#neil would climb out of a window or a moving car without hesitation

[ashestoashes7]

I am so obsessed with Neil climbing out windows. First thinking about it at Wymack’s before deciding it’s too high, then actually doing it in Columbia. He is fully prepared to analyze all of the possible exits and I’m not sure the Foxes fully consider what that means.

I have no doubts he would climb out of a hospital window and give the Foxes a heart attack when they come to visit him and find an empty bed and he won’t answer their calls (let’s be real, that phone is definitely dead). Panic ensues while Neil is chilling back in the dorms and wondering why they haven’t come back. Meanwhile, they are very close to calling the FBI themselves to track him down until they remember it’s Neil

[otdiaftg]

The King's Men - Chapter Nine

Day: Saturday, January 20th Time: 11:00 AM EST

It was only a couple minutes from Fox Tower to the Foxhole Court, but it took almost fifteen minutes for Andrew to turn into the parking lot. He pulled into the space a couple inches from Neil's left foot and didn't bother to kill the engine. Kevin was in the passenger seat, frowning silent judgment at Neil through the windshield. Andrew got out of the car when Neil didn't move and stood in front of Neil. Neil looked up at him, studying Andrew's bored expression and waiting for questions he knew wouldn't come. That apathy should have grated against his raw nerves but somehow it steadied him. Andrew's disinterest in his psychological well-being was what had drawn Neil to him in the first place: the realization that Andrew would never flinch away from whatever poison was eating Neil alive. "I don't want to be here today," Neil said. "We were almost to the interstate," Andrew said. It was the most half-hearted invitation to come along that Neil had ever heard, but Neil didn't care. Andrew had turned around and come back for him without hesitation. That was more than enough reason to get up and go with him. Neil climbed in behind the passenger seat and stared out the window. Kevin glanced back at him but said nothing, and Andrew got them moving before his door had even slammed all the way closed.

Art used with permission by Ouijacine. Thank you @ouijacine!

[larryfanficwriter98]

Chapter Four

{ My idea of the flowers, painting, and pearl necklace because I need visual things. sorry. if you don't want pictures just let me know}

Harry was wrapping the framed painting in bubble wrap when his phone started ringing. He grabbed it. frowning when he saw it was a facetime request from Louis. Which was weird for many reasons especially since it was currently 2 in the morning in Manchester. Harry hesitated but accepted it only to laugh when he saw Louis was completely drunk and squinting at the phone.

"Louis.. Louis no. You can't call your boyfriend drunk off your ass."

"Yes, I can. Leave me alone. I want to call him."

"Louis you will regret in the morning and besides you remember our rule. Friends don't let friends drunk call boyfriends. Or text. Or just handle a phone in general. So give it here."

"No." Harry quickly started recording his screen so he could send it to Louis tomorrow.

"Fine. I need to go find Niall and Zayn then we are leaving got it?"

"Got it, dad."

"Nialler!" Louis frowned at the screen and tapped at it.

"Call Hazzy. Call Hazzy. Siri... Siri.. call- Liam my phone isn't calling him!" Louis yelled over the sound of the music and people in the pub

"Louis do not climb on the table. No get down people are going to think you're a dancer with that ass of yours. No, don't shake it. Fucking christ Louis. How you've not been approached all night is beyond me with the way you do things."

The phone was on the table that Louis was currently standing on with a drink in his hand. He was shaking, what Harry now knew was a very round ass as a song played in the music. Harry put his phone against the stand so he could go back to bubble wrapping while also paying attention to a very cute drunk Louis. Eventually, Louis and the others were dragged to a car than inside a house. Louis had been telling the phone to call ''Hazzy'' for the past ten minutes.

"Go to sleep Louis." Liam said as pushed Louis onto the bed, Louis whined as he looked at his phone.

"Siri. Text Hazzy night night xxx. Kay? Bye." Harry covered his mouth as Louis fell asleep almost immediately

"Night night Louis." Harry said as he looked at the phone screen, studying Louis' features. He was cute and breathtaking even with his flushed face from alcohol and the cold wintery air. Harry ended the recording then the facetime shaking his head we he sent Louis the video.

Night Louis xx

Louis was able to not look at the video until he was soaking in the tub only a few hours later. He had woken up puking and he very much regretted taking Niall up on the drinking contest. He had known of course to never try and out drink an Irish, but he had already been drunk and he was stupid when he drank. He watched the video twice, once to see what he did as he didn’t remember anything and the second time to see Harry's reaction to everything.

They had never spoken about what they looked like, but for some reason, Louis was not at all surprised to see Harry with a curly bun resting on the top of his head as if he hadn't brushed it yet. Which no judgment from Louis, everyone has those days. He also wasn't surprised to see he had soft muscles like he was mo muscular, but not buff and not overly so, just enough to give a soft outline of his forearms. His jawline was perfect and he had a brilliant smile and his emotions portrayed in his eyes open as he glanced at the phone regularly.

Louis watched as he bubbled wrapped what Louis was assuming his next set of gifts there was already a long skinny box taped and closed that Louis thought Harry put a painting in. Louis also saw a scatter of fake flowers again on the ground around him. Louis knew Harry from somewhere, he just couldn't place it and it bothered him as he paused the video staring at Harry's face as he looked at the camera. Not able to think too much on it Louis moved on. He got out of the bath and headed back to bed to sleep some more.

***

The next few days were without texting because Harry was going from Sydney to Los Angeles, Sydney was almost a full day ahead of L.A, 17 hours to be exact so Harry took two days, after a 13-hour flight, to settle into the time zone differences. It also meant that Harry was now 8 hours behind London which means Louis now woke up first and went to sleep first, not the other way around. It took a few days to adjust to it, but they did adjust eventually. Louis only accidentally woke Harry up once.

Harry had sent the package of Chinese and Australian souvenirs before he had gotten on a flight. Louis had gotten a notification telling him he had packages delivered at the p.o boxes so after work he had headed there excitedly. He headed to the locker and pulled out the two 20x20x20 boxes then pulled out a 37x4x27 picture box. He put the items in his car and grabbed the note that was sticking out and Harry told him to look for.

Before going home head here if it's before 8pm.

There was an address written in the note so Louis typed it into his Maps and headed there parking upfront of a flower shop. He shook his head as he got out walking inside the.

"Hello, can I help you?"

"I don't know. My boyfriend-"

"You're Louis then. This way dear." Louis followed the woman to a back room where she grabbed a beautiful bouquet of flowers, "he told us to pick them for a long-distance partner. We made sure love was represented too much as he told us you guys wanted to wait to see each other in person. He did say you two were exclusive and committed so we made sure represent that. Faithfulness and admiration as well as honesty, trust, and longing." Louis blushed as he accepted the bouquet

"Thank you."

"Of course dear." Louis headed to his car and grabbed his phone texting Harry that the flowers were beautiful and that he'll send pictures when he got home. He had been debating whether to tell Harry his address so he could just send it to the house and as he struggled to only make one trip inside he decided he would do that.

"Need help?" Liam asked already grabbing the picture box and flowers, "how's the boyfriend? Spoiling you rotten still I see.

"Leave him alone. It's cute." Louis set the box on the coffee table then grabbed the picture box and sat that on top of it.

He then headed to where he had put the vase from Denmark at the end table in the hall that had a clutter of mail, keys, and other knick-knacks they didn’t bother to clear away. He filled the vase with water then carried it to the living room, he put his flowers inside the vase then carried it upstairs setting it on his bedside table. Louis adjusted a few things then took a picture of it sending it to Harry.

Hurrying downstairs he was anxious to see the picture, he had let it slip he liked Chinese paintings when Harry was sending pictures of an art gallery he was visiting. Louis hadn't thought of it, but now that he saw what could possibly be a painting he was a little worried that it may have come off wrongly. He didn’t want Harry to think he only wanted these gifts, not that he didn’t appreciate them and love them, but they weren't wanted.

"Open up the long box first." Niall said eagerly

"I was going to Neil." Louis grabbed the box and broke the tape pulling out a beautifully framed painting of pink flowers and black bark that make Louis smile as he thought it matched his real flowers upstairs. He set it off to the side then set the box off to the ground sp he could open a 20x20x20 box. Ripping the tape he laughed seeing Christmas wrapping paper wrapped around different items. There was a letter there and he unfolded it reading its contents,

Louis,

Do not open until Christmas except the one with the double bow. Open that one on the 24th. I'll be free on the 23rd, 24th, 25th, 26th, 31st, and 1st. Make sure to have it set up as soon as you open it for skyping.

Harry xx.

Louis set the letter off to the side and grabbed the first gift with a green bow. He frowned though when he saw it was addressed to Niall.

"This is for you Niall. Harry says not to open it u too Christmas though."

"What? Really? Sweet." Louis handed him the rectangular package then pulled out another rectangular box with Niall's name. "Is he trying to win us over?" Niall asked

"He's just thoughtful like that." Louis said with a shrug as he pulled out two packages with a lighter green bow.

They had Zayn’s name on them so he handed them to him. Liam's two packages had a white bow on them and the rest had red bows. Louis set them under the tree carefully nothing the one package at the bottom had two bows, a red and green. The second box had a few packaged wrapped in birthday wrapping paper with a note telling him not to open them until his birthday. He set them under the tree as well for now then pulled out the Teddy bears for China and Australia.

The China souvenirs consisted of a few different teas for Louis with descriptions of what they tasted like to Harry without anything added to them. A few large paper cuttings with a note saying they are placed in windows in China and at night with a light on it looked " cool ". Louis chuckled as the simple explanation as he set them aside he did like them, the bright red was beautiful. He was already thinking of ways to decorate his room with a Chinese accent wall above his headboard. Next was a Chinese silk wall hanging that was a beautiful blue shade. Following that was some sweats, a few Chinese knots, a box of beautifully painted chopsticks, and then the last thing was a long rectangular box. The sticky note on it read,

I have a set too. I wear mine often, but you don't have to wear them I just wanted to get you a pair to have. Never know when you may need them.

Louis opened the box revealing a three chain set of pearls. Louis grinned and ran a gentle finger over them. He has seen a glimpse of Harry's pearl's over his shirt during their facetime. Louis still couldn't quite place where he knew Harry from and it's been bugging him.

Moving on for the Australian souvenirs the first thing was a lot of T2 Tea products which Louis was grateful for. He loved trying new teas and the fact Harry has bought at least one tea product from each country meant a lot to Louis and showed him that Harry paid attention. After the tea, it was some classic Vegemite with a note telling Louis it tasted like three days old Thai take out that had Louis laughing. There a side note saying no one was allowed to taste it without it being recorded.

Following the Vegemite was some food and snacks, an adorable koala ceramic mug, a 3D Ned Kelly mug that Zayn took and claimed as his own. Following those, there were some kid-friendly wooden puzzles, 21 kookaburras, koala, kangaroo, emu, and crocodile growing eggs for each child and staff member at the daycare center. 25 paint your own boomerang kits for the daycare and the lads that they were going to paint later that night as they share a bottle of whiskey together. Then the last few items were just small Australian animal bouncy balls for the daycare and of course some teas.

"He really likes those kids." Liam said as he examined the boomerang kit

"We both want a big family one day, that's something we have mentioned in passing and he knows I adore the kids at the daycare. He loves kids."

"You two have talked about kids?"

"Not like that, but yes it sort of came up while we were talking about the daycare." Louis shrugged as he put the kids’ things in the box to take it to the daycare after the holidays. Today had been the last day of work until the 2nd of January. He set that box aside then packed the rest of his stuff in the other box and headed up to his room to decorate.

[isitgintimeyet]

Letting Go

AO3

Previous

Happy Thursday! Thanks for reading and all your support, two more to go after this. Hope you enjoy!

Thanks to @mo-nighean-rouge for the beta

And @happytoobserve for the encouragement

Chapter 14: Hello Again

Hello, again, hello Just called to say hello I couldn't sleep at all tonight And I know it's late I couldn't wait

Neil Diamond, Alan Lindgren

A sense of déjà vu crept over Claire as she scrambled around on the office floor, searching through the piles of papers emptied from her filing cabinet. The one certificate -- her medical degree from Glasgow University -- that she needed for her job applications and she couldn’t find it. Although she now knew exactly where it must be… back in the safe in the loft… at Uncle Lamb’s house.

********

Jocasta opened the front door and welcomed Claire warmly into the house. She led the familiar way into the kitchen.

“Ye’ll have a brew afore ye go and find yer certificate, will ye no’? Murtagh will be in shortly. He’s just planting up some tubs fer the garden.”

Claire gazed out of the window and watched as Murtagh carefully placed a large terracotta pot, full of a riot of brightly coloured pansies, on the ground next to the swing. Instinctively, she gave a slight smile and turned to Jocasta.

“You know, when I came to live here after my parents died, that swing was the first thing that Uncle Lamb gave to me.”

“Ah, I ken it must hold many memories fer ye. Murtagh’s godson, Jamie, reckoned it must be important… tae leave it in the garden, even though it’s no’ been used fer years.” Jocasta glanced across at Claire, who was  again turned towards the window.

**********

Eight years ago

“Ye ken, at Lallybroch, I’ll build a swing fer our bairns. Weel, more than one swing. We dinna want them tae be fighting over it. Swings and a seesaw and a wee climbing frame… mebbe a treehouse. There’s an old tree…”

“Wow, Jamie, you have this all planned, don’t you?”

“Aye. Do ye no’ think about these things, about the future?”

“Well, yes, but more generally. I want us to be together, I want to be a qualified surgeon. More than that I hadn’t planned. Who knows what will happen?”

“I ken. We’ll be together at Lallybroch. I’ll always want ye with me.”

**********

Murtagh joined them at the kitchen table as Jocasta poured three mugs of tea and placed the biscuit tin on the table. Murtagh opened it, and after offering it to Claire, helped himself to a couple of chocolate digestives.

He sighed contentedly. “Ah, there’s nothing better in the afternoon than a cup of hot tea and a chocolate biscuit. And nowadays we seem tae have more biscuits in the tin than we used tae, Jocasta?”

“Aye, weel, that’ll be because Jamie’s no’ been here as much as he was. He’s a devil fer all the wee snacks. He can go through ma pantry like a swarm of locusts.”

“Ye’re not wrong. Jamie, he’s ma godson, ye ken,” Murtagh explained to Claire. “He’s been visiting with us a lot, up until fairly recently.”

Claire tried to focus on her mug of tea, desperate not to let any emotion show on her face.

Murtagh continued between mouthfuls of biscuit. “Aye, he was here regular a while back. And I kent there must have been a lass involved tae be driving from Lallybroch so much. But nae more, apparently.”

He paused, brushing a couple of stray biscuit crumbs from his beard and took a swig of tea. “He admitted it last time he was here, that there had been a lass he had his eye on, wanted it tae go further but it wasna any use. She was with someone else and now it’s too late.”

Claire tried to relax and keep her breathing steady. Jocasta watched her out of the corner of her eye.

“And…” Jocasta prompted. “Did Jamie no’ have anything more tae say about it?”

