leaked from his stinging eyes. He moved to peer over the angel's shoulder and regarded the blackened, charred eggs with his bottom lip between his teeth, to keep from both laughing or inhaling more smoke. “It doesn't look...that bad,” he lied.
“So you'll eat it?” Michael asked, his eyes brightening in that hopeful, golden way that made Adam want to agree.
Instead, he shook his head, choosing a bit more longevity over imminent death. “Not even on your long life, buddy, but I'll tell you what, I'll bring home some of that ice cream you like after class. What do you say?” He added the last bit appealingly, to spare Michael's feelings, and blew out a sigh of relief when Heaven's Sword accepted his terms. If he hadn't, Adam might have chickened out and tried his burnt cooking, anyway.
“I like vanilla,” Michael reminded him, shooting one last disappointed look at the pan-full of eggs, before dumping them out. They'd have the luck to be amassed into a nuclear reactor someday.
“I know,” Adam said, grinning and squeezing his angel's bicep. “I think I'll get to school myself. It's only about half an hour, so if I run, I can count it as my morning exercise. Two birds with one stone.”
Michael eyed him for a moment, then began to put his now empty pan into the pantry, that hard set to his back again. “You don't wish for me to take you.” It wasn't a question.
“No, it isn't that,” Adam protested, then paused. “I just... I'm sorry, Mike. You can take me if you want? Or I could stay, if that's better?” he offered.
“No,” the archangel returned. “I didn't intend to get testy. I suppose I will simply miss you. I don't like being alone.”
“Oh,” Adam murmured, feeling awful now. He had spent a lot of time worrying about how his going back to school would affect him, not Michael. “Well...maybe you can go where you go when you're mad at me? Hang out with other rebel angels?”
“There are no other 'rebel angels,'” Michael spat out, but when he saw Adam's wide eyes, all the air deflated out of him. “I cannot see any of my brethren – not ever. When you aren't with me, I-I fly around, take in the sights, but I don't really do anything. Nothing meaningful, and it's still very lonely.”
Adam swallowed, then repeated his apology, closing in the distance between them till he was inches away from being chest to back with the angel. “When I get out of class, we can do whatever you want – together – and the great thing about college is, I'll only be gone a few hours. I'll be back before you know it.”
“All right,” Michael said, nodding curtly. He turned halfway and touched Adam's cheek. “Goodbye.”
“For now,” Adam replied with determination, lifting his own hand, but not making contact with Michael's fingers. He almost regretted it when they fell away from his face, but a quick glance at the clock alerted him of the time, and he was already too late. “See you.”
“Yes,” the archangel murmured, golden eyes concentrated intensely on him as he left the room, picking up his new bag from where he'd left it leaning against the coat-rack last night. Even after the door shut behind him, Adam felt as if his soul was being dissected by that heady gaze.
Damn it.
“Mr. Milligan!” a little voice piped in, followed by an older girl's cry, and he rotated till he caught sight of the Holmes' children, Sari and Ritchie. Their mother, Jenny, a pretty blond woman who was looking a bit raddled, followed after them, her arms busy with a tray.
“Oh, hello, Adam,” she said, slightly out of breath, as she pitched her hip to rearrange the platter so she could tuck a long strand of hair behind her ear. Catching his curious gaze, she explained, “The kids have a scouting mission. We're handing out muffins and fliers.”
“Here,” Ritchie chirped, handing him the aforementioned piece of paper, which advertised a charity pet adoption event that would take place in the Holmes' yard later that night. Sari batted her eyes at him, her fingers interlaced over her plaid skirt. She and her younger brother were both decked out fully in boy and girl scout uniforms.
Adam smiled at them fondly, despite the situation, and accepted the flier. “I used to be a boy scout, you know?”
“Really?” both children inquired, eyes round as saucers. Ritchie rounded on his sister. “And you said being one wasn't cool!”
“I guess it is, if Mr. Milligan's doing it,” Sari admitted, blushing and staring down at her Mary-Jane shoes.
“Oh yeah, totally,” Adam agreed, with exaggerated gravity, as he shot Jenny a wink. “I was even an Eagle Scout. That's the highest you can get.” He was actually quite proud of that feat, and could easily recall the day when the scout leader had promoted him during a national ceremony, pinning his last merit badge onto his already full sash.
“Whoa,” the kids breathed, but their mother only laughed, handing him a still warm, chocolate muffin.
“For the great Eagle Scout, then,” she joked, bright blue eyes crinkling at the corners.
Adam's smile wavered for a moment. Jenny was all alone, raising Ritchie and Sari by herself, and she reminded him of Kate so much.
He plastered his grin back on, slightly forced, and moaned when he bit into the treat. “It's good,” he said through a mouthful, “and I'll definitely go to this event thing if you're gonna bake some more. Plus, baby animals.”
“You can never go wrong with baby animals,” she laughed, before picking up her pace when the kids bounded off. “See you later, Adam.”
He nodded at the receding trio and took off in a trot, mood uplifted. Having an actually edible breakfast had that affect on him. It was the most important meal of the day, after all.
-
Adam had died, initially, at the start of his third semester. His birthday had just barely passed in September, October drawing closer with its holidays of old, when he got the call about his mother missing work for almost three days, which left him terrified and rushing home, only to be devoured by something that bore her face. It wasn't exactly the best way to end any experience.
The one positive, however, was that the classes he now had were a repeat of the ones he hadn't had the chance to finish, so he was ahead of the rest of his classmates in his coursework. Of course, he'd been ahead then, too, being what his friends had always called a nerd, and it might have been nice to finish school without all of that horror movie drama, but he'd take what he could get.
The professor of his first class, anatomy, was new to the university himself and impressed by Adam's knowledge of the body, which carried over to the already friendly class. It was a nice pick up after the way the morning had started, and while his history class was looking to be a bit dry, Adam was genuinely glad and couldn't wait to tell Michael so, especially after he'd spent all the dull periods of the day filling the pages of his new notebooks with doodles of the archangel's wings, nowhere near as beautiful as the original models.
He caught one of the shuttle buses that departed from the university campus and stopped at the small ice cream parlor a few blocks from his house, recalling his promise, where he purchased two small cones and sprinted the rest of the way home with them dripping all over his fingers under the still sweltering September sun.
When he slid to a stop in front of their welcome mat, which had a small devil's trap painted under it, Michael instantly opened the door. Grateful that he wouldn't have to knock with both his hands full, Adam handed him the vanilla cone, then immediately grasped his wrist.
“Come on,” he began bossily, although it didn't usually take much prodding for the angel to succumb to his whims.
“Where?” Michael asked, so frazzled that he hadn't had the chance to lick his ice cream yet.
Adam slowed down a bit, not wanting the sidewalk to end up painted with the archangel's favorite treat, and said, “The Holmes are having a pet adoption event. We might be able to find you a friend there.” Michael's expression immediately became stormy, but before he could protest, Adam added, “I-I've always kinda wanted a pet. Mom was allergic so we couldn't have one before.”
It wasn't a complete lie, but if Michael believed it meant a lot to him, he'd back down at once, and Adam wouldn't have to feel bad about taking advantage of him if they actually did find something he could keep company with. The archangel was always trying to make him happy, and if he could return the favor, Adam would truly be pleased.
“I suppose a pet might be nice,” Michael yielded, finally dipping his head to catch the cream that trickled to meet the skin between his thumb and fingers.
Adam followed the motion, swallowing the cold lump of chocolate on his tongue, then looked away, fixing a smirk onto his soiled lips. “'Sides,” he began facetiously, “Jenny can really bake. You can at least get a cookie or two to go with that ice cream.” Predictably, his favorite warrior of the Lord perked up, and Adam laughed as they closed in on the Holmes' residence, number one hundred and nine.
Right in front of it, he stopped, finishing off the last of his cone. With balloons tied to the bannisters around the stairs and a colorful sign that read 'go around back, adopt a pet', it should have been a cheerful place. Its inhabitants were always sweet, whenever Adam met them during his morning runs or if they stopped by to drop something off at his place, but it always gave him the heebie-jeebies.
“Bad things happened here,” Michael said, in all but a whisper, and Adam's eyes flashed to his face, the air around them becoming tense. “But that was almost twenty eight years ago, not now. That spirit has since been put to rest.”
“Y-you sure?” Adam asked. He loved it here, in this idyllic little town, but the kind neighbors and cookie-cutter houses could never dispel the memories – the nightmares – of the world that coexisted with this one, that he never wanted to be a part of again, if at all possible.
The angel wasn't given more than a chance to nod before a small figure barreled toward them. He forwent talking to step protectively in front of Adam, but the human only shot him an amused look before bending to catch Ritchie Holmes around the waist.
“Hiya, Mr. Milligan!” the little boy started breathlessly. “Why are you guys standin' out here for? Who's he? Will you take home a pet? I want a doggie, but Sari's stupid cat, Chester, doesn't like sharing us.”
Adam laughed at his incessant array of inquiries, then said, “This is Michael. He's my...friend.”
“Your best friend?” Ritchie pressed, his big brown eyes latching curiously onto the discomfited archangel. At Adam's hesitant nod, his tiny face broke out into a huge grin. “I have a best friend, too. His name's Stevie and we met in kindergarten!” He couldn't quite pronounce the word properly yet and it was very cute, earning him an even bigger smile as Adam took his small hand, his free one reaching for Michael's, and tugged the two of them into Ritchie's yard.
Jenny was on the ground, picking up a crumbled crispy rice treat while chastising a gaggle of children even younger than her son, telling them not to feed the pets with people-food.
Adam cleared his throat and she whipped around. “Oh, hello,” she said, looking between them and her bouncing son, who ran forward and hugged her legs. She pet his hair lovingly, but didn't remove her prying gaze from Michael.
“That's Mr. Milligan's best friend,” Ritchie informed her. “His name's Mr. Michael.”
“I-it's really nice to meet you,” Jenny murmured, blinking at them from behind coy lashes.
Michael cocked his head at her in his customary alien way, until Adam elbowed him, at which point he said, “The pleasure is mine. And I prefer my name without honorifics.”
“Just Michael, then,” she returned, her pretty face glowing, before she stepped out of the way to give her guests a thorough range of her yard. Her daughter was chatting animatedly with a few of her girlfriends at a table near the porch, and other pieces of fold-out furniture occupied the yard, with cages of animals sitting on top of them. Across from Sari's station was a final one, nearly pressed up against the neighboring fence, that had a few pitchers of lemonade and platters of treats on it.
Adam appraised everything and whistled. “Wow, you guys did a great job. What badge is it for: first aid to animals or is it one of the rescue badges?”
Jenny's eyes went round, then crinkled in amusement. “You really were a boyscout!” she exclaimed, as if she couldn't quite imagine him in that post.
“Yup, scout's honor,” Adam answered proudly, lifting his arm to do the signature oath. She giggled and he narrowed his eyes at her. “Hey, being a scout really is cool, and lemme tell you, I've got the legs for it.” He shook one of said jean-clad legs and winked, incurring more laughter, particularly since Michael played along and nodded sincerely alongside him.
“Okay then, you've convinced me and the kids,” Jenny said, upon catching her breath. She glanced around at the array of cacophonous creatures and her smile softened. “There are a lot of mistreated animals, both housebroken and wild, in Douglas County, so the boy and girl scouts are teaming up for events like this to raise money for shelters or find them good homes. I'm only one of the den mothers, but the only one in Lawrence, and a lot of these little guys have been adopted already. Mrs. Carter took home three dalmatian pups – one for each triplet – and it feels really nice to know that they're in good hands.”
“Well, we can't take home three,” Adam stated, casing the cages himself, “but we wouldn't mind helping out, if we can.”
Jenny nodded gratefully. “That would be perfect! I'll be over there, with Sari, if anything catches your eye.” She waved cheerily and left them to their observations, while Adam pulled Michael along by the hand he still held deeper into the fray.
“She seems rather pleasant,” the angel said, too quietly for any of the people around them to hear, partly due to their own rowdiness.
“Yeah, she really is. She reminds me of my mom,” Adam murmured, as he stopped in front of a cage of gerbils, propped next to another with hamsters. He watched as Michael curiously inserted his finger between the bars, only for the chubby creatures to sniff it, before he squeezed the archangel's wrist to get his attention. Ever since he saw Willard, rats and their relatives sort of freaked him out, so much so that he couldn't even get through Ratatouille without shuddering at least once. Ugh, creepy crawlies.
Michael followed him, patient as always, and they slowly explored the whole yard, from the buffet to get his promised cookies to everything else, before Adam knelt purposefully in front of a handful of puppies, a few still remaining, till he was eye to eye with a chocolate colored Labrador with big, floppy ears, a bandage on one overgrown paw and a tail that wagged excitedly whenever she caught sight of a certain heavenly being.
“You want her?” Michael inquired, squinting at her analytically as her tongue lolled. “Are you certain you wouldn't prefer that fair-furred tabby?”
“No,” Adam answered with irritation, nursing his palm, now adorned with a unicorn bandage courtesy of Sari, with a frown. “That little monster may be cute, but he took a chunk outta me. He'd be a total bitch to take care of.”
“Ah, so he's a bit too much like you,” the angel theorized, bemused. “Truthfully, that's why I liked him.”
“Ha ha,” Adam deadpanned, before the corner of his mouth quirked up in a smirk. “I want this puppy because she loves you. You'll be even more adorable with a tiny sidekick shadowing you and I'll be entertained, which is what matters the most, in the end.”
Michael merely sighed, unaffected by his mocking, and lifted the top of the cage. All the puppies yipped excitably, some backing away in fear, but the little brown Lab eyed him without surprise and even jumped into his waiting arms. Adam laughed at her conduct and scratched her behind one large ear, then pulled his hand back, not wanting to get bitten again, when it became apparent she didn't extend the same trust to him.
“And he was gonna trade you up for the cat,” he grumbled at her, as they drew closer to the Holmes' table, where Ritchie currently played crossed-legged with his toy cars, his mother and sister still handling the remaining paperwork. The sky above was a deep, pinkish color that signaled night was close to falling, and the yard was now almost empty, apart from them.
“You found one!” Sari exclaimed blithely.
Ritchie glanced up at her shout and temporarily paused in making his 'vroom' noises, two small police cars in each of his upraised fists, to cheer, “You picked Sammie!”
“S-Sammie?” Adam mimed, nearly choking on the word, as the little girl handed him a handmade birth-certificate that proclaimed as much in a bright spectrum of colors.
Jenny was staring at Michael in awe. “Yes, Sammie,” she murmured. “She was actually the pet of one of our former neighbors, but when Mr. Patton left, he abandoned the poor thing in the unsold house and she had to break out or starve. I-I hadn't thought she'd be ready for a new master, but she must sense how kind a soul you have, Michael.”
Before the angel could protest and reveal he didn't have a soul, at least in the traditional sense, Adam interjected with, “He can be a jerk sometimes, but...he really is the kindest person I know.”
Michael's hazel eyes grew large in surprise, while Sammie lovingly licked his fingers, further attesting to the compliment.
“Thank you,” he said silently, not looking away from the furry crown that rested on his bicep, and Adam took in the sight affectionately.
Jenny was staring at the archangel, too, but when her daughter touched her arm and offered her a reassuring smile, she came out of her stupor and declared, “I'm...really thirsty. A little hungry, too.”
