#sometimes i think about how neil cried when wymack passed away

[kevindavidday]

as shifty as they were when they were younger, at the actual age that andreil are at do you think they've got the potential to be friendly strangers? like not overly friendly but the kind of people who understand what being human is

think about it, the experience of living a sheltered life and neil is standing behind someone in the grocery line, watching them unable to scour up money for ramen and water so he pays for it to help things along

andrew watching a little kid peer into his mega expensive car of the year and the kid gets scared of him and moves aside but andrew opens the door moves back, tells the kid he can have a look its fine

do you think they would interfere by force if they ever saw something bad happening in front of them? neil on his runs stopping to help someone cross the road, feeding stray cats in alleyways, yk the people who know what struggle is and don't want it for anyone else?

idk if they're the type to shrug off injustice so easily, i feel like whatever they learnt as children is buried deep inside the caution and fear of strangers and all but maybe what wymack taught them would rise to the surface too cuz if wymack hadn't chosen to help them they wouldn't be alive either

[skunked-up-kicks]

How do you feel about people saying Andrew is Wymack’s favorite? I think there’s some evidence for it in terms of the amount of leeway he gives him sometimes, and tbh I do think Wymack might have a closer relationship with him than with Kevin too, but I also feel uncomfortable with Dan being sidelined in some of those posts.

i stand by that dan is his favourite, given her backstory he's presented as a father figure for her. he walks her down the aisle when she marries matt. he makes her the captain of his team and later the coach, sorta mirroring the way parents pass things down to their children.

i think you're right about andrew being closer to wymack than kevin is though, and i'd even say i think neil is too... when paring up the 3 guys with the 3 adults the order that seemed to make the most sense to me was: andrew + bee, kevin + abby, neil + wymack. (this doesn't mean it's super strict or anything, obviously the others can have strong bonds too)

with neil and wymack, the conversation dan has with wymack in the ec where he recruits her to be captain feels very similar to the one neil has wymack when he makes him vice-captain. wymack also seems to work as a father figure for neil in replacement for nathan, in the same way he does for dan. neil cries for the first time in years when wymack dies, and it's dan who makes the call to him. basically, i see a lot of parallels between dan and neil and their relationship with wymack. plus, both aren't looking for a mother figure. both of them had a mother figure for most of their lives.

kevin seems to be closer to abby, which makes sense to me cause i think kevin sort of avoids wymack? keeping the fact that he's his dad a secret is gonna be stressful and i think it makes him find approaching him or trying to get closer to him difficult. and from what i remember, nora said something along those lines. it's abby that kevin tends to seek out, and i get that, she's very traditionally motherly and kevin seems to find that comforting. in comparison to wymacks roughness/tough love sorta vibe. and i think this is in part because kayleigh dies when he's so young... i don't think he gets enough time with her, so it makes him want to seek out a mother figure more than a father figure?

with andrew, he's obviously very close to wymack. evident in more than just him letting him get away with things, but also in how much andrew trusts wymack. i still think when pairing him up though, bee is the obvious choice. andrew wanted a mother figure in cass and lost it. bee takes that role instead. not great while she's also his therapist... but that's what the book pushes you towards so.

sorry i went off on a tangent lol, i just find these dynamics very interesting.

[codename-adler]

Kevin Day and his Oblivious Literature Lover, pt.IV

In times of college finals, aftg is my coping mechanism of predilection. hope it helps some :)

>> Table of Contents,TW and other parts here!

i’ll let you guess what Kevin and Juliet chose for their project

oh, yes

the letters of Hamilton, Eliza and John + Hamilton: The Musical

i will fight you on this

at first, when Juliet suggests it, Kevin stares at her so hard bc really?? a musical??

but then she lends him the 50$ leatherbound official book of the musical (you know the navy blue and beige one? you know what i’m talking about, right?) and reads it all in one evening and wow

lin-manuel miranda? genius. ron chernow? Genius. alexander hamilton? Dumb Genius.

oh yeah and Juliet? Absolutely mind-blowing genius.

