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If Adam’s being polite, he’d describe Michael as a little odd. His appearance is slightly off-putting—maybe it’s because of the late hour, but all of his features feel completely unplaceable, a vague collage of face parts meshed together to create something that tangentially resembles a man. It’s impossible to keep an image of his face in your head once he’s left, but when you see him he’s instantly recognizable. Michael has a perpetual crease between his eyebrows and a severe set to his jaw. He’s a severe man, Adam thinks.
If Adam’s not being polite, he’d describe Michael as batshit insane.
The ways in which Michael is—to put it bluntly, completely off his fucking rocker—are subtle and too numerous to count. For one, whenever he comes in, he always orders one black coffee and an omelet. This would be a perfectly mundane order, were not the fact that he always comes in between eleven-thirty in the evening and two in the morning.
The first time they met, Michael didn’t say a word to him for the first half of the night. It was a Thursday. The diner was mostly empty save for a lovestruck teenaged couple sitting at the bar, chattering away and kicking at each other’s feet over a plate of fries. Adam was listlessly wiping down an already clean counter. He found you quickly ran out of things to do when working the late shift.
The man was an intriguing figure in a long, dark, wool overcoat that was somehow both nondescript and uniquely distinct. Adam jumped when he walked through the door, startled out of his boredom-induced trance by the chimes in the otherwise quiet night. Adam remembers noting the way the man held himself; confident, powerful. But his eyes were vacant like he wasn’t all there. He didn’t even spare a glance at Adam as he took a menu and gracefully stalked off towards a booth in the back corner.
When Adam came out from behind the counter to take his order, he seemed no more present than he was when he first came in. It took Adam clearing his throat for the man to even realize he was there.
“Hi, sir, what can I get you tonight?” Adam said, pen to notepad. He was rather proud of his customer service voice.
The patron looked up at him, scrutinizing. “Adam. Like Genesis? The first man?”
Adam was bewildered for a moment before he realized he had his nametag pinned to his apron. His confusion had little chance to dissipate as he processed the rest of what the man said. What was this, weird Catholic flirting?
“Um,” he said, “Yeah, I guess.”
The man made some sort of unidentifiable noise, a slight (amused?) exhale from his nose accompanied by a wry smile that barely lasted half a second. He folded the menu and handed it to Adam. “Black coffee and a German omelet. Please.” Tacked on like an afterthought. Oh well, better than nothing, Adam supposed.
“It’ll be just a few minutes,” Adam replied with his most mundane smile.
One of the teenagers at the bar laughed, a high-pitched, over-exhausted squeal.
The customer turned back to face the window. That was that.
He was back the next day, around the same time (an oddity for Michael, Adam will find. After this, he only ever comes in sporadically, never two days in a row). He wore the same coat, same shoes, same expression, but today his eyes were a little livelier. He sat at the bar while Adam washed dishes.
That day there was no teenaged couple. The diner was short-staffed in the night, never needing too many employees with the lack of customers that came in. Tonight it was just him and his buddy, Kevin. Talia—his other coworker—was either super late or a no-show. Adam was betting on the latter.
Kevin moved to talk to the man but Adam waved him off. “I got it, don’t worry,” he said, drying his hands. He could tell the kid was anxious about it by the way Kevin smiled at him gratefully as he assumed Adam’s old position by the sink.
“Hey,” Adam said. “Need a little more time, or can I get you something?”
The man put down the menu. “Just a black coffee and a German omelet. Please.”
Adam paused. The order tipped off something in his brain, making him recognize this guy from the previous night. “Alright. It’ll just be a minute.”
Even with only one man taking orders and one working in the kitchen, it didn’t take a team of rocket scientists to fry up some eggs and brew some coffee in five minutes. The only time the man looked at him directly was when Adam set down his plate and poured him a mugful.
The man thanked him briefly, picking up his knife and cutting up his meal into bite-sized portions. Adam watched him.
Not in, like, a creepy way, all right? He was leaning against the counter on the other side of the bar, a little ways away, slacking on his dish-drying duties. He was just curious. What’s up with this dude?
Adam weighed his chances of offending the stranger in his head before he decided he was far too bored to give a shit.
“So, what’s the story?” Adam asked, coming a little closer. The man raised his eyebrows, pausing in his cutting motions. Adam elaborated. “Why the midnight breakfast?”
“I’m partial to egg dishes,” the man replied, flatly. As if to demonstrate, he skewered a piece with his fork and ate it, seemingly done with the conversation.
Adam wasn’t just going to give up like that. “At twelve in the morning?”
“I don’t see how that changes anything.”
Adam laughed. The man was not laughing. Adam stopped. Not much of a jokester, he guessed. “What’s your name, anyway?”
The man just looked unimpressed, like he was considering whether or not to deign revealing anything about himself to a common man like Adam. “Michael,” he said, finally. “My name is Michael.”
Adam humorously wondered whether or not Michael remembered their interaction last night. “Named after the angel?” he asked drily.
Michael smiled, as unsettling as the rest of him. “Sometimes I rather think the angel was named after me.”
Adam would like to consider himself a fairly normal, average, dude. Some might say working the eleven-to-three night shift at a 24-hour diner was a little strange, but with his classes during the day it just works out easier. He’s always been more of a night owl, anyway. He’s infinitely different from Michael, he thinks, who comes in weekly and always pays in cash but only ever has dimes as pocket change. Still, he finds himself drawn to the man.
Not much has changed since the first night they met, except now Michael sits at the bar. Sometimes he even talks to Adam, if he’s feeling generous. Adam takes the little bits of information he offers and hoards them like gold. It’s not weird, okay? You don’t just meet a guy like Michael and settle for knowing absolutely nothing about him.
Tonight, Michael looks tired. He looks tired every night.
“Thank you, Adam,” Michael says as Adam sets down his plate. He always says “thank you,” but somehow he never makes it seem polite. Adam is grateful for it anyway.