Both of her guests examined her, confused, but she only had eyes for Michael. After a moment, Ritchie said, “Mommy wants to go to the café with Mr. Michael. She likes-likes him.”
“R-Ritchie!” Jenny sputtered, her face flushing. Her hopeful eyes, however, remained riveted on the former holy general.
“Oh,” Adam whispered, biting his lip, his own eyes locked on the ground, looking anywhere but at Michael. He didn't know why he was surprised, or even why he suddenly felt like he'd throw up, and he had half a mind to tell his roommate that, since it meant he'd want to go home at once so he could start fussing. Instead, he took a deep breath a said, “You should take her, Mike. It's pretty late a-and you really shouldn't eat nothing but junk food.” Never mind that he'd done as much himself.
The archangel frowned at him. “Maybe I shouldn't,” Jenny replied. “I couldn't leave the kids alone, could I? Unless you'd babysit?” She leveled Adam with her pleading stare.
“Mom!” Sari complained, standing up and stamping her foot. “I'm almost fifteen, not that much younger than Adam! Don't call me a baby around him!”
If Adam was being attentive, he'd notice how the teenager was, for the first time, calling him by his first name, or the way she kept glancing at him furtively, as expectant as her mother, and while he might have previously found it somewhat precious, he didn't have it in him to care at the moment.
“Okay,” he said quietly, lips curving into a stiff grimace. “You two have fun. The kids and I will.”
Jenny beamed at him appreciatively and rushed into the house, perhaps to quickly fix her hair or grab a sweater.
Michael watched her go with a bemused expression, then asked, “Why won't you join us?”
“'Cause I'm babysitting,” Adam answered coolly, unaware of how Sari's face fell or how Ritchie crowed in glee. He took the puppy from Michael and directed the kids to go inside, sparing the silhouette of their home one last forlorn glance, remembering that bad feeling it had given him earlier, and ignoring the angel all the while.
“Thank you, Adam,” Jenny said, as she dashed past him while fiddling with the straps on her high-heeled sandals. “It's been such a long time since I did anything like this.”
“No problem,” he muttered, only after the door slammed behind her, before he took a seat on the couch and listened as Ritchie began to prattle about the funny man from the shelter who'd be picking up the rest of the animals.
Said man arrived about twenty minutes later, and Ritchie began yawning soon after that, prompting Adam to coerce him into going to sleep, Sammie tailing him up to his room. His sister had run up to hers as soon as they entered the house, but since she was still giggling on her phone – and he could, if he muted the television, hear his own name mentioned more than once – he figured it was okay to let her stay up.
With the children tied up, he had nothing more to do but watch stupid talk-shows. Either that or think, which he honestly didn't want to do, since every epiphany he'd have would inevitably lead to him berating himself for being a dumbass.
At exactly midnight, the lock in the front door clicked open, keys jangling outside it, and Adam blinked blearily at Jenny's shadowed figure as she stepped into the foyer.
“Thanks again, sweetie,” she murmured, standing in front of the couch he was sprawled on. Adam scrutinized her face, trying and failing to ascertain whether her hair was mussed or her lips were bruised, sure signs of his archangel losing a bit of his innocence, but it was too dark.
After stretching his arms behind his back and yawning, Adam said, “It's cool. Um, really, it is. Did you...have a good time?”
Jenny tilted her head at him, wearing a quirky, cryptic smile, then asked, “Do you know he's in love with you?”
“W-what?” Adam exclaimed, startled out of his tired stupor. Now, he was glad for the darkness, because it hid how his embarrassed face positively glowed.
Jenny inclined her head, taking a seat next to him. “The whole time, all he talked about was you. I don't think his heart was in our date at all, if he even knew it was a date.”
“So you...” Adam began, before hesitating. “I don't know what to say, honestly. I'm – I guess I'm just really sorry for coming between you, Jen.”
“No, it's okay,” she replied, laughing lightly and touching his arm. “I only met him today, Adam. Wouldn't it be stupid of me to fall for him so quickly?” Her expression became contemplative, more amused than upset. “I'm not usually bold enough to ask someone out so quickly, especially since I saw the way he was looking at you in the backyard, but... Well, he's a beautiful man, so I took a chance.
Adam chuckled, feeling a bit less awkward. “Yeah, he's totally hot,” he agreed cautiously.
Jenny gave him the look that moms everywhere had perfected – the one that screamed 'don't you pull that B.S. with me, young man'. “So you noticed that and, judging by your look of relief, you're glad things didn't work out, am I right?” she wondered, crossing her arms in a no nonsense way.
“Oh no, of course not!” Adam replied quickly, gesticulating with his hands, but she laughed again, dismissing his panic.
“As I said, I'm not mad. I know I must seem old to you, with two growing kids, but I'm not desperate either. I'm just–” She frowned at him for a moment, then continued, “–trying to figure out why you told him to go, if neither of you wanted him to?”
Adam leaned back against her sofa cushions with an exhausted sigh. “I am the stupidest person alive. I can't explain things any better than that.”
Jenny smiled at him gently, reaching out to grasp his hand so she could give it a squeeze. “You're not stupid, sweetheart. You're young, that's all, and it can be hard on you when someone who's got everything figured out, like Michael, falls for you, but if you don't want him to move on, you have to go for it. Someone a bit more stubborn than me might come along.”
Adam nodded weakly. “W-where is he?” he asked. They both knew who he meant.
“I sent him home,” Jenny said, releasing his hand with one last pat on his knee. “You should go to him.”
“Thank you,” Adam told her truthfully. Haloed by the moonlight that seeped through the windows, she really did resemble his mom, with the same shade of blond hair and those genial blue eyes. A part of him wanted to hug this woman who was so much like Kate, the way he always would after his mother helped him come to terms with a difficult decision, but he'd only known her for a few days and that would be creepy.
Jenny nodded, fair hair tumbling past her shoulders, and watched him run out the door. “You're welcome, Adam. Goodnight.”
He kept his heart-pounding pace until he left the Holmes' house, ever ominous, in his wake, and didn't stop until he was right in front of his own door. When Michael opened it without requiring a knock, as he always did, Adam threw himself into the unsuspecting archangel's arms, his own locking behind his neck, and kissed him.
If he was anyone else, Michael might have tumbled further into the living room, but they stayed in the doorway, Adam's fingers tangling in the vessel's curly hair, arms holding him tightly against the angel's broad chest.
It was Adam who pulled away first, far enough to search Michael's face, to take in the signs he wore that he'd looked for and had thankfully not found in Jenny's, before the words he'd kept back tumbled out to shatter the silence. “I didn't want you to go.”
“You told me to,” Michael said, his swollen lips tucking down into a frown.
“I know,” Adam replied, touching his forehead to the angel's, “and I'm so, so sorry for being an idiot and complicated and, oh God, I'm a woman.”
Michael's eyes widened, almost brown in the darkness, and he seemed terribly confused again, no thanks to his human. “Neither Father nor I were aware of your switch in gender, I'm afraid,” he murmured.
Adam grinned and pecked the archangel again, before reluctantly extricating himself and pushing the archangel inside. “There's probably a better place for revelations than the doorstep. We're gonna weird the neighbors out.”
Michael watched him shut the door behind them and asked, “Is that what this it: a revelation?”
“Yeah,” Adam answered, nodding firmly. “And it's not a bad one, like when I found out Mom had died. It's a good one – an awesome one.”
“Good,” the angel said, a smile dawning on his painfully handsome face. He made to pull Adam into the cage of his arms again, ducking his head into his pale neck, and Adam allowed him to do so, holding him just as tightly.
“You know what we should do now?” he inquired, the words puffing out against Michael's shirt, acquiring a sated hum from its owner. “Sleep together.” The angel drew back, scandalized, and Adam chuckled. “No, I just meant in the same bed. It's gotta be better than watching me all night, right?” Belying the bravado he attempted, his tone was a bit insecure, as he awaited Michael's response.
It was silly, since they'd practically traded promise rings, but when Michael whispered, “I would like that,” Adam's grin became absolutely shit-eating. A few minutes later, however, Michael asked, “What happened to the dog?” the movement of his lips miming butterfly kisses against the column of Adam's throat, drawing first a shiver and then a groan from the human.
Fuck, he knew he'd forgotten something, but none of that mattered. What did was, he loved this oddball angel and they could finally have their big, epic, gay happily ever after.
-
Chapter Five: The Fine Art of Nesting
-
Adam had died, initially, at the start of his third semester. His birthday had just barely passed in September, October drawing closer with its holidays of old, when he got the call about his mother missing work for almost three days, which left him terrified and rushing home, only to be devoured by something that bore her face. It wasn't exactly the best way to end any experience.
The one positive, however, was that the classes he now had were a repeat of the ones he hadn't had the chance to finish, so he was ahead of the rest of his classmates in his coursework. Of course, he'd been ahead then, too, being what his friends had always called a nerd, and it might have been nice to finish school without all of that horror movie drama, but he'd take what he could get.
The professor of his first class, anatomy, was new to the university himself and impressed by Adam's knowledge of the body, which carried over to the already friendly class. It was a nice pick up after the way the morning had started, and while his history class was looking to be a bit dry, Adam was genuinely glad and couldn't wait to tell Michael so, especially after he'd spent all the dull periods of the day filling the pages of his new notebooks with doodles of the archangel's wings, nowhere near as beautiful as the original models.
He caught one of the shuttle buses that departed from the university campus and stopped at the small ice cream parlor a few blocks from his house, recalling his promise, where he purchased two small cones and sprinted the rest of the way home with them dripping all over his fingers under the still sweltering September sun.
When he slid to a stop in front of their welcome mat, which had a small devil's trap painted under it, Michael instantly opened the door. Grateful that he wouldn't have to knock with both his hands full, Adam handed him the vanilla cone, then immediately grasped his wrist.
“Come on,” he began bossily, although it didn't usually take much prodding for the angel to succumb to his whims.
“Where?” Michael asked, so frazzled that he hadn't had the chance to lick his ice cream yet.
Adam slowed down a bit, not wanting the sidewalk to end up painted with the archangel's favorite treat, and said, “The Holmes are having a pet adoption event. We might be able to find you a friend there.” Michael's expression immediately became stormy, but before he could protest, Adam added, “I-I've always kinda wanted a pet. Mom was allergic so we couldn't have one before.”
It wasn't a complete lie, but if Michael believed it meant a lot to him, he'd back down at once, and Adam wouldn't have to feel bad about taking advantage of him if they actually did find something he could keep company with. The archangel was always trying to make him happy, and if he could return the favor, Adam would truly be pleased.
“I suppose a pet might be nice,” Michael yielded, finally dipping his head to catch the cream that trickled to meet the skin between his thumb and fingers.
Adam followed the motion, swallowing the cold lump of chocolate on his tongue, then looked away, fixing a smirk onto his soiled lips. “'Sides,” he began facetiously, “Jenny can really bake. You can at least get a cookie or two to go with that ice cream.” Predictably, his favorite warrior of the Lord perked up, and Adam laughed as they closed in on the Holmes' residence, number one hundred and nine.
Right in front of it, he stopped, finishing off the last of his cone. With balloons tied to the bannisters around the stairs and a colorful sign that read 'go around back, adopt a pet', it should have been a cheerful place. Its inhabitants were always sweet, whenever Adam met them during his morning runs or if they stopped by to drop something off at his place, but it always gave him the heebie-jeebies.
“Bad things happened here,” Michael said, in all but a whisper, and Adam's eyes flashed to his face, the air around them becoming tense. “But that was almost twenty eight years ago, not now. That spirit has since been put to rest.”
“Y-you sure?” Adam asked. He loved it here, in this idyllic little town, but the kind neighbors and cookie-cutter houses could never dispel the memories – the nightmares – of the world that coexisted with this one, that he never wanted to be a part of again, if at all possible.
The angel wasn't given more than a chance to nod before a small figure barreled toward them. He forwent talking to step protectively in front of Adam, but the human only shot him an amused look before bending to catch Ritchie Holmes around the waist.
“Hiya, Mr. Milligan!” the little boy started breathlessly. “Why are you guys standin' out here for? Who's he? Will you take home a pet? I want a doggie, but Sari's stupid cat, Chester, doesn't like sharing us.”
Adam laughed at his incessant array of inquiries, then said, “This is Michael. He's my...friend.”
“Your best friend?” Ritchie pressed, his big brown eyes latching curiously onto the discomfited archangel. At Adam's hesitant nod, his tiny face broke out into a huge grin. “I have a best friend, too. His name's Stevie and we met in kindergarten!” He couldn't quite pronounce the word properly yet and it was very cute, earning him an even bigger smile as Adam took his small hand, his free one reaching for Michael's, and tugged the two of them into Ritchie's yard.
Jenny was on the ground, picking up a crumbled crispy rice treat while chastising a gaggle of children even younger than her son, telling them not to feed the pets with people-food.
Adam cleared his throat and she whipped around. “Oh, hello,” she said, looking between them and her bouncing son, who ran forward and hugged her legs. She pet his hair lovingly, but didn't remove her prying gaze from Michael.
“That's Mr. Milligan's best friend,” Ritchie informed her. “His name's Mr. Michael.”
“I-it's really nice to meet you,” Jenny murmured, blinking at them from behind coy lashes.
Michael cocked his head at her in his customary alien way, until Adam elbowed him, at which point he said, “The pleasure is mine. And I prefer my name without honorifics.”
“Just Michael, then,” she returned, her pretty face glowing, before she stepped out of the way to give her guests a thorough range of her yard. Her daughter was chatting animatedly with a few of her girlfriends at a table near the porch, and other pieces of fold-out furniture occupied the yard, with cages of animals sitting on top of them. Across from Sari's station was a final one, nearly pressed up against the neighboring fence, that had a few pitchers of lemonade and platters of treats on it.
Adam appraised everything and whistled. “Wow, you guys did a great job. What badge is it for: first aid to animals or is it one of the rescue badges?”
Jenny's eyes went round, then crinkled in amusement. “You really were a boyscout!” she exclaimed, as if she couldn't quite imagine him in that post.
“Yup, scout's honor,” Adam answered proudly, lifting his arm to do the signature oath. She giggled and he narrowed his eyes at her. “Hey, being a scout really is cool, and lemme tell you, I've got the legs for it.” He shook one of said jean-clad legs and winked, incurring more laughter, particularly since Michael played along and nodded sincerely alongside him.
“Okay then, you've convinced me and the kids,” Jenny said, upon catching her breath. She glanced around at the array of cacophonous creatures and her smile softened. “There are a lot of mistreated animals, both housebroken and wild, in Douglas County, so the boy and girl scouts are teaming up for events like this to raise money for shelters or find them good homes. I'm only one of the den mothers, but the only one in Lawrence, and a lot of these little guys have been adopted already. Mrs. Carter took home three dalmatian pups – one for each triplet – and it feels really nice to know that they're in good hands.”
“Well, we can't take home three,” Adam stated, casing the cages himself, “but we wouldn't mind helping out, if we can.”
Jenny nodded gratefully. “That would be perfect! I'll be over there, with Sari, if anything catches your eye.” She waved cheerily and left them to their observations, while Adam pulled Michael along by the hand he still held deeper into the fray.
“She seems rather pleasant,” the angel said, too quietly for any of the people around them to hear, partly due to their own rowdiness.
