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it’s half one in the morning. gabriel stares intently at his work, even as the lines start to blur from exhaustion.
“c’mon, gabe,” jack whines, arms draped over gabriel’s shoulders. “you can do this tomorrow. there’s time before the party.”
gabriel sighs. “i’m nearly done.”
“you’ve been saying that for nearly two hours,” jack protests. he tightens his grip, and gabriel struggles to keep the fabric he’s sewing even. “bed time. please.”
“i can just… mist into bed, you know.” gabriel keeps a careful eye on the needle, nervous. “that’s something i can do now.”
“i don’t think sneaking into bed is the intended use of this,” and jack waves a hand, loosening his hold, “whatever it is. what if it wears off or something and you get stuck like that?”
gabriel’s nervousness spikes up. if it wears off.
“i mean i’d still love you even if you were a sentient cloud,” jack continues, oblivious. “but i think sex would be weird-”
“fuck off,” gabriel groans. he slaps at jack’s arms. “i’m not having this conversation. you’re weird and i hate you.”
“you loooove me,” jack sings, directly into his ear.
“why is that even the first thing you think about! what the fuck. not ‘how do i keep my darling husband from blowing away in the wind’.” gabriel covers his face with his hands. “it’s ‘how will i fuck the cloud’.”
“it’s not like i went into the logistics of it!” jack is laughing against his back. “and it’s not like i wouldn’t- ugh, never mind. i’ll shut up about it if you come to bed already.”
“given your train of thought, that sounds like a proposition.” gabriel leans back, grinning.
“i literally have to be up at seven tomorrow.”
“yeah, but i know how quick you can be.”
jack pulls gabriel’s beanie down over his eyes and leaves, grumbling. gabriel laughs so hard he ends up slumping off his chair onto the floor.
“it wasn’t even that funny!” jack insists as gabriel, eventually, comes into the bedroom, still holding his side. “you just have the sense of humour of a twelve year old.”
“you’re one to talk, cloud-fucker,” gabriel retorts, chucking his shirt at him. jack catches it and gives him a withering glare, undermined by how his lips tremble with trying not to smile.
gabriel finishes up his nightly routine and finally gets into bed. jack immediately curls up to him, wrapping his arms around gabriel’s shoulders and giving him a little kiss on his spine. gabriel can feel him smiling in the dark.
“if you cut the blood supply off to my arm,” gabriel says, “i won’t hesitate to push you off.”
“just cloud it or whatever,” jack mumbles into his neck, half asleep already.
“you’d like that, wouldn’t you.”
jack just snorts. “love you.”
“love you too.”
–
he dreams of blowing away in the wind.
–
jack is gone when he wakes up, which is increasingly normal. life for them was never simple, but work had been a bigger burden over the past few months, and their time together was more and more centered around dinner and sleeping.
but it was nice, even then. just to relax and be human for a while, much as he could.
he ignores paperwork to finish the costumes; it takes another good hour and a half, and he begrudgingly admits to jack via text that he was right. jack texts back ‘always am ;)’ and gabriel makes a very irritated cheese sandwich.
he eventually drags himself over to the training range to go check on cassidy. he had left him in charge of the recruits for the morning in order to finish sewing (and have a lie-in), and felt the urge to make sure he hadn’t burned the place down.
“howdy!” cassidy greets him before the door even finishes opening, jogging on over with a wave. the recruits all look nervously between him and gabriel, before cassidy remembers himself. “uh, i mean, howdy… commander.”
gabriel looks at him tiredly. “report, cassidy.”
one of the very new recruits looks like they’re about to pass out at their casual interaction. gabriel always loved pretending to be a serious hard-ass to new recruits at first, usually to test how they were with authority. it also made the parties blackwatch had a lot funnier for them.
“already had to send that palmer girl up to angie,” cassidy sighs. “fightin’ over what target she gets to shoot at. real pain in the ass. rest of the kids here are doing fine, though.”