as Andrew & Neil grow closer and the match agaisnt the Ravens rounds the corner, Kevin finds himself looking more and more forward to the time spent at the library with Juliet

she is just so focused on their project and so oblivious as who he really is and doesn’t really care if sometimes he is more anxious, if freaks over everything to be perfect, if he babbles on&on&on&on about any bit of history he discovered

she’s just there, smirking, stiffling her laughs and asking for more

they’ve exhanged phone numbers and she installed snapchat on his, and although he never sends her anything, she always has a short video and a funny caption that pop up from time to time; they’re that little reminder that the world goes on outside of exy and that he exists outside of exy

she introduces him to funny videos and he didn’t know absolute dumb shit could make him snort??

his favorite is the peanut butter baby

at first the Foxes give him this judgemental look when he ugly-snorts in the locker room or at Eden’s, but eventually they just get that glint in their eyes as if they were in on the jokes

sometimes, Juliet’s so focused on writing down bullet points in her notebook, peeling the skin off her lips, so unaware of Kevin’s personal hell of a life, that he just wants to spill out everything

although he’s not sure if it’s because he wants her to know him and stay, or because he wants her to reject him and therefore spare himself the trouble of getting attached...

she takes the decision for him

on a Thursday afternoon, on their planned study session, she doesn’t show up

she doesn’t answer her phone either

he even tries out a completely blacked out snap with “r u alive?” in caption

no answer

he gives her space, sending her occasional cat videos he thoroughly researches

if she watches them, she doesn’t say anything

on Monday afternoon, she doesn’t come to class

that’s when the panic Kevin’s been reigning in just... bursts

what if it’s Riko? 

what if it’s the Master?

what if it’s Ichirou?

what if, somehow, it’s the Butcher’s people?

that afternoon’s practice is hell for the Foxes, Kevin is ruthless and an asshole and very agressive

Dan waits for him outside the boys’ locker room as all the other Foxes leave (not even Andrew and Neil want to wait for him)

“Spit out your goddamn problem before I tell Coach to bench you next game”

oh, how Kevin wants to cuss her out

and then he looks  at her face, ready to vomit words, when he sees her worrying her lips

just like Juliet

it shouldn’t be enough to make him tear up, but it does

he still manages to keep as much of the truth to himself as he possibly can

“My EAL partner isn’t responding to my messages or my calls and she didn’t even come to class today and it stresses me the fuck out and what if it’s like with Neil, Dan?” he says in one breath, trying to tear out the net of his racket

Dan recomposes her face and gets that very serious look, the one she usually gets when someone touches her family

“It’s not, Kevin. That’s over. We got Neil back, we got you back, you got Jean back. The team didn’t even know who that person was. The most info we’ve gathered is what you just told me now. Yeah there are some bets but it’s mostly for funsies, nothing even remotely serious. You wanna look for her?” she soothes him.

“I don’t even know...”

“She lives on campus?” she asks.

“I don’t- I don’t know, Dan. I spent months with her and I can’t even vaguely say where she lives! How fucked up is that?” Kevin yells.

“It’s not even remotely fucked up, Kevin. You should know that. Does she have instagram? twitter? Or like, facebook?” she questions some more.

“God, I don’t know. She only sends me stupid fucking videos and I never even respond like the goddamn asshole I am...”

“Shut up. We’re all assholes at the end of the road, ‘kay? You ain’t better or worse than others. Now she sends them to you in text or somewhere else?”

“Sometimes texts... Sometimes the yellow app, the chat one. Why.”

“Oh great, that’s great. We can locate her, with snapchat, if she forgot to turn off the sharing. And if you’re comfortable with that, too. I know you’re not a creep like that. You’re creepy sometimes, don’t get me wrong. But, not a creep.”

“Gee, thanks, Dan.”

“Hey, shush. You down or what?” she says, arching an eyebrow.

“Okay,” he answers, unable to make the fear go away without knowing for sure.

And so it turns out Juliet’s location is, in fact, knowable. Dan grabs one of Kevin’s shoulders as he leaves the court, squeezing her affection into her grip; he nods emotionally in her direction, as far as emotions can translate unto his face.

he doesn’t even know what he’ll do once he finds her, his brain is solely focused on the animated map that brings him closer and closer to Juliet

the more he progresses, the more he realizes he is far from Fox Tower, on a campus area he has never even seen

he stops before a decrepit building, old and moldy-looking

Jackie Kennedy Hall

student dorms? this shabby? she can’t possibly live-

except that she can, because there isn’t another building close and the map has brought him here, and he doesn’t really know her...

so Kevin straightens his shoulders, inhales deeply, and goes inside

he could go on and on and on about everything that is just wrong with the place, from the smell to the decoration, but he makes a beeline for the front desk (he’s lucky there’s even one)

he asks for a way to contact someone, flashes his press smile at the women behind the desk, gives up his ID in exchange for the room number

Juliet Grier, 418

stairs, stairs, stairs, stairs

heavy door, right, 412, 414, 416...