“Yeah, she really is. She reminds me of my mom,” Adam murmured, as he stopped in front of a cage of gerbils, propped next to another with hamsters. He watched as Michael curiously inserted his finger between the bars, only for the chubby creatures to sniff it, before he squeezed the archangel's wrist to get his attention. Ever since he saw Willard, rats and their relatives sort of freaked him out, so much so that he couldn't even get through Ratatouille without shuddering at least once. Ugh, creepy crawlies.
Michael followed him, patient as always, and they slowly explored the whole yard, from the buffet to get his promised cookies to everything else, before Adam knelt purposefully in front of a handful of puppies, a few still remaining, till he was eye to eye with a chocolate colored Labrador with big, floppy ears, a bandage on one overgrown paw and a tail that wagged excitedly whenever she caught sight of a certain heavenly being.
“You want her?” Michael inquired, squinting at her analytically as her tongue lolled. “Are you certain you wouldn't prefer that fair-furred tabby?”
“No,” Adam answered with irritation, nursing his palm, now adorned with a unicorn bandage courtesy of Sari, with a frown. “That little monster may be cute, but he took a chunk outta me. He'd be a total bitch to take care of.”
“Ah, so he's a bit too much like you,” the angel theorized, bemused. “Truthfully, that's why I liked him.”
“Ha ha,” Adam deadpanned, before the corner of his mouth quirked up in a smirk. “I want this puppy because she loves you. You'll be even more adorable with a tiny sidekick shadowing you and I'll be entertained, which is what matters the most, in the end.”
Michael merely sighed, unaffected by his mocking, and lifted the top of the cage. All the puppies yipped excitably, some backing away in fear, but the little brown Lab eyed him without surprise and even jumped into his waiting arms. Adam laughed at her conduct and scratched her behind one large ear, then pulled his hand back, not wanting to get bitten again, when it became apparent she didn't extend the same trust to him.
“And he was gonna trade you up for the cat,” he grumbled at her, as they drew closer to the Holmes' table, where Ritchie currently played crossed-legged with his toy cars, his mother and sister still handling the remaining paperwork. The sky above was a deep, pinkish color that signaled night was close to falling, and the yard was now almost empty, apart from them.
“You found one!” Sari exclaimed blithely.
Ritchie glanced up at her shout and temporarily paused in making his 'vroom' noises, two small police cars in each of his upraised fists, to cheer, “You picked Sammie!”
“S-Sammie?” Adam mimed, nearly choking on the word, as the little girl handed him a handmade birth-certificate that proclaimed as much in a bright spectrum of colors.
Jenny was staring at Michael in awe. “Yes, Sammie,” she murmured. “She was actually the pet of one of our former neighbors, but when Mr. Patton left, he abandoned the poor thing in the unsold house and she had to break out or starve. I-I hadn't thought she'd be ready for a new master, but she must sense how kind a soul you have, Michael.”
Before the angel could protest and reveal he didn't have a soul, at least in the traditional sense, Adam interjected with, “He can be a jerk sometimes, but...he really is the kindest person I know.”
Michael's hazel eyes grew large in surprise, while Sammie lovingly licked his fingers, further attesting to the compliment.
“Thank you,” he said silently, not looking away from the furry crown that rested on his bicep, and Adam took in the sight affectionately.
Jenny was staring at the archangel, too, but when her daughter touched her arm and offered her a reassuring smile, she came out of her stupor and declared, “I'm...really thirsty. A little hungry, too.”
Both of her guests examined her, confused, but she only had eyes for Michael. After a moment, Ritchie said, “Mommy wants to go to the café with Mr. Michael. She likes-likes him.”
“R-Ritchie!” Jenny sputtered, her face flushing. Her hopeful eyes, however, remained riveted on the former holy general.
“Oh,” Adam whispered, biting his lip, his own eyes locked on the ground, looking anywhere but at Michael. He didn't know why he was surprised, or even why he suddenly felt like he'd throw up, and he had half a mind to tell his roommate that, since it meant he'd want to go home at once so he could start fussing. Instead, he took a deep breath a said, “You should take her, Mike. It's pretty late a-and you really shouldn't eat nothing but junk food.” Never mind that he'd done as much himself.
The archangel frowned at him. “Maybe I shouldn't,” Jenny replied. “I couldn't leave the kids alone, could I? Unless you'd babysit?” She leveled Adam with her pleading stare.
“Mom!” Sari complained, standing up and stamping her foot. “I'm almost fifteen, not that much younger than Adam! Don't call me a baby around him!”
If Adam was being attentive, he'd notice how the teenager was, for the first time, calling him by his first name, or the way she kept glancing at him furtively, as expectant as her mother, and while he might have previously found it somewhat precious, he didn't have it in him to care at the moment.
“Okay,” he said quietly, lips curving into a stiff grimace. “You two have fun. The kids and I will.”
Jenny beamed at him appreciatively and rushed into the house, perhaps to quickly fix her hair or grab a sweater.
Michael watched her go with a bemused expression, then asked, “Why won't you join us?”
“'Cause I'm babysitting,” Adam answered coolly, unaware of how Sari's face fell or how Ritchie crowed in glee. He took the puppy from Michael and directed the kids to go inside, sparing the silhouette of their home one last forlorn glance, remembering that bad feeling it had given him earlier, and ignoring the angel all the while.
“Thank you, Adam,” Jenny said, as she dashed past him while fiddling with the straps on her high-heeled sandals. “It's been such a long time since I did anything like this.”
“No problem,” he muttered, only after the door slammed behind her, before he took a seat on the couch and listened as Ritchie began to prattle about the funny man from the shelter who'd be picking up the rest of the animals.
Said man arrived about twenty minutes later, and Ritchie began yawning soon after that, prompting Adam to coerce him into going to sleep, Sammie tailing him up to his room. His sister had run up to hers as soon as they entered the house, but since she was still giggling on her phone – and he could, if he muted the television, hear his own name mentioned more than once – he figured it was okay to let her stay up.
With the children tied up, he had nothing more to do but watch stupid talk-shows. Either that or think, which he honestly didn't want to do, since every epiphany he'd have would inevitably lead to him berating himself for being a dumbass.
At exactly midnight, the lock in the front door clicked open, keys jangling outside it, and Adam blinked blearily at Jenny's shadowed figure as she stepped into the foyer.
“Thanks again, sweetie,” she murmured, standing in front of the couch he was sprawled on. Adam scrutinized her face, trying and failing to ascertain whether her hair was mussed or her lips were bruised, sure signs of his archangel losing a bit of his innocence, but it was too dark.
After stretching his arms behind his back and yawning, Adam said, “It's cool. Um, really, it is. Did you...have a good time?”
Jenny tilted her head at him, wearing a quirky, cryptic smile, then asked, “Do you know he's in love with you?”
“W-what?” Adam exclaimed, startled out of his tired stupor. Now, he was glad for the darkness, because it hid how his embarrassed face positively glowed.
Jenny inclined her head, taking a seat next to him. “The whole time, all he talked about was you. I don't think his heart was in our date at all, if he even knew it was a date.”
“So you...” Adam began, before hesitating. “I don't know what to say, honestly. I'm – I guess I'm just really sorry for coming between you, Jen.”
“No, it's okay,” she replied, laughing lightly and touching his arm. “I only met him today, Adam. Wouldn't it be stupid of me to fall for him so quickly?” Her expression became contemplative, more amused than upset. “I'm not usually bold enough to ask someone out so quickly, especially since I saw the way he was looking at you in the backyard, but... Well, he's a beautiful man, so I took a chance.
Adam chuckled, feeling a bit less awkward. “Yeah, he's totally hot,” he agreed cautiously.
Jenny gave him the look that moms everywhere had perfected – the one that screamed 'don't you pull that B.S. with me, young man'. “So you noticed that and, judging by your look of relief, you're glad things didn't work out, am I right?” she wondered, crossing her arms in a no nonsense way.
“Oh no, of course not!” Adam replied quickly, gesticulating with his hands, but she laughed again, dismissing his panic.
“As I said, I'm not mad. I know I must seem old to you, with two growing kids, but I'm not desperate either. I'm just–” She frowned at him for a moment, then continued, “–trying to figure out why you told him to go, if neither of you wanted him to?”
Adam leaned back against her sofa cushions with an exhausted sigh. “I am the stupidest person alive. I can't explain things any better than that.”
Jenny smiled at him gently, reaching out to grasp his hand so she could give it a squeeze. “You're not stupid, sweetheart. You're young, that's all, and it can be hard on you when someone who's got everything figured out, like Michael, falls for you, but if you don't want him to move on, you have to go for it. Someone a bit more stubborn than me might come along.”
Adam nodded weakly. “W-where is he?” he asked. They both knew who he meant.
“I sent him home,” Jenny said, releasing his hand with one last pat on his knee. “You should go to him.”
“Thank you,” Adam told her truthfully. Haloed by the moonlight that seeped through the windows, she really did resemble his mom, with the same shade of blond hair and those genial blue eyes. A part of him wanted to hug this woman who was so much like Kate, the way he always would after his mother helped him come to terms with a difficult decision, but he'd only known her for a few days and that would be creepy.
Jenny nodded, fair hair tumbling past her shoulders, and watched him run out the door. “You're welcome, Adam. Goodnight.”
He kept his heart-pounding pace until he left the Holmes' house, ever ominous, in his wake, and didn't stop until he was right in front of his own door. When Michael opened it without requiring a knock, as he always did, Adam threw himself into the unsuspecting archangel's arms, his own locking behind his neck, and kissed him.
If he was anyone else, Michael might have tumbled further into the living room, but they stayed in the doorway, Adam's fingers tangling in the vessel's curly hair, arms holding him tightly against the angel's broad chest.
It was Adam who pulled away first, far enough to search Michael's face, to take in the signs he wore that he'd looked for and had thankfully not found in Jenny's, before the words he'd kept back tumbled out to shatter the silence. “I didn't want you to go.”
“You told me to,” Michael said, his swollen lips tucking down into a frown.
“I know,” Adam replied, touching his forehead to the angel's, “and I'm so, so sorry for being an idiot and complicated and, oh God, I'm a woman.”
Michael's eyes widened, almost brown in the darkness, and he seemed terribly confused again, no thanks to his human. “Neither Father nor I were aware of your switch in gender, I'm afraid,” he murmured.
Adam grinned and pecked the archangel again, before reluctantly extricating himself and pushing the archangel inside. “There's probably a better place for revelations than the doorstep. We're gonna weird the neighbors out.”
Michael watched him shut the door behind them and asked, “Is that what this it: a revelation?”
“Yeah,” Adam answered, nodding firmly. “And it's not a bad one, like when I found out Mom had died. It's a good one – an awesome one.”
“Good,” the angel said, a smile dawning on his painfully handsome face. He made to pull Adam into the cage of his arms again, ducking his head into his pale neck, and Adam allowed him to do so, holding him just as tightly.
“You know what we should do now?” he inquired, the words puffing out against Michael's shirt, acquiring a sated hum from its owner. “Sleep together.” The angel drew back, scandalized, and Adam chuckled. “No, I just meant in the same bed. It's gotta be better than watching me all night, right?” Belying the bravado he attempted, his tone was a bit insecure, as he awaited Michael's response.
It was silly, since they'd practically traded promise rings, but when Michael whispered, “I would like that,” Adam's grin became absolutely shit-eating. A few minutes later, however, Michael asked, “What happened to the dog?” the movement of his lips miming butterfly kisses against the column of Adam's throat, drawing first a shiver and then a groan from the human.
Fuck, he knew he'd forgotten something, but none of that mattered. What did was, he loved this oddball angel and they could finally have their big, epic, gay happily ever after.
-
For a while, they did – have their happily ever after, that is.
They spent lazy mornings with each other, Adam snoozing on Michael's chest while the angel threaded curiously tender fingers through his hair, and when the alarm rang for the human to start for school, Michael would fall back into his role as commander in an effort to train Sammie, the puppy whom Adam jokingly referred to as their child.
The only thing even close to impeding them from doing what they wanted – which was, of course, having sex all the time, although Michael demurely deemed it 'being intimate' – was nosy neighbors, most notably Vivian. Since she'd been dropping innuendos about them since they'd first met her, she felt she had the right to drop by coo and them whenever she pleased, usually accompanied a flock of her rumormonger friends.
As annoying as it was, being a small town boy, Adam was used to it. Everyone back in Windom had been busybodies, too, and just as well-meaning, butting in to see his report card or to find out about whatever new girl he'd been crushing on, so he predicted they'd become old news soon enough, and they did – ultimately, as cute or vexing as the new gay couple was, the adulterous Mrs. Tortelli was much more interesting, even if Vivian still called once a day to check up on them. And so Adam's first semester at the University of Kansas ended.
He'd done all right on his midterms, but he didn't think himself much of a test taker, which resulted in enough freakouts of a heroic proportion during study sessions that sort of shied Michael, so when the professor of his last final exam stood up and tapped his watch, indicating their time was up, Adam was relieved. It hadn't been so bad and now he could go home to make things up to his favorite holy warrior. He really wanted to evaluate whether makeup sex was as awesome as people claimed.
Of course, as soon as he reached the door, his plan was derailed by a boy in his class, Joey Brown, who tapped his shoulder from behind. He was a bit shorter than Adam, but a heavyweight in the university's wrestling team, the Jayhawks, with a curly Afro of red hair and the lightest green eyes he'd ever seen.
“Hey, Milligan, that shit sure was hard, huh?” he asked, voice low enough for the harried teacher to miss.
“Yup,” Adam agreed, trying to appear politely interested rather than in a hurry. It wasn't that there was anything wrong with Joey, who happened to be perfectly friendly, but he was a bit too much of your cliché jock type and fell short on Adam's standards of humor.
“Uh huh!” Joey nodded wildly, then glanced around the room, as if about to divulge the meaning of life. His answer, however, was drastically different from what Michael had explained to Adam not long ago. “Y'know that club on Fourth Street? Lucky Larry's? My uncle owns it and he's totally cool with a few of us guys goin' to celebrate.”
Adam smiled at Joey weakly. “I dunno, man,” he started to say, “I've kinda got plans with my roommate.”
“So invite him!” Joey begged, clasping his meaty hands together. “Please, Adam, my pop's back in Texas and he don't care about degrees, anyhow. He wanted me to take over our family deli, for fuck's sake, and all the boys have a meet in Nebraska. C'mon, I can guarantee free drinks!”
Adam bit his lip in response. He'd heard about how Joey had been benched for head-butting an opponent below the belt, but it was talk of his distant father that was the clincher.
“Okay,” he said quietly, figuring he could text Michael and ask him to join them. They'd had a few dates at the Lady, a few restaurants in town, and at the theater near their house, so something a bit more wild might be a nice change of pace.
Or it would suck and his romantic night with Michael would be ruined, but at least Adam's big goon of a friend was happy. He smirked at a whooping Joey and took out his phone, both to message his angel and snap a picture. Passing up such a golden opportunity for blackmail would only be criminal.
Joey only quit his ridiculous dancing when a passing girl shot him an unnerved look, to which he grinned sheepishly, before saying, “Let's take my Dodge.”
Adam shrugged and followed him out to the student parking lot, imparting only half an ear to his jabbering, and by the time he slipped into the passenger side of Joey's monster of a car, his phone buzzed to alert him that Michael had finally replied.