“Weel, here’s the thing. He kent her a long time ago, afore he went tae America. And now he’s back but she’s moving away with a new job. It’s a shame, it’s time he settled down. He needs a good woman...”

“Are ye ok, dear? Ye’ve gone awfa pale.” Jocasta laid a hand gently on Claire’s arm.

“Er, yes… I’ve just… it’s my blood sugar.”

“Aye, of course, that must be it. Have a biscuit, dear, and we can go and get that certificate.”

***********

With the certificate safely in her bag, Claire made her way into the kitchen to say goodbye. Jocasta was still in there, now busy peeling potatoes. Murtagh had returned to the garden to continue the planting.

“Thanks for this. Sorry I had to disturb you. So, goodbye.”

Jocasta wiped her hands on her bright floral apron. “Will ye no’ sit down a minute? I wonder if we could have a wee chat.”

Claire sat down at the table. “Oh, is there a problem with the house?”

“Och no, the house is fine. We love living here. It’s, weel, I hope ye dinna mind me asking, but ye said on the phone ye needed the certificate fer a job. Are ye moving away tae a new hospital?”

“Possibly… er… there may be opportunities elsewhere for me… nothing’s been decided yet… I’m just exploring… you know…” Claire’s voice tailed off as she looked down at her hands, unwilling to let Jocasta see the truth on her face.

“And ye’re no’ planning on leavin’ because of a man?”

Claire shook her head, fighting back tears.

“Claire dear, I’m sure this is none of ma business, but I canna help but ask… is it ye Jamie was talking about? Did ye know each other years ago?”

Claire thought for a moment before answering truthfully. “I did know Jamie before he went to America, but we sort of lost touch. What made you ask?”

“I dinna ken… I suppose it was a few things. The way Jamie reacted when I spoke about moving that swing, the way he somehow kent his way around this house without being shown, the shocked way ye reacted when I mentioned Jamie’s Da. But I’m guessing ye were more than friends?”

Jocasta walked over to the fridge and poured a glass of water. Sitting down, she pushed the glass in front of Claire. “Here ye go. Do ye ken how Jamie feels about ye? Is that why ye’re planning on moving?”

“I thought… I thought… when we met -- by chance -- he was so cold to me. We hadn’t parted on good terms eight years ago. He has become friendlier to me.” She blushed remembering their night together. “But I thought he was keen on our friend Anna and that’s why he wasn’t around so much now that Anna has a boyfriend.”

“Oh, Claire, I dinna think that's the reason at all. Now, if ye are sure ye want tae move away, or if ye have a new man, that’s fine. I only wanted to let ye know what I think… Did I do wrong?”

“No, Jocasta.” Claire now made no attempt to stop the tears from flowing. “You didn’t do wrong.”

************

Claire’s patience was beginning to wear thin. So far she had rung John’s mobile half a dozen times. Each time it had gone straight to voicemail. She had left three messages (John, it’s Claire, can you give me a call please… John, call me as soon as you get this… John, I need to talk to you urgently) and left similar messages on text, WhatsApp and Messenger. Finally she had bypassed technology and run downstairs to stick a handwritten message on his front door.

Claire knew that Jocasta would have willingly given her Jamie’s phone number, or that she could simply Google a phone number for the Lallybroch stables. But she wanted to know exactly what John had said to Jamie. Plus, she did not think that she wanted to talk to Jamie over the phone.

She wandered into the kitchen, randomly opening cupboards, not quite sure what she was looking for. Finally, she decided to occupy herself while waiting for John by baking scones from a recipe she knew by heart. Indeed, the recipe was one of the first Claire had used when trying to forget her broken heart eight years ago.

The scones were baking in the oven, their comforting smell filling the flat as she heard a knock at the door. Claire rushed to answer it, almost tripping over a pair of discarded shoes in her haste.

John stood in the doorway, his face etched with worry. “Claire, what’s the matter? I came as soon as I got your note. Did you ring me? I’m sorry, my phone needs charging.”

Claire led him into the living room, suddenly feeling slightly foolish and incredibly over dramatic. This wasn’t a matter of life and death. Or maybe it was… the final death of any lingering dream she may have, forcing her into a new life away from Glasgow.

She indicated for John to sit while she perched on the arm of a chair, too tense to relax.

“I didn’t mean to alarm you, John. It’s just something I need to know. Have you mentioned to anybody my plans to move away?”

“No, why? Has the hospital found out? Are they making it awkward for you? It wouldn’t have come from me. I haven’t told anybody… oh…” John stopped.

“Well, something did slip, but there’s no way it could have got back to the hospital. I was chatting to Jamie a couple of weeks ago, and he was joking about the English emigrating to Scotland and accidentally I may… actually I did… mention that there would be one less English immigrant in this city as, chances are, you are moving away for a new job. But that was it, I swear, I’m sorry. Somebody else must have said something to your bosses, it that’s what this is about.”

A kaleidoscope of butterflies started in Claire’s stomach at John’s confirmation that Jamie knew about her plans. “No, that’s fine,” she reassured John. “I know you haven’t told anyone at the hospital.”

Whilst this was the absolute truth, Claire decided not to elaborate on the real reason for her question and to let John think her issue was with the hospital.

John stood up. “If there’s nothing else, and you’re ok, I need to go. I’ve got loads of reading... work stuff to do.”

Claire pulled nervously at her lip with her fingers. “I would like to ask a favour… but you can say no if you want.” She hesitated before making the decision. “Could I borrow your car today, please? I’ll pay the extra insurance and fill up with petrol. There’s just something I need to do, somewhere I need to go. I’ll bring it back late tonight.”

“Hmm, a Friday evening assignation, hey? Sounds intriguing.”

“John, I promise I will tell you all about it tomorrow. So, what do you say?”

John sighed exaggeratedly and smiled. “You’re on, Claire. Call in on your way out for the keys. I’ll ring the insurance and make the arrangements.”

**********

Claire had set the sat-nav with the address for Lallybroch, but, in reality, that was unnecessary. The route up to the Highlands was as familiar as it ever had been. Some sort of muscle memory took over, her brain automatically recognising where to turn, where to brake, where to give way. This left her free to consider her actions.

Claire prided herself on never making rash decisions, always weighing up all options, and considering all outcomes before taking action. There had been one notable exception, of course, when all rational thought had been discarded as quickly and carelessly as her underwear.

But now, as she drove closer and closer to Lallybroch, she wondered what exactly she was doing. She hadn’t weighed up all options, considered all outcomes. What if Jocasta was wrong? What if it wasn’t her he had been avoiding? What if he wasn’t even at Lallybroch? Claire had been so intent on this grand, dramatic gesture, nothing else had been considered. There was no safety net.

Claire turned off the road and drove slowly along the drive. She passed the turning for the stables and offices and decided to go to the house first. Pulling into a parking space in front of the house, she was relieved to see Jamie’s sports car there. No other cars were around.

She clambered out of the mini and stood clutching her Tupperware box of scones, unsure where to go first. The house looked unchanged, the solid grey stone softened by the purple flowering wisteria climbing up the walls. Her feet crunched on the gravel as she moved closer, but... front door or back door… visitor or family?

She started for the front door as, from the side of the house, she heard footsteps. Suddenly, Jamie came round the corner. He didn’t see her at first, being occupied with his phone. He was not dressed for company -- his black jodhpurs and riding boots were splattered with mud, the pocket of his gilet was torn and his polo shirt was faded with age. Claire thought she had never seen him look so handsome.

Jamie looked up and saw her. There was a moment of silence.

Finally, Claire spoke. “Hello, Jamie.”

Jamie gave a small smile. “Hello.”

[ravenvsfox]

rockband chapter 5 babey 😈🤘🏻

Neil tilts a record out of the stacks, and the sun catches the sleek surface and shows him his reflection.

“You’re not even in the right section,” Kevin calls. He’s two rows away flipping through rock-punk CDs, looking exhilarated when they fall towards him like dominoes.

The whole store is no bigger than a spacious bedroom, and the shop front is all boxy windows, letting in honeycombs of late-afternoon light. Kevin’s never looked so relaxed, dragging his fingers along the spines of albums, inspecting the equipment behind the till, smiling and chatting with the owner.

“There is no right section,” he mutters, sliding the album back into its slot. “It’s all music.”

“Right,” Kevin says. Neil glances up and finds him unexpectedly close, mouth pursed reluctantly with amusement. “Except we’re not here for all music.”

“What are we actually here for again?” Neil asks, distracted. He can see Andrew waiting outside with his back to them and his arms crossed, serious and stock-still as a bodyguard.

“Inspiration.”

Neil watches Kevin’s face. The crease that’s usually between his brows is only suggestion now, a slouchy, un-tensed line. He’s tolerable like this, Neil thinks, almost impressive, choosing music to feed his creativity.

“You love it here,” Neil accuses. “This is a vacation for you.”

Kevin scoffs. “Like you’re not the same.”

Neil shrugs. There’s an upright piano on the wall and he wants to squeeze the keys in his hands like fingers in a crowd. The sound of voices and tires on asphalt from outside spreads like frosting over the crumbling drumbeat from the stereo. The rusting brown of the wallpaper behind the counter looks almost orange with the full force of the sun on it.

He could live and die in a place like this, head down, hands full of bright new music and dark classics, never in silence, never alone.

"Come look at this,” Kevin says. Neil follows him to the far corner of the shop where there are picked-over alternative CDs and peeling tape labels. He plucks an album from the stack and wiggles it at Neil. “Old school Ausreißer.”

Neil squints at the cover art. “You look like a bad metal band.” The original four are caught in the middle of a set, dressed in all black under a red spotlight, mid-howl. The word Ausreißer is so stylized that it’s almost illegible.

Kevin rolls his eyes and puts the CD back in its slot. “Things change. When we found you you looked like you were on day ten of a bender.”

“I can go back to that, if it’s the look you’re going for. Wouldn’t want to stand out in a band full of junkies and burnouts.”

“Funny,” Kevin says flatly. “Just bring that smart mouth to song writing.” He gathers his little stack of music and a clear box of sturdy picks, and drops them on the front counter to be checked out.

Neil hesitates, swaddled in the darkest, warmest corner of the store, reluctant to splash back out into the cold. He can already see how it will play out: Andrew’s silence and Kevin’s focus, the way they take up so much of the sidewalk that Neil has to fall in behind them or walk in the gutter, the drive home like a never-ending commute to nowhere at all.

He’s listless without a stage, and Kevin won’t let him forget that he’s not a natural born songwriter. He’s waiting for inspiration like that second raindrop after you swear you felt the first one.

His eyes wander and catch on a lurid red flier stapled to the bulletin board above the stacks, and he does a double-take. Foxes. Township Auditorium. Friday, January 25th.

“Dan’s group is playing this Friday?” Neil wonders aloud, and Kevin looks at him over his shoulder, handing bills off to the cashier.

“Oh yeah, the Township gig. I think they’re hanging out in town for a week or so, too.”

“We should go.” He thinks of the way the girls had laughed about their public personas and plastic recognition. He wants to hear them for real, as magnetic and driven as they were at Abby’s, assuring him that they do pop like he’s never heard in his life.

“Waste of time,” Kevin says, accepting his bag with one of his frozen, ken doll smiles and making towards the exit.

“We’re not touring right now,” Neil argues, catching up. “We can take two hours off from the new album.”

“We can,” Kevin says, “but we shouldn’t.”

“And yet you find the time to drink six hours a day.”

“The creative process looks different on everyone,” he grits. They push out into the sunlight and Andrew looks vaguely in their direction, his face chapped from the wind.

“Great. Mine looks like going to local concerts and supporting our label, and you know full fucking well that Wymack would agree with me.” They start walking, Neil leading them in a frantic triangle down main street. Andrew doesn’t ask or care about what they’re arguing over, which is why Neil tells him, “I want to go to the Foxes concert on Friday.”

“Then go,” he says. He’d been chain-smoking while Neil and Kevin were in the shop, and he looks irritable and sick. His pallor has been almost bruised lately, like something’s wringing him out and leaving marks behind.

Neil flips Kevin off and walks further ahead of the group, buoyed by the opportunity to be part of an audience again. He loves the silky anonymity and sway of the crowd almost as much as being doused in lights and held up by a mic stand.

Kevin’s still talking about accountability and wasted talent, but he’s lost his audience.

Neil reaches the van first, parallel parked at a wicked angle. He waits for the muted click of the unlock button, then climbs into the passenger seat. There’s a parking ticket folded over the windshield wipers and Andrew sets them going so that it flutters down onto the street.

“It’s not going to be the same in the crowd as it is onstage,” Kevin says calmly from the backseat.

Neil turns his head. “I know.”

“The fans know who you are now, and I’m not sure you’re ready for what that actually looks like.”

“I’m pretty good at blending in,” Neil says, eyes narrowed.

“You’re not,” Andrew says, pulling jerkily out of the spot without looking and nearly catching a hyundai by the nose. “You’re loud.” Car horns blare on all sides like a chorus of agreement.

“You draw attention,” Kevin agrees grimly. “I’d rather you stick it out in the studio where you can��t get into trouble. And Wymack would agree with me about that.”

Neil watches pedestrians swarm and cars criss-cross beyond the window. “So what, I join a band and now I’m on full-time house arrest?”

“Shouldn’t you be used to keeping your head down, runaway?” Andrew taunts. His hands flash as he makes a left turn, ink spelling yes over no over yes. Neil gives him a look.

“You’re not talking about staying on the move, you’re talking about hiding. And in my experience, your problems catch up with you when you sit and wait for them to go away.”

“I’m not talking about your fucked up past,” Kevin says irritably. “If you want to stumble into the nearest concert, you can, but if you misrepresent us or pull some stupid shit to distract from the set, Wymack will kick your ass. If Dan doesn’t get there first.”

“Don’t worry Kevin,” Andrew says, glancing away from the road to fix Neil with a cool, knowing look. “He has winning impulse control. Right Neil?”

Neil clenches his teeth and ignores him. “I realize that you don’t trust me, but I need you to understand that I don’t care. I’m not going to stay in the cage until you figure out if you’re ready to unlock it or not. I’m not going to live that way anymore.”

“You’re on a team now, and you have to care,” Kevin argues.

Neil scoffs. “Tell that to Andrew.”

Kevin looks pained. “He’s—“

“What? An exception? I’d love to know why I’m held to a higher standard than the person with concealed weapons and an unreliable drug dependency,” Neil says, fuming. Andrew pumps the brakes so that Neil topples forward into the dashboard, then he’s thrown back again when they accelerate. He grips the headrest and seethes, “you’re fucking psychotic.”

“You—“ Kevin starts.

“Kevin,” Andrew says, toneless, barely there, and Kevin stops short. Neil recognizes that easy power, that tongue-biting obedience.

They collapse into strained silence, Andrew looking infuriatingly tranquil, the air around Kevin vibrating with how badly he wants to speak.