“How’s your night been going?” Adam asks. It’s part of their newly-acquired routine. This is the part where Michael clinically responds with something like “It’s going well, and you?”
Instead, today Michael pauses. “I’m doing alright,” he says, “and you?”
Uh oh.
“Uh oh,” Adam says, aloud.
“What?”
He pulls out the stool Kevin keeps behind the bar so he can look like he’s working while actually playing Pokémon Sun on his DS and takes a seat, crossing his forearms on the countertop. “What’s wrong?”
Michael blinks at him. “I said I was alright—“
“Exactly,” Adam interrupts. “You never say that. What’s up?”
Michael spares a moment to look distantly baffled before he snorts, shaking his head. “You are truly absurd,” he says. Adam finds this ironic, as he is not the one with the mysterious face, and the coat, and the breakfast, and the dimes, but he keeps this observation to himself.
“I was right,” he says instead, smug. Michael rolls his eyes. Adam didn’t think the man was capable of emoting to that extent.
“I got into a fight with my brother earlier. I suppose it just left me in a bit of a sour mood.”
Michael’s knife produces a quiet scraping noise against the ceramic as he makes his ritual cuts. Adam rests his head on top of his palm, elbow against the shiny, smooth countertop.
“Oh,” he says. He considers adding something sympathetic, but something tells him that Michael wouldn’t appreciate a “well, that sucks" or a “sorry, man.” He settles on, “I kinda get it. I mean, I don’t have any siblings, but I’ve got a couple of half-brothers who’re nothing but pests. They’re so condescending—as if they somehow know me better because, what, they’re older?” Adam scoffs.
Michael, believe it or not, smiles at that, a rueful tinge at the corners. “That’s exactly what my brother says about me.”
“Oh.” Adam winces. “Sorry. I’m sure you’re not like that.”
“Oh no, I usually am. I’m just always right.”
Adam glances up at him, not sure if he’s joking or not. Michael’s face is completely impassive as he takes a drawn-out sip from his mug.
“I’m sure you’re a much more tolerable little brother than Lucifer, though,” Michael hums, barreling onwards. “Turned eighteen and thinks he owns the world. Thinks he owns the house, at least.”
“Sorry, what?”
“Oh, yes, really, I know,” Michael nods. “The audacity of it, as well. Ever since he was young. No respect for authority, no respect for tradition, institution, he has this incurable superiority complex, too—”
“Lucifer?” Adam repeats.
“What?” Michael blinks at him over the ring of his mug. “Oh! Oh. Yes. My mother was a bit eccentric, to say the least, and my father was very willing to do whatever pleased her. You wouldn’t believe the looks we got at Sunday church, growing up.”
Adam yelps out a bark of incredulous laughter. Then another. Suddenly, he just can’t seem to stop, doubled over in hysteria. Lucifer , holy shit—Oh, god, he can’t even say holy shit, unholy shit —and Kevin is shooting him a weird look from his side of the bar but Adam just can’t stop.
“Sorry,” he begins to say, trying to compose himself, but he pauses when he notices an odd, low rumble. It takes him a minute to realize that Michael is laughing too, a barely-there chuckle indicated by only the faint noise and a delicate rise and fall of his shoulders. The sight sends Adam into fits all over again.
Once they’ve both composed themselves, they take a moment. Adam stares at him with a dopey grin, and Michael returns with faintly amused eyes.
“You must seriously not like the kid, huh?” Adam asks in a semi-non sequitur.
“Oh no,” Michael replies, not looking away, “I would kill for him, without hesitation. It doesn’t mean sometimes I wouldn’t like to kill him as well.”
Adam knows for a fact that Michael is one-hundred percent serious, and he doesn’t know if it’s because of that or despite that that his smile doesn’t fade. He thinks Michael might be rubbing some of the crazy off on him.
If Adam is a relatively normal guy—or, was, before Michael—Kevin is so obsessed with normalcy that it circles back and becomes weird again. He doesn’t like engaging in any situation he deems unfamiliar or strange (which are most situations, in his eyes).
Kevin has a rigorously-followed, jam-packed schedule that involves very little sleep and a lot of caffeine. He hates energy drinks but consumes about twice his body weight in Red Bull every shift. He’s always either doing homework or complaining about how he should be doing homework while playing video games.
“I don’t really do well with stress,” Kevin told Adam once. He was taking a break from practicing cello without a cello, which evidently involved staring at sheet music until he had every note ingrained into his memory.
“You don’t really do well with stress?” Adam prompted.
“No,” Kevin agreed, “No. But most of my life seems to be stressful anyway.” And then he went back to tapping out rhythms with his fingernails against the countertop.
Adam thinks Kevin maybe needs to go to therapy.
Regardless of his imminent mental breakdown, Kevin is a good friend and a good coworker. Even though he’s also relatively sure Michael is going to kill him.
“He’s kind of...” Kevin says one day after Michael has left. Adam and Michael had just spent the last forty minutes discussing deep-sea creatures and the possible existence of unknown eldritch horrors lurking far below the level we can observe.
“Mm?” Adam prompts. Kevin mulls it over for a second.
“Psychotic?” Kevin offers.
Adam frowns. “Well. He is a little odd,” he says, because he’s feeling polite.
“He’s scary.”
“He’s—” Adam preemptively retracts what he was going to say, because Michael isn’t nice , per se. “He’s not that scary. He even smiles, sometimes.”
Kevin squints at him skeptically. “Whenever he smiles, I feel like he’s gonna chew my face off.”
“I don’t think you two have even exchanged a word,” Adam protests, not exactly disagreeing. “He’s not gonna chew your face off.”
Kevin pulls a face and looks away towards his paper, taking a sip of his Red Bull.
They are forced to exchange their first words that coming Friday. Michael comes in a little earlier than usual, towards the beginning of Adam’s shift.
“Yeah, no, mom, I’m working right now,” Adam says into his phone. “No, I’m okay, I got to work fine, you don’t need to worry about me. Mhmm.”