'I shall congregate with you there soon if you'd like', the message read, grammatically correct as ever, as Adam banged back a flirty reply.
'Ooh, i'd like, bb. ;)' He pocketed his phone again, leaning back against his seat and surveying the inside of Joey's truck. There was a little hula dancing bobble-head on the dashboard, packets of Cheese Doodles and half-finished water bottles on the shag-carpeted floor, and a gym bag in the back seat with some dumbbells around it. Adam's inner clean freak shuddered at the mess, but he shot his friend a smile. “Nice ride, Brown.”
“Ain't it?” Joey agreed happily, before bouncing in place and pointing some ways ahead, to a big silver building with a neon green sign that was shaped like a four leaf clover and proclaimed the name of his uncle's business. “We're almost here!”
“I can see that,” Adam smirked, as the truck slowly crept into a too small parking spot, Joey flouncing out before the motor had even fully stopped. Adam shook his head and trailed after the crazy redhead, a bouncer nodding at them from behind a pair of sunglasses, and grimaced at the music that immediately assaulted his ears, raucous and distinctly pop.
From a table near the middle of the bar, someone waved them over and Joey gestured back, informing Adam, “That's my pal, Angelo Verona. We had a film class together this semester.”
“And you couldn't have just hung out with him today?” Adam asked, before shaking the new guy's hand. He was incredibly short, but probably not enough to be labeled with some pituitary gland condition, and had slicked back brown hair with olive toned skin. His beam, however, was infectious.
Hearing him, Angelo cut in, “You know what they say, bro, three's a crowd. I love crowds.”
Adam laughed and took a seat beside him, Joey sitting opposite them. “Not my scene, honestly. Too loud.”
“Then you won't like me,” Angelo joked, butting a fist with Joey.
“Nah, y'all are both pretty cool,” the redhead said. “You'll definitely be buds in no time.” He glanced around the dark depths of his uncle's club and caught the eye of a balding brunet, likely the man himself, then stood up. “Why don't I scrounge us up some drinks? No I.D. or money required, boys.”
“Hells yeah,” Angelo replied with a grin, before propping his face on his palms and leveling his brown eyes on Adam. “We have Professor Booker’s class together, don't we?”
Adam blinked, trying to recall if he'd seen the diminutive man there, but drew a blank. “Uh, you have that mythic lit morning class?”
“Yeah, that's the one!” Angelo said, as Adam wondered how he'd missed seeing him there. It wasn't that big a classroom, after all. “I loved doing them Norse myths, man. That fellow, Loki, sure sounded hot.”
Adam quirked an eyebrow at him and chuckled. “Dude, the only description they gave of him was that he was both beautiful and evil. He goes around tying ropes to his chin and balls...I'm sorry if I'm not getting it.”
“So he's a bit kinky,” Angelo huffed, waggling his dark eyebrows. “That much the better for me, Milligan.”
He shot Adam a wink, but before he could answer, a new voice jumped in, stressed by the microphone. “We're now opening the floor to performers in the audience. The karaoke machine is greased to go.”
“Ooh, ooh, ooh!” Angelo cried, eagerly clapping his hands. When he saw Adam's arched eyebrow, he exclaimed, “I really wanna. Will you do a duet with me?”
“Dude, no,” Adam said at once, but for such a small guy, Angelo was surprisingly strong, easily pulling him to his feet and dragging him halfway to the stage in a minute's time. “W-what about Joey? He's not back with drinks yet.”
Angelo blew off his excuse with an airily waved hand, pointing to the bar, where Joey was chatting up a tall, busty girl. “He ain't comin' back yet, don't worry. By the time he figures out she's way out of his league, we'll finish at least one song and get a few laughs.”
“Fine,” Adam relented, allowing himself to be carted in front of the karaoke machine, where his new friend immediately began pushing buttons. After he saw the name of the song that was picked, he scoffed. “ABBA? Really? This isn't embarrassing enough?”
“Shut up,” Angelo replied, slapping his arm playfully. “It's just one song. Don't be a spoilsport.”
Adam sighed and watched as lyrics began to flash on the small screen, then reluctantly started to sing. Beside him, Angelo was screeching in a high pitch into his own mike, and Adam gradually found himself relaxing, amused by his friend's outrageous behavior. In a few minutes, the words on the screen faded into ellipses and the crowd applauded. Their score came up on the machine: Adam got a seven out of ten while Angelo only received a three.
The small man moped, then said, “Dude, you have a killer voice, and don't even lie, you were totally into that song.”
Adam blushed, rubbing his neck, and mumbled, “Yeah, I guess ABBA's okay. Thanks.” The band had been a favorite of his mother's, back when she was in high school, and although he was loathe to admit it, he didn't think they were half bad.
Angelo smirked, hopping off the stool he'd been sitting on and clacking their microphones back into place. “Sorta hurts that I sucked, but it's nice to be told the truth. Don't ya sometimes wish everyone would?”
Adam bit his lip, pondering over that answer, then nodded. Maybe, if John had told his brothers the truth about him, he wouldn't have died in the first place, but then he might not have Michael.
“It might be nice,” he agreed quietly, before startling when Angelo grabbed the golden coaching whistle he kept around his neck and blew into it. “What was that for?” he demanded, touching his aching ear.
“Uh, just time for me blow this Popsicle stand, that's all. I'll see ya soon, Addie-boy,” the little pest declared, and too quick for such stubby legs, he rushed out of the club. In fact, it almost seemed like he'd up and vanished, though it was more likely the growing swarm of people had simply absorbed him.
Adam stared after him, but soon grew distracted by the tall, dark figure that entered the club a few minutes later. He grinned and jumped off the stage, starting for the exit, but Joey stepped into his way, a cute girl with round glasses standing behind him.
“That was sorta weird, Milligan, you singin' like that,” he said, frowning. The expression was rather foreign on his normally cheerful face.
Adam smirked. “Tell you what, if I ever do that again, I'll sing a little Keith Urban. That's more to your tastes, isn't it?”
“I liked it,” the girl giggled, twirling a pigtail. “Let's dance,” she ordered Joey, some of her sweetness melting away.
“You cool with that?” he inquired Adam, as his girlfriend dragged him off. “Not that I wouldn't go with her, anyway,” he added.
“Oh yeah, fine,” Adam replied, jutting his chin at Michael, who was now leaning against an unoccupied wall, waiting for him with his eyes roving mistrustfully over the other patrons of the club. “In any case, my roommate, Michael, is here. If it's all right with you and–” The girl chirped her name, with was Nelly, and he continued, “–Nelly, we'll be getting out of your way.”
“Okay,” Joey agreed, before obediently moving onto the dance-floor.
Adam let out a relieved sigh and crossed the distance separating him and Michael. “Hey there, stranger,” he greeted, passing his eyes appreciatively over the artfully disheveled archangel, who wore a white shirt with the top two buttons unraveled and neat slacks.
“Hello,” Michael said, his cheek dimpling as his smile tilted crookedly, a sure sign that he was happy to see Adam, who caught him by the collar with both hands and pulled him down for a hungry kiss, more teeth than tongue. When they pulled away, although the archangel wasn't breathing heavily, he did seem a bit dazed. “Hello,” he repeated, forgetting already that he'd mentioned that.
Adam laughed and pushed open the door, welcoming the fresh breeze that assaulted his hot face with closed eyes, then jerked on Michael's collar, drawing the angel out with him and into a secluded alleyway, where he maneuvered him against a wall and caught his mouth again.
The kiss was more intimate this time, his tongue pressing against the angel's gently, luring it back with his, and when he drew back, with another peck on Michael's stubbly jaw, Adam murmured, “Missed you, fly-boy. What took you so long?”
“It's been six hours, forty minutes and twenty-two – no, twenty-one, twenty, nineteen... – seconds since I last saw you. I do not understand why your professors couldn't schedule their tests for their usual classroom hours,” Michael grumbled, lowering his forehead till his vessel's curly black hair mixed in with Adam's shaggy blond, short locks billowing together as the human chuckled. In answer to the question, he said, “I needed to walk the puppy. She was quite restless, and I briefly considered stepping forward in time to quicken the process, but it still would have required forty-five minutes of my time and would have expended more grace.”
“Would have meant less time for me, though,” Adam pointed out, pouting his already swollen lips, but he wasn't actually upset. In a moment, the exaggerated expression was replaced by a devious smirk, as he inserted a knee between Michael's spread legs, putting pressure on the 'v' between his thighs. “Don't worry, Mike. I'm willing to let you make it up to me, for a price.”
“And what would that price be?” the angel prompted huskily, eyelashes fluttering shut when he felt Adam's fingers skimming beneath his shirt, smoothing over the lightly defined abs on his stomach and moving tantalizingly lower.
“We'll think of something at home,” Adam whispered into his ear, inspiring a weak shiver, before possessive fingers dug into the human's hips and the two men were transported out of sight, landing in a tangle on their own bed.
Inside the club, an ominous Marilyn Manson song began to play, carried on the wind of their flight: Angel with the scabbed wings...
-
The next morning, Adam woke up to the sound of his phone vibrating on the bedside table. He scowled sleepily at the annoying device and poked Michael's heavy arm, which kept him pinned onto the bed.
“Shall I hand it to you?” the warrior of the Lord asked, already reaching to do so.
Adam grew distracted by the way the morning sunlight made the flexing muscles on his arm gleam with sweat, then muttered, “It better not be Vivian. Why she wakes up at the butt-crack of dawn, I have no frickin' idea,” but his intuition said it wasn't the old hotel hostess, since she didn't usually text, anyway.
The message in question was from Joey. U have my science txt. Com give it back @ my dorm 2day, plz. Soon.
Adam turned his head and groaned into his pillow. “Why, Joey? Why not in a few hours, you jerk?” he whined.
Michael stroked a soothing hand down his bare back, stilling at his nape, and said, “You're vexed. I can make you feel better.”
“Oh yeah?” Adam asked, cracking open an eye. When he saw the mischievous glow lightening the angel's face, he made to turn, but strong hands stopped him, securing him to the mattress. He put up a struggle, halfhearted at best, then huffed, “What have you got planned?” after realizing resistance was futile.
Michael bent down and ordered, “Just stay still,” before moving his palms down in a sensual, massaging motion over Adam's back, stopping at the bonding mark, his hands locking perfectly into the tiny wing-shaped scars there.
“Oh,” Adam gasped, heat flowing from the angel and seeping into his skin, which began to tingle pleasantly.
He arched up into the touch and Michael met him halfway, bending down so that his breath puffed warm against Adam's ear. “Do you know how much I love seeing you wear my mark?”
“A l-lot?” Adam cautioned blithely, and Michael bit his earlobe in reproach. It was more playful than painful, really, but he got the underlying message: snark was not to be employed in bed. “Sorry,” he mumbled, choking the word out through gritted teeth as another wave of lust rolled through him.
Michael kissed the area just behind his ear in acceptance, trailing even more chaste nips down the bumpy ridge of Adam's spine, till he reached the mark, still cradled by his palms. He paused for a moment, tracing his fingertips over the circumference of the raised circle almost reverentially, dipping into every sigil that was forever branded into Adam, before he dropped a final kiss on the untarnished skin inside it and felt the shiver that coursed through his human's frame.
“My mark on you,” he began, very close to actually purring, “and yours on me. On my wings. Beautiful.”
Adam moaned again, twisting his fingers in his sheets in order to restrain them. “C-can I see them? Please, Michael?” he pleaded, trying not to sound desperate even as he started picturing them behind his closed eyelids.
Feathers that went on infinitely, such a deep sanguine that they were almost black, except for the very shortest, closest to Michael's body, and the elongated tips, which were a burnished gold. They weren't Michael's true wings, but manifestations of them, since it would be a no-no if some snooping neighbor was accidentally blinded after seeing them through the window, but the archangel had displayed them proudly after he and Adam had first consummated their bond.
The gilded feathers, he'd informed his attentive charge, a hint of pride sweetening his voice, were not there before our bond. Adam understood the implications behind that – that something of him would be seared eternally on Michael – and that made him love them that much more, although the radiant originals obviously had their own charm, making their appearance nightly in his dreams.
Michael hummed in reply to his inquiry, purposefully taking his sweet time to answer, then smirked. With his back bared to him, Adam couldn't see the expression, but he just knew, the stupidly cocky bastard. “Very well. You'll need something to hold onto, I suppose.”
And before Adam could comprehend what was happening, coercive hands swept down to his waist, burying into the jutting bones of his hips, and lifted his rear up into the air, the blankets slipping to tangle around his ankles as the beat of giant wings filled the air. Thousands of feathers, prettier than he could have ever imagined, burst into his vision, nestling about him, as the archangel pressed bodily up against his body, his cock sliding snugly into the crack of Adam's ass.
Afterward, Michael stilled, pitching his head to hear Adam's heavy breaths, and the human growled while grounding back into him. “Move!” he demanded.
The former general chuckled at his impatience and acquiesced. “Whatever you wish,” he said, adding, “Nevertheless, you're still loose from last night.”
Adam keened, fisting the fingers of both hands into whatever he could reach of Michael's wings, as he'd been advised to, while the angel drove into him at a frantic pace.
“Harder,” he cried, the rocking of the bed mimicking a prop out of a bad porno, “and for your Dad's sake, you dick, touch me!”
“So eager,” mused Michael, decidedly mocking, and Adam might have been proud if he could think with his upper brain again. With what reproach he could manage, he ducked his head and caught a mouthful of feathers between his teeth, grinning spitefully around them when he heard a responding yelp, nowhere near as dignified as his bonded always attempted to appear.
The archangel got his revenge with a particularly rough jab of his hips, hitting a bundle of nerves that immediately jellied Adam's legs, his prostate, making it very difficult for him to hold them up, much less when he felt a warm hand grip his cock, jerking him off in time with Michael's thrusts.
Adam reached his orgasm first, his partner following him over the edge as his hands, teeth and body clenched, and then Michael rolled onto his own back, his wings, one trapped under Adam's body, unfurling all the way out just once, actually making contact with the walls on either end of their bed, before he magically tucked them back into whatever pocket dimension they belonged in.
“I am quite fond of doing that,” he said, stroking Adam's sweaty back like he would to a big cat.
Adam laughed quietly and lifted himself onto his elbows, wiggling in an attempt to get comfortable under the archangel's immovable arm. Finally, he gave up, stood, and muttered, “Well, I hope you're also fond of cleaning up the mess, 'cause I still have to bathe. I should have been gone, like, yesterday.”
“All right,” Michael replied. He watched Adam limp around the room with a troubled frown. “You don't have to do that,” he went on, when the human stooped to pick up the discarded items of clothes they'd ditched the night before. “If you'd let me, I could clean the room, our clothes and you in an instant. I could make the pain go away.” He motioned toward the dark, handprint-shaped bruises that were already blossoming on the pale skin of Adam's pelvis.
Adam regarded them himself, then shook his head, a blush assailing his face. “Nah, call me old-fashioned, but I don't mind these, and I love my Adam-time in the shower, thank you very much. Besides, now my ass can match my back.”
“You like it when I brand you,” the angel said, smug again.
Adam glowered at him, but didn't deny it. “Shut up and do your job,” he bit out, instead. “You're gonna have to drop me off, after.” Michael nodded, still smirking, and he stomped off.