418

what, now?

Kevin hesitantly knocks once, twice

no answer

he knocks again and decides to speak up, in case she didn’t hear

“Juliet? It’s Kevin. Day. From EAL? Can I speak with you?”

still nothing

maybe she isn’t home... no, the map says she’s here. maybe she’s sleeping...

he decides to try one last time

“We really should finish that project, you know? I think we could both use the free time...” he says without his heart into it.

without surprise, no response still

he decides to take a loose paper from his sachel and writes down some words

Greetings Hi,

My friend Dan helped me look for you, but you don’t have to worry about your privacy; it’s because of the yellow app. You should turn that off if you don’t want other people to be nosy. 

You weren’t in class today. I’ll share my notes if you want them. But, you should come to class, it’s better. For learning. 

I’ll wait a few in case you’re asleep. 

Text me or call me or whatever when you’re ready.

- Kevin D. (your partner from EAL)

quick, efficient, to the point

Kevin slips the paper under the door, and waits

he refreshes the map too many times, to see if her location changed or if somehow there was a glitch

it stays put

he ends up sitting on the hallway floor, his back sliding down the wall

he catches up on a book for another class, checks exy stats and watches many, many videos of Jeremy Knox on the court and in interview

some students pass him with a nasty look, eyeing the lack of earphones on his phone

some other students walk by him and will themselves to keep going, because holy shit it’s Kevin Day in Jackie Hall

it’s at least an hour and a half before the doorknob slowly and quietly starts to click

Kevin was absorbed deep into whatever move Knox was making before scoring

the 418 door opens

Kevin gets up in one move, all things Jeremy Knox and exy forgotten

she’s loosely holding Kevin’s paper in one hand, the other clutching a large scarf that covers up the majority of her body

from what he can see, though, she’s wearing sweats from head to toe; her hair’s tied on the top of her head, but most of the curls escaped and it looks unwashed and her curls, dry

her skin’s turned pale, dark circles under her eyes, a haggard look in them, her cheeks stained with dry tears

Juliet looks terrible

“Hi...” Kevin attempts

she finally looks up from the paper and gives him a bored look that could rival Andrew’s

with a rough voice strained from cries and many days without speaking, she asks, “My EAL partner?”

“Well, yes. In case.”

“In case of what.”

“I-”

“I know who you are, Kevin.”

and isn’t that both his most ardent wish and his worse fear?

with that, she turns around and goes back to her dark room, leaving the door open behind her

is that... an invitation?

Kevin’s never been to another person’s place, apart from the Columbia house, Abby’s and Wymack’s

he reminds himself why he came in the first place and decides it would be a waste to leave now, right?

the small studio is a mess, much like its occupant

there are clothes everywhere, on the floor, on a chair, on the bed, on the desk

all the curtains are drawn, no light is on, the only source coming from Juliet’s laptop somewhere amongst her bedsheets

it’s like she made herself a nest and hasn’t moved from there for a long time

maybe even since last Monday, the last time he saw her

Kevin doesn’t understand the scene he has before his eyes

he’s never seen such apathy in someone that is not Andrew

and at this point, apathy is pretty much Andrew’s default state of being

not Juliet’s

Juliet is a soft glow, toothy grins, wild curls, countless jumpers, dumb jokes and references, color-coded notes, an organized mind, unwavering focus and determination, flowing words and warm, kind eyes...

so what is this?

then Kevin realizes he spoke aloud

and Juliet can only chuckle sadly, almost mockingly

“This? This is why I don’t have friends. This is why I don’t mix with people. This is why I’ll never amount to anything in life. This is my dirty laundry, both metaphorically and literally. This is it. That’s... That’s it. This is what I get,” she answers flatly

Kevin’s mind is spinning

he doesn’t understand

he needs to understand, though

“Explain it to me,” he says

Juliet looks at him like a brick just hit him on the head and made him speak Swedish

“Why.”