Neil thinks about the corner of the music store and that old album, an Ausreißer from back when Neil was still lost in between hotel rooms, when his mother was alive, and she could change the course of his life with just the tips of her fingers. He thinks, things can be so easy and so ugly at the same time.

They get out at Palmetto, Neil wrenching doors closed behind him, trying to feel like he has a raft to himself for once, like he’s not always sharing, feeling for someone else’s shifting weight.

Nicky’s spread between two chairs when he gets to the studio, and Neil’s relieved to see the easy smile on his face. It fractures when he gets a good look at him.

“Oh no. Was it unbearable? I thought music shopping would mellow Kevin out, at least.”

“It was fine,” Neil says, rolling a chair towards the table where they left all of their notes and stray music. He sweeps everything off the table, feeling a vindictive shock when it all settles on the floor; every dangling idea, stagnating chord progression, and experimental piece of garbage.

“Yeah, you seem fine,” Nicky says sarcastically.

“Better,” Neil says, rummaging in the heaps of wasted work until his hand closes around a discarded pen. “I’m inspired.”

_____

The dye burns cold on his scalp. He paints the wispy place above his ears, and tucks it up into the rest of the gummy mess. There’s a dark streak on the porcelain of the sink, and he rubs it with one gloved finger.

Someone knocks at the door, and Neil reaches behind himself to open it. There’s a beat, and a flutter of movement, and then his eyes meet Andrew’s in the mirror. 

“Brown,” Andrew remarks.

“You wanted me to tone it down,” Neil says, focusing on smothering his auburn roots and pointedly ignoring the rest of his reflection.

“Don’t put Kevin’s words in my mouth.”

Neil meets his eyes again. “What do you want?”

Andrew doesn’t reply for a long moment, and then he starts to peel down his armbands. It’s like watching a snake shed its skin, and Neil’s so startled to see it happening that he turns around to watch him directly.

He’s expecting the thatch of scars, but it still knocks the wind out of him to see them, tender pinks and whites that nudge all the way up to the ink on his wrists and hands.

Andrew plucks the brush out of Neil’s limp hand and scoops up a mound of colour that looks black in the weak light.

“Head down.”

Neil complies, chin towards his chest, and feels Andrew smooth the dye from just below his ear up into the coil of loose, wet hair. He can feel the damp heat from Andrew’s bare wrists, smothered for most of the day.

“Who put you in a cage?” Andrew asks, and the hair on Neil’s neck stands up.

“What—“

“You said: I’m not going to stay in the cage until you figure out if you’re ready to unlock it. I’m not going to live that way anymore.” He says it robotically, like an automated recording.

“I know what I said,” Neil snaps, starting to look up, but Andrew grips his neck and steers his head down again.

“Then you should be able to explain what you meant. Without lying to me.”

Andrew’s initiating one of their trades, he realizes, baring a secret and nodding at Neil do to the same. He closes his eyes, flinching when the brush makes sudden contact with his neck.

“My mother.” It’s an easier answer than the reality--a web of injustice too thick to see through. A childhood spent escaping from one cell block to another. 

The brush stops midway through a glide towards his hairline. “She hurt you?” Andrew asks, low.

“It’s not that simple.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“You know better than anyone that protecting someone can get bloody. Our circumstances weren’t--they were never good enough for us to have a decent relationship. But she kept us moving.”

A bare hand curls in his hair, and Neil’s eyes open. His breath catches when he recognizes the hateful look on Andrew’s face.

“Did she hit you, yes or no?”

Neil swallows thickly, trying to focus on the feeling of Andrew’s hand against his scalp. “Yes.” The hand tightens painfully. “But she’s dead now. My parents are dead.” He doesn’t know what drives him to say such a hasty, partial truth, like it has any bearing on the way it felt to be forced to the ground and pinned until his arm broke. Death gets rid of the person, not the memory. 

Andrew’s hand drops altogether. He moves into the space at Neil’s side, hip to hip, and rinses his hand under the tap. “If she was beating you, she wasn’t protecting you.”

“You don’t understand what people are capable of when they’re struggling to survive.”

Andrew steps slowly and lethally into Neil’s space. “Yes, I do,” he says, nearly whispering. Neil’s eyes hitch down to his destroyed wrists. 

He nods, and Andrew backs off. He feels a strange, remote disappointment watching him move away, like climbing out of a roller coaster and watching it take off without him.

“We’re not keeping you locked up,” Andrew says. “We do not own you.”

Neil shakes his head a little, running a hand over his hair under the guise of checking for dry patches, trying to reclaim the tingling, grounding feeling of Andrew’s fingers.

“Contractually, you do.”

“You’re with us,” Andrew says, “until the second someone abuses your contract, then you leave. We both know you could outrun me if you really wanted to.”

“Maybe,” Neil says, on the blunt edge of a smile. “But you might be able to outlast me.”

Andrew looks at him in the mirror for a long while. “You’re disgustingly stubborn,” he says. “And dense. I wouldn’t count on my ability to put up with you for that long.”

Neil shrugs. “It doesn’t matter, anyway. I won’t leave. We have a deal.”

“I just told you—“

“Not the contract. You and I have a deal. And I’m not ready to give it up,” Neil says, and he means it. The tenuous promise of protection, the give and take, the lure of the stage. He’s only grown more and more obsessed with the whole thing.

Andrew wavers. He reaches for his discarded armbands, and takes his time rolling them back up. Neil feels a painful rush of recognition at seeing his scars swallowed up, and he reaches out impulsively to hold him by the wrist. Andrew’s fingers are still ruddy with dye.

“This isn’t a cage. You’re nothing like—it’s nothing like my mother.”

At Abby’s, he’d told Andrew he reminded him of home, the most nightmarish insult he could lay his hands upon. And for a jarring second, Andrew’s commanding relationship with the band had looked like the dynamic between himself and his mother, ceaseless authority meeting senseless devotion. He’s been stupid enough to mistake Andrew’s promises for Mary Hatford’s threats.

At length, Andrew tugs, and Neil lets go of him.

Long after he’s gone, and Neil’s hair is washed out and limp, wet brown, he can still feel the raised scars underneath the fabric of the armband, and beneath that, a curiously rabbiting pulse.

______

And “monster” does not begin

to cover bolts and stitches in my skin

sinew held with safety pins

but you made me

the creature not the man, right?

but this lab coat’s fitting pretty tight

and if you’re living out of spite

are you a person or a feeling,

and would it hurt to look at you directly?

gunshots speak louder than words

but the warning shots you heard

don’t work for people who’d prefer

to die than to live on their knees--

“It needs workshopping,” Kevin says, tossing the notebook onto the coffee table.

“I think it’s great, Neil,” Nicky says. “The Frankenstein stuff is cool, our fans eat that shit up.”

Neil shrugs, and he gathers his notes back up from the table, out of reach from prying eyes. They’re assembled in a loose square in the living room, with Andrew at the window, a cigarette burning delicately between two fingers.

“You call yourselves the monsters so— I don’t know.”

“It works,” Kevin sniffs. “They’ll get it. They’ll like it.” It’s a more generous response than he was expecting, and he knows it’s the most approval Kevin can bring himself to show. “How soon can you match it musically?” he asks Andrew.

“I already have a melody,” Neil interrupts. He stands, walks over to the keyboard Kevin insists they always keep on hand, and presses the ‘on’ button. “It’s not very complex,” he says, walking his right hand over a couple of keys until the power catches up and the notes start to voice.

He plays the song through once, low arpeggiated chords and a sustained, high tenor line. He sings when he can’t help it, crooning until it gets too high to sing softly.

Out of the corner of his eye, he catches Andrew’s fingers drumming against the windowsill.

“You’re right,” Aaron says when it’s finished. “It’s not very complex.”

“Downer,” Nicky accuses. “It’s just keys right now, we can amp it up.”

“Is it worth it?” Aaron complains.

“Yes,” Andrew says, leaning over to put his cigarette out in the ashtray balanced on the arm of the couch. They all look at him expectantly, and he gets up, grabs the music directly out of Neil’s hands, and disappears into his room with it.

“Well that’s a good sign,” Nicky says, bemused. “Guess we’re going to that concert, Neil.” When Kevin opens his mouth to protest, Nicky says, “Wymack signed off on it. Plus we’re making headway on the b-side tracks, and Andrew’s actually working.”

“I’m not going,” Kevin says, crossing his arms.

“Me neither,” Aaron says. “Allison will have our balls if we pull focus from her.”

“So we won’t,” Nicky says. He ropes Neil in by the shoulder and tousles his newly dark hair. “No one will even know we’re there.”

______

Later, Nicky sends Neil to ask for the car keys, and he finds himself standing in the dusk outside Andrew’s room, delaying the inevitable confrontation.

Andrew comes out before he can knock, wearing boots and a black baseball cap, keys clenched in his fist. They nearly collide, and Neil staggers back a step. 

“You’re coming with us?” he asks dumbly.

“You and Nicky can’t be trusted alone,” he says. It’s an insult, but it hits Neil like warm water from a shower-head, like relief.

“Did Kevin ask you to do this?” Neil asks, but Andrew ignores him, brushing past into the living room, then the entryway. Nicky pushes off from the back of the couch where he’s been waiting, looking back and forth between the two of them nervously.

“We’re all going?”

“Apparently,” Neil replies.

“Cool. Weird. Shotgun.”

“Neil’s sitting in the front,” Andrew says, cranking the screen door open.

“Family really means, like, nothing to you when Neil’s around—“ Nicky’s saying as he follows Andrew out into the night.

Neil breathes out, lacing his shoes and listening to Nicky chatter circles around Andrew, who is steady and silent, already fixed in the driver’s seat.

He’s been picturing the Foxes concert as that same ambiguous darkness from before he joined the band, skulking in the back of bars and hoping to be caught. Now he imagines Andrew and Nicky propping him up like brackets, a drink he actually paid for, the hair-raising knowledge of what it feels like on the other side of the performance.

Wind shivers through the front door and underneath Neil’s collar. He jams his hands into his jacket pockets—the leather already stiff and unyielding from the cold—squares his shoulders, and opens the door.

______

They’re smuggled in through a door backstage, already late. Nicky clings to Neil’s sleeve so tightly that it pulls down over his hand. 

Renee comes to greet them, as unnervingly pleasant as the last time he’d seen her. Neil keeps expecting her even-keeled demeanour to clash against Andrew’s like icebergs meeting, but they only seem to thaw around one another. 

Andrew greets her, and she knocks her knuckles into his hand and smiles.

“I’m glad you guys came. Don’t tell her I told you, but Allison’s raring to show off.”

“I bet she is, competitive bitch,” Nicky says good-naturedly. “All you foxes are such a handful.”

Renee seems to be considering whether or not he’s joking when Dan appears at her elbow. “Walk in the park compared to your lot,” she says, smiling sharply. Her eyes flit to Neil and she softens. “Still doing okay, Neil?”

“She means, have we ruined your life,” Andrew says in German.

“Quick, tell her how saintly we are,” Nicky says.

“And lie?” Neil asks in exaggerated German, as if scandalized. “I’m fine,” he says to Dan. “Excited to see a Foxes set.” 

It’s a bigger venue than he’s used to, and the energy is intimidating, people whisking past them and calling instructions to one another.

Her smile quirks, and she lets her arm drape around Renee’s neck. “We’ll try our best to impress, then. As usual.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Nicky says. “You’re a big deal, we get it. Don’t you have warm-ups to do?”

Dan snorts. “Time off is making you a little mean, Hemmick. You better watch him, monster.”

Andrew stares blankly back at her, and Nicky says, “you try living with Kevin 24 hours a day and tell me how personable you’re feeling.”

Dan winces. “Point.” Someone ducks close and whispers in her ear, and her face flickers through several shades of confusion and annoyance. “Okay, shit. One of Allison’s pegs came loose and her tuning is all over the place. Sound check’s in five, and Matt’s on the wrong side of drunk, but um. The show must go on, I guess.”

Renee ducks out from under Dan’s arm, excusing herself, and Dan squeezes Neil’s shoulder in parting. “See you out there. Try not to get into trouble.”

“Yeah right,” Nicky says, and she aims a kick at his shin. He falls back a step, laughing, as she jogs after Renee. “Hey, rock and roll, Dan,” he calls. “Or whatever it is you guys do.”

He’s still beaming when he loops his arm with Neil’s and steers them towards the door. Neil looks anxiously back at Andrew, but he’s a step behind them as usual.

They wait for a lull in passersby, and then they’re out in the thick of the crowd, pushing conspicuously from the front of the stage to the side of the room. Eyes linger on them and narrow, and his throat starts to constrict until he feels Andrew’s hand thread into the shirt under his jacket, keeping him tethered.

Nicky can’t resist dancing a little to the opener, as obvious as they already are, and he bobs through the aisles, shooting furtive looks back at Neil to see if he’s enjoying himself. The band on stage is too high energy for their low energy song, jumping and twisting to a half-time rhythm. 

Andrew’s hand tightens at the small of his back, and Neil glances back to see him eyeing the thrashing drummer with distaste.

“I thought you didn’t care about technique,” Neil tells him over the music, and Andrew tears his eyes away. He’s frowning, and Neil relishes that off-guard little furrow of emotion.

“I don’t,” Andrew says, “I also don’t listen to bad music if I can help it.”

“Guess we must be pretty good, then,” Neil says.

“I didn’t say that.”

“No,” Neil agrees. “You didn’t.” He knows that it’s true, though. Somewhere past the layers and layers of bandages that Andrew wears, there must be raw flesh. It’s just that Neil can’t tell if he’s healing or rotting underneath it all.

They come to a stop close to the stairs up into the stands, and Nicky gestures at an empty patch halfway up. Most of the crowd is standing already, chaotic, but they climb up into the mess and find their seats, Nicky on the inside and Andrew in the aisle, with Neil sandwiched in-between.

“Our fans are louder,” Nicky leans over to say smugly.

“That’s because they’re trying to keep up with you,” Neil says. “Decibel for decibel.”

“Fuck you,” Nicky laughs. His eyes are bright, and he grips the seat in front of him to get the leverage to see through the masses.

They ride the energy of the crowd to the end of the song, and then the group is hollering goodbyes and filing offstage, and people start to sit down or escape to concession. Nicky relaxes back into his seat and pinches Neil for his opinion.

“I don’t think we missed much,” Neil says.

Nicky shrugs. “Yeah, but we were like that once. You got to skip Ausreißer’s adolescence, Neil, you lucky shit. It was not pretty.”

“Kevin showed me your first album,” he tells him.

“Oh, Jesus,” Nicky groans. “Those were dark times. I used to wear leather biker gloves on stage, like a tool.” He rustles in his inner jacket pocket and produces his flask. “Drink to forget?”

Andrew reaches across to pluck it from his hand before anyone can drink. He unscrews the cap and points it at Nicky. “I know you’re already fucked, Nicky.”

He scoffs, making a messy grab for it that Andrew dodges. “Hardly.”