-
Not half an hour later, the archangel and his human mate stood under a secluded bridge area near the main campus of the University of Kansas. The dormitory, where Joey resided, was only a few minutes' walk away.
“Thanks for the ride, Michael,” Adam said, maneuvering the big, heavy anatomy textbook that his friend had lent him from one arm to another. He stepped up into the angel's personal space and whispered, “In maybe thirty minutes, I wanna go on another one, if you know what I mean.”
His flirting flew over Michael's head, a confused furrow forming between the angel's eyebrows. “It will take you thirty minutes to return the book?” he inquired with disappointment. “I suppose I can wait.”
“Not that kind of ride,” Adam answered under his breath, rolling his eyes, before he stole a quick kiss and dashed out from under the bridge. “See you in fifteen, babe. If I'm gone any longer, know that Joey's probably sucked me into another of his dumb conversations, and then you have full permission to call with news of fake emergencies. Say my older brother's having a baby. Make it convincing.”
“Okay,” Michael replied, bobbing his head in an adorably sincere way. Adam threw a concluding flash of his teeth over his shoulder and jogged until he reached the dorms.
Being such a diversely populated campus, there were quite a few, but most had already begun to empty with the semester over. In another week, all the students in them would be gone.
Adam skidded to a stop at the entrance to Joey's, but it was locked. He was tempted to text him so he didn't have to wait for much longer, but when he peered through the glass, he noticed an athletic-looking blond girl carrying her bag out, and called her over with a quick succession of knocks.
“What?” she asked, opening the door for him suspiciously.
He offered her his most winning smile and replied, “Thanks for letting me in. I've gotta meet a friend.”
She was silent for a minute, and he almost considered stepping around her, but then she said, “I think you're really hot. If you blow off your friend, I'll blow you. I'm a slut.” She batted her eyelashes and he gaped.
“U-uh, no thanks. Not that you aren't, um, hot or anything, but I'm sorta taken,” he finally stuttered, taking initiative and dodging her to reach the elevator. “Gotta go, Joey's waiting.”
Before the door closed behind him, he thought he heard call, “I have a boob job!” after him, but then the lift dinged and took him two floors up, to his great relief.
Joey's door was the second to the left in the lobby. After three knocks, the redhead opened it, looking weary, and said, “Hey. I'm not that happy to see you.”
“Feeling's mutual,” Adam returned easily, assuming he was kidding, as he returned the textbook to him and glanced around the tiny room. There were two small beds in it, one completely stripped of its adornments, the other unmade, with a small wardrobe between them. “Nice place, dude.”
“I don't want you in it,” Joey answered, with a more caustic bite to his tone.
Surprised, Adam wheeled around and stared at him, taking in how his face had darkened to a garish red that clashed with his hair and bloodshot eyes. “What's the matter? Are you okay? Is it – it's not your father is it?”
“That ain't why. I never would have wanted you, had I known,” Joey said, moving closer to him, his grip white-knuckled and shaking around the book. Adam unconsciously took a step back, unsure why he was suddenly feeling nervous, and his friend went on with, “I would never have sat next to you in class or been your friend – I never would have trusted you with my fucking dad.”
“W-what are you talking about?” Adam asked, fighting to keep his voice steady. “Whatever it is, Joey, we can work things out. Just tell me what's wrong.”
Rather than explaining, Joey sneered. It was a cruel expression, baring slightly crooked teeth to the world like fangs, and Adam knew enough about demons to expect his eyes to flare black, but that didn't happen. Instead, his friend's beefy arm rose, almost in slow motion, and the textbook, the way too heavy textbook that Adam had complained about since he got it, made impact with his face.
In his head, even as his own vision pitched dangerously black, Adam started doing calculations. A three pound textbook thrown from this distance at that speed...how much damage could it do? The fact that his nose felt broken indicated a lot, thank you very much.
It didn't exactly knock him out. In fact, it wasn't even enough to drop him, after everything, but a tackle from a two hundred and eighty pound amateur wrestler was, especially when said wrestler decided choking him would be a great side dish.
Both young men tumbled to the floor, the book cracking open to a random page beside them, as Adam wildly thrashed under Joey's staggering weight, making it impossible for him to inhale air through his abused trachea.
“Why?” he tried to ask, not completely sure if he was questioning Joey or the universe at large. After all, as bizarre as it was for the former to asphyxiate him to death, the latter was apparently paying heed to the idiom third time's the charm.
Joey got the gist, anyway, or maybe he was following in the footsteps of villains everywhere and merely wanted to do a dramatic monologue.
“I can't believe you're gay,” he growled, squeezing even tighter. “You didn't even try to hide it, you sick, disgusting fag.”
The world was starting to shift colors now, the black at the edges of Adam's vision bleeding darker, even as quirky little shapes floated around, and he would have laughed if he could – at them, at the confession, at everything. However, he didn't even have the energy to scratch Joey anymore, much less that, with how sleepy he was getting.
“I'll only close my eyes for a second,” he told himself mentally. “A second, before I wake up deal with this. Just a second.”
The next thing he knew, there was a whoosh of sound, Joey screamed, the pressure on his chest was gone, and careful arms were cradling him.
“Adam,” a familiar voice, not Joey's, began to speak nonsensically, saying things like, “Your brother's reproducing,” and, “Shh, you'll be okay.”
Adam forced his eyes open and managed a smile for his favorite archangel. Michael remembered his stupid rambling about evacuation excuses – of course he did – and that made him happy, even now. He sighed and melted against the angel's chest, the air around them buzzing as Michael flew them home.
-
Adam woke up to a wet sensation, sliding over his chin and lips repeatedly, with the distinct smell of kibble assaulting his nostrils.
He cracked open a bleary eye and pushed Sammie's snout away with a muttered, “The only two people allowed to do that are Michael and Megan Fox.” An ache, however, ran through his throat as soon as the words were out, inspiring a coughing fit that startled the tiny pooch off his chest and onto the floor, where she regarded him with wide, chocolate-brown eyes, almost worried. “I-I'm okay,” he told her, wiping residual tears from his eyes while pounding a fist against his chest, from which a similar pain resounded.
It wasn't that bad, even if it caught him by surprise, because it felt more like he was coming out of a bad cold than how he should have felt: like a corpse on an autopsy table, ready to be dissected.
Adam swallowed, his throat still uncomfortably parched, and held out his arms for the puppy, who immediately leaped into them, laving his cheek again while he scratched her soft head. She wasn't usually so affectionate with him, not like she was with Michael, but he squeezed her tighter now because of that, grateful that she didn't hate him too much to offer comfort. He needed this – needed more, actually.
“Where's your other pet, anyway?” he mumbled into her floppy ear, using his free arm to prop them both up, though the motion left him winded, his head spinning. The bedroom was empty of all signs of Michael, as neat as they'd left it that morning, and the bedside clock told him only a few hours had passed.
It hadn't even been a fucking day since someone had tried to kill him – again. Sucking in a deep breath that nearly expanded his lungs to their limit, he cried, “Michael!”
Before the second syllable was out, the archangel was there, a glass of water in his hand that he immediately proffered to the bedridden human.
“Are you well?” he asked, voice lulling with concern.
Adam considered him over the brim of his glass. It was a tall, plastic object that he recognized from their kitchen cabinet, the unbreakable kind that you might give to a child. Despite that, he knew Michael hadn't been home. There was a leaf tangled in the curl of his dark hair, a smudge of something shimmering and unidentifiable on his cheek, and Adam really wanted to know where he'd been traipsing off to this time.
Instead of demanding that flat out, he sunk further back into the headboard of the bed and released a squirming Sammie, opening his arms for the angel instead.
“Come here,” he murmured, his voice shaking without his permission.
Michael's eyes swept to the door, almost too fast to catch, and there was that pain again, less of a physical thing this time, pinching his chest, that alleviated only when he saw the set of the Michael's shoulders soften as he delved into his side.
Now that he was there, the angel seemed to forget his ulterior motive and melted against Adam, his nose burrowing into fair blond hair, his arms alternatively cherishing and restricting around his mate as Adam's had been with Sammie not long ago, and his lips soon replaced his nose in Adam's hair.
“I almost lost you,” he breathed. “I never want that to happen again.”
Adam hugged him back, with as much strength as he could possibly muster, then said, “Unfortunately for you, you're practically hitched to a Kennedy. I predict a lot more excitement in our future.” He could sense the frown that depressed into his hair.
“The anticipation will kill me,” Michael replied, more weary than sardonic.
Adam's own smile wavered a bit, before he forcefully hardened his voice and inquired, “What happened with Joey? You didn't hurt him, did you?”
“Why?” Michael asked, tone sharp and incredulous, as he pulled some ways back. “Would you truly be bothered if I did?”
“Yes,” Adam answered at once, but even to his own ears the word lacked conviction. After a moment, more quietly now, he added, “He was my...friend. Of all the times someone tried – and usually succeeded – to gank me before, they weren't really people. Joey was.”
“He still is,” Michael revealed softly, embracing him even closer, as if to mesh themselves into one being again, “but sometimes, humans are as bad as any of us creatures. Some are worse.”
Adam accepted that, but couldn't help tacking on, “And some creatures don't deserve to be called 'creatures' at all. They're too good for that.”
Michael turned his head away shyly, a modest, pleased smile forming on his lips. “I didn't hurt him,” he finally revealed. “I sent him away.”
Adam sighed, wanting very much to leave it at that. “You didn't zap him somewhere bad, did you?” he pushed, anyway. “He's not gonna bite it from hypothermia in the North Pole?”
“The South is colder,” came the wry reply. When Adam glared, Michael continued, “I wiped his memory clean – tweaked his outlook a bit – and sent him home. Texas is rather picturesque, even if I'm not fond of him.”
“Thanks,” Adam murmured gratefully. “I-I don't like him that much either – I don't know if I did that much in the first place – but someone getting hurt because of me is not something I can deal with, even if they deserve it.”
“He deserved much worse than what happened to him,” Michael began slowly, “but it wasn't entirely his fault. Your friend was...influenced.”
Eyes wide, Adam inquired, “I-influenced? Was he high? Possessed?”
“I sensed residual magic regulating his behavior,” Michael said. At Adam's blank look, he explicated, “You see, when supernatural powers are employed, something of the user is left behind. The only exception is with human witches. What remains, in their case, is the essence of the demon they gleaned their powers from.”
“So witches made him wig out?” Adam asked, frowning. “Man, after all of the other bubbles reality has burst, couldn't they, at least, have been like the witches in Harry Potter? Sure, Hermione might have been an annoying know-it-all, but she didn't worship Hell spawn and Emma Watson's hot.”
“No. The magical residue left behind, although a miniscule amount, was far more potent than your average witch or demon,” Michael answered balefully. “It felt vaguely familiar and yet I cannot rest until I reach a definitive conclusion.”
“You're going hunt it,” Adam said. When Michael didn't deny this, he declared, “Then I'm coming along,” with a defiant tilt of his chin.
Scowling was more his signature than Michael's, but right now the archangel mimicked him, his mouth twisting downward at the corners. “No!”
“Yes!” Adam snapped back, equally impetuous. “Wherever you're going, I'll be there with you. That, or I won't be here when you come back.”
Five minutes passed, crawling on evermore, in the running for the most awkward quintet of minutes in existence. Finally, Michael said, “I am not going after it. I'm summoning it to me. Perhaps the basement would be the best location for that.”
“Whatever you want, baby,” Adam grinned. He'd already won, so that was easy enough to agree to.
Michael sighed, long-suffering, and muttered, “I've already carved the necessary sigils into that bowl from the china set Mrs. Vivian gifted us. I presume you'll explain that to her, yes?”
As he realized the implications – involving the possible deafening of his ear, of course – all the excess air blasted out of Adam, leaving him grudgingly impressed. “Touché.”
The archangel smirked and bowed his head, then went off to find whatever other components he needed to perfect his summoning spell. Adam lay back against his pillows, staying there for but a few minutes, before forcing himself to get up.
For the first time in his life, he'd be hunting a monster. Hopefully his Winchester blood would come in handy at long last.
-
-
Chapter Six: No Such Thing AS Happily Ever After
-
In another half an hour, everything was prepared.
Michael stood vigil over the porcelain bowl he'd mentioned earlier, now overflowing with all sorts of archaic materials, with Adam at a safe distance behind him. In the ancient warrior's fist, of all things, was a pinch of thyme, the final ingredient. Considering how salt kept demons and spirits at bay, perhaps that wasn't so surprising.
“Be ready,” Michael said, waiting for Adam to nod before he unclasped his fingers, releasing the herb into the mix, the cut on his palm gleaming red in the faint light, already beginning to heal, from the blood he'd lined the scoop of the bowl with. And then they waited.
For nearly an eternity, absolutely nothing happened, and Adam suspiciously scrutinized every hideaway space his basement had, like the area behind the boiler, ready for Ashton Kutcher to skip out and tell him he'd been PUNK'D. A bad actor or some evil beast – he wasn't sure which would be worse.
Then, the concoction abruptly exploded, bright blue smoke exuding from it, along with a thick, burnt odor that made his eyes water.
He coughed and waved his hands to blow the fog back, unable to even see Michael 's profile through it, but when it cleared, there were two men in front of him: Michael and a short, familiar brunet.
“Hey, bro,” Angelo Verona greeted, sing-song and bold.
Michael stared at him disbelievingly, then breathed a single name, “Gabriel,” before rushing forward to meet him, his weapon materializing in his grip in a blaze of glory.
“Wait, Gabriel, like the archangel?” Adam tried to probe, but he was blown onto his ass by the wind of their flight before he could, and found himself grimacing dizzily up at the stone ceiling.
The angels, meanwhile, fell into a motion reminiscent of a tango, with Gabriel elegantly springing out of Michael's path every time his older brother swung his sword, using his own to block if it came too close, and Adam thought that their moves seemed practiced, even choreographed, when he finally managed to sit up.
Another thing he noticed was the tight expression of rage, of betrayal, that pinched Michael's face, while Gabriel's cheer didn't seem to diminish, at least until a horizontal slash nearly nicked his vessel's belly, at which point he exclaimed, “Hey, who called who, here? You'd think you weren't happy to see me!”
“I'm not,” Michael growled, his eyes flicking once to Adam's worried face, then returning to meet his brother's. “Why did you attack us?” he went on, the inquiry slipping out between gritted teeth. “Did you truly go so far as to blow the horn of truth?”
“I thought it might be funny and...yeah, in your boy-toy's ear. Don't worry, no one else was really affected,” Gabriel answered smoothly, but his hazel eyes were constantly shifting, gauging the basement for possible exits, and he chuckled nervously when Michael responded by halting the tip of his blade on his bobbing Adam's apple. “I'm sorry, Mikey! You were both just so lost in your la-la-land that I wanted to give you a reality check, but I swear to Dad, I didn't think he'd get hurt...or that you'd get so mad.”
“Well, I am mad,” Michael replied, the muscles in his sword-arm not loosening in the slightest. “I'm mad because, after leaving home behind, you still have the audacity to believe an oath on our Father from your tongue means anything. I'm mad that you haven't quit with your silly pagan tricks, even after dying because of them. But mostly, Gabriel, I am enraged that you've returned now to ruin my new life, after abandoning me to the old one, the lonely one, so long ago, and that you went so far as to hurt my mate!”
To his credit, Gabriel turned his head away, remorse softening his smirk briefly, but then it was back, a notch more arrogant.