Kevin pokes his head in through the half-open door to the storage room. “Psst. Your freaky boyfriend’s here.”
“Hey, yeah, gimme a sec,” Adam says to the phone. He pulls it away from his face, glaring at Kevin. “I’m on the phone,” he hisses, “go deal with him. Sorry, mom, I’m back. No, I haven’t spoken to John recently.”
Kevin gives him a pleading look which Adam pointedly ignores. “You are a terrible coworker and friend,” Kevin pouts, disappearing back behind the door. He pops back in again. “Tell Ms. Milligan I said hi.”
Adam only emerges from the room after he’s able to convince his mom that yes, he’ll be fine, and she can go to sleep, love you too. He squints as his eyes adjust to the brighter lights of the main room. The diner’s not full, but there are a couple of people—a group of hyper kids in the corner booth, a woman looking over a menu at the table closest to the door, Michael and Kevin making uncomfortable eye contact over the bar.
“Uh,” Kevin is saying, “Anything else?”
Michael looks at him, the corner of his mouth turning down. He pauses before he says, “No, thank you,” as if he was planning to say something else.
Kevin looks about ready to bolt, so Adam decides to step in. “Hey, Michael,” he greets, easy. Kevin jumps slightly in surprise.
“Adam,” Michael says. His voice is calm and even, but he sits up a little straighter, head tilted. There is a strange quality to the tone of his voice that Adam can’t quite place. “I was worried I came in on a day you weren’t working.”
Worried. Michael was worried that he wouldn’t get to see him. Adam smiles.
“Nope. Toiling away Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays, eleven to three.”
“I figured,” Michael said, “I came in last Tuesday and you weren’t here.”
It never struck Adam that Michael would come around when he wasn’t working. Maybe he didn’t. Maybe he only needed his midnight omelet and coffee fix once weekly, every Wednesday, Thursday, or Friday.
The idea that Michael might come in specifically to seek Adam is quickly too much. He glances at Kevin, who has slowly been trying to slink away while they were distracted, and pulls him in with an arm around his shoulders. “So, this is my buddy, Kevin. Kevin, Michael, Michael, Kevin,” he introduces, grateful for the opportunity to change subjects.
“I was aware. He’s wearing a nametag,” Michael says.
“What is it with you and the nametags? No one reads the nametags.”
“I read the nametags. You know, usually your waiter will tell you their name, you’re just an especially anti-social exception.”
“I’m very social! I just don’t see the need to inform strangers of my name.”
“If you don’t see the need, why are you wearing the nametag?”
“It’s part of the uniform. I can’t just not wear part of the uniform. You’re not supposed to read the nametags. It’s weird when you just call people their names.”
“What am I going to call you, if not your name? And what are they there for, if you’re not supposed to read them?”
“Posterity?” Kevin offers weakly. “Or, management likes to, uh, encourage conversation. And also makes waiters more easily identifiable when there are, uh, more of them. So you can, like. Remember who’s serving you.”
Adam honestly forgot Kevin was there. Right.
“Right,” Adam continues. “This is Kevin. He thinks you’re gonna eat his face off.”
Kevin is almost comically panicked. He raises his hands in a “please-don’t-eat-my-face-off-I’m -a-defenseless-baby” gesture. “No. No! I mean, maybe. I mean, not in a disrespectful way.”
Michael looks from Kevin back to Adam, straight-faced.
“Of course I won’t eat you,” Michael deadpans. “I’m not a fan of eating heavy meals when it’s late. Bad for digestion.”
Kevin gapes. Adam smirks. “Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”
Adam doesn’t have that many friends, he realizes, later. It’s kind of sad that most of the people he’s even remotely friend-adjacent to are from the diner. He and Kevin are pretty tight. He and Michael are… something. But they’re not strangers, and certainly not acquaintances.
Talia was never a friend so much as a chatty sometimes-presence. She barely ever showed up to her shifts, and when she did, she would always spend most of the time telling Adam some new, interesting, obscure facts about animals.
Did you know that koalas’ brains are pretty much completely smooth? Did you know dolphins have names for each other? Did you know some ducks literally sleep with one eye open?
Adam wonders, not for the first time, why he can’t attract any normal people in his life.
Anyway, Talia finally got fired this week for never showing up. Adam was a little bit sad. She was pleasant. But, that means that now it’s technically just him and Kevin for a while—until they find a new hire.
They’d been getting by just fine for a while now, but something about the finality of it makes him feel a little more alone. He doesn’t have many friends, nor many presences. A small blip in the large world.
He’s contemplating this while he spins a quarter on the countertop. Two in the morning. Wednesday night. The place is completely devoid of any patrons, which is pretty par for the course on a day like today. The quarter stops spinning with a clatter. It falls on heads.
Kevin moved to a booth to study for a chemistry exam, but Adam’s pretty sure he’s passed out. If Adam leans to the side just so to peer over the seats, he can make out Kevin’s head lolling down against the window.
Alone. Huh. He’s not used to that.
Two-fifteen. No customers. No Michael. Kevin still passed out. Not too long until his shift is over, Adam figures.
Two-thirty. A man stumbles in. He’s wearing a dark coat, and for a split second Adam perks up, thinking it’s Michael. It is not Michael. His coat is a bit too short, and the man’s facial features are far too identifiable.
“Hello, sir,” he says, softly. His voice is a bit hoarse. “Would you like a menu?”
The man sneers at him. He’s drunk, Adam realizes, he can tell by the slightly off-kilter way he walks and the slight smell of alcohol.
“I’d like,” the man says, and then pauses. He tilts his head like he’s just been struck with an idea, slowly turning his gaze to the register. “I’d like to know how much you’ve got,” he says, gesturing towards it with a tip of his head.
Adam’s not giving shit to this guy. “Sorry, sir,” he said, customer service voice coming in clutch, “I can’t tell you that. Would you like me to make change for you?”