Andrew swallows a generous shots worth, then passes the flask to Neil. This is familiar by now, sharing space and booze and drugs as a means to an end. They get drunk like they’re grappling down a cliff-face together, connected by rope.

Neil hesitates. There are strangers on all sides and the sick smell of sweat and beer in the air, but there’s something about his back to the wall and a concert ahead that he trusts. This is how he spent the years after his mother’s death, anonymous and drunk, losing control in measured doses like taking medication.

He drinks, the mouthpiece still wet from Andrew’s mouth, and screws his face up at the tartness of the flavour—a salty, lemony vodka. Nicky tries to steal the flask halfway through his sip, so Neil pushes him away by the face.

He and Andrew share the rest of the liquor, and he puts the back of his hand to his face to feel it warming up. It’s a relief, to feel his edges shaved off. It’s like he’s less defined this way, less likely to be recognized.

Stagehands are fiddling with amps onstage and taping wires down, and the buzz of the crowd is suddenly deafening.

“What’s the deal with Renee?” he hears himself asking.

“What d’you mean?” Nicky asks.

“You like her,” Neil guesses, jabbing Andrew with the base of the flask to get his attention. “But she’s nothing like you.”

“She’s one of us,” Andrew says.

“But she’s not, though,” Neil says, half-frustrated and half gawking at his own lack of composure. He wants his curiosity back inside where it can fester and wonder in circles and die. “I thought Wymack only took in strays. Charity cases.”

“You have met her twice,” Andrew says coldly. “How well do you think you can judge a person’s character in that time?”

“Pretty well,” Neil says grimly. He thinks of the cross around her neck and the prim lace of her collar, attention-grabbing hair offset by dark, serious eyes. He saw Matt’s track marks and Allison’s rage before Dan had even whispered their stories to him, but he can’t read anything on sweet, prim Renee.

“Lucky she doesn’t care what anyone thinks,” Nicky interjects. “She’s waiting to be judged by God, I think. Everyone else’s opinions are just… noise.”

He can’t imagine anyone who was really like them believing in God like that, but he bites his tongue.

“Little orphan Neil Josten gets in some trouble and he thinks he knows what rock bottom looks like,” Andrew muses, and Neil’s stomach sinks. “You haven’t even hit it yet.” He looks unfocused, and it occurs to Neil that he might have taken something before they left.

“You’re right,” Neil says. “But you promised that you’d be there when I do,” he reminds him. 

“What the fuck does that mean?” Nicky asks. “Neil?”

“Neil?” someone else says, and Neil looks over to see a woman and a couple of scruffy looking dudes frozen halfway up the stairs. His eyes drop to the shortest of the two, who’s wearing elbow-length armbands identical to Andrew’s. “Andrew! Nicky! Oh my god,” he says.

Nicky puts on a winning smile. “Hey!”

“I can’t believe you’re here—like, for real, there were rumours, but—oh my god— “

“He’s completely obsessed with you,” the woman gushes.

“Katie,” he hisses, and his friend shakes him good-naturedly by the shoulders.

“He’s afraid to say it, but—“

“Fuck off—“

“—every single album—“

“That’s very cute,” Nicky interrupts, cocking a flirtatious grin at the guy who’s holding his own cheeks, dismayed.

“We couldn’t believe you were just, like, changing your sound completely,” the taller guy says. “But Neil, man, I see why they’d take a chance for a voice like yours. It’s sick, dude.”

“Thanks,” Neil says stiffly.

“He’s not used to being recognized, yet,” Nicky says apologetically. “You’re taking his fan virginity.”

They titter, and the woman says, “we’re honoured.” She nudges her friend and widens her eyes meaningfully.

“We can’t really hang out though, sorry guys. Low profile tonight,” Nicky says. His smile is less believable by the second.

“Totally,” they chorus.

“I just quickly want to say, Andrew,” the first guy starts, breathless. “I know you get this all the time, but your lyrics saved my life. I couldn’t believe someone understood me like that, and—and you’re my--you inspire--I mean. I’m sorry, I’m so tongue-tied, I—“

“I didn’t write them for you,” Andrew says. 

The fan’s face crumples. Nicky looks at Neil, panicked, and then he forces a loud, incongruous laugh.

“Wow, good one,” Nicky says. “He doesn’t mean it, obviously.”

“Don’t I?” Andrew says.

“We appreciate it,” Neil interrupts. “But we can’t talk anymore.“

“Right, sorry, I’m so—“

They urge one another up the stairs, apologizing and thanking them, the one guy looking on the verge of tears through the bars of his friends’ arms, until they disappear up to the next level of seats.

“You could’ve pretended to be human,” Nicky hisses as soon as they’re gone.

“They call us monsters,” Andrew says. “What do they expect?” 

Nicky groans. “Please can we have fun, and not ruin anyone else’s night, especially our fans? People are gonna egg our car.”

Neil’s stomach squirms, and he crosses his arms over it. There could be well-meaning, invasive people like that everywhere, and now he’s tipsy and angry and stuck.

The house lights go down a few minutes later, and the whole crowd sucks in a collective breath before they plunge headfirst into cheering.

Neil’s arms loosen. Nicky stands up at his side, hooting, and everyone follows suit, craning towards the stage, wanting to be the first thing the band sees.

Dan comes out first, waving with both hands, and Matt follows, winking at the crowd and sliding his guitar over his head. Allison and Renee emerge from either side of the stage, Allison towering in high heels and glowing under the lights. Renee’s hair is wild, and her face is different, tongue caught in her teeth, almost cocky.

They fit behind their instruments like joints cracking into place, and they play their first chord in perfect unison, all of them operating different parts of the same body.

The crowd roars their approval. Neil sits upright. He’s surprised to feel Andrew standing up beside him, stepping into the aisle to watch. He follows without thinking.

The jangling, bopping drum line doesn’t wait for the strings to catch up, and Renee doesn’t need to watch to see that they’re following her. Her wrists are supple, and she’s lost to the music like she’s been playing for hours and not seconds.

The room goes up in flames when Dan starts singing, like the fans are all hungry, dry wood, and she’s a spark. She works the microphone free from its stand and starts running with it.

“Fucking excellent, right,” Nicky shouts, and Neil nods, mesmerized. The crowd moves together even separated by sections and rows of seats. 

It’s nothing like an Ausreißer concert, where boiling blood turns into wine, and everyone turns their desperate faces up to the stage like they’re waiting to be healed. Foxes sing like they’re in love and they fought for it. 

Neil can admit that they’re as musically proficient as the monsters, too, making up for lack of technical flair with a complete understanding of their sound.

Matt smiles dopily down at his guitar and then at Dan, like he can’t decide which deserves his attention more. When she floats towards him, he gets springy with it, teasing her with guitar licks, carving shapes into her oaky voice. Allison’s hand goes protectively to her tuning pegs whenever she has a break in the music, but her bass is rich and in tune.

They do an old-fashioned crescendo like it’s a classical piece, and Dan is almost conducting, hitting the air when Renee smashes the cymbals, gesturing for more when Allison starts a slippery solo, so fast that she laughs and tosses her hair, exhilarated.

Neil makes a hurt noise that gets swallowed in the din, but Andrew looks at him anyway. Neil looks back, studying his wide black pupils and wondering why he only bothers to pay attention when he’s stoned.

He remembers the wide eyes of the kid with the armbands, the agony of his disappointment, and he forces himself to look back out at the band.

One song finishes and another climbs on its back. People move and mill out of their seats towards the stage. He feels like he’s seeing double, like he’s watching a long pilgrimage that’s somehow been condensed or played back.

The first break in the music, Dan laughs her way out of the song, takes a swig of wine, and says “how was that?” into the mic, pointing out towards the place where the monsters are standing. Nicky puts two fingers to his mouth and whistles.

Her stage presence is unparalleled. She’s funny and a little hard on her audience, begging them to sing louder, drive her offstage if they can. Neil can see why she’s in charge, unofficially. She paces circles around the stage like she’s boosting morale. She barely needs the microphone to be heard.

They topple back into their set without warning, a trust fall of a count-in where Renee bangs out a few warning shots and everyone’s hands fly to their instruments.

Somewhere in the thicket of fans, Neil hears someone call, “Andrew!” He sees an incongruous flash, turned towards the audience and not the stage.

“Nicky, Nicky Hemmick! Nicky, over here—“

“Andrew,” Neil starts.

“We love you, Neil,” someone screams.

“Don’t—“

Neil’s jostled down a stair, and Andrew yanks him back up.

“Ignore them,” Andrew says viciously.

“Yeah,” Nicky agrees, but he’s clearly rattled. “What are they gonna do?”

Neil struggles to get his bearings. A few of them are still shouting, recording them with their phones or fighting their way through the crowd towards them. Nicky motions for them to stop, but a few people get close enough to beg for autographs or snap blurry photos of themselves with the band members in the background. He wonders if it was the fans from before, upset enough to tip off the whole crowd to their seat numbers. 

“Bet you didn’t think we were this famous, huh?” Nicky jokes nervously. 

Andrew has no problem with shoving people away, and Nicky frantically apologizes as many times as he can before he just starts shaking his head. Neil is forced painfully into Nicky’s side, and he can hear people in their row restlessly asking what’s going on.

Most of the audience is oblivious, still focused on Foxes’ raucous energy, but the three of them are surrounded for another ten minutes before people start to get frustrated enough to give up. The rest of them are shoulder-tapped by security, and the throng dwindles to nothing.

“You okay?” Nicky asks. Neil nods, but when he blinks he can still see pinholes of light from camera flashes. He knows that the photos will end up online where anyone can see him as he is right now, and they can guess at his habits or zero in on his location if they want to.

He’s been reckless for a long time, but standing pooled in stage lights feels entirely, chokingly different from wading down into the crowd and feeling the attention slither around him like seaweed.

Andrew crushes a hand to the back of his neck, and Neil inhales all at once.

“Kinda ironic that crowds freak you out so much when you sing for one every night,” Nicky says. He’s standing half in front of Neil, eclipsing the concert still unfolding in the background.

“It’s not the crowd.” Neil shakes his head to clear it. “It’s—they all know who I am.”

‘They think they do,” Nicky corrects firmly, fingers curling into Neil’s arms. The harpy tattoo peers out from under his sheer sleeve, a monster in a veil.

“They want to,” Andrew says, gaze tossed out to the back of the venue. His face is so blank and washed out under the lights that it’s like it’s been chemically stripped of colour. “You’ve caught their attention.”

Neil pulls free from Nicky’s arms and sits heavily in his seat. “I don’t want it.”

“You might not have a choice,” Nicky says, sitting next to him, smothering the distance Neil keeps trying and failing to cultivate.

“You always have a choice,” Andrew says, and when Neil looks up at him, he’s holding out his right hand with its painted yes. Neil accepts it gingerly, and Andrew drags him to his feet.

They watch the rest of the concert from backstage.

Andrew sits propped up on an amp, and Nicky alternates between trying to get the band’s attention from the wings, and mimicking Matt’s solos with vigorous air guitar. Neil suspects he’s trying to get him to laugh.

Neil has enough distance now to feel stupid about locking up during such a minor incident and proving Kevin right. The crowd has already forgotten them, or never knew they were there. The show goes on. 

They’re coming up on their encore performance when Neil feels a buzzing at his hip. 

He fishes an unfamiliar cellphone out of his pocket and stares uncomprehendingly at the message lingering on screen, sent from a number he doesn’t recognize.

A neat little ’60’ and nothing else.

[incorrect-tfc-quotes]

Scars Are Okay, Part 2

The air felt different without his mask and while Marcus would never say it out loud, he missed it sometimes. He missed have the reminder that he had gotten out, gotten free. Ms. G might have given it to him out of fear, but his parents had loved to admire their work and the mask felt like a barrier between himself and his parents.

Being without the mask was very foreign to Marcus, but being alone was completely alien to him. Andrew and Neil had to leave early for a game close by that Marcus wanted to go to go, but they would have stayed out too late for him. So they left him with his sitter, a nice lady who went by Kelly. She had brought him to Aaron and Katelyn’s to see Andy who also was not allowed to go to the game. They had played together for hours and he wanted to sleep over, but he had to ask Neil first and they couldn’t reach him until the game was over, so he had to go home. Kelly had class the next day, so she took him home and stayed with him until he fell asleep, tucking him in and kissing his forehead gently. She didn’t seem to mind his scars at all. Actually, she seemed to be very protective of him because of it. Marcus liked her very much, so Andrew and Neil like her too. But she had left a long time ago, shutting the door as softly as possible before locking it with her spare key.

He had just started to get used to living with Andrew and Neil, but on nights like these, when he felt the hands pinning him down and the burn of the cigerette buds as they seared his skin. He had jolted out of bed from the nightmare, covered in a cold sweat and heart racing so fast the Marcus gripped the shirt above his chest. He couldn’t breathe, couldn’t get past that haunting pain that crawled over his skin.

The younger kids at the orphanage would have broken into the kitchen to get him water and the older ones would have hugged him until he felt better, brushed his hair back and told him stories of the great Neil Josten who had survived his scars and was living his dream on the court. But Marcus was alone in the apartment. The bed felt too big, his room too empty and for the first time in a long time, Marcus felt entirely alone. He was used to having people only a whisper away, but no one would hear him even if he screamed at the top of his lungs. He had panicked in his fear, stumbling from his bed and fumbling on the doorknob, ultimately waking up Andrew in the process.

The man had opened his door silently, peeking his head out, hair making its appearance before his face.

“I didn’t hear you come in.” Marcus croaked, eyes wide. He wanted to run at the man, bury his face in his chest and feel safe, but Andrew had other ideas. He had taken one look at Marcus and glanced back into his room. Marcus could see the silhouette of Neil in the bed, chest rising and falling in even breaths. Marcus knew the man had trouble sleeping, so he made no further noise. Marcus held himself as still as possible and he thought Andrew would shut the door in his face, he looked to tired. They had just played a whole game and here Marcus was making a whole problem.

But Andrew had stepped out and shut his bedroom door as softly as possible and led Marcus through the apartment to the front door. He fussed about, grabbing this and that, grumbling under his breath and Marcus was so tense he felt like he might shatter like glass if he made a single move. But Andrew had handed Marcus his shoes and coat before slipping on his own.

The boy had no idea of what to make of the man, but he slipped on his shoes all the same. The pair stepped out of the apartment, locking the door behind them. Andrew had jerked his head and Marcus followed him as they walked down the hall and to the elevator. Andrew pushed the button and Marcus risked a glance at him. The ends of his hair were a bit damp and Marcus wondered if he had showered.

The door dinged and slid aside for them. Andrew pushed another button and they stood in silence as the cart rose to the top floor, dinging proudly before sliding the doors open to reveal a dimly lit hall with no windows and no doors. It could have been a hospital, so sparse was the furniture. White wall and white floor tiles and a wooden railing on either side.

Marcus threw a confused glance at Andrew, but he simply led him down the hall and around a corner to a flight of stairs just as barren.