“What are you gonna do, Michael? Kill me?” he mocked, bravely baring his neck so that more of it was exposed to his brother's weapon, which resulted in a sliver of blood slipping down his collar. “In the end, I guess you and Lucy ain't so different, huh? My big brothers with their big problems, taking it out on everyone else when they fuck up.”
Michael's mouth dropped open, as if he wanted to say something, but he couldn't seem to find the right words and his teeth clicked audibly as he snapped his jaw shut, holding it so tight that a tic twitched on the taut skin.
Adam saw how his shoulders were slumped and knew that, even if he won this standoff, Michael would be unhappy. Upset because of that, he scrabbled off the floor, stomped to his angel's side, and pointed. “You're wrong!”
Gabriel leveled his gaze onto the human and sneered, “Am I?”
“Yes, because you are the low life dick who stalked us here, who even joined my fucking school to spy on me, but Michael doesn't want to kill you, asshole! You are bringing that on yourself, so don't go blaming anyone, especially Michael, and FYI, maybe I don't know much about the supernatural, but any two hunters with a single braincell between them would have known what you were as soon as you introduced yourself! Even I know Angelo means angel, Mr. I'm so damn clever!” The outburst left him winded, but between heavy pants for air, he kept glaring down at the small angel.
The longer he'd ranted, the further Gabriel had shrunk in on himself, and now the archangel's face was barely visible, shadowed by the few locks that managed to slip out of whatever hair product he used to keep his head resembling a shiny helmet. Appearing so downtrodden, Adam almost felt bad for yelling at the little guy, but then a soft snuffing sound filled the room, soon replaced by full on guffaws.
Eventually, to the human and older angel's relief, Gabriel wiped away the last of his mirthful tears, using his free hand to push Michael's sword away and reduce his weapon to nothingness. “Oh, Mikey, this one's a real hot tamale! You have been doing well for yourself! Never knew you had it in you, stud,” he teased, winking with a newly dried eye.
Michael frowned, face flushed and forehead crinkled, but allowed him this, lowering his arm till the point of his blade scratched the ground. “I am confused,” he admitted.
Shooting their shared enemy a black look, Adam muttered, “You and me both,” before exclaiming, “You better start talking now or we're having crispy fried angel wings for dinner!”
“Okay, okay,” Gabriel appeased, his palms raised in a we come in peace gesture. “It's kind of a long story, but here goes: in the beginning, Dad created the heavens and earth...”
“Gabriel!” Michael chastised warningly, his knuckles whitening around the pommel of his sword.
The younger archangel deflated, then continued, this time in a more subdued tone, “All right, here's what really happened...”
-
It all started with God, as per usual.
He had commanded that Lucifer be struck down and Michael had obeyed him, but it was difficult, even for an archangel, to take all the love you had for your older brother, the one whose beauty had always awed you, the one that had taught you your tricks, and tuck it away, as if it had never existed in the first place.
Michael had always been detached, if loving, and with Lucifer gone, he and God both drew further and further into their own worlds. Raphael, meanwhile, only grew angrier in the wake of Lucifer's betrayal, his grace blackening to something static and dangerous, unrecognizable, rather than the panacea it had previously been.
In that situation, Gabriel was lost. He tried to stick around for a while, holding out hope that his older brothers would notice how he needed them and how they needed him in return, but they didn't. Thus, he went along with the first solution that occurred to him: running away from his dysfunctional family. God had set the same precedence, after all.
He faked his death and hid on Earth – in what would become modern day Kalamazoo, where Elvis would someday pull a similar stunt – and the Heavenly Host chorused its cries of mourning for centuries afterward.
That was a wake up call, at least for Michael. Gabriel watched, hidden, as his older brother left the seclusion of the Garden to tear through the world and find him. One time, by which point Gabriel had already assimilated into the frost giant Loki, Michael even came close.
But he didn't reveal himself and even Heaven's Sword had a breaking point, so Michael conceded defeat, his grace singing with such depression that Gabriel almost exposed himself. Almost.
And so time carried on, leaving Gabriel to comfort himself with pranks on deserving humans or supernatural creatures, until two boys came along to first break, then save the world.
They convinced him to, for once, stand up for what he wanted, against one of the only four beings in the universe whom he both adored and was terrified of, and Gabriel died to give them an out – to give humanity the out that he knew it deserved.
He died and there was nothing, leastwise for a time, but then he was revived. He woke up on a dirty hotel floor, no longer powered by his brethren demigods to look spiffy, and he couldn't even begin to fathom why.
Why would God save him, the runaway, the coward? What purpose could there possibly be? What was his mission, now that he was back? And why, oh, why was he so gosh-darned hungry?
It was the latter that bugged him most, until he realized that his grace had been recharged enough for him to zap in a candy bar or a hundred, and then the penultimate suddenly became his priority. If he had brought Gabriel back, surely there was a reason, and he had to find out what that reason was.
After so long, he wasn't foolish enough to assume he could simply pop into Heaven and ask someone there for Intel. Who knew what would be awaiting him? Raphael had quite the chip on his shoulder, Gabriel recalled.
He wasn't without his sources, however, and stretching his feelers out around the globe, while still laying low, was nothing he hadn't done before, so he found out about how his oldest brothers and their meatsuits had taken a swan dive. A year hence, it was one of his trickster friends – Anansi, who was a nosy little arachnid, mostly because he was the collector of stories – who told him a very interesting tale: about a former general of Heaven who had escaped Hell and fallen halo over pinions in love with a little human boy.
Now, don't get him wrong, Gabriel loved happily ever afters as much as the next archangel-turned-trickster, but this one was a bit far out, even for him, which was saying something.
But a certain explosion of grace, one that had briefly rocked the entire world, corroborated Anansi's otherwise tall tale, and that was actually how Gabriel got on Michael's trail. It was hard to stay on the down low, after all, if you were going to go around killing fellow archangels.
It was true, Michael had more juice than he could ever imagine, but being incognito was ultimately his signature move, and it wasn't a biggie to find the newlyweds in question. Why he didn't just drop in and introduce himself as Adam's new brother-in-law, he wasn’t quite sure of yet.
A part of it was because of Raphael, who might have been a douche of the first degree, but a well-loved douche, at that, and the idea of Michael choosing a human, one of the fragile creatures he'd always secretly despised, over his own brother was enough to inspire something like wrath from Gabriel.
However, the boy was a Winchester, the forbidden fruit in a compact, blue-eyed, blond-haired form, and Gabriel could understand the lure of his sweet soul – could understand why he made Michael smile more often, why Michael had bonded with him in the first place, why Michael stayed. He liked seeing his eldest brother happy.
But was it enough? Was whatever his older brother felt for the snarky little brat a stronger force than whatever had driven him to start the Apocalypse? He blew the horn of truth to find out. After all, what was better than an instrument of honesty to induce it?
He only wanted to see Michael come to Adam's defense. Perhaps the weapon, used to such a feeble degree in order not to draw the archangelic warrior's attention, wouldn't affect him, but as soon as Gabriel saw him swoop to his bonded's rescue, he'd know how genuine Michael's feelings were.
The answer was very. As far as Gabriel figured, Michael wouldn't revert back to his old ways – the roundabout ways that had resulted in Gabriel's own death – any time soon. He was too whipped for that and it was oddly adorable.
And here they all were, twenty minutes later, sorely wishing they were sipping some chai lattes. Or maybe that was just him.
-
“That's my story. Do with it what you will,” Gabriel finished, extending his arms. He blinked his eyes and handcuffs appeared around his exposed wrist.
Adam frowned from the melodramatic angel to his older brother, who was staring down at the shiny helmet of brown hair with an alarmingly blank expression, then made a snap decision. “That won't be necessary. You sticking around?” Michael's neck turned toward him so fast that Adam had to wonder if angels got whiplash, especially since Gabriel was gawking, too. “What?” he mumbled defensively.
“Adam,” Michael began, as if speaking to an obtuse child, “he sounded the horn of truth. If you don't know, it's a weapon that can commence Armageddon.”
Gabriel opened his mouth to counter, but the human answered, “Hm, kinda like how a certain someone nearly kick-started the Apocalypse, huh?” Michael lowered his head, ashamed, and Adam reached out to take his hand, tone softening. “You changed, Mike. Maybe he's a dick, but he's also your brother, so what's to say he won't?”
After a moment, Michael nodded. “It is true that Gabriel was always the most malleable among us and...I have failed him, apparently.” He stopped Gabriel's protests with a halting gesture, every bit the general the younger archangel remembered. “I will give him a chance, to make up for that, but he cannot–” His eyes met Gabriel's, his lips pursing chidingly, “–you cannot harm Adam again. Understood?”
“Yessir,” came the surprisingly heartfelt reply, earning a fond smile from the oldest archangel. Gabriel became meek, under the bright beam of that gaze, and mumbled, “Can I talk now, Mom and Dad?”
“If you have to,” Adam injected dismissively, mostly to annoy him.
“Thanks, Mother,” Gabriel went on, playing along, before his sarcasm dimmed to something more somber, capping with an uncharacteristic sigh. “I didn't just come here to watch you guys go at it like rabbits, though that was a plus,” he revealed, a hint of what mischievousness he couldn't tame finding its way back in. “Dad wouldn't have offered me a second chance to be a porn critic.”
It was Adam's turn to gape, but the scandalized squawk on the tip of his tongue was overpowered by Michael squeezing his fingers. “What do you need, Gabriel?”
“Sam Winchester,” Gabriel said, without preamble, his severe mask not slipping in the slightest. “Someone has to raise him and I can't do it alone. Lucy'll only smite me again.” Adam's eyes widened and the younger archangel's moroseness finally evaporated into his trademark smirk. “What's the matter, baby Winchester? Did marital bliss help you forget your blood?”
“Gabriel,” Michael admonished, prompting his younger brother to back down at once with a muttered apology, and when his dominance was once again asserted, the archangel continued, “I will help you, but because Adam wants me to.”
The thing was, Adam wasn't sure he did.
Oh, don't get him wrong. As Michael had explained it, Adam had the lineage of Abel, the brother in Davy Jones' locker, not Cain, who'd pushed him into it.
Maybe he didn't know Sam that well, but he had no pressing urge to kill him – or, in this case, to deny him his millionth chance at revival. But...
“The two of you...you can steal Sam back from Lucifer? For sure?” he asked – demanded, more like.
“Easy,” Gabriel replied, waving his hand airily, but Michael's free hand moved to join the other one, caging Adam's fingers.
“Nothing is certain,” he murmured, “but doing nothing is worse than doing wrong.”
Adam pursed his lips, staring down at the beady little eyes of the bunny slippers Vivian had gifted him, and mumbled, “I think I heard some dinky actor say that once. Or something like it, about not making choices.”
“Actually, it's what the demigod Krishna said in the Bhagavad Gita,” Michael countered, faintly amused.
“Oh yeah, that guy,” Gabriel rejoined. “One of my exes introduced us. He kept bitching 'bout some dude named Arjuna, though, so we never hit it off.”
Adam looked up at him, the corner of his mouth quirking. Had it not been for the situation, he might have laughed, but it would sound too revealingly choked now.
Instead, he inquired, “When will you go?” looking into his archangel's golden eyes. He couldn't even fathom not seeing them for an extended period of time – perhaps even forever.
“The sooner the better,” was the hushed reply, the blow softened by a thumb stroking the tender skin between his own thumb and other digits. “With how long your brother has been in the Cage, as Lucifer's only source of amusement, we cannot risk putting off the task. Right now, even, would be viable.”
“Right now...” Adam repeated, the words practically a sigh.
“I, uh,” Gabriel cut in, pointing to a random spot behind him, “think I'll skedaddle, for now, leave you two kids to talk. Find me when you're ready to vamoose, Mikey.”
Michael nodded without looking away – neither of them did – and a moment later, they felt wind rush around them, leaving them alone.
“Okay,” Adam said, ultimately, both happy and disgusted when his voice didn't catch – the first because it would mitigate his angel's many troubles, but the second because it made him seem like he didn't care, like the ice-prince he sometimes pretended to be, but wasn't. “You go,” he continued, meeting Michael's eyes unshakably, “and you bring Sam back, but not at the cost of yourself! I mean it, Michael, if you die, I'll end you, whatever it takes!”
Heaven's Sword blinked, yet the fact that he didn't start pointing out how irrational that was meant he actually was one of the few people in the universe who got Adam, wholly.
“I wouldn't want that. You terrify me,” he joked, before bending to kiss Adam's forehead, one hand coming up to caress Adam's cheek, both his lips and his fingertips warm and consoling.
Adam screwed his eyes shut, feeling them burn uncomfortably, then whispered, “I love you,” and Michael froze.
He had reason to. In all the months they'd been together, Adam had skirted around the L-word. When Michael said it, often enough, he'd reply with a casual, “me too,” “thanks,” or, if he was mad at the time, “shut up, suck up!” And Michael, being the infinitely, annoyingly placid being that he was, had never pushed for more, probably because he could read Adam's mind and tell, anyway. Still, this was monumental.
When the archangel moved away, it was only to take Adam's mouth, this time, and after a kiss that left them both grasping desperately at each other, he murmured, “I love you, too,” against Adam's already bruised lips, which curled up into a weak smile.
“You should go,” the human said, after a moment, stepping back and running a hand down his already rumpled clothes.
“Yes,” Michael agreed, and just like that, he was gone, like he'd never been there in the first place.
Adam allowed himself to wilt, feeling more depressed than he ever had before, but an unexpected tap on his shoulder made him jump. Behind him, wiggling his fingers with unnatural sunniness, stood Gabriel.
Adam ran a hand over his face and snarled, “What do you want?”
“Cool it, princess,” Gabriel quipped, baring his teeth in a wide, Cheshire cat grin. “Just wanted to thank you for, ya know, keeping Michael from gutting me. Not fun, that, even the second time around.”
“It wasn't for you,” Adam snapped, turning away sharply from the small archangel. “I'm not dumb – I know you think I'm selfish for not trying to help Sam before, but I don't know him – it's an empty obligation. I know Michael, I love him, and I know he misses you pricks, for whatever reason, so you'd better not screw things up!”
Gabriel quirked an eyebrow at him, as if disbelieving that a measly human would actually try and threaten him.
“Dad almighty,” he eventually said, “does Michael have his hands full with you or what? Whatevs, I'm out.”
“Humph, like I care where the jackass who tried to kill me goes!” Adam replied, pressing his lips together in vexation, but Gabriel merely laughed him off.
Instead of spiriting away at once, however, the beaming angel glanced back over his shoulder, murmuring, “I'm gonna be with him the whole time, don't worry. I'll bring your Romeo home.”
Adam didn't answer and he vanished for real. Afterward, Adam sat down on the ground, putting his head between his knees, and only Sammie's incessant barking, coupled with her scratching at the basement door, provoked him to get back up about an hour later.
-
Adam didn't sleep. He had never noticed it before, but on the rare occasions when Michael wasn't there, he never did, likely because the archangel acted as a sentinel for his dreams, keeping them from shifting to nightmares.
The one positive: when Sammie began to bark yet again, impatient for the morning walk that her inhuman caretaker usually took her on, Adam was already awake and ready to be her bitch.
“Are you always this high-maintenance?” he asked the energetic puppy who, despite her size, dragged him this way and that with relative ease, stopping to sniff every mailbox, lamppost or sign in her path – and some out of her way.