“I said I’d like to know how much you’ve got,” the man slurs, and then he’s reaching under his too-short dark coat and then he’s pulling out a gun, and then there is a gun in Adam’s face.
Adam tries to subtly peer around the man to see if Kevin’s awake, but there’s no way he can without alerting the robber that there’s someone else in the diner. He swallows, speaking slightly louder as he levels his gaze with the man’s eyes. “I’m sorry,” he repeats. “I can’t tell you that. Seriously, if you want me to make change or something, you can just ask—doesn’t have to be this whole big deal.”
The man sneers at him. “You’re a real smartass, huh?” he asks. Fucking christ, Kevin, please wake up. “Open the register.”
Adam doesn’t want to give up and let the guy win, but he also really doesn’t want to get shot. With his mouth drawn in a tight line, he slowly turns to the register, telegraphing his movements.
“Good, so you do know how to do as you’re told,” the man says, smugly. Adam wants to punch him in the face.
But, tragically, he’s not the one with the gun. He’s the one with the money. Adam wonders how he ended up in this situation. He just wanted a job, he reflects, and this one was available and easy, and all he had to do was take orders and grill greasy food, and his coworkers were nice and his customers were weird, and all the dominoes just... fell into place. Shitty dominoes, if you ask him.
Adam hits the button to open the cash drawer, turning his head upwards to respond, but the words get caught in his throat. His eyes widen.
The man misinterprets his look, drunkenly elated. “Not such a smartass now—”
He is cut off when a second man grabs him from behind, wrenching the gun out of his hand and yanking his arm behind his back. The robber whips back, catching the hero in the face with a stray elbow, but the second man uses his body weight to slam the robber’s head against the bar and keep him pinned. The robber swears, loudly.
“Good evening, Adam,” Michael says. His expression is thunderous, jaw clenched tightly in rage. He’s bleeding from his nose. Adam swallows.
“Michael,” he says, dumbly.
“Good evening, Kevin,” Michael says, not breaking eye contact with Adam.
“Hi, Mike,” Kevin feebly replies. He’s peeking his head out above the back of the booth, phone pressed to his ear.
The robber makes a noise. Michael presses him harder into the bar. “Could you please call the proper authorities, if it’s not too much trouble?”
“Already on it.” Adam, in some background part of his mind, is surprised Kevin hasn’t passed out yet. Mostly, he’s just staring. He’s about two steps behind in this conversation.
“Michael,” Adam repeats.
“Adam,” Michael replies. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?” He leans over to inspect him, but Adam shoos him away.
“Am I—“ Adam sputters belatedly. His jaw drops open. “Jesus Christ! You’re bleeding! Am I okay—are you okay? Let me get you, Jesus, a towel or something, holy fuck.”
The police arrive and take the man into custody. Adam gets Michael a towel and an ice pack. His nose isn’t broken, at least. He’s just gonna have a seriously nasty bruise for a while.
They’re sitting next to one another, on the same side of the bar for the first time. Michael finally has his omelet and his coffee, though both go untouched. Kevin is slumped tiredly in his Pokémon chair opposite to them.
“My mom’s gonna kill me when she finds out I almost died,” Kevin gripes.
Michael adjusts the bag of frozen vegetables he’s been keeping against his face. “Don’t be absurd, you didn’t almost die,” Michael says. “He didn’t even know you were there.”
“I could have died! Before I got my Harvard acceptance letter, no less!”
Adam ignores them. “Are you sure you’re okay, Michael?” He presses. “God, you didn’t have to do that.”
They’re hunched so close together that their knees are pressed together, but not touching anywhere else. Their ankles crossed over ankles. Michael is not noticeably tall or short, nor slim or fat, but he has long legs, Adam notes. Long legs. A discernible feature.
“I did,” Michael insists. He’s practically growling. “I did. I’m fine. He threatened you, Adam.”
“You could’ve been shot coming at a guy with a gun like that, idiot.”
Michael scoffs. “He didn’t even have the gun cocked. I doubt it was loaded. It was easy enough to disarm, he couldn’t have done any real harm.”
“If you’re so sure that he was harmless, why does it matter so much that he waved the thing in my face?”
He frowns. “It’s about the principle of it. Disgusting that he thought it was within his right to—to even think he could speak to you like that. Treat you like that.”
Adam raised his eyebrows. A short but thick silence develops between them. How does he interpret that? How does he interpret Michael’s fingers curling around the ice pack like he wants to curl them around Adam’s wrists and yank him closer? Close enough that he’d be able to shield him, protect him from anything, that Adam would be able to press his face against his collarbone and make a home there?
Hell. Adam’s projecting.
“Where’d you learn to do that, anyway? I didn’t even hear you come in, and I was facing the door,” Kevin interrupts. Adam’s glad for the reprieve from his thoughts.
Michael shrugs. “I’m just a quiet person, I suppose. I took a lot of self-defense classes when I was young.”
That feels like more than a few self-defense classes’ worth of power in Adam’s opinion, but he doesn’t say anything.
Michael sets the ice pack down on the table. When he picks up the mug of coffee, he does it with two hands in an oddly childlike gesture. Adam smiles at him.
Talia’s replacement comes in that Friday. Adam likes her a lot, mostly because Kevin is scared of her, and Adam apparently has a history of liking people who Kevin is scared of.
Her name is Claire. She’s younger than both of them, he thinks, but he can’t tell how old she is. She wears leather jackets when she’s not wearing her work apron and somehow manages to look badass instead of like a child in her father’s clothes. Adam likes the way she doesn’t really smile, just impassively half-glares at everything.
Kevin is showing her the ropes while maintaining a healthy distance. Claire takes a step towards him to check out the coffee machine. Kevin takes a step away. It’s like some weird half-dance, and Adam watches because he thinks it’s fucking hilarious to see Kevin scrambling around some teenage girl who’s, like, at least half a head shorter than him.
Claire shoots him a weird look. Adam gets the feeling she doesn’t like them very much.
