Something washes over him then, and he can't put a name on what it is, but it feels like a sort of numbness all the way out to his fingertips. Gabriel nods a bit to acknowledge the-- he doesn't know. It isn't even an apology, not really.

Maybe he's being ridiculous. But he doesn't think he imagined the-- the what? The feeling between them. He can't have imagined what he saw and felt during their late-night conversations, when he'd seen Anthony more bare and vulnerable than ever. Don't do that, he'd said when Anthony tried to brush him off. Maybe this entire thing has been more one-sided than he thought, and he hates the creeping threat of humiliation.

He takes a fortifying drink from his glass.

"It's alright," he says, affecting his best impression Anthony's cool and distant tone. "Sorry to have made a thing of it."