She responded with another derogatory yip, as if to say, Where's the other one? You know, the scruffy-looking two-legs I actually like?
“And I'm the one who springs for your gourmet kibble,” Adam griped back, sighing when she found a nice fire-hydrant to do her business at. “You're slumming from now on. One of those no name, spoof brands will have you crawling back to me.”
She ignored him, lowering her lifted leg, before jerking him forward by the leash, to a direction leading away from their house.
“W-where are you going?” Adam exclaimed, stumbling over an errant stone and dodging a fellow jogger. The answer soon became apparent when he saw a familiar house: the Holmes'. “Really? Michael leaves and you're just willing to go back to the pound, rather than sticking around with me? Hurtful!” he told the traitorous puppy, who simply regarded him with her big brown eyes, amused by his rambling.
He nearly had a heart attack – more entertainment for her, no doubt – when Jenny, undetected up until then, inquired, “Do you always talk to her, Adam?”
“Oh, um, Jenny, I'm sorry,” Adam stuttered, running a hand through his unruly head of bed-hair sheepishly. “Didn't mean to wake you and the kids.”
“You didn't,” she replied, smiling and stepping back into her house, leaving the door open as an invitation. “They're in school. Collegians like yourself get out way earlier. I may love them, but thank God for that.”
“Not sure He had anything to do with it,” Adam muttered, only to himself, spritzing back up when she regarded him curiously. “Well, I'm sorry, anyway. With Michael gone, this little diva's being unbearable. Maybe I should send her to obedience school, eh?”
His joke fell flat when she frowned at him, beckoning for man and best friend to take a load off on her couch. “Michael's gone? What happened, dear?”
Adam felt himself blush, for blowing things way out of proportion, then explained, “He'll only be gone for a little while. He had a..family emergency that he had to attend to.”
“So that's why you look so troubled today,” she mused, inciting a noncommittal shrug of his shoulders. Girls and their sixth sense always sort of bugged him, but she genuinely seemed worried, so he couldn't resent her.
“It's just...well, it feels like we've been together, even before we were together-together, for more than a century. I miss him already and he just left yesterday!” He pouted his lips at the realization, which he'd been ignoring for the sake of his pride. He was practically Bella Swan right now and you couldn't go lower than her level of pathetic codependency.
Jenny came over and sat beside him, taking his hand and petting Sammie, who took the opportunity to hop into her lap. “That's fine, you know? My husband – my ex – wasn't the nicest man. Never hurt me or the kids, I'm happy to say, but he...let's just say he had his vices. Even knowing I was better off without him, I missed him for so long after he left. Thought I'd never move on.”
“I don't want to move on, though!” Adam replied, not noticing how she winced when his fingers compressed tighter. “I can't even think about that.”
“That's because you, Mister, are so sweetly in love that my diabetes is acting up,” she laughed, her genuine mirth taking the sting out of her words. “Besides, I'm not saying you should move on. I'm saying, sure, you'll miss him, but he'll come back to you. That sickening, sugary sentiment I mentioned seems nothing but mutual to me.”
“Thanks, Jenny,” Adam said, the corner of his mouth grooving shyly.
“You're welcome – both for the gift of my wisdom and to visit me anytime, whether you need help with this bad girl right here or anything else.” She released him and stood up, setting the 'bad girl' in question on her paws once more, then called back, “Want some pancakes? I made them from scratch, this morning.”
Adam grinned widely, recalling those Belgian waffles Michael had procured, once upon the day they left Hell. “Pancakes sound awesome!”
He left an hour later, feeling way more upbeat than he had up locking his house's door after him, but then he found out a fussing Jenny had called Vivian to update her on new developments.
Small towns. What could you do?
Answer: put up with an even greater extent of smothering, both literally and metaphorically.
-
The smothering Vivian imparted on Adam was mostly the former, because he choked on the cloying scent of her hairspray when she pulled him in for a bone-crushing hug, but just like with Jenny, he didn't actually mind. It was yet another rock in his life, Vivian's affection for him, and after so many upheavals, these rocks were much approved of.
“Aw, honey, I can't believe he's gone!” she practically wailed into his shirt, gnarled hands pounding against his back.
He indulgently petted her hair, then murmured, “Only for a bit, Viv. He's not MIA forever.” He hated the tiny part of him that acknowledged how he'd said that only to reassure himself. “He'll be back in a couple days, tops.”
“Where'd he go, anyhow?” she went on, drawing back a few inches to squint at him, having lost her spectacles in her rush to come and comfort him. “Jenny said somethin' 'bout his family. What the heck kinda family does he have: fashion moguls, the mob, international spies?”
“Religious fanatics,” Adam deadpanned, watching her droop at the too honest revelation. “It's not completely his fault, anyway. He's...doing something thoughtful for me, like always, and I want it to get done – I do – but I can't help worrying. I feel like, when he kissed me goodbye yesterday, it was the very last time.”
“Like how I was when my husband left for the war, I'd think,” Vivian mused, staring dreamily at absolutely nothing for a minute, oblivious to how fitting the comparison was, before laughing him off. “You're just not used to it, is all. When the honeymoonin' phase is over, you'll be wishin' he went away more often.”
“I don't think so,” Adam protested sullenly, though it was partly a lie. He actually could imagine Michael, with all his quirky antics, soon becoming insufferable, but he'd be affectionately so, and Adam would always welcome him back, no matter how much he shooed him out.
For his efforts, he received yet another patronizing pat and a look that read here, have my unrequested sagacity, you naïve child. “If you're that worried, take a page outta your in-laws' book and talk to the Lord. Maybe He'll listen.”
“I doubt it,” Adam muttered, backing out of her reach when she shook a fist at him, offended by his writing God off so easily.
If only she knew the reasons that merited his reaction, then she might not be so quick to judge, but her affront was playful, at best, so he didn't bother to share – also, as already established, she was old and the elderly tended to suffer heart failure if you revealed fantastical truths to them.
Before she left, however, she broached the topic again, the caveat, “Try to be more open-minded, baby boy,” and pressed a sloppy kiss to his cheek.
For a whole week, Adam excused her advice as the ranting of a loveable, but vaguely senile old woman. It was only on the seventh night since Michael's parting that he figured there might be something more to it than that. After all, Michael had already been gone for four more days than he'd calculated – hoped – so if he returned after a prayer shot to his Dad, then there wouldn't really be a loser, and if he didn't, it would be no change, anyway.
That was why Adam attired himself in his pajamas, spat the last of his minty toothpaste down the drain, gurgled to finish his cleanup process, and approached his bed cautiously, as one would a sleeping dragon, before stooping to his knees in front of it.
“I...haven't done this in a while. Not since, actually, that Christmas after my sixth birthday. In my defense, I asked you for a mountain bike and got a freaking Tonka set. What was I, five? Total disillusionment in both you and Santa, man,” he began, before bashfully clearing his throat. “That's not the point. You don't like me – that's been proved a million times over – but damn, shouldn't you love your son – your children? Even I do – or well, one of them! The point of this is, enough screwing around. You already took my mom–” If his voice broke a little, no one but him and the big guy were around to hear it, “–you took John, who might not have been the best, but was my dad. You can't deprive me of all that, keep me from my brothers, then expect me to lay down and take it when you steal Michael, too. Sure, you made us all, but that's low, so...please. Just please. Do right by me, just this once, or I'm going pagan. I've heard they, at least, have regular orgies. Thank you.”
There was no dramatic flash of thunder or the clatter of falling objects as a replying sign. There was nothing, not a fucking thing, so he whispered a, “Goodnight,” to someone that had better things to do than listen to him and went to bed.
-
The next morning, a series of frenetic knocks woke Adam up before the sun. Grumbling and rubbing his eyes, he tottered to the front door like a drunken penguin, then stopped cold when he saw the tall, dark figure that stood behind it, leaning heavily against the frame.
“M-Michael?” he gasped, surveying the disheveled hair, the torn clothes and his archangel's pained smile.
“Hello,” came the muffled reply, prior to Michael falling bodily forward, pitching Adam back a few steps, completely dead to the world.
Adam's hands, propping the heavier frame up, came away wet, he noted with horror, as he brought Michael out of the view of prying eyes. On them, shiny gold ichor, the liquid grace that leaked from holy beings, sparkled like a vat of Lady Gaga's makeup glitter. The fingers they sparkled on began to shake, the faint tremors disseminating to everything beyond them.
Yet, if he continued at that rate, Adam knew he would lose his grip on the unconscious angel, so he strove to strengthen both his resolve and his hold, sliding his palms past Michael's chest, under his noodle-like arms, till he could heft him to their bedroom.
He tried to take it painstakingly slow, to avoid causing further harm to his angel, but since the vessel weighed more than him even when comatose, Michael's legs ended up lagging along the carpet, his cumbersome frame bouncing once against the mattress when Adam finally lowered – dropped – him.
After that, however, the human sprung into action, his medical training kicking in. Put pressure on the wound! Keep Michael from spilling out all over the sheets! Keep him alive!
The last time he'd tried doing the same, it was to himself, after the pair of ghouls had left him, half-dead already, to investigate the rest of Windom with their spanking new faces, and didn't we all know how that had ended? They'd eaten his liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti – and, damn it all to Hell, now was not the fucking time for Silence of the Lamb quotes!
“Come on, come on, come on!” he cried aloud, pressing down with more force than was strictly necessary, as sweat and something else – something he wouldn't identify, not yet – pooled together to blur his vision. Michael's heartbeat remained dangerously decelerated, his breathing slow, which may or may not have been reassuring for an angel in his condition, for all Adam knew, though it would've been negatively telling for a normal person.
Eventually, the ephemeral smell of liquified gold dispersed into the air and faded, the injury that Adam discovered after unbuttoning Michael's shirt waning with it, right before his eyes, and there was nothing left for him to do anymore. He was useless.
He drank in a shuddering whiff of air, his own body aching like he had contracted his mate's pain via nothing but touch, and he laid himself down next to Michael, his arms wrapping securely around him, wanting futilely to keep him there – keep him safe – what he should have done a week ago. He should have said no.
Michael's quiet huffs of breath whistled in the air, calming as a lullaby, and Adam struggled to keep his eyes open, but he'd been sleeping fitfully, at best, for so long that it had become unfeasible to resist mow.
His lids soon drooped and, restless, he migrated to the position he found most comfortable: with his head pillowed on Michael's chest. That was why he wasn't initially disturbed when he blearily realized fingers were combing through his hair. After all, Michael was touchy-feely, always trying to ascertain the limits of society with his lack of personal space, so that ended up happening every time they slept together, anyway.
But then, in a flash, memories of blood holier than church wine assaulted Adam, forcing him to draw back in shock, which leveled his rounded blue eyes with Michael's curious, perhaps still drained, but alert hazel counterparts.
“You don't generally sleep in the afternoon,” their owner pointed out calmly, as if he hadn't been lying in his deathbed just, a glance at their wall-clock confirmed, three hours ago.
Adam didn't answer. Instead, mouth pursed angrily, he sat up and straddled the irritating archangel, grabbing the haggard lines of Michael's face to smash their lips together, their teeth gnashing together at the rushed, violent motion.
“Don't ever do that again,” Adam ordered, upon pulling away, and Michael nodded mutely, a rosy blush spreading across his face. Satisfied, Adam let himself fall back further into the befuddled angel's lap, his legs spreadeagled on either side of him, and continued, “Now, tell me what happened? Why were you...” His voice began to quiver, causing him to rephrase the inquiry, “What happened to you?”
Michael's bemused facade began to morph into sobriety, his hands coming up to settle on Adam's shoulders and steady him.
“Lucifer is one of the few beings who can contend with me. Our Father molded us, in antiquity, from the same shred of grace,” he explained, in a grave tone that complimented his expression. “Yes, it was why I had to be the one to banish him, and also why I had to salvage your brother, but neither task was easy.”
“He hurt you while you were getting Sam,” Adam surmised, sounding more clinical than was true.
“No,” Michael corrected, “he hurt me when I offered myself as bait, giving Gabriel the opportunity to get Sam.”
Adam balled his fists into the sheets, feeling them pale and tremble – with frustration, with anger, with every pent up emotion that might prove spontaneous combustion to be more than fantasy – before he gritted out, “You're an idiot,” barely remembering to maintain a polite level of noise.
“An idiot, perhaps, but one who succeeded, because of you. Our bond – my contact with your soul – put me on the path to a speedy recovery, and the thought of you gave me strength at my darkest hours.” Michael's voice was cautiously explicating rather than outright defensive, and Adam hugged him again, close enough to perceive not only that magical scent that was purely Michael, but what amounted to a healthier heartbeat, as well. The archangel responded by spreading a hand across his back, tracing tranquil circles over the cotton cloth there, his warmth channeling through it. “Sam's soul is safe now,” he whispered into Adam's ear. “Gabriel will take him home.”
Before Adam could reply – or, in this case, mumble gibberish, since that was all his relief currently left him capable of – the archangel in question interrupted, “He already has.” They startled, each straining their necks to get a glimpse of the Houdini-pulling menace, who was watching them from a safe distance away, a suave smirk on his stupidly smug face. “You two are so cute,” he went on smoothly, no doubt to add to Adam's mental alliteration, “I think I'm actually gonna hurl.” He stuck a finger down his throat and mimicked exaggerated barfing.
Adam glowered at him while Michael asked, “What are you doing here, Gabriel?” in a foreboding rumble.
Gabriel shrugged. “Wanted to say thanks, first of all. I know you didn't have to leave apple pie land to help me out, to go back to something you probably not only want to leave behind, but forget, so thank you. Both of you.”
“You're welcome,” Adam said, softening at the prospect of a genuine acknowledgment from the tiny troublemaker, then waiting for Gabriel to take his leave again.
Instead, the angel fidgeted there, scuffing a foot along the carpet, persuading a wary Michael to carefully take Adam by the hips and move him aside, so they were both face to face with his younger brother.
“What is it?” he inquired, disquieted by the antsy display.
“I...need your help again,” Gabriel muttered, the picture of reluctance, spiraling Adam into a sense of deja-vu.
“No,” he snapped, without bothering to listen any longer. “Last time you needed his help, even after you promised to take care of him, he got his ass handed to him by the fucking Devil! No damn way!”
He ignored Michael's quietly protesting, “I won,” and scowled down at Gabriel's falling face.
“I didn't exactly promise and you don't have to say yes,” the bantam ex-trickster began, “but I can swear that this time's the last. Please? Help me and your muddleheaded brothers one more time and we'll be outta your hair for good, family or not.”
He shuffled from foot to foot, watching the human and angel pair converse, unspoken, then grinned when Adam sighed in a displeased, telltale manner. “Last time,” he grumbled, concurrent with Michael's, “What is it you require?”
They both scrambled back, slightly surprised, when Gabriel made to climb in between them, like a child in his parents' bed, and after he was comfortably situated, reclining against their pillows, the younger archangel said, “It's Sam's soul. Gettin' it from the Pit was good and well, but it's been through the meat-grinder, Mikey, and I'm not sure, even with me and Cas, we can heal it.”
“You believe I might be able to?” A frown formed between Michael's eyebrows and on his mouth.