Michael, on the other hand, Claire absolutely loves. He comes in later in the evening, nose still purpled from Wednesday’s bruising.
He comes in Thursday, too, a significant diversion from their usual pattern. Adam’s pretty sure he’s just coming in to check on them. Michael’s somehow gotten this idea in his head that if he’s not there at all times, someone will come in to rob them again.
“Hey, Michael,” Adam says. Kevin’s already getting the eggs. “How’s your night been going?”
Michael smiles, unbuttoning the top few buttons of his overcoat and taking his seat. “It’s going well, thank you. And you?”
Adam shrugs. “Just peachy,” he hums, drumming his hands against the countertop. “How are the brothers?”
This is a new addition to their routine in Michael’s recent visits. Adam’s learned about Michael’s three younger brothers all living in the same house, his huge extended family, about his life in general. Michael’s learned about Adam’s mom, his annoying half-brothers, his “dad,” his dreams of becoming a doctor. It’s nice not being strangers anymore.
Michael’s smile tightens. “No more of a nuisance than usual,” he says, but Adam knows his heart’s not in it.
“Hi, Mike,” Kevin calls from the stove. Michael waves at him awkwardly, unused to being greeted.
“I think he’s less afraid of you after you saved our asses from getting robbed by that guy with the gun,” Adam says, conspiratorially.
“You guys got robbed?”
Adam looks over to Claire. She’s leaned against the bar, expression incredulous as she raises her eyebrows at Adam.
Michael snorts. “No. It was an insultingly poor attempt.”
“We almost got robbed. Michael defended my honor with his expert karate skills.”
“It’s not karate. Mixed martial arts,” Michael says. “It’s different. And he wasn’t much of a threat, to be honest, just a moron with a gun.”
“You single-handedly took down a guy with a gun,” Claire repeats, not a question.
Michael answers anyway. “No,” he says, “no, I used both my hands.”
Claire snorts, thinking Michael is joking (big mistake to ever assume Michael is joking, Adam has learned), and then furrowing her eyebrows once she realizes he’s not. Kevin comes by with Michael’s plate and mugs, which he accepts graciously.
The rest of the night proceeds in a pretty standard fashion, except tonight Claire is with them, grilling Michael on the hot topic of the evening: Michael’s apparent acrobatic, mixed martial arts, and Krav Maga skills from his teenage years. He presents all of this information as if it is entirely standard for a human being to master the fine art of disarming armed hostiles at the age of sixteen.
As Michael is scraping up the yolky remnants of his omelet, Adam gets a phone call.
“Now, actually,” Michael is saying in his usual insane-yet-deadpan fashion, “hand-to-hand combat training is a viable method of bringing one closer to the Heavenly Father or to spirituality in general; see, it’s all about—”
Thin strains of Britney Spears coming from Adam’s back pocket interrupt him. “Shit,” Adam says, surprised because no one ever calls him at ass o’clock in the morning. “Gimme a sec, gotta take this.”
Michael nods in acknowledgment. Claire flat-out ignores him and continues prodding Michael about the process of escaping a chokehold, which he reluctantly begins explaining. Adam slips away into the back room to pick up the phone.
“Hey, John. What’s up, is something wrong? It’s pretty late.”
“Jesus, kid, nothing’s gotta be wrong,” John says. “Just got off of work, figured you’d still be at that little gig of yours.”
Adam’s still not sure what John does for a living, and he honestly doesn’t care. He keeps odd hours too.
“How’re you holding up?” John continues.
Right. Mom probably told him about the whole debacle a couple of nights ago.
Adam sighs. “Yeah, ‘m fine, wasn’t a huge deal,” he half-lies. “You didn’t need to call to check in on me, seriously.”
“Good, good, I’m glad to hear it, son. But that’s not the only reason I’m calling,” John says. Adam frowns. John never calls. “I also wanted to know… what do you want for your birthday? Coming up soon, I was thinking you could come over for dinner with me and the boys.”
Oh, God, Adam’s birthday is in a couple of weeks. He almost forgot himself. “Oh, yeah, no, I don’t want anything,” he says awkwardly. Adam very vehemently doesn’t want to be a man who owes something to John Winchester. “I was planning on just staying home with mom, but I’m sure we could, uh, figure something out.”
John laughs. “It’s your birthday, kid, not like you’re doing me a favor.”
He kind of is doing John a favor, by letting him pretend he’s a good father instead of a stranger who calls every once-in-a-while and takes him out on special occasions. He thinks they both know, but neither mention it.
“Yeah,” he says instead, “but we’ll figure something out.”
They chat for a few more minutes—just about idle things, the weather, mom, Sam and Dean—before Adam eventually excuses himself to go back to work. He steps back out into the diner and tries to shake off the tension in his shoulders that always collects when he talks to John.
Kevin has gone back to his calculus homework in one of the side booths. Claire is counting coins on the counter while Michael buttons up his coat, turning away. He lights up when he sees Adam.
“Leaving without saying goodbye?” Adam grins.
Michael shrugs. “You were taking a while,” he replies, coming back to set his hands on the countertop. Adam’s hands rest on the other side, inches away.
“Goodnight, Michael. See you next week.”
“Goodnight, Adam.”
He watches Michael turn and leave, a tragically familiar sight. The door swings shut behind him. Adam wonders where he’s going home to. What is his house like? Living with four brothers… Are his parents there too? When he gets home, does he hang his keys up or put them in a dish? Does he leave them in his coat pocket because he wears the same coat every day? What does his room look like? What sorts of things does Michael keep on his desk?
Claire taps him on the shoulder. “Your freaky boyfriend paid me in dimes?” she says. Adam’s not sure what she’s asking but knows it’s definitely a question.
“He does that because he’s a psychopath,” Kevin pipes up without looking up from his textbook.
“Well,” Adam says, “usually it’s not just dimes. He has a few bills... Mostly two-dollar ones, now that I think about it. It’s a bit weird.”