Andrew walked, hands searching his pockets, but Marcus did not follow. There was a bulge in his pocket that pushed on the thinning fabick, rectangular and small enough to fit in the palm of his hand. The boy had become too accustomed to that sight and his body became numb as his brain shut down. He froze, running would only make it worse and he knew his parent had gotten mad if when he didn’t follow, but his legs didn’t move.

Andrew glanced over his shoulder when he reached the top of the stairs, staring at Marcus for a second and tracking his eyes. He grumbled again and dug around in his pocket, pulling out a box, wrapped in a ribbon.

“Neil wanted to give this to you.” He said and shrugged, holding it out. Marcus climbed the stairs, curiosity fueling his legs before his mind could stop himself. When he got close enough, Andrew pushed it to his chest. Marcus gripped it with both hands, not taking his eyes off Andrew.

It was a flip phone, fresh from the store. “It’s already programmed with our contacts. I don’t care if you use it or not, but we have a rule. A single rule that you follow not matter what.” It was the first either of them had said since they left the apartment and his voice echoed down the hall. Andrew held up a single finger and stared Marcus down. “You keep that on you at all times. You may never use it, but you keep that on you. Understand?”

Marcus gave him a wary look, hesitating, but he nodded after a moment, clutching the phone harder. He started at the box that hardly fit in his small hands, a tightness in his chest easing slightly. Marcus didn’t see Andrew’s face soften, but he watched his hand as it relaxed at his sides.

Andrew’s face didn’t change as he searched and struggled with his pockets before he pulled out a ring of keys. Neil’s hoodies seemed to fit differently every time Andrew wore them and he never put the stuff in the same pockets. Andrew cursed him and his cats under his breath, fingers finally finding the right key. He unlocked the waiting door in a quick jerk, pushing it open to the chill night and empty roof.

Andrew walked into the cold night, leaving the door open behind him.

An open invitation, he realized. Marcus could leave if he wanted to, walk back to the elevator and to the apartment or all the way back to the orphanage if he wanted to, but something about Andrew had made Marcus stand up straighter. His instincts weren’t on edge, but he felt concentrated when he was with Andrew, focused. So Marcus had waited until Andrew had seated himself in the center of the roof, laying on his back, before passing under the doorway.

He shut the door behind him and his senses immediately sharpened as the light vanished and the cold air nipped at his skin. A thick layer of gravel crunched under his shoes as he moved to stand next to Andrew’s still body and the distant sound of cars floated up to meet him. The apartment building was quite tall and the lights from the surrounding city didn’t quite reach the roof, but the moon was bright enough for Marcus to look around.

There was no fence and when Marcus strode to stand at the edge, he found no barrier between him and the sidewalk, far, far below. Gravel crunched behind him and Marcus found Andrew standing behind him, so close Marcus could hear the rustle of his clothes as he breathed.

He hadn’t even heard Andrew get up, but there he was, standing like a statue behind him. Something like fear flashed in Andrew’s eyes and only then did Marcus realize just how close he was to the edge. One step and he’d be gone. Dead.

“Neil doesn’t want you too close to the edge.” He said and looked to the door Marcus had shut as if expecting to see the man. Marcus nodded in understanding and stepped back, seating himself a ways away from the lip. He laid on his back like Andrew had, phone still tight to his chest. Gravel dug into his back and he could feel some sharp edges against his head, but he held himself still as Andrew followed him.

Andrew laid beside him, a good two feet between them. “I had a bad dream.” Marcus said and Andrew blew out a breath. Marcus tensed. The cold make it look like smoke.

Andrew noticed his muscles tighten and said, “Neil and I used to smoke.” Marcus nodded. He had smelt it in the apartment, nose always searching for the familiar stench that made his eyes burn and lungs stutter. “We don’t anymore.” Marcus nodded again, fingers tightening on the box.

“I know.” Marcus said. “I went through your trash. I hope you don’t mind, but I found the packets.” Marcus lifted his scarred hand and examined it in the moonlight. His fingers were shaking and his teeth were chattering softly, but he felt no cold. “Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me. We didn’t do anything to deserve it.” Andrew said, but Marcus wasn’t having any of it.

“Yes, you did.” He said and spoke again before Andrew could shut him down. “Withdrawal is a scary thing.” Andrew did not speak. Neither pushing nor pulling and Marcus wanted to thank him for the silence. He didn’t just want to talk about what happened, though. He wanted to talk to Andrew, because if nothing else, Andrew was solid. Not stable and maybe not sane, but solid. “The police lady tried to make my parents quit when they had me, saying it was bad for me. I knew she was just being nice, but they did not like it when people told them what to do. That’s when they started to burn me.” His breathing was starting to grow ragged and his breath was becoming the smoke they had breathed in his face before they grabbed his face in their gray hands.

Andrew had been watching him from the corner of his eyes and when Marcus started to hyperventilate, he reached out and covered Marcus’s eyes with his hand.

It was scary at first. It always hurt more when he closed his eyes, but then Andrew said, “Breathe.” Marcus followed his command, pulling cold air into his lung, chest expanding. He smelt no smoke. There was no sound of a lighter flicking open, only the crunching of gravel as Andrew sat up.

Marcus calmed enough to speak, reminding himself that he only smelt the cold air and the scent of the detergent Andrew and Neil used. “They started with me feet. They said that if the smoke was bad for me, they could make it worse. They moved us after the school asked where I was and the police left us alone after that. They went to a bad area, but by then were done with my feet and had moved to my legs.” He shuddered and hot tears welled in his eyes. One tiny hand released his new phone and reached for Andrew. His hand was freezing compared to Andrew’s and the man released his eyes to rub at both of his hands.

Even without Andrew’s hand, he kept his eyes closed and he talked. “I told the teachers I had a skin condition and the older kids from the orphanage said that it was such a bad area they couldn’t do anything anyways.” He laughed under his breath, succumbing to hysteria as his memories took over. “Andrew.” He said, laughter subsided and voice suddenly becoming solem. “I can still feel it sometimes and it hurts.” He pulled his hand away from Andrew’s and brushed it over his face as if trying to remind himself that his skin had healed as best as it could and no scabs were left from where they burned him. “It always hurts.”

“Do you need to go anywhere?” Andrew was stone beside him, not breathing too hard and gripping his hand enough for Marcus to feel it, but not enough to feel like a vice. “I could hurt them, if you wanted to.” Andrew had felt anger before. He had felt rage and ferocity and an unending need to hurt, but he had never felt so hot because of it. His blood was boiling and his hand straining to a set Marcus’s parents on fire. There was lava in his veins and it burned to sit there and do nothing as Marcus suffered. His Marcus. His little boy who he had sworn to protect the moment after he’d seen him with that mask.

“No.” Marcus said. “You can’t.”

“Why?” Andrew knew he was proding, but it was inhuman to go through that much trama, that much pain and not want anything in return.

“Because they're dead.” Marcus said and finally opened his eyes.

Andrew was stunned into silence. Dead. This boy was an orphan. Andrew had thought the police had taken him and his parents locked away in some prison, but they were truly gone. Marcus had said can’t, not won’t or don’t, but can’t. Andrew could not hurt his parents because they were already dead.

“Did you?” Andrew asked, getting his voice back enough to ask. Marcus shook his head, just as choked as Andrew. “Did you see?” Marcus nodded. Andrew remained silent. If he wanted to talk, he would. And Marcus really did want to talk. He couldn’t tell the other students since it would scare them and Ms. Green had already been terrified of him. He had kept his story to himself and it suffocated him.

“The police officer who had first talked to my parents had found us against after a few years. She said she had come to see how I was doing.” He laughed again, eyes burning as he talked. “She had no idea about what they were doing to me.” His gaze was far away as he continued and Andrew recognized that stare. He had worn that stare for so long. “They had gotten to my face by then and I couldn’t hide it even if I want to. They had been sleeping when she came, so I was the one to open the door. I remember feeling my skin on my hands burn when I opened the door.” He was heaving and there was a weight on his chest that was pushing him into the ground him. Just like all those times his dad would hold him down and all the times his mom’s nails would sting when she gripped him. “She had taken me from the house and she put me in her car. She told me if I needed anything from the house and I had told her no, but she didn’t close the door when we left. She went back to close the door so it would talk them longer to realize I was gone. Someone had grabbed her when she reached for the door and I remember hearing yelling and then a bang. Then mommy came out of the house and there was blood on her face and then the police lady came out. Mommy was running to the car and I thought she was gonna take me, but then she fell and the police lady was on her back. They were fighting right outside the car and I wanted to get out, but I couldn’t more my fingers anymore.” He flexed them as if trying to remember how to move them. “Then mommy got police lady’s gun and put it in her mouth. Police lady stopped fighting, but mommy hadn’t shot yet. They got up and police lady stood in front of the window. They were talking, but I could hear them. And then there was the bang. Mommy wouldn’t get up after that.” He had started crying, but he didn’t remember when. “Andrew?” Marcus asked and Andrew almost didn’t hear him.

“Yeah?” He answered, not moving in case he scared the boy.

“Are you and Neil going to go die too?” Too much, Andrew realized. This boy had gone through too much. Marcus reached up and fisted his scarred hand in Andrew’s sweater. “I don’t want you and Neil to die.”

Andrew lifted the boy, going slow. He watched the boy’s face for any shift, any change in his expression, any tensing of his body. But Marcus remained limp and Andrew lifted him from the gravel, phone still clutched in his hand.

He set the boy on his lap and stared directly into his eyes. “No. Neil and I are not going to die.” Marcus seemed to accept that and leaned his head against Andrew’s chest.

“Good, because you two have to make it to semifinals next month.” He said, muffled against Andrew’s chest.

“You’re worse than he is.” Andrew almost laughed. “I might start calling you Junkie Jr.” He brushed his hand over the boy’s hair, not entirely knowing how to confort. But then he felt the boy’s ears. They felt like ice and now that he listened, he heard Marcus sniffing softly. “Let’s get you inside. Neil is probably going to yell at us, but I am going to make us some hot chocolate downstairs.” Marcus nodded and Andrew wrapped his arms around the boy, lifting him easily and heading for the promise of a hot beverage.

“Wait a minute.” He told the boy and Marcus nodded obediently. Neil narrowed his eyes, but said nothing. Eventually, the cup cooled down enough for them to take a sip and Neil smiled softly at the two of them. “Two oh six.” Andrew said into his cup and Neil smiled a little wider.

Neil was indeed awake, hands on hips and a scowl on his face. He scolded Andrew for taking Marcus out without gloves and a hat, but he was most angry about the phone Marcus had clutched to his chest.

“We agreed I would give it to him.” Neil whined, handing Andrew and Marcus their steaming cups. Andrew shrugged and took Marcus’s cup before he burned his tongue.

Marcus glance between them and said. “One percent.”

AN: Sorry this took a hella of a long time. School had me stressed for a really long time and there are still some issues that need to be resolved. In short, I am dealing with a lot of isolation and anxiety rn and I needed a distraction so I wrote a part two.

[wematch]

Only You

In their second year a deal is made. Andrew wants to explore his boundaries and there’s really just one person he trusts around himself.

Set in a universe where everything is the same except that Andrew never kissed Neil on the rooftop that night. Instead, they just got closer and more comfortable around each other.

Read from the start if you haven’t yet! [Part 1]

You can also read it on [AO3]

As always a huge thank you to @velvetnoodle for being an amazing beta <3<3

Part 6

Neil follows Andrew to their usual spot at the end of the bus and sits down in front of him. Kevin had tried to go over what everyone had done wrong during the game as soon as the engine started running but Wymack had told him to shut up. So now, the bus was quiet as everyone settled down to rest during the journey back.

Neil has his forehead resting against the window to watch the blurry landscape as they travel but he finds himself keep coming back to stare at Andrew instead. He keeps thinking about the game they just lost against the Trojans — they’re a fierce team and the Foxes gave it their best against them but tonight it just wasn’t enough. Maybe they’ll play again against them at the finals; if there’s a team Neil would like most to face in the finals, it’s the Trojans.

Halfway into the journey back, Andrew slowly opens his eyes to look at Neil. “Staring,” he comments.

Neil averts his eyes again and takes a deep breath. He can feel the exhaustion setting in after the game but he’s too uncomfortable to try to properly rest the way he is. A few minutes later, Andrew nudges him with his feet so Neil looks curiously at him. To anyone else, Andrew would seem to be only staring back but Neil sees the unspoken question in Andrew’s face about what’s going on in his head.

“I was thinking about the Trojans,” Neil tells him, “and that I want to meet them in the finals this year.” Andrew rolls his eyes at that and Neil can almost hear him in his head calling him a junkie. But then after a moment, Neil continues almost in a whisper, “Jean seemed well with the team.”

Andrew visibly tenses at the mention of Jean and doesn’t say anything about it. “Try to rest,” he tells him instead.

“I can’t; not like this,” Neil explains, understanding that talking about Jean brings back too many memories from last year. He didn’t manage to talk to Jean after the game but in reality, he wouldn’t even know what to say to him after everything they’ve been through. Neil’s just glad that he found a good team to stay with after the Ravens.

Neil looks at Andrew and studies him for a moment. He has a foot resting between Neil and the window, and the other lazily stretched on the floor, looking as comfortable as he can be on the bus. After a moment, Neil decides to stand and sit next to Andrew to stretch his legs on the bench he was previously sitting on.

He tries to find a comfortable position to be in but doesn’t quite manage. He feels annoyed at himself; two years ago he would’ve fallen asleep anywhere he wanted, but now after getting used to sleeping in a decent bed every day that doesn’t happen anymore. He keeps moving around to get a into better position until Andrew speaks again.

“Stop moving,” Andrew tells him with his eyes closed. “Either that or move away.”

Their legs are touching so Neil tries to stay still to let Andrew rest but after a few minutes, he can no longer manage to do it. He shifts slightly again to find a better position to relax.

“Neil,” Andrew says it like a warning and opens his eyes to stare at Neil.

Nei looks sideways at Andrew, and notices the comfortable hoodie that he has on and begins to wonder if Andrew would allow him to lean against him. “Andrew, yes or no?” Neil asks tentatively motioning with his hand towards Andrew’s shoulder.

Andrew turns to stare outside through the window for so long that Neil thinks he’s not going to get an answer. “It’s a yes, as long as you stay still,” Andrew quietly replies.

For a moment Neil doesn’t move, too surprised that Andrew had just agreed to it. He blinks three times before he slowly moves to rest his head on Andrew’s shoulder to try to close his eyes for a few minutes. However, it doesn’t take long for his neck to start to ache from being bent in a weird angle.

Andrew, sensing his discomfort, sighs and shifts to put his arm that was resting on his lap around Neil, pulling him closer to his chest in the process. The hoodie feels soft against Neil’s face and there’s a faint smell of smoke on it from the cigarette Andrew had before they climbed onto the bus. The warmth from Andrew’s body reaches him making his body relax. Neil closes his eyes and grins, feeling safe where he is.

“One hundred and twenty-eight,” Andrew says as he squeezes his side in a warning. Neil tries and fails to stop the grin on his face. “Going on one hundred and twenty-nine.”