“Well, it wouldn't hurt to have Heaven's Sword,” Gabriel answered hesitantly, his gaze flicking rapidly to Adam's unimpressed face, before returning to his brother's, “but the thing is, that isn't all. If all we needed was holy juice, our resident Godfather of Heaven – Cas, in case you didn't know – could have hooked us up with some of his connections, so–”
“What you need is something from me,” Adam stated simply, crossing his arms and ignoring, for the time being, the protective glance his angel shot his way.
Rather than being blunt, Gabriel said, “You don't have to,” once more. “If you decide to duck out, no one knows about you yet. Since not even Cas knows, I could leave here now and you'd be off chalk-free...”
“And I think it's already been assumed, if not admitted aloud, that we're gonna say yes, so quit beating around the bush, you chatty twerp,” Adam replied indelicately.
Gabriel trained a meaningful glare at him, equal parts impressed and peeved, but he did as requested. “You could leave and none would be the wiser, but you two are special – you're the only human and angel pair-bond in existence. Not only that, you, princess, are Sam's brother, and Sammy-boy's stubborn soul would rather implode, after all the angel-inflicted damage done to it, than let us get close enough to fix it.”
“But,” Michael broke in, “if Adam is there and Sam's soul is more receptive to him–”
“–Then Michael can make contact, too, by proxy,” Adam concluded, although he had no clue about the finer details probably required.
“And they even finish each other's sentences,” Gabriel answered, clapping his hands in delight. “Aw, how quaint!”
Michael's perpetual frown beamed down on his slicked brown hair, preceding the rifling gesture that he made, and suddenly he was alone with Adam.
“Gabriel will return soon,” he murmured, twisting to catch Adam's attention. “Before that, I have to know, are you sure about this, Adam? It will hurt.”
Adam attempted vainly to wet his parched throat, then asked, “Will it kill me?” When Michael shook his head, albeit guardedly, he had his answer.
It came right in time for Gabriel to authenticate Michael's prediction. “Shall we?” the youngest archangel inquired, snapping his fingers and transporting them all away.
-
They reemerged in a place that was vaguely familiar: a barren wasteland with towers upon towers of scrapped cars forming a mountain around it, the sky beginning to darken overhead. Adam could almost remember seeing the sight through a small, fogged-up window, but it hadn't been quite so sinister then. It was Singer Salvage, Bobby and the Winchesters' home.
Gabriel looked around momentarily, then loped forward and considered Bobby's door, from the iron threshold to the old mutt curled up in front of it. His dark eyes were temporarily inscrutable, till he shook his head, as if spritzing off water and seemed to make a decision.
“They've relocated to the panic room,” he informed them, which Adam figured meant the one that Dean had been locked up in the last time he visited. Gabriel lifted an arm again, his fingers spread wide. “Hold onto your pants, kiddies!”
The scenery around them shivered, the shift of a hastily changed channel, and they were briefly blanketed by darkness. It cleared up into a loud shout of “Hey!” and Dean Winchester's livid face.
Adam stared at his older brother, who had been sitting on the edge of the sort of cot you might see in an asylum, but was now standing, his handsome face drawn, verdant eyes immense with shock and who knows what else, as his lips formed Adam's name. Sam would have known, of course, but he could also see Sam's large, unmoving form behind Dean on the cot, next to a hot pink Barbie lunchbox that emitted a celestial glow, so Sam was in no condition to be creepily attuned to either of them.
At Dean's exclamation, the door behind them had slammed open, revealing an armed, shotgun toting Bobby Singer, and Adam noticed that the archangels were nearer to the old hunter than him, which was all well and good, save that it left him, alone, in the heart of the panic room.
“Um, hey,” Adam greeted awkwardly, wiggling his fingers in Dean's direction. The minute motion seemed to propel his awestruck half-brother into action, and Adam doubled back when he saw the knife that Dean had managed to grab, glinting under the weak light of the rotating fan above and whatever was in the lunchbox, that Adam had an inkling about, anyway.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Gabriel didn't step in between them, impeding Michael from doing so with an outstretched arm, but his yelling did force Dean to pause and face him. “That's really Adam, dummy. You poke him now, you'll have an angry diva on your hands, and I ain't sticking around if that happens. Learned my lesson, for sure.”
Dean pursed his lips, rounding his scowl on a wary Michael, then gritted out, “You brought him, too?” He didn't have to inquire after the older archangel's identity.
Adam bristled, but Gabriel said, “Go on, ask Cas,” before he could jump to Micahel's defense.
“I will,” Dean replied, raising his pinched face up to the Heavens. He shut his eyes briefly, mouthing two syllables under his breath, and his trench-coat wearing buddy was immediately there, canting his head at Dean's back.
“Hello, Dean,” he murmured, his icy gaze drifting from person to angel to person, “Gabriel, Bobby, Adam, Michael.” Lastly, it halted on the cot, then returned to Dean, reading him with ease. “You seem unhappy.”
“Unhappy?” Dean mimed, moving further into the careworn angel's personal space, which wasn't much at all since Castiel had left but a few inches between them, to begin with. “Oh, that's observant, Cas! Why would I be happy, with one little brother soulless and dying, the other MIA until now, a few unwanted members of your dickbag family lounging around me, and..., Fuck, Cas, yes, I'm unhappy!”
Castiel lowered his unruly head of hair ashamedly, practically touching his forehead to Dean's shoulder, and Adam looked away – back to a confused Michael, a Gabriel who looked like he was watching a particularly juicy soap-opera, and to a continually weary Bobby, the only other sane person in the room, to avoid the unresolved tension. Why did this launch him into deja-vu again?
“I did not know,” the trenchcoat-wearing angel said, not bothering to specify what, precisely, he'd been in the dark about.
Dean squirmed under the attention, blushing unusually red, then whispered, “Ugh, fine, whatever. So long as you keep Thing One and Two under control, capisce? And Cas?” When Castiel glance up, he added, “I didn't mean you, before. You're not a dickbag.”
“That's nice to know,” Gabriel disrupted, “but Sammy doesn't really have time for you to sift through your domestic issues.” Dean and Castiel extricated themselves at once, alarm bleeding into the very way they held themselves, though the angel remained close. “The reason I brought Lucy and Ricky Ricardo, here, along is 'cause...well, the nature of their relationship is, let's just say, unique. In fact, it's exactly the kind of unique we need.”
“What does that mean?” Dean exploded, throwing his arms up angrily.
Adam frowned between his older brother and the oldest archangel, who was staring back at him with such troubled eyes, then blurted out, “We're married!”
“W-what?” Dean's jaw dropped.
Castiel pressed his chapped lips together and scrutinized them, before locking eyes with Gabriel, who nodded once, the gesture curt.
“You're bonded,” he said, frowning disapprovingly at them. “To do that with a human is unsure, at best.”
“But it worked.” Gabriel shook his wrist in a dismissive motion, his smirk aimed namely in Dean's direction, observing how ready the young hunter looked to throw a tantrum. “What that means, Dean, is that sweet baby bro cut himself a little slice of Heaven. His soul's completely drenched in Michael's grace, and before you freak out, know that we–” He thumbed betwixt himself and Castiel, “–can hook up to Michael, who can siphon our grace and his into our beloved Sasquatch through his lover boy. It's a foolproof plan!”
Some of the hot air started to leak out of Dean. Adam smiled wanly, unnoticeable, because he knew why, this time around. Sam's well-being would matter most, always, more than any pissing contest with either archangels in the room – or anyone.
“That's cute, but I'm all for it,” he said, when he noticed Dean's gaze roving to him, some of that residual worry brimming over. Adam was his little brother, too, after all. “Shortstop told me it might hurt, but I can't let Sam wander around soulless to avoid a little pain. That's low.”
“You don't have to,” Dean mumbled, though the relief he wore openly was palpable.
“I know,” Adam replied gently, “but I want to. Really.”
“Glad we got that outta the way!” Gabriel interjected, as inappropriately cheerful as ever. Adam was beginning to reach the conclusion that he took sadistic pleasure out of cutting people off. “Baby Winchester, don't worry 'bout a thing! This will be just like donating a kidney, but your hubby dearest will be handling the surgery and it'll scar you deeper than a knife ever could!” He focused on Dean before Adam could answer that it was against medical protocol, at least, for loved ones to preside over any dangerous procedures. “And you, my pretty old friend, can't be here at all!”
Dean opened his mouth to protest, then vanished, along with his confounded father figure, when Gabriel snapped his fingers. After a moment of utter, uneasy silence, vigorous pounding on the newly locked panic room door began, coupled with hyperbolic threats, unsurprising to everyone left inside the confined space.
After a moment, three among that generalization clustered around Adam, who shifted from foot to foot, abruptly realizing that Gabriel hadn't even waited for him to change out of his pajamas and slippers, then took the only plausible next step: he wandered over to Sam's unconscious body and the lunchbox containing his soul.
“Uh, hey,” he mumbled, to himself more than anything, before startling when his brother's soul responded by shining even brighter.
“He likes you,” Gabriel informed him, with a surprising amount of affection in his generally blasé tone. “Go on, pick him up,” he advised, flicking his wrist again. “Time to get this show on the road, once and for all!”
Adam waited until Michael nodded that it was okay, then dipped his fingers into the opening on top of the box, gasping at the warmth that instantly filtered into them.
It was the memories that assailed him first, of Dean's slowly aging face, that of his father and a woman who resembled Kate so much that it almost hurt. However, they soon faded, leaving emotions – ones that didn't belong to him, that had no place in his head or heart – in their wake.
Fear, apathy, a burst of courage that ebbed into guilt. Pain, pain, more pain, with only one comfort, stolen away to propagate an even deeper agony, lasting an eternity and a day. Finally, a hiatus, likely to lower what crumbling defenses remained, a precursor to more suffering, and the throbbing of another creature's grace. This time, the anguish was emotional, rather than mere torture. The fear had returned.
A hand on Adam's shoulder saved him from drowning in the depth of Sam's feelings. He directed unexpectedly wet eyes, his hands too busy cupping the radiant essence of his half-brother to be much help, at a worried Michael.
“He remembers me,” he murmured, recalling that never-ending century when he'd thought himself silly for talking to an unresponsive Sam, unaware that it had been the only thing to keep him going. “I-I abandoned him.”
“That's a good thing,” Gabriel condoned, gliding forward. At Adam's disbelieving glower, he said, “If he'd forgotten about you, he might not be so receptive now that he's willing to let Michael get close. He trusts you and that's what we need.”
Castiel, who had been virtually silent till then, drew up behind his archangel brothers. “If the impact of Sam's soul against his mind can shake him so, Adam may not require the resilience necessary for this task. We may accidentally tear him apart.”
“You don't want to risk that for an 'empty obligation',” Gabriel augmented pragmatically, going so far as to add air quotes.
He was emphasizing what Adam had said before, but the sole human in the room just sighed and nodded again. “I agreed already. I'm doing it, but...” His eyes flashed up to meet Michael's, “I am sorry if this hurts you in any way. I-I love you, Mike.”
“I know,” the archangel answered, his beautiful eyes sad in a way they never should be. “I know, also, that you're too stubborn to give up now, but my grace is yours, despite that. I love you, too, more than anything.”
“We'll be careful,” Gabriel added helpfully. “We won't make a widower out of Michael, will we, Cas?” Castiel frowned like he wanted to offer a reality check, but he agreed with a hum at the erstwhile trickster's pointed clearing of the throat.
“Thanks guys,” Adam replied, chuckling falsely. He sucked in a heady breath of air and turned till he was level with Sam's body, still in possession of the giant's soul. “Let's do this.”
-
The first time Adam could remember hurting was after falling out of a tree when he was four.
Twelve years later, he'd been absolutely certain that no pain could surpass that the broken leg he got when his car wrapped around a pole.
Then, of course, he'd met his friendly neighborhood ghouls, and his torture threshold had risen dramatically.
Zachariah's torment had been quite a bitch, but nothing compared to that moment when he first said yes, like a watermelon trying to squeeze into a hole fit for a needle, though Michael took measures to ensure that it was minimized.
This – taking the grace of two archangels and their decidedly impressive younger brother – made all that seem like the scratch of a wet kitten, put it all to shame.
Adam was very happy he blacked out five seconds into it. Maybe God was merciful, after all.
-
He woke up to someone humming the musical styling of Led Zeppelin, mullet rock band extraordinaire. After fighting and narrowly winning the battle to lift his eyelids, he discerned that the someone was Dean – or, at least, Dean's back, attired in a beat up, brown leather jacket that was mistily familiar and sitting in a wooden chair.
Adam grunted and made to sit up, struggling with the blankets that had been draped over him, which inspired his older brother to whip around, exposing the sight of a giant Sleeping Beauty who had yet to do more than breathe since Adam's return.
“Oh, you're awake!” Dean declared, smiling almost shyly at his bedraggled younger brother.
“No shit, Sherlock,” Adam muttered, when he finally got his mouth to work.
Dean was goggle-eyed for a minute, then continued dryly, “Well, ain't you a ray of sunshine in the morning?”
Adam ran a hand down his face, hoping to soften the stiffened muscles. “Sorry, but you try singing show-tunes after being gang-banged by every freaking kid God spewed out, including your boyfriend!”
“Not my boyfriend,” Dean replied childishly.
Adam ignored him to throw his legs over the side of the bed, grasping its stand to stop from swaying on his feet.
His big brother took the hint and rushed over, but he shook out of Dean's grip, inquiring, “How's he doing?” instead, jutting his chin in Sam's direction.
Dean bit his bottom lip, chewing on it ponderously, before disclosing, “As good as you can expect, I guess. I mean, you've been out this last day, too, and you're up, right? Gabriel says he needs time to heal and Cas says he's right, for once. No one knows for certain, though.”
“I'm sure he'll wake up,” Adam reassured him, letting go of the bed-stand to squeeze his brother's hand just the once. He didn't know how much more Dean would go for, but he did seem grateful.
For all that, they parted soon enough, and Dean cleared his throat to explain, “Your, uh, that is – Michael's waiting in the house. Everyone and their grandmother has vouched for him, I know, but I didn't want him in here with you guys. Didn't have the heart to kick him out, either, since he hasn't left you once. He's real taken with you.”
“He is,” Adam agreed, his smile etching wider. “I only hope he's remembered to ask someone to feed our dog.”
“You've got a dog?” Dean stopped himself mid-question, shaking his head. “Of course you do. You've stuck every available branch into your little holy chicken nest, haven't you? Can't wait to tell Sam.”
“You're just jealous,” Adam replied, but he was eager for that moment, as well.
-
Two days later, Sam Winchester graced the world with his conscious presence, only to find the weirdest sight waiting for him: both of his brothers, three friendly angels, and a fondly exasperated Bobby.
He gathered all the energy he could muster and asked, “What did I miss?”
Adam caught a glimpse of Michael's out of peripheral and clutched his mate's hand, figuring he'd let Dean take the first shot. His motivation wasn't completely beneficent. To explain everything that had happened – his falling for Michael, Dean's apple pie life, Castiel in Heaven and even, maybe, an angel who wanted to be a permanent fixture in Sam's life – seemed slightly complicated.
“It's...a long story,” Dean eventually replied, love for his brother dripping in spades from him, as Castiel offered moral support, within the hunter's reach.
Adam grinned from the pair to a bemusedly blinking Sam. That was one way to put it.
Elsewhere, a certain prophet smiled. All that was missing now was a rainbow.
-
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End
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