There's a brief pause. Claire stares blankly at him for a moment, then smiles for the first time since Adam’s met her. “Wow. He is totally batshit,” she says, a little awestruck.
Adam can relate to the feeling. “He tends to be slightly off-putting,” he agrees.
So, the long and short of it is that Claire and Michael absolutely hit it off. They’re an odd, suspiciously violent pair, and together they succeed in making Adam laugh and Kevin nearly cry. They form a little… clique, for lack of a better word. Soon enough Michael doesn’t come in and just talks to Adam, but he’s there to share gruesome stories with her and freak out Kevin, too.
Not to imply that Michael ever came in only for Adam.
Anyway.
Tonight, Michael looks tired, again. Tired-er than usual.
It’s been well over a week since the incident and the bruise on his face is gone, but he’s gained darker lines under the eyes. He’s still been coming in all three nights instead of once a week. Today, his mouth is drawn in a tight line. When he walks in, he does it with more force and precision than necessary, more of a march than a stroll.
Adam knows Michael. This is his “long day” posture, although it’s admittedly usually less severe.
Claire looks up questioningly at Adam from where she has been backseat-gaming over Kevin’s shoulder as he plays Pokémon. Adam waves her off—he’ll deal with it, doesn’t wanna risk upsetting Michael further when he’s like this.
Michael takes his usual seat. “Hey, Michael,” Adam says, softly, “How’s your night been going?”
Michael gives him a tense smile. Adam takes temporary solace in the fact that he’s at least trying. “I’m alright. Just a coffee tonight, please.”
Adam glances back to give a wide-eyed, “are-you-hearing-this” look with Kevin, who reciprocates in kind. He makes some sort of frantic complicated gesture at Kevin. Kevin glares at him and makes a different complicated gesture back. Adam repeats his first gesture more forcefully, to which Kevin rolls his eyes, longsuffering, and passes the DS off to Claire while he stands up to brew coffee. Adam turns back to Michael as if that whole exchange didn’t happen.
“Lucifer again?” He sympathizes.
Michael sighs. “Who else,” he grumbles, keeping his voice low. This conversation is just for them, Adam thinks with a bit of a twisted glee. “This was probably our biggest fight to date. Gabriel and Raphael are… unhappy to say the least.”
Adam winces. He doesn’t know much about the two youngest brothers, but he knows Michael cares about them a lot. “Sorry,” he says sincerely, unsure of how to give comfort, “that’s awful.”
Michael shrugs. “Nothing new. Just some things that’ve been brewing for some time finally bubbling up to the surface.”
After a brief moment of deliberation, Adam comes over around the other side of the bar so he can sit next to Michael. He knocks their feet together under the table. Michael smiles at him.
They spend a few minutes together like that, not talking. They listen to the comforting noise of Kevin rustling around with the coffee filters, of Claire fucking around with Kevin’s games, of the plastic tap of a small group of teens in the booth by the door clinking their fake glasses together.
Kevin gives Michael his coffee, eventually, which he accepts as thankfully as always. He doesn’t wait for it to cool off before taking a sip. Adam watches him, and Michael watches back.
He sets down the mug, looking Adam up and down with a thoughtful gaze. “Adam...“ Michael begins.
“Yeah?” Adam asks, curious. Michael thinks for a moment before continuing.
“Adam, I want to say—“ Michael gets cut off by his cell buzzing in his pocket. He holds up a finger to Adam, pulling it out and frowning at the screen. His long-day posture is back. Adam sighs inwardly. It was so close to going away, too.
“Lucifer,” he says sternly, “you are not supposed to be awake at this— what? Calm down, speak slowly.” He punches the bridge of his nose. “It wouldn’t be the first time that he snuck out, brother, I will call— for how long? You didn’t call me immediately? Why—“
Adam watches Michael’s mouth snap shut. His grip goes white-knuckled on the cell. “What do you mean, his things are gone,” he growls, flatly. “Lucifer. Keep Raphael calm, I want him out of the loop, he’s upset enough with the both of us already. I am serious, he doesn’t need to know, we can’t deal with that—no, I don’t fucking care what you think, you will do as I say for once in your life—! Don’t you even try and pin this on me, I am coming over.”
Michael hangs up the phone, pushing it deep in his pocket and shoving away from the bar. His expression is angry and panicked and his movements are so violent that Adam finds himself unconsciously leaning back. “I have to go, I— goddamn it, I have to go—“ he snarls.
Adam has never heard him blaspheme before. Claire and Kevin are looking up, speechless. Adam has no idea what he’s supposed to do.
“Hold on, Michael, hold on a sec,” he says, scrambling out of his seat and running after him, trying to come in front of him. The outside air is cold and he doesn’t have a jacket, but he doesn’t care. “Jesus, give it a minute, what’s wrong?”
“I don’t have time for you right now, Adam,” Michael hisses. He looks like he’s going to hyperventilate. Adam tries to grab onto his sleeve, but Michael shoves him away in a forceful push.
Adam stares at him, shocked into standing still. That hurt. He gives himself two seconds to recover before trying again.
“Michael, for fuck’s sake, if you try and drive in this state you are going to crash and die,” he shouts, hand firmly wrapped around Michael’s forearm. “Breathe, breathe.”
Michael looks back at him over his shoulder, wild-eyed, and for a moment Adam is convinced he’s going to punch him. But Michael meets his eyes. Takes a breath. Swallows.
“Tell me what’s happened,” Adam orders.
Michael finally turns to face him. He scrubs his hand over his face. “Gabriel,” he begins, but he has to stop mid-sentence. He breathes. His voice is even. “Gabriel has gone missing. He’s snuck out before but, but this time he’s taken his things with him, and we don’t know where he is, and Lucifer already called all his friends that we know, and I can’t— I just can’t—“
Adam pulls Michael towards him and Michael comes willingly, pressing his face against Adam’s shoulder. “He’ll be okay, Michael.”