“Because, surely there’s a way to work with it.”

she laughs

it doesn’t reach her eyes, nor her lips or her cheeks

it’s just a desperate sound

it makes him think of Andrew again

and that gives him an idea, a gut feeling, if you will

“Can I try something out?” he asks

“Kevin... I can’t- I’m tired... It’s not a good idea... I’m tired, Kevin,” Juliet responds, pain noticeable in her voice and her movements slow

“I know, I- I know. Someone I know... He plays this game. It’s really not a game, it’s more like a communication thing. He calls it “A Truth for a Truth”.  In exchange for something I tell you, you tell me something. And in exchange for something you tell me, I’ll tell you something else. It’s made me... work through some things... before,” Kevin explains calmly

Juliet keeps on observing him from her bed, silent

“Look, can I just stay here to do homework? I have nowhere to go right now,” Kevin asks, almost blurting out “Please” before Andrew’s ghost caught it in his throat

she lies back down, burries herself in her covers, a silent “yes”

Kevin ends up falling asleep sitting on the floor, books open, head resting at the end of Juliet’s bed

he wakes up around 2 AM

he’s got multiple texts from Aaron and Nicky, one from Andrew, and one from Dan

“told everybody you spent the night at Coach’s. take care.”

he silently vows to thank her later

now he either really goes to Wymack’s to finish his night there, or... he stays exactly where he is

Juliet is still sleeping soundly

in a haze, he palms for a pillow or cushion, pulls his hoodie on and lies back down on the carpeted floor

he’s only awaken in the late morning when he brutally gets stepped on

“What the shit?? Kevin! How...???” Juliet yells

“Um, ow? No, no, don’t apologize so quickly. You just, you know, crushed my lungs and a couple of ribs, no worries, Jules!” Kevin groans

“Ju- you know what? I’m not sorry. Right now I gotta pee, so you better have a damn good explanation when I get back,” she replies and leaves her room to go to the bathroom at the end of the hall

instead of dread, Kevin feels calm about the upcoming conversation

he doesn’t prepare lies, doesn’t run away, doesn’t resort to assholery

he just stays put where he is on the floor, snuggles deeper into his hoodie, and waits for relief, for the truth

he waits for Juliet

[stickballl]

This was based on a beautiful piece of art by @llstarcasterll

also on ao3

He hadn’t been sleeping.  A week since the last good night’s sleep.  A grand total of seven hours of sleep since then.  He’d started running when he’d get up at 3 am, at 6 am, whenever the itch became too strong to ignore.  He returned exhausted enough to pass out right as his head hit the pillow, legs turned to mush, lungs stretched too far, mind blissfully blank. Yet when he got to bed, his mind began a race of its own, spanning from insecurities to the deal that kept him alive. He lay there, completely still, until he felt his heart threaten to burst out of his chest and his mind melt out his eyes.  So, he got up and ran again.

When asked for a reason why it was happening, Neil shrugged and muttered a simple I don’t know.  It had to be the stress of championships.

But Neil knew and each glance at the calendar made the anxiety worse.  He’d ignored the anniversary for as long as he could.  He thought he’d be fine with it.  The past two years hadn’t bothered him, but it was like his body was finely attuned to it and made it a mission to make sure Neil remembered.

Baltimore had been a blessing disguised as a curse. Those few hours Neil had desperately wanted it to just end.  He never saw the appeal in prolonging the inevitable, but each look at the demented smile on Lola’s lips showed him just how wrong he was.  As the day drew closer, he started to feel her hands on him all over again.  He’d dreamt of that car ride during those few blissful hours of sleep he’d get. Sometimes it’d been Lola. Sometimes his father or his mother. Sometimes Andrew.  It never really got easier depending on who’d done it. Just a different hurdle to get over.

He woke up with bags under his eyes every day, drank as much coffee as he could, focused every ounce of attention he had left onto finishing his last season with the Foxes as he’d finished his first. He occupied every second of his day, refusing his subconscious the right to sidetrack him with useless memories.