***

An hour later, Wymack parks the bus in their parking lot and rushes everyone to get out. Neil quietly exits the bus followed by Andrew, and they make a beeline for the Maserati to make the short drive back to the Fox Tower.

As soon as they park the car in the dorms and exit the vehicle, Kevin storms away into the building without waiting for them and Neil watches Aaron stop in front of Andrew with Nicky trailing behind him. He notices how Nicky is looking at his feet so Neil decides to start walking inside to give them some space to talk as a family. However, he almost curses when he finds himself walking behind Mike and Renee. He doesn’t want to be included in their conversation, so he slows down his pace to create some distance between them.

He’s about to enter the building when he hears Nicky call his name so he looks to the side and sees Nicky jogging to catch up with him.

“Hey,” Nicky says once he stops in front of Neil, “Andrew is asking for you.”

Neil nods slightly confused and wonders what they said to Andrew that made him call Neil back instead of meeting back in their dorm room. He walks back to the end of the parking lot where Andrew always parks and passes Aaron on the way. They glance at each other but neither one says a word. When Neil reaches the Maserati, Andrew is already inside with the engine on.

Andrew spares him a glance when Neil pauses near his open window. “Get in the car," he tells him.

“What about the others?” Neil asks, feeling even more confused after he steps into the car. Neil thought they were all going to Columbia like every other weekend, except Kevin, who had already told them before the game that he wanted to stay with Wymack in order to spend some time with his father. When his question is ignored he insists, “What about Aaron and Nicky?”

“Aaron wants to stay," Andrew explains, “so Nicky is going to stay too. The upperclassmen already invited him to go out.”

Neil stays quiet until they enter the highway as he tries to process this. It was going to be just the two of them going to Columbia this weekend. He didn't mind the idea; between practices, and classes, and sharing the dorm with Kevin they could never spend a lot of time together. The few moments they had alone were mostly on the rooftop.

“Are we going to Eden’s?” Neil asks once they reach their highway exit.

“No, let’s just stay in the house tonight,” Andrew answers him. Neil hums in acknowledgment and glances at Andrew; he feels exhausted and the idea of just going back to the house and not to the packed club sounds pretty good.

Once they're at the house, Neil is about to go to the bathroom after Andrew to get ready for the night when he remembers that he never went upstairs to get his travel bag. “Andrew?”

Andrew sees him hesitating near the bathroom door and comes to stop near his side and glance into the bathroom. When he doesn't see anything wrong he simply stares at Neil, waiting for him to continue.

“Is just that I didn’t go upstairs to get my bag and— ”

“There are some spare toothbrushes in the cabinet,” Andrew tells him and starts to walk towards his bedroom.

Neil nods; he can always go to the mall tomorrow and get a fresh pair of clothes for the weekend. Nicky would be happy to see him in new clothes as he keeps complaining about his old ones, but Neil grimaces at the waste of money that would be. He has a few new clothes already that Allison made him buy; there’s no point in buying more. It’s not like he’s just going to throw away all his old ones; those are still good to go to the gym.

When he steps outside the bathroom, Andrew points to his left at the top of the couch where a small pile of clothes is sitting and doesn’t bother explaining it.

Neil grabs the clothes and glances at Andrew. “Thanks,” he tells him, Andrew doesn’t acknowledge it other than glancing in his direction and returning to look at the TV screen, so Neil returns to the bathroom to put on the clothes. Both the sweatpants and the sweater are black. The sweater feels comfortable and loose on him since Andrew has broader shoulders and the clothes look very similar to the ones Andrew has dressed just now. Once Neil’s done changing he sits on the couch right next to Andrew.

They begin to watch an old movie but Neil is not really focusing on it. He feels exhausted from the day so not even halfway through the movie he makes himself more comfortable on the couch to try to rest by sliding down on the cushions.

Andrew turns his head to the side to study Neil. After a few moments, his hand comes to rest on Neil’s neck, guiding Neil’s head to his lap. Neil gets the idea and follows along, stretching his legs on the couch. Then he feels Andrew’s hand resting on his hair, and one of his fingers starts to make slow patterns on Neil’s scalp, making his eyes feel heavy.

Neil closes his eyes feeling content where he is. He starts to wonder what it would like to sleep next to Andrew. He's expecting Andrew to get up to go to his bedroom at any moment but when it doesn't happen Neil eventually turns his head to look up and finds Andrew with his eyes barely open.

“Are you going to sleep here?” Neil asks quietly. They’ve slept near each other before but not this close, not when they were close enough to be touching.

“No,” Andrew says. “It's not a good idea, you know how I can wake up.”

“I know, and it doesn't matter.”

“Don't be stupid,” Andrew tells him.

“I'm not. All I'm saying is that I don't care.” When Andrew doesn't say anything else Neil continues, “If you lash out you'll stop as soon as you understand what's happening.”

Neil gives Andrew some time to think about it and when the hand in his head starts moving again, he presses on insistently,“ Yes or no?”

Andrew lets out a frustrated breath. “Yes, but not here. I'm not going to sleep on this damn couch,” Andrew finally tells him and removes his hand. “Now, move.”

Neil sits up on the couch and watches Andrew get up and start to walk in the direction of his bedroom. Neil blinks twice, wondering if he had heard right, that Andrew had just agreed to this. “Come on,” Andrew says to Neil once he opens the door and notices that Neil hasn’t moved from his spot on the couch.

When Neil enters the bedroom, Andrew is already on the bed with his back to the wall. “Are you going to just keep staring?” Andrew asks him when Neil doesn’t move from the door.

“No,” Neil answers, closing the door before walking to the bed. He climbs in and leaves as much space as he can between them. ”Tell me if you need me to leave, okay?”

“Yeah, or I can just push you off the bed,” Andrew points out. Neil rolls his eyes and watches curiously as Andrew moves closer to him, holding himself up with his arm. “Yes or no?” Andrew asks him, staring at his lips.

Neil licks his own lips subconsciously. “Yes,” he answers right away; he’s been waiting the whole damn day for this. They kiss until Neil feels his mouth sore and he’s too sleepy to move at all. And eventually, they fall asleep.

[Part 7]

[transgenderboobs]

Do you write kevineil? If you do 18 for Situation and 24 for the sentence!! Thank youuuuu

i Do write kevineil !! i’m still getting the hang of their characters b/c this is only the Second time i’ve written them but like. i’m trying my hardest and i love them ! :’>>

18 - Someone’s birthday + 24 - “I never want you to feel like you’re not good enough.”

On the morning of February 22nd, Neil awoke to a bleak morning. There was rain hammering the windows, and everything outside looked gray and cold and uninviting. It looked like the world itself was practically begging Neil to stay in bed, but practice would start in an hour and if Neil wanted to get any kind of run in he had to get up now.

Neil almost skipped his run entirely when he moved to get up and Kevin’s arms tightened around his middle, Kevin himself letting out a faint groan of dissatisfaction as Neil extricated himself and climbed down. Kevin didn’t wake entirely, but that was no surprise. He slept like the dead, and wouldn’t truly wake until the alarm for practice went off. 

Neil grabbed his clothes as quietly as he could and changed in the bathroom as not to disturb the others. He made his way out to the living room, pulled on his shoes and closed the suite door quietly behind him. He took a second to steel himself, and then took the stairs down to the ground floor and headed out into the rain. 

Even Neil couldn’t stay out in weather like this for too long; especially after all the rain almost made him slip and fall twice. After the second near-miss, Neil slowed down to a jog and turned back towards Fox Tower. By the time he made it back to the dorm, Nicky and Aaron had migrated over from their own dorm to catch a ride in Andrew’s car, and Andrew had the coffee maker brewing. Kevin should be up by now, too, but there was no sign of him in the living room. 

“Jesus, Neil,” Nicky said when he heard the front door close, “Please tell me you didn’t actually go running in this.”

“Where’s Kevin?” Was all Neil said to that, figuring his dripping hair would be answer enough for Nicky. 

Nicky sighed and shrugged. “Still asleep,” he said. “You know Kevin. A nuclear holocaust couldn’t even get his ass out of bed.”

Neil frowned. It was true, Kevin was impossible to wake, but Exy was usually the only thing that could get him up. “He’s going to miss practice,” Neil commented, trying to mask the faint prickle of unease in his gut.

Nicky shrugged. “Yeah, probably. He gets weird on his birthday.”

Neil blinked. He tried to remember if Kevin had been at practice on this date last year, but with all the mob drama and pressure to beat the Ravens and healing form Riko’s abuse the months of January through March were a complete blur to Neil now. “It’s Kevin’s birthday?”

“Yep,” Nicky confirmed, and then hopped to his feet when Andrew meandered over to his side with a full cup of coffee and a bored expression on his face. “He’ll be fine tomorrow if we give him some space,” Nicky assured Neil, putting a hand on his shoulder and turning him towards the door as he and Aaron followed Andrew out the door. 

Neil hesitated, half wanting to stick around, but if he needed space Neil could give him that, and he followed the cousins out the door and down to the car.

Neil’s thoughts kept drifting back to Kevin during his classes, and things didn’t improve when Kevin was absent from afternoon practice as well. Jack and Sheena constantly pushing his buttons during the entirety of practice didn’t help, either, and for once in life Neil couldn’t wait to get off the court.

Once Dan dismissed the team, Neil showered as quickly as he could and skipped the ride in favor of walking. He didn’t think he could stand being crammed into a crowded car right now; even if Kevin’s absence meant he’d be awarded the front seat. The rain had calmed down enough by now that Neil could make it back to the Tower without being soaked, so he jogged his way down Perimeter Road and back to the dorm.

Andrew’s car was already in the parking lot when he returned, but Neil found the suite empty when he got there. Neil figured Andrew was up smoking on the roof. Neil found Kevin wandering out of the bedroom, presumably after hearing the door open and shut. Kevin was still in his pajamas, which were really just sweats and an old T-shirt which was just a little too small for him. Normally Neil would’ve had a hard time tearing his eyes away from the little strip of skin between his shirt and his pants, but the dead look in Kevin’s eyes got his attention this time.

There was a moment, barely a fraction of a second, where they both just stood there, frozen in place, and then Neil crossed the room to stand in front of Kevin. It was pretty much an established fact that Neil was shit awful at the whole comfort thing, but whatever was eating at Kevin was obviously serious, and he had to at least try.

Luckily, Kevin seemed to know what he needed better than Neil did. Kevin had to bend down to do so thanks to their height difference, but he wrapped his arms around Neil’s waist and buried his face against Neil’s neck. Neil stood on his toes so Kevin would have to stoop less, putting his own arms around Kevin’s shoulders. Neil wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that, but he didn’t mind.

An hour or so later, and Neil was sitting with Kevin on the couch. Kevin was curled up on the cushions, his head in Neil’s lap while Neil ran his fingers through his hair. They hadn’t spoken since Neil got home from practice, but Kevin seemed to have relaxed from just having someone to lean on.

But Neil couldn’t just let the silence stretch on forever. He wasn’t exactly known for keeping his mouth shut. And he needed to know what had brought on Kevin’s breakdown today, so he could do what he could to prevent it in the future, or at the very least know better how to be there for him.

“Kevin,” Neil said, his hand going still in Kevin’s hair. “What is it about today?”

He didn’t need to be any more specific than that for Kevin to know what he meant. His  fingers tightened around Neil’s thigh, his nails digging into Neil’s jeans. He was quiet for long Neil was almost sure he’d have to give Kevin another little prod to get his answer, but finally Kevin sat up so he could look at Neil while he explained. 

Kevin’s jaw worked for a second, that haunted look returning to his eyes. “It’s idiotic and trivial,” Kevin said.

“Who cares?” Neil asked. “It’s a big enough deal to make you have a meltdown in the middle of the week. That hardly sounds idiotic and trivial.”

Kevin scowled, like he always did when he knew Neil was right. He glanced around the room like he was double-checking that they were the only ones there. “Think about it, Neil. Think about what day it is. Think about the fucking date.”

So Neil did think about it, and he was a little ashamed to admit how long it took him to figure it out. “February twenty-second,” he said. “Two-two-two.” Neil didn’t believe in fate or luck or anything like that, but he couldn’t help but think that if it was real it was truly unkind to Kevin Day, it seemed.

Kevin nodded, a grimace on his face. It looked as though it physical pained him to say what he said next. Maybe it did. “It feels like I was born to be second,” Kevin said, subconsciously lifting his hand to trace the tattoo on his cheek. “Like I’ll never step out of— his shadow.”

Neil had to fight back an unexpected spike of anger. Kevin didn’t need that right now. He sighed, willing his temper to back off at least for a little bit. It helped him to picture the broken look Riko had worn the moment before his brother had shot him. 

“Kevin,” Neil finally said, choosing his words carefully and taking Kevin’s left hand in his own. He rubbed his thumb along the pale scars. “He was never better than you and he never would’ve been, even if he was still alive,” Neil told him. “I never want you to feel like you’re not good enough.”

“I know,” Kevin mumbled, “It’s just hard to believe sometimes. Especially today.”

Neil nodded. He wished he had something better to offer Kevin, some way to ease his fears, but all he could come up with was, “Well. The day will over soon enough.”

The reaction he got from Kevin certainly wasn’t the one he’d been expecting. He actually managed what sounded like a snort of laughter. It was more dry than actually amused, but it was better than nothing. “What if it’s not any better tomorrow?” He asked.

Neil sighed, leaning forward to press a quick kiss to Kevin’s lips. “Than we deal with that when or if we have to,” he suggested. “And I will be with you to make sure it doesn’t get this bad again.”

Before Neil could pull out of Kevin’s space entirely, he slipped his hand up to cup Neil’s cheek and leaned back in for another kiss. Neil wrapped his arms around Kevin and pulled him closer.

When they finally broke apart, Kevin rested his head on Neil’s shoulder and leaned into him, eyes closed. He let out a shaky breath against Neil’s neck. “Thank you,” he said.

“You have nothing to thank me for,” Neil told him, hiding his face in Kevin’s hair. He’d proved to himself last year that there wasn’t much he wouldn’t do for Kevin’s wellbeing. Kissing and being a shoulder for him was hardly Neil’s idea of an imposition. 

[toosicktoocare]

unfamiliar days, unfamiliar ways

I literally had a dream shortly after I watched the season 2 Camp Camp finale where I was plotting out this fic, and when I woke up, I decided to write it. (Spoilers for the season 2 finale.) (This is NOT a ship fic. This is a family-like fic.)

Summary:  4 Times David Hugs Max, and The 1 Time Max Hugs David

Word Count: 2098

1. Warmth

Regret settles like a heavy weight over David’s shoulders. He should have checked the weather beforehand. Had he checked, he wouldn’t have suggested a bonfire nor would he have sent Max out into the woods to gather sticks without knowing a dangerous thunderstorm was looming on the horizon. 