“He’s fourteen , Adam, he can’t be out on his own at this hour of the night,” Michael babbles, “I tried, I tried so hard to be good to him, but he just hates it here and he’s always wanted to leave, and maybe he is gone for good, maybe he’ll get himself killed out there, I don’t… I don’t know.”
It all comes pouring out of him. Adam’s never heard Michael speak this much, usually a paragon of stoicism, but Michael just talks and talks and talks.
He tells Adam how hard he’s been trying to raise his brothers after his father left when he wasn’t much older than Lucifer. He tells him about how much he and Lucifer never see eye to eye about anything, but especially his father. He tells him about Raphael’s growing resentment and anger, and Gabriel’s growing resentment and fear, and he tells him about how Lucifer has been encouraging Gabriel to cut class and sneak out late and how Lucifer blames him and he blames Lucifer and how he actually blames himself anyway.
He tells him about how none of his brothers have wanted to attend church since their father left.
Adam grips him tightly around his back and listens. He doesn’t think anyone’s listened to Michael in a while. It can’t last any longer than a minute, but it feels like ages until Michael finally trails off and pulls them apart.
“I need to… I told Lucifer I would come home. I have to go find him, Adam,” Michael says solemnly, hands wrapping around Adam’s wrists.
Adam nods. “I understand. He will be okay , I promise.”
Michael doesn’t smile, but his eyes crinkle around the edges a bit. “Thank you. For everything,” he says, letting go of Adam.
Adam’s not sure what to say, but it doesn’t matter. Michael has seemingly decided they are finished. With one last look at Adam, he turns and walks to his car. Adam watches the steady rise and fall of his shoulders.
When he goes back into the diner, Kevin and Claire look at him strangely. They ask him what happened, but he waves them off. He cleans up the kitchen. He finishes up his shift. He drives home. The whole time, he can’t stop rubbing at his wrists.
Michael doesn’t come in the next day. Adam panics.
“What if they didn’t find him?” Adam says, pacing the tiled floor.
Claire is lying face-up on a booth table. “Then they’ll find him today.”
Y’know, Adam is a good, honest friend and wouldn’t tell another friend’s personal affairs to other people. Usually. But he’s just been really worried, and Claire and Kevin wouldn’t stop prodding him as to what happened, so maybe he gave them a vague breakdown of the whole situation.
“What if, they didn’t find him, or something terrible happened and Michael is freaking out and that’s why he hasn’t come in.”
“He’s not legally obligated to come visit you every day,” Claire deadpans. “Apparently you’re not even dating.”
Adam doesn’t dignify that with a response. “I don’t understand why you’re not more freaked out. I mean, I get that you’ve only met him a couple of times, but you like him. It’s pretty freaky!”
Claire rolls her eyes. She pushes herself up onto her elbows, then onto a sitting position at the table’s edge. “Look. The kid is fine. I know it seems scary, some middle schooler running off into the world on their own at three in the morning—”
“—High schooler,” Adam corrects, “and it was more like eleven—”
“But he will be fine. I ran off plenty of times when I was younger than that. Thought I was gonna get to Canada. Usually just ended up bunking at a friend’s house until their parents called my mom. Or the cops found an unattended child and brought me home. So don’t freak out. Your boyfriend and his brother are most likely safe and sound. You can shut up about it.”
Adam stops his pacing and looks at her. Claire never shares personal information with him, he thinks. It kind of puts her in a new light. She must be genuine.
“You guys do realize we have, like, customers here,” Kevin calls from behind the bar. “And everyone can hear everything you’re saying.”
“What if he did find his brother and it somehow made him realize that he doesn’t want eggs and coffee at midnight anymore and now he never comes in ever again?” Adam insists.
Claire flops back against the table, presses her hands over her eyes, and groans. Kevin comes over and gives her a can of Red Bull. Adam paces.
Claire was right. Adam comes into work on Friday no less jittery, fully expecting Michael to not show up at all this week. He shows up at ten forty-five sharp, ready to fulfill his thrice-weekly ritual of saying hi to Jerry and Anya from the last shift (sometimes Kevin too, if he arrives early), clocking in, and settling in for a riveting five hours of nothing.
Today, however, things are different, When he walks in, he is greeted with the sight of a familiar nondescript black coat sitting at a chair at the bar. Accompanied by a familiar nondescript face.
“Michael?”
The familiar nondescript man turns around and grins at him. Adam gawks.
“I’ve never seen you without that stupid apron on,” Michael remarks.
“Evening to you too,” Adam laughs, still a bit in shock. “You’re early! I don’t clock in until eleven.” He instantly clams up, flushing red. He didn’t mean to imply that Michael comes in just to see him, of course he doesn’t. Does he?
“I’m early,” Michael agrees, not seeming to notice. “I wanted to see you, and I didn’t have anything to do.”
Michael came in just to see him, Adam thinks. Maybe he has for a while. Adam swings his backpack off his shoulders, coming down to sit next to Michael at the bar. “How’s—how’s Gabriel? Is everything okay?”
Michael tips his head to the side, sighing. “Yes. He was staying at a friend’s house. He somehow snuck in and convinced her not to tell her parents. It’s exactly his brand of harebrained scheme,” he snorts. “Who knows where he was planning on going next.”
“I take it he wasn’t very happy about getting caught?”
“Heavens, no. We had a—a discussion.” Michael sobers, smile turning a bit bitter. “He’s been very unhappy lately. Says he can’t live in our house anymore, because it’s more of a war zone than a home. Didn’t want to talk to me or Lucifer. Didn’t even believe we were worried about him. Raphael just barely convinced him to stay. I’m glad. I didn’t want to force him, but I would if I had to.”
Adam winces. “Just glad he’s safe, right?” he offers.
Michael nods. “Yes, of course. He was… he was right, though.”
“Right?” Adam asks.
“It’s not been a home for a while. It’s my fault.”
“Michael—”
Michael holds up a hand. “None of that. It is, at least to some extent. I’ve let my quarrels with Lucifer consume my life, and Gabriel and Raphael have to deal with the fallout. Not to mention I’m not exactly fantastic at showing affection, or so I’ve been told.”