Jack was the first to notice the change in Neil’s demeanor, the lethargy, the dark circles, the already almost nonexistent patience he had cut in have, and was quick to take advantage of it.  He picked at Neil’s past.  Back talked at practice.  Got physical whenever he could.

Wymack helped when he could, but Jack only fired back by pointing out his favoritism.

Neil ignored the majority of it and ran off the rest.  It wasn’t anything he hadn’t heard before from news stations or Edgar Allen fans.

Neil thought he had a decent hold on his splintering life.

But when one thing fell, the rest followed.

It started with an off-hand comment, the kind that wouldn’t have bothered him any other time of the year.

“Why do you think he changes in the showers?” a freshman asked.  Diaz, he thought.  Neil kept his eyes on his locker in front of him as he tied his shoes.  At the beginning, he’d found it amusing to hear all the freshman’s guessing at his scars.  Now, not so much.

“He’s probably a battered wife.  Wasn’t he dating one of the twins.  Terrifying bastards both of them,” someone else said. Neil clenched his jaw as his fingers tightened around his laces.  There was no point in starting a fight with someone who had no idea what they were talking about.

“Maybe he’s just self-conscious.”

“Maybe you should all shut up and mind your own damn business,” Robin said a little too loud.  Neil shot her a grateful smile.

“Oh, please.  He’s a narcissistic asshole who wants everyone to think he’s so fucking mysterious.  He exaggerates the fact that he had a slightly tough childhood.  Isn’t that right, Junior?” Jack announced.

Neil’s senses blurred in and out, rage building in his chest, spreading through his veins.  Jack’s voice echoed in his head, joined by many others all taunting the same nickname.

Just smile for me.  Please, Junior.

What did I say about keeping quiet, Junior?

Junior, do you remember me?

Junior’s all grown up.

Hello, Junior.

Neil launched himself off the bench, deadly gaze set straight at Jack.  Within seconds, Neil had Jack pinned against the lockers, forearm pressed into his throat. His grin bordered on manic, all teeth and no mirth.

“Give me a reason, Jack.  Please, give me a reason,” Neil begged.  Jack’s eyes blew wide, surprise and fear mirrored in his body. His hands hovered over Neil’s shoulders. “You’re all so obsessed with my past and my secrets?  Then fucking google me.  Don’t bring this shit into the locker room.”

He shoved away from Jack, his skin still prickling with untapped panic, with the need to run.  He ignored it though, trudging toward the court to remind him why he was still there.  Exy distracted him until he forgot who Neil was, who Nathaniel was, who Abram was. He became just a body whose sole mission was to get the ball into the goal.  No one needed a solid identity to do that.

On court, he broke himself down until he was just muscle, bone, sinew, only parts of a whole.  A machine.

~

“Stop it.”

“Stop me,” a rough voice whispered in his ear.  A knife dragged down his thumb, tears welled in his eyes, a scream begged to be let loose.  Nathaniel stayed silent, squeezing his eyes shut until that tension distracted him. He stayed remarkably still while Lola made slow work of the rest of his fingers before setting her sights on the tattoo on his cheekbone.  The knife made shallow cuts around the four, but Lola’s smile hinted at something more sinister.  She held an empty hand out.  Nathaniel turned and saw his mother hand Lola the dashboard lighter.

“I told you how dangerous this was.  I thought you were smarter than this,” she said, hands gripped firm on the steering wheel until her knuckles were white.  Her brown eyes flickered with a rage he’d seen so often when he was younger.  “What did I tell you?  don’t look back, don’t slow down, and don’t trust anyone.”

“Be anyone but yourself, and never be anyone for too long,” Nathaniel finished for her.  Her expression changed at once, melting into a soft, almost proud smile.  She reached one hand out and ran it along his jaw.

“Oh, Abram,” she said a second before the car burst into flames.

~

He woke up in the basement.  The air around him already smelled putrid, metallic.  He saw the outline of a figure standing over him, but he couldn’t make out any detail other than the bloody axe he held in one hand and the thin delicate knife in the other.

“Hello, Junior,” his father said, but his voice was too far.  He was by the wall, next to a smiling, rotting Riko. Nathaniel scrambled back until he hit the wall, bristling at the dirt that dug into the fresh cuts on his hands. “I brought some friends along.”