But, he didn’t, and a frightening storm had surprised the group as they were preparing the bonfire. David and Gwen had thought that they had rounded up all of the kids in their race toward the dining hall cabin, but once everyone was inside, David took quick note of a blaring absence among the campers. He had scanned studied eyes all across the cabin, but he didn’t spot that blue hoodie or wild black hair anywhere, and now he’s struggling against sharp winds and icy rain drops carried along a cold front that hit his bare legs like needles in order to find Max. His rain jacket is only doing so much for his upper half, but he shoves his discomfort to the far back of his mind because he has to find Max. Max is his priority. 

“Max!” He calls out, desperate for his voice to pierce through the roaring winds. He keeps one arm raised in a poor attempt to shield his eyes and continues forward. “Max! Where are you!?” He’s not expecting to hear an answer; he’s not expecting to hear anything over the raging storm, but he still tries, and he will keep trying until he finds Max. 

“Max!” His voice holds an air of desperation, a crack that signifies the worry gripping his heart. He’s not sure how long he’s been out searching for the young boy now, twenty minutes maybe, but he’s drenched through and freezing, so he can only imagine how Max must be feeling. “Max!” He tries again, and though faint, he hears a response, a fleeting voice carried along the wind. He comes to a stop, glancing around with squinting eyes. “Max!?” 

“David!” 

David whips his head to the left and starts toward the voice. “Max, I’m coming!” He moves forward, pushing against the wind as if pushing against a brick wall blocking his every step, but finally, he spots the young boy curled up beside a large tree. He breaks into a sprint the last remaining distant and drops to his knees in front of the small boy. 

“Max-”

“Only y-you would p-plan a fucking b-bonfire during a f-fucking storm.” 

David’s gaze flicks all across Max’s shivering frame, and he’s unzipping his rain jacket and pulling Max toward his warm, surprisingly dry chest. 

“David, w-what the fuck?” 

David bites back a wince at Max’s cold body, and he rubs large hands all across Max’s back to generate some sense of heat. “You’re freezing,” he explains, voice thick with worry. 

“N-no shit,” Max mutters out between chattering teeth, and David only tightens his arms around Max’s trembling frame for a few more moments before he pulls away from the hug and slips out of the rain jacket. 

He drapes it over Max’s shoulders before he scoops Max up into his arms and gets to his feet, pulling the hood of the rain jacket over Max’s head. 

“I can walk, David,” Max mumbles, yet his voice carries no heat with it. 

David only hugs Max closely to his chest as he starts back out into the storm. “Just focus on warming up,” he tells Max. “I’ll get us back.” 

To his surprise, Max doesn’t argue. The young boy just pushes close to David’s chest as if leeching what little warmth David can offer, but David doesn’t mind in the slightest. He sets his determined eyes forward despite the rain masking his vision and starts back toward the cabin. 

2. Fear

David’s not ever seen Max afraid; he’s always worked under the impression that Max is a fearless kid. So, when Max stalks away from a tree climbing trust exercise with a snide “fuck this,” comment, David shares a silent look with Gwen before going after the younger boy.  

He loses sight of Max only seconds into his chase and doesn’t spot the young boy again until ten minutes later at the river. A frown pulls at his lips as he approaches the young boy, who is sitting close to the water with his knees drawn to his chest and his face buried against his knees. 

“Fuck off, David,” Max mumbles, but David ignores this in favor of studying the slight tremors wracking the young boy’s frame. 

“What’s wrong, Max?” David asks, keeping his voice soft, gentle, as he moves to crouch in front of the boy. “Why did you run off?” 

“Because the exercise is fucking stupid.” 

David tilts his head slightly. “That’s never stopped you from staying to poke fun at the others.” He waits a moment before pressing further. “Max, really, what’s-”

“It’s fucking stupid, David!” Max shouts as he lifts his head to lock eyes with David’s. “The whole thing is fucking stupid, so I left! Why is that so hard to understand?” 

David’s always taken pride in his ability to read people, so he picks up on the trembling fear holding heavy behind Max’s sharp words. He can spot the bright color of hesitance coating Max’s eyes, and he breathes out a low sigh as he nods. 

“You’re afraid of heights, aren’t you?” 

Max holds David’s gaze for an endless moment before he snaps a defeated gaze toward the ground. “I don’t do the whole trust thing. But, heights suck, too.” 

Words seem not as helpful as actions to David, so he leans forward and pulls Max into hug instead. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” Max struggles against David, pushing small hands against David’s chest, but David’s determination his unyielding. 

“I’m hugging you as a form of comfort, Max. It’s what people do.” 

“Not me,” Max spits out just as David pulls away. “I don’t fucking hug people.” 

A smile pulls at David’s lips as he notes that Max’s tone is clearer, and the younger boy’s eyes are brighter, less afraid. “Okay, Max,” he says, drawing out the name as he gets to his feet. “Whatever you say.” 

3. Happiness

It’s not often that David and Gwen team up with the campers in activities, but sometimes it’s necessary. Numbers are needed when David plans a new game, and as it turns out, he’s paired with Max when they draw numbers. Max is less than thrilled by this, but David’s enthusiasm masks any negative feelings Max holds toward the whole situation. 

David carries the game up until the final round, which, per Gwen’s request, is trivia. Neither Gwen nor David are allowed to offer answers since they were the two that came up with the questions, so when one of their cooks asks the questions, David is bouncing on the balls of his feet and shifting his darting gaze toward Max, only looking away when other teams shout out incorrect answers. 

He’s surprised Neil or Space Kid haven’t answered the question yet, but he’s not surprised at the bored expression on Max’s face, nor is he surprised that Max has yet to even attempt to answer. He figured this much going into the game with Max; he never expected the two would win because of Max’s unwillingness, but that doesn’t stop him from giving Max a gentle nudge. 

“Do you know the answer?” David asks, and Max shrugs. 

“I know it; I just don’t care.” 

David looks back to the other kids, trying hard to not let his face give away the realization that he believes Max, in fact, does not know the answer, but after another five minutes of incorrect shouting from the others, he’s proved wrong when Max calls out the correct answer followed by a muttered “Jesus Christ.” 

“And, team David & Max is the winner,” the cook says, voice monotonous. 

David’s sucked into a warm, wide-spread feeling of victory, and before he realizes what he’s doing, he’s scooping Max up in the air and hugging the younger boy to his chest. 

“David, put me down.” Max mutters, voice flat, annoyed, and David sets Max down before shooting the younger boy a wide smile. 

“Wow, Max! You knew the answer!”

Max shakes his head and turns on his heel to stalk off back to his tent. “Because it was fucking obvious,” he calls out over his shoulder with a half wave of departure. 

David watches Max leave, wide smile still painted across his face. 

4. Relief

David taps his foot repeatedly as he watches every single car that drives by. He had never expected Max to actually leave the camp, so when he received a call from a bystander who picked Max up in the city, David’s heart sank to the floor, but he recovered enough to hop into his car and race to the city toward the place he and the man agreed to meet at. 

Now, he’s leaned against his car with his arms crossed and his face borderline unreadable, fitting considering he’s not sure how to feel. He feels almost numb and heavy, and the feeling extends even when an unfamiliar car pulls up beside him. He turns a slow gaze toward the car, but when the backdoor opens and Max steps out, he’s hit with a suffocating wave of relief that has him pounding toward the younger boy almost as if in a daze. 

He drops to his knees and pulls Max to his chest, and for once, Max doesn’t try to pull away. Instead, the younger boy just stands there with both hands to his sides as David crushes him in the embrace. 

When David finally pulls away, he keeps both hands clamped down onto Max’s shoulders as he scans frantic eyes all across Max’s small frame. “You’re okay?” He asks. “You’re not hurt?” 

Max is wordless as he nods, and David gets to his feet, offering the man still in his car a nod of thanks.

The man rolls his window down and arches a brow. “You need to keep better watch on your campers.” 

“I will,” David says back, voice suddenly very tired but still slightly light along a line of relief. “Thank you.” 

The man only drives off in response, and David and Max are quiet as they climb back into David’s car. The silence extends fifteen minutes into the drive before Max finally cuts through it with his small voice. 

“You’re not going to, like, fucking yell at me or something? Get mad? Anything?” 

David slides a slow gaze toward Max before flicking his eyes back to the road. “No. I’m just glad you’re okay.” 

And, he is. He realizes now the numbness was stemmed from an underlining fear that Max wasn’t okay. Sure, he’s mad, but his relief that the younger boy is safe overpowers every other emotion. 

Max only grunts in response and crosses small arms over his chest. “I was so close,” he mutters, but David chooses to ignore this. 

Instead, David keeps two eyes glued to the road as he focuses on bringing Max safely back to the camp. 

+1 

Happiness is an unsettling feeling that bolts against Max’s heart. It almost hurts, he thinks as he steps out of the diner with David and Gwen. It’s a foreign warmth that spreads across his chest, so hot that it burns. Yet, he wants to hold onto it; he wants to feel the pain for the sake of feeling. 

He watches Gwen leave toward the car before glancing up in thought. He should... No, he’s not sure what he should do. But, he feels that he should do something for David, the man who has given up so much for him. But, what? What does he do? What would David do? 

“David?” 

“Mmhmm?” 

Max looks away; he knows exactly what David would do, and well. Fuck it. He leans over and wraps his small arms around David’s legs for just a moment before pulling away, instantly becoming irritated at the smile that plays on David’s lips. 

“That never happened.” He snaps, pointing a warning finger up toward David. 

“Okay, Max,” David replies, voice soft and gentle and completely fake to Max’s ears. 

“Seriously! I will murder you if this gets back to the gang!” He fires out, waving his hands about in a physical show of his anger and frustration that contradicts the small smile playing on David’s lips. 

When Gwen pulls up and brings up how things are back at camp, Max pulls his attention toward the girl, keeping his face slightly interested while his heart beats warm in his chest. 

[whalehalothere]

Promises Broken and Promises Kept

Andrew's mouth was full with chocolate ice cream. He couldn't remember a time when he was allowed to have this much. He shoved another spoonful in his mouth while he listened to the stories his current foster dad, Michael, had to share. 

Michael was not the best person to foster a child, but he never hit him or touched him. His daily attire consisted of all black clothing, and typically preferred the name brand clothing.  He smoked often and drank on some nights. On the surface he appeared to be a harsh man, but Andrew had learned he was a total pushover.  

Michael gave him anything and everything he wanted without reservations. The reasons he gave for this behavior was that he wanted to give Andrew everything he hadn’t had as a child. Although Andrew had been with him for a few months now, he still wasn’t sure what to make of him since he didn’t fall under any of the normal behaviors he had witnessed in foster families.  

Andrew continued to listen to Michael’s story about a misunderstanding that got him kicked out of a bar due to some inexplicable mix up.  Usually, Andrew’s attention span to his foster family's stories was short, but Michael’s expressive telling of things had a way of drawing him in.  That, and he was much more interesting than other people.  He finished his ice cream and set the empty bowl on his bedside table in his room.  His  room. Michael had set him up with more than he had ever had.  A good bed and and nice furniture along with more clothes than he was usually given. Despite the fact that Michael hadn’t violated him once, he still locked his door every night, and reveled in the ability to lock his door.  

He pulled his knees to his chest and tried to stifle a yawn as it came, and Michael paused in his story and gave and knowing smile. “I see I have kept you up too late. It’s way past your bedtime” he said with a light chuckle.  Andrew smiled at that, both of them knowing that Andrew didn’t have a bedtime. Another plus of life with Michael.  As he got up to leave the room, Andrew finally asked the question that had been itching in his mind for months. “Why don’t you date?”

Michael stopped and turned around to give him a considering look.  He was an attractive bachelor in his 30′s, surely he would want to be with someone rather than look after a kid who hardly spoke. Michael answered, “When I picked you up, I promised you that I wouldn’t bring anyone else in the picture. That it was just going to be me and you.  I said that you would come first. Do you remember me saying that?”

Andrew did remember. But he hadn’t believed him.  No one ever meant what they said, and ‘promise’ was a meaningless phrase to him.  “But did you really mean it? There’s no way you did. No one ever does.” 

Again, Michael looked at him with hesitance in his eyes and thought for a moment.  His face was cast in a strange shadow as he answered, “People should mean what they say.” 

He waited for Andrew to comment, and when he said nothing, continued. “Listen Andrew, I want you to remember this.  When a man makes a promise, he keeps it.  A man doesn’t deserve trust when he goes back on his word.  When I promised you that I wouldn’t bring anyone else into this house, I meant it.  You are my only priority.  It’s fine if you don’t believe me, but I hope you will trust me someday.”

Andrew had never heard someone say words like this with such conviction.  He didn’t trust Michael, nor was he fully comfortable in his presence.  But he hadn’t even attempted to date or flirt, so Andrew supposed that he could accept his answer for now.  His must have looked disbelieving because Michael said, “I will never lie to you Andrew. I made two promises to you. That it was just going to be you and me, and that I would protect you.  I meant both of them. While you’re with me, you’re safe.”

At that, he turned to leave the room, bidding goodnight and went to his own bed, leaving Andrew to process what he had said.  He got up to close and lock his door and returned to his bed while trying to dispel memories of harsh hands on his body. Foster families rarely took his safety into account.  Michael had not violated him in any way since he arrived in his house, nor had he hit him or raised his voice even when he should have.  Michael let him get away with anything and didn’t seem to mind Andrew taking advantage of the lax rules.  He still didn’t trust him to not at some point cross lines, but he supposed that he was okay for now.

......

With the school week up, Andrew collected his things excited for their road trip, and in denial about his excitement. Michael owned a black Ferrari and Andrew loved every detail about the car. The feel of the leather seats underneath him, the steady purr of a powerful engine, the sleek interior that he was afraid to touch, and the acceleration that could take them from zero to sixty quicker than he thought possible.  When Michael took him on drives like this, they would go to unknown country roads and speed down them just to put the car’s capabilities to the test.  Andrew felt himself smiling and thinking that one day, he wanted a fancy car like this one. 

He turned to look at Michael when he smelled the familiar smell of cigarette smoke; the smell had been repulsive at first, but now it calmed him down.  Looking at Michael, clad in his leather jacket, sunglasses, and cigarette lightly hanging from his fingers, he couldn’t help but think that Michael was the coolest person he had ever met.  He got to do whatever he wanted, had plenty of money, and even treated people well. As a 10 year old, Andrew didn’t think of the future much, but with Michael, he actually considered what it would be like to have this guy support him as he grew up.  He found that he liked the idea.

......

Andrew was woken from his slumber by the bright red and blue lights flashing through his window into his room.  It only took him a moment to understand the significance of those lights and he was sprinting out to see what was going on. 

He found Michael being escorted by two officers out to the curb in cuffs.  He ran over to them, reaching out to grab at an officer when suddenly a social worker stepped in front of him.  She nabbed his wrist and pulled him away from the scene and began to explain to him that he needed to go pack his things and that it was time for him to move on to another foster home.  He heard none of it as he craned his neck to see what they were doing to Michael and called his name before they lowered his head into the flashing car.  