He looks up at Adam, something in his eyes. Adam is beginning to think he might be able to interpret it. Michael glances away.
“Lucifer will move out, eventually,” he continues absentmindedly. “But I can’t just wait around for that day. Things will be better now. I know it.”
His jaw is set. Adam knows in that moment, Michael is making a promise. Michael doesn’t strike him as the type to break those. He clears his throat, lightening the moment.
“You haven’t even touched your omelet,” Adam says, motioning to the plate. Michael wrinkles his nose.
“Gerald here just doesn’t quite make it the same as you or Kevin do, I’m afraid.”
“Oh, so now not only are you reading the nametags, you’re extrapolating full names from them?”
“Well, I’m not going to call him Jerry.”
Adam laughs at the absurdity of it. Michael turns to face him so that their ankles cross under the table.
The following Wednesday is Wednesday, September 29. The day passes with little fanfare. Mom takes him out to dinner before work, and they talk and laugh over overpriced steak and french fries. He still has dinner with John scheduled for the weekend as their compromise. Things are good.
He still goes to work that night. Kevin wishes him a happy birthday, produces a cupcake from his bag while Claire kicks him in the shin for not telling her it was Adam’s birthday today. The cupcake has a single candle in it, and Adam jokes that he’s happy to be turning one. Claire actually chuckles at that. He figures his birthday gift from her is receiving anything other than a put-upon glare.
The day is almost perfect, really, in a very pleasantly mundane way.
Well. Almost perfect, up until Michael comes in.
It’s still before twelve—if only by a couple of minutes—so it’s technically still his birthday. Claire and Kevin are back to their nightly Pokémon playing in the corner booth, but save for them, the diner is devoid of customers. Not incredibly unusual.
Michael presents him with a paper bag.
“You remembered,” Adam says, wide-eyed. He’d only mentioned it once in conversation, maybe.
“Yes. I, well, I didn’t know if you would be here, maybe you took the night off to celebrate, or...” Michael trails off. He’s rambling, Adam thinks. The idea of Michael rambling, of all people, makes him laugh.
He smiles, hands tightening on the rolled-up top edge of the paper bag. “I celebrated with mom earlier. Figured there was no reason to miss my shift. Not like it’s a holiday.”
Besides, it’s Wednesday. He didn’t want to miss Michael if he chose to come today. Adam only gets Michael once to thrice a week, for thirty minutes to an hour, and it’s not as much as he’d like. He’ll be damned if he’s passing that up.
“It is a holiday, you know. Technically,” Michael comments passively as Adam tears open the bag.
“Yeah?” Adam asks. There is a paper box inside the bag. He sets it on the table, curious.
“Saint Michael’s Day. Michaelmas. For some sects, at least, the date changes depending on who you ask.”
Adam looks up, caught off guard. Their eyes meet over the counter. “Really,” he says in an exhale. Michael’s eyes seem to shift, changing color impossibly under the poor quality fluorescent light. “Huh. No shit.”
Michael glances away and nudges the box towards Adam. “Go on, then.”
Adam gently opens the box.
Inside is some sort of custard pastry. It’s got a yellow, glossy filling, golden-brown on the edges, with cinnamon sprinkled on top. Whatever it is, it smells heavenly.
“It’s a Portuguese egg tart,” Michael says. “Not to be confused with its Chinese counterpart. Well. Kind of. Gabriel and Raphael helped me make them, and I’m positive Gabriel added way too much sugar than strictly necessary, and a lot of extra ingredients, so maybe it’s not exactly the same? And I wasn’t entirely sure if food was an appropriate gift item, but I thought it would be a bit, well, funny, for lack of a better word, since you’re always feeding me, and, well—”
“You are partial to egg dishes,” Adam echoes, dumbly.
“Yes,” Michael says. “Yes, I am.”
“Michael—” Adam begins.
“Wait, no. Hold on a minute, that’s not what I wanted to give you. It is, but it’s not the—main thing. That was mostly for fun, and mostly Gabriel’s absurd idea. Let me just...” Michael pats down his coat pockets while Adam waits patiently.
Michael pulls out a long, silver chain from one of his pockets and presents it to Adam. It’s a necklace, a small angel charm dangling beneath his fingers.
“Lucifer accompanied me to church today. For the Michaelmas sermon. Oh, of course he hated every second of it, but he chose to go with me, to make me happy. It’s the only kind thing he’s done for me in years, and likely the only thing he’ll ever have done for me many years in the future,” he says, softly. “The point is—it’s a bit of a miracle, you see? A bit of a miraculous day. So I thought I would get this blessed there.”
Adam doesn’t speak, just stares at the proffered jewelry. Michael swallows.
“I know you’re not religious. It’s not about that, I promise. It’s a… a token. It’s more like a piece of… me. In theory, the angel can keep you safe. I don’t know if I quite believe that part either, but it’s a nice sentiment, I thought.”
Adam is still silent. He snaps out of it when he sees Michael retracting, anxious. Adam grabs him by the wrist.
“Michael. You baked me a pastry for my birthday,” he breathed.
“That is what I did, yes.”
“You blessed a necklace for me.”
“The priest did that bit, actually. But, yes.”
“You blessed a necklace for me so that you could protect me at all times. ”
“Well. It’s supposed to be the angel, not me, but—”
Adam leans over the bar and kisses him firmly on the lips in one smooth motion. Michael makes an undignified squeaking noise. Adam giggles against his mouth.
He takes the chain from Michael’s limp hand and places it around his own neck. The pendant lays nicely over his heart.
“You know, Michael,” Adam says, “you’re kind of a strange guy.”
He is fully aware that Kevin and Claire are probably watching them like hawks, possibly exchanging bet money. He doesn’t care.
Michael blinks at him. “I’ve never thought I was all that odd,” he says, before grappling at Adam’s neck to tug him in for another kiss.