Nathaniel looked back to the figure that loomed over him and choked back a scream. Andrew was smiling wide, trickles of blood falling from the side of his head, the same expression he’d worn after Drake.  Everything in Nathaniel’s body recoiled.

“It’s really a cruel world, isn’t it, Nathaniel?  You came so far, salvaged the unsalvageable, crafted yourself a real identity, and yet we all end up here, don’t we?” Andrew said, advancing with each word.  He knelt in front of Nathaniel, swinging his knife around in graceful arcs around their heads.  “I’d planned this so many times, but now I’m not sure where to start.”

“The legs,” Nathan supplied behind him.  Andrew’s smile widened as his hand circled around Nathaniel’s ankle.  He stood, dragging him across the gravel. Nathaniel couldn’t help the scream that tore through his lips.

“No, Drew, no don’t do this,” Nathaniel begged.  He tried to find purchase as he was dragged, but it only ruined his hands further.  He tried to kick at Andrew’s grip, fought with every inch of energy in his body. Nothing helped.  “Drew, look at me.  Please don’t do this.”

Andrew froze.  He stared down at Nathaniel, untampered violence burning in his eyes.  The manic smile dropped, replaced by the twisted lip of anger.

“I don’t like that word,” Andrew growled, throwing Nathaniel’s leg down. He followed it with a swing of the axe, imbedding it deep in Nathaniel’s shin.  He screamed and writhed on the floor, pinned by his father’s axe and his boyfriend’s hand.  His cries brought the smile back onto Andrew’s face and he continued hacking away at Nathaniel’s legs before moving onto his arms.  His screams filled the room, brought smiles to everyone else’s faces, and drowned Nathaniel into unconsciousness.

~

Neil woke with a start in a sweat drenched bed. He struggled against the blankets wrapped around his legs, throwing them off to the side.  His breath was trying to escape him, coming out in rough, uneven spurts.  The clock next to his bed said 3:52, March 9.  A weight settled heavy on his chest.

Immediately, his body set into motion, tugging on shoes, grabbing the nearest sweatshirt he could find, stuffing his phone and keys into his pockets, and running as fast as he could out of that dorm and away from Palmetto.

Each step was a shock to his system, reminding him that he was awake, he was alive.  He’d beaten them.

He entertained the thought of calling Andrew, of hearing his voice for just a second, but it seemed ridiculous. Nightmares were a mundane occurrence for both of them.  Nothing to get worked up over.  He was fine. He had to be fine.

He pushed himself as hard as he possibly could, ignoring the throbbing in his ankles or the burn in his lungs.  As long as he could hear his father’s voice, the echoes of his scream, the desperate edge of his voice as he begged, he ran. Until he could shed the feeling of Nathaniel, feel comfortable in his own skin, he ran.  Until he could forget the image of Andrew, drugged and frantic, smiling over him as he carved into him, he ran.

It felt like he would never stop running.

He eventually made it back to Fox Tower, unharmed and exhausted, at 6 am.  His feet dragged on the floor as he made his way to the room.  He fell into bed, expecting sleep to come easy.  When he closed his eyes, he felt the pain all over again.

~

They’d lost.  They’d lost to the fucking Bearcats by one point.  They weren’t out of championships yet, their last two-point totals saving their pathetic performance, but it should’ve been easy. They’d beaten better teams before. Their game was fucked up, and Neil knew exactly why.

He couldn’t get out of his head the entire game. Each person he faced was his father, each voice he heard was Lola, each check was his mother.  There was nowhere else for his brain to go.  He’d benched himself during the first half, but his subs hadn’t fared much better.  It’d been four fucking years.  Why couldn’t he be done with this?

He sat on the bench, hands digging through his sweaty hair, pulling at each strand.  Exy was supposed to be the one thing he was good at and he couldn’t even do that right.  He couldn’t even muster the energy to shower.  He was useless.

Footsteps echoed off the empty locker room, each step spiking Neil’s irritation.  He kept his head in his hands, bent over in half.

“I don’t have the fucking patience right now,” he growled.

“What the fuck is going on?” Andrew asked. Neil’s head snapped up, his breath leaving him in one sigh.  The weight of Andrew’s hand on the back of Neil’s neck silenced the world and left just the two of them.  Neil’s mind quieted, the endless