Michael turned around and gave him a small smile as he spoke to the officers. “Can I at least say goodbye to Andrew.  He deserves at least that much.” The police officers shared a look and then turned to the social worker, asking if that was acceptable. She spared a glance at Andrew and conceded.  

Michael was led over to Andrew, still in cuffs but smiling anyway.  When he was in front of him, he began speaking, “Andrew.  I am sorry I won’t be able to stay with you. Sometimes the pigs decide we are bad people and don’t deserve to be on the street.  But that’s okay because we had some really good times together, right?”

Andrew nodded his head.  Michael had been his favorite foster home. He continued, “This isn’t the end of anything okay. Someday, I will get out of prison and maybe we can meet again.” Sadness passed through his eyes as he looked intently at Andrew and spoke his final goodbyes. “Listen to me Andrew, I want you to remember what I say.  And I know you have a good memory. Sometimes our actions have consequences, but we shouldn’t waste our time with regret, it just holds us back.  And I want you to believe me when I say this. I promise you that someday, you are going to have everything.  And you won’t have to steal to get it.  You will have everything because you deserve it.  It will happen someday, it may take a while, but it will come.  I promise you”. When he finished, he motioned to the officers that he was done and Andrew found himself softly whispering ‘goodbye’ as he lost yet another foster family. Michael’s words spinning in his head, an impossible promise that he had no right to make. there was no way he could keep it. No way.

.......

Andrew woke to sunlight streaming through the windows of their house in Columbia, stirring from his dream of a memory.  Michael.  The man had an impenetrable optimism and a past that he would never know. 

His eyes followed the sun beams to where they rested on the red hair of the sleeping junkie next to him.  Neil usually woke first, so in a rare moment, Andrew allowed himself to study Neil in the sunlight.  His harsh scars marred his face, torso, and arms, but they had never made Andrew flinch. His sleeping face made him look gentle and quiet, though Andrew knew he was anything but.  He resisted the urge to run his hands through hair that felt like silk and smelled like strawberries.  The strange desire to see Neil’s eyes finally motivated him to get out of bed.  He climbed over Neil, waking him, and left their bedroom to go make breakfast. 

Neil came down shortly after, dressed for his morning run with shorts and running shoes on.  A persistent morning person.  Andrew spared a look at Neil’s toned legs and remembered how they had been wrapped around him the night before. The direction his thoughts went made him turn away and continue making breakfast.  

Neil left without much fuss and would return in an hour after running harder than any member of their team was capable of.  The junkie.  While he was gone, Andrew mulled over the dream he had had. Michael had made him a promise that he had no way of keeping, and had been entirely sincere.  He had promised him that he would have everything someday.  Andrew had never believed him. 

He plays Exy. He has a brother and a cousin. He was getting a college education.  He has an expensive car. He has house in Columbia that he shares with other people. All of these things are a huge step up in his life than where he used to be.  But he wasn’t sure if he considered these things to be ‘everything’ though.  

His mind considers a certain junkie whose disappearance caused him to break a promise.  He still remembers his hands around Kevin’s neck, all of his energy focused on choking out the truth. 

Neil is a broken shell of a human being with a body that has been put through the wringer one too many times.  Neil is a liar who still struggles in being honest at times. Neil is a runner whose first instinct is to plot out escape routes as soon as he enters anything.  Neil was once a rabbit, but now a fox.  

As Andrew considers Neil, he tells himself that Neil is nothing.  Neil has always been nothing. But maybe, just maybe...... Michael kept his promise. 

[ravenvsfox]

remember everyone’s favourite headcanon about neil coming back to life once upon a time and telling his unsuspecting friends about it on movie night?? I wrote that bitch!!!

The light from the TV seizes every time a scene leaps off a building or the action crashes into the protagonist. It’s exhausting to be in the same room as the flicker of it; the pulsing gunfire and longwinded monologues intercut with showy violence that’s all soft in the middle.

The combat is slow — it’s obvious the director wants you to follow the stunt double’s prowess with your eyes, to take the moment that someone goes sprawling and package it, understand it, delight in your own understanding. The urgency of the fight whimpers and dies. It’s a half-time waltz set to galloping music, stilted dialogue fed into it all like splinters.

It’s almost a comedy, this palatable brutality playing out in a room full of fighters.

A woman hooks her leg in the window of a moving car and slides inside, and Neil makes a tsk-ing noise. She grapples with a driver and wins impossibly. The scene shifts and becomes a greyscale basement; the villain orders his cronies about in German that can’t figure itself out. Neil nudges Andrew’s foot with his and Andrew nods without looking.

The screen hiccups, abruptly paused. “What is it Lassie?” Matt jokes, mouth twitching. “Something wrong?”

“No,” Neil says, sour. “Just wondering if his German coach spoke any German.”

“I thought it was cute,” Nicky says.

“You think he’s cute,” Allison corrects, reaching over Renee to steal a twizzler from the knot of opened snacks on the coffee table. She bites into it viciously when she says, “you’re into boys who can’t speak the same language as you. They’re easier to trick.”

“Wow,” Nicky says, bewildered. “The bitch is out today.”

Allison swipes primly at her lipstick. “Always is.”

“You got another horrifying factoid to share with the class, Josten?” Dan asks. “Something about the proper technique for jumping between cars maybe?”

“Yeah. Don’t lead with your legs. That’s a good way to get yourself ripped in half.”

“Un-pause,” Renee prods, and Matt laughs when he hits play. The movie skids around and tries to find its own plot again. Light flickers over Neil’s frown.

The protagonist shoots at a tank until it blows up, and Neil snorts, jostling Andrew’s side when he stands up. He watches Matt and Neil have a conversation in gestures, and Matt relents after a moment, letting Neil slip away without pausing anything.

He’s gone for a while. Doubtless somewhere in their bedroom or breathing secondhand smoke from his own hand or killing time cross-legged in the brightness of the kitchen.

It’s less bearable, trying to swallow the movie without Neil shaking with laughter against him every time someone lies or shoots the wrong way. Andrew feels uncomfortably like the only other person in his lifeboat had just been rescued without him.

Another explosion rocks their sound system, and Andrew flicks bored eyes back to the villain circling the lead in a helicopter. He’s still waiting for the plot twist to get over itself and make an appearance, or for Neil to do the same. It’s starting to chafe, being in the dark with the whole team, shifting and breathing and rustling plastic packages around him.

The protagonist gets suddenly skewered by the debris from the helicopter he just shot down, and the heroine tumbles down over the rubble, scrambling to hold his face in both hands. Dialogue devolves into blood-bubbling I love you’s and come back’s from there, and Andrew concentrates on zoning out.

“He’s not actually dead,” Nicky says incredulously, mouth full of popcorn. Dan shushes him. “He’s too pretty to be impaled to death.”

“I bet you want him to impale you to death,” Matt says slyly, pleased with himself, and Renee frowns at him.

“Ay, he’s back!” Nicky says, popping another handful as the protagonist gasps back to life, face wet with tears or sweat or rain. “What’d I tell you?”

“You’re ruining this movie,” Aaron says flatly.

“Do you think he went to heaven for those five minutes?” Nicky continues, ignoring his cousin. “Like I get that he’s a mass murderer, but it was all ‘greater good’ stuff. Like charity work.”

“I don’t think God had time to decide,” Renee says softly.

“Like he was hanging out in limbo?” Dan asks, playing along. Renee shrugs generously.

“I’d love to die for like ten minutes, make a scene, have Erik weep over my broken body. Then high five God on my way back to life.”

“Nothing happens when you die, Nicky,” Neil says matter-of-factly from the doorway. He smells like Andrew’s cigarettes when he climbs back onto the couch, legs tucked underneath him. He reaches for a handful of popcorn.

“You can’t know that for sure,” Renee says, frowning a little. Her beliefs never show on her face so much as when she’s trying to fight back without fighting.

Andrew can feel his heart wind up and get ready to throw something, though he’s not completely sure why until Neil says, “I died once.” He shrugs. “God looked a whole lot like an endless abyss.”

Renee reaches over and pauses the TV. Matt looks anxiously at Dan, who can’t seem to look away from Neil or close her mouth.

“You’re not serious,” she says lowly. Neil looks up from his handful, startled by the mood shift.

“Wouldn’t be a very good joke, would it,” Allison says, blatantly overcompensating. Her hand is making dents in her plastic cup.

“You died?” Kevin says. “You didn’t think to mention that?”

“I didn’t mention a lot of things,” Neil says narrowly. “Just like you didn’t mention a lot of things. You really want to play that game?”

“Neil,” Matt interrupts. “I know you think this is one of those things you can say and then we hit play and move on, but it’s really not.”

“Who did it?” Andrew’s mouth asks. In his head he’s already flipping backwards through the filing cabinet of stories Neil has pressed into his hands and said into his neck and written down and handed to him because his voice gave out. Everyone looks at Andrew, then Neil.

“My father,” Neil says stiffly. Andrew can see Dan close her eyes and keep them closed.

“When?” Andrew demands. He doesn’t know why these particular questions matter so much, if they matter. The taste of ‘I died once’ is making everything that comes out of his mouth bitter and dull.

“I was nine.” His eyes are on Andrew, fixed and screwed in. His brow is twisted, and Andrew knows that this is a story he hadn’t intended to be sharing until he already was. “I let someone give me a ride home. He insisted, I don’t know. I wasn’t good at saying no yet.”

Andrew blinks. Some part of him wants to heave, and his muscles strain against the impulse.

“You don’t have to tell us,” Renee says. She looks troubled. Almost everything has happened to her at least once, but not this.

“Tell me,” Andrew says, lets the anger curl his mouth into something demanding, knowing it won’t do any good.

Neil’s face flickers, a flame buffeted by wind. “He dropped me home, and when no one came to the door he walked around back. He didn’t see anything but— it was. Close. It was very close. My father was slitting someone’s throat in the basement at the same time that this guy was lurking around our fence.”

“Jesus, Neil,” Nicky says, reaching for Neil’s shoulder. Andrew catches his wrist before he can make contact. Neil shrugs again.

“He heard the knocking, finally, and came upstairs. He let the guy live. I still don’t know why.” He pops one kernel of popcorn into his mouth. “He held me down in the bathtub until I blacked out. Or — died, I guess. Surprisingly merciful killing, for him.” Another kernel, thoughtful. “Business, not pleasure.”

“What happened?” Dan asks thickly. “Your mom…?”

Neil nods. “As soon as he was gone, she dragged me out of the tub and did CPR, I guess. I didn’t have a pulse for— minutes. I don’t know. She said I turned blue.”

“No shit,” Matt says, running a hand through his hair, displacing the spikes so they look as sad as he does.

“He was pissed that she’d done it, though. He beat us both. I remember the bath flowing over, and the water going red—“ he seems to come back to himself, catching Andrew’s eye and frowning at what he finds. “It was ten years ago Drew,” he says quietly.

“I would kill him again.”

Neil’s jaw works, and he flushes, overwhelmed. “I know,” he says finally. “So would I.”

The silence stretches, then breaks uselessly to pieces like wet paper. Everyone stopped pretending they were going to watch the rest of the movie five minutes ago.

“And you…” Nicky swallows. “You didn’t see anything? In those minutes?”

Neil looks at him consideringly. “No. I was gone and then I was back.”

Andrew can see that ‘back’ most clearly, the way Neil’s mouth pops open around the word, trying to let it go. He remembers the way living feels so much more deadly than dying.

Renee’s face is a chess game; she’s trying to strategize her way out of the other team’s looming checkmate. She doesn’t trust Neil’s story, or she doesn’t trust herself, or she trusts both and her religion is tugging her sleeve until she answers it.

“I’m sorry,” someone says.

Neil shrugs, tosses popcorn into his open mouth, looks at the ceiling. “I’m here. There are worse things.”

“Than death?” Kevin says incredulously.

“Yes,” Neil says without hesitation.

“I think,” Matt says hesitatingly, “I think maybe we should go.”

“Don’t be stupid,” Neil says, at the same time that Andrew says, “yes.”

“I didn’t die today. Don’t stop on my account.”

Matt glances around the room, eyes catching on the screen — still paused on the tear-streaked heroine with her arms strung like lace around the hero’s neck. “I think I might need a breather. Your childhood kind of… makes me believe in real evil, so, like. I’ve gotta deal with that.”

“Sort of undermined my belief in God, too,” Nicky pipes up, and Aaron snorts.

“You only ever believe in Him when it suits you, anyway.”

“Yeah well I don’t believe in Him right now,” Nicky snaps, surprisingly fierce. Neil looks surprised at the way he has anything to do with his friends’ beliefs or moods. He still doesn’t quite understand that he influences people with his honesty just as much as he did with lies.

“Matt’s right, I think. We’d better go,” Renee says. Andrew can tell that her religion is unscathed, ultimately. It’s always been more powerful than her fear.

The movie’s shut off, snacks scooped into the bags they were purchased in, and the upperclassmen trudge from their room with their shoulders bowed, apologies bouncing straight off of Neil. Aaron and Nicky follow the crowd, and the dorm trickles down to three again.

Kevin stands awkwardly, looking utterly unlike a professional athlete with his hands folded in front of him and his expression curdled and un-charming. He looks like he wants to say something, but he leaves abruptly for their room instead. He looks profoundly sad for the second before he turns to go.

“Tell me,” Andrew prompts as soon as they’re alone, and Neil sinks down further into the couch.

“Death scares me more than it used to,” he admits. Andrew watches the little rueful set of his mouth, the way he’s holding his own arms to his chest. “I remember my lungs going rubbery and my vision cutting out and I felt— I was more scared that he wouldn’t finish the job. Or that he’d find a way to do it wrong. But if it happened now… I don’t know. I don’t want to leave you.”

Andrew looks at the wall, breathing hard through his nose. He wants to tell Neil that he’s been waiting for him to leave him alone, that death is easy, that nothing— not even the mornings where they wake at precisely the same time and grope their way back to life together— means anything at all. “Then don’t.”

“Andrew,” Neil says. “I don’t want to be the one that derails everyone’s lives because I couldn’t keep my past in the past.”

“Then don’t,” Andrew repeats. “You don’t owe them any truths.”

“I owe them everything,” Neil tells him quietly. “The truth is the least of it.”

“Then get over it.”

“Get over it,” Neil repeats.

“They asked,” Andrew says slowly. “You answered. All they lost was the last ten minutes of a movie with a 34% approval rating and poorly performed German.”

Neil huffs, almost a laugh. He leans in haltingly to kiss Andrew on the mouth, off-centre, barely there. He holds onto his hair when he pulls back, heavy-lidded.

“Neil,” Andrew says against his lips. He traces the slender scar from Neil’s cheekbone to the corner of his mouth. “Were you ever that close again?”

Neil’s brow furrows, close enough that the feeling of it registers on Andrew’s forehead. “To death? No, not— no.”

“Don’t be,” he says as clearly as he can, weakness thinning his mouth.

“Okay,” Neil whispers. “Yeah. Okay.”