“some of these ‘kids’ have a decade on you, cole.”
cassidy coughs, adjusts his hat. “okay, okay, whatever. some of these respectable recruits,” and he puts on a very posh voice, “are doing absolutely wonderfully given the stressors of the situation.”
gabriel rolls his eyes. “right.”
gabriel watches the recruits for a while as cassidy goes into detail, occasionally inputting his own notes on his tablet to add to cassidy’s report when it comes. assuming the cowboy hadn’t forgotten to write up the physical report, of course, but he planned to leave him to remember that on his own.
cassidy shuffles closer after a while, leaning in. “did ya get the costumes finished?”
gabriel raises an eyebrow. “you think i’d be here if i hadn’t?”
“oh. right.” cassidy pauses. “i just… had an idea. your mask has eye holes, right?”
“yeah.” gabriel lowers his tablet slightly. “i gotta see, cole.”
“well i was thinkin’,” cassidy gestures to him. “you can smoke up random bits of you, yeah?”
gabriel grimaces. “it’s supposed to be for combat only.”
“aw, like you haven’t used it for convenience. i know you! but that’s not the point.” cassidy grins. “say you go in normally. everyone’s impressed by your craftsmanship, yeah, of course. but they’re used to it now. they all know you too well.”
gabriel frowns.
“i’m not bein’ insulting,” cassidy adds hurriedly. “but it’s true.”
gabriel’s frown deepens.
“alright, alright! i’m just sayin’… the people there all know your weird cloud status.” gabriel pinches the bridge of his nose, trying to forget his conversation with jack the previous night. cassidy doesn’t seem to notice. “and i think you could pass it off as clever effects if anythin’ got leaked. so just imagine bein’ dressed as sexy grim reaper-”
“it’s not sexy grim reaper, for fuck’s sake,” gabriel mumbles. “it’s tasteful and mature gothic halloween fashion.”
“the point IS if you start having smoke melt out your eyes-”
“wait, is it the boots? are heeled boots too much? christ, i’m not sure i can find flat boots in time-”
cassidy elbows him. “the boots are fine, pops, i’m joking. now the smoke. think about it?”
gabriel stops thinking about how he’s going to obtain thigh high flat boots before the evening. “right. smoke. i dunno how long i can do that for, though.”
“you ain’t gotta do it for a long time,” cassidy says, leaning back against the wall. “just occasionally when someone looks at you. and during the pictures.”
gabriel thinks about his dream. thinks about the deep-seated fear he’s had of himself since undergoing moira’s treatment and being able to dissolve.
thinks about the potential look on jack’s face.
“you got a deal.” he flicks off cassidy’s hat with a grin. “good idea, kid.”
–
the look on jack’s face - a mixture of fright and awe - is definitely worth it.
gabriel wins the informal costume contest, again, and donates half the winnings (a bottle of absurdly pink and sparkly gin) to cassidy as thanks. reinhardt nearly passes out from fear. the rest of the party is simply good fun, and he feels a little more comfortable that the people around him don’t think him some kind of monster. outside of costume, anyway.
later, in bed, jack tipsily tells him he thinks smoky grim reaper in high heels is actually pretty hot. gabriel refuses to speak to him for a record two minutes, pillow over his face, while jack nearly cries laughing to himself.
“i’m not indulging your new cloud fetish,” gabriel says eventually, and jack wheezes into the quilt. “the rest of it i’d be happy to get to wear more often. they’ve been in my closet for years.”
“wait.” jack sits up. “in your closet? you didn’t just make that stuff?”
gabriel lifts the pillow off his face slightly. “nah, cole asked me to make his and genji’s costumes. mine was just a well planned combination of clothes i actually own. i don’t wear ‘em much cause i don’t want the press to be weird about it.”
“oh my god,” jack groans, flopping back into the bed. “oh my god. you kept me up late like three days in a row making a ridiculous two-piece dragon cowboy costume for those two?”
“i take my work seriously, jack.”
“you skipped like four important meetings over the past month.”
“saving the world is just a hobby,” gabriel grins.
jack slaps the pillow back onto gabriel’s face. “you’re terrible. awful. evil. i hate you.”
“love you too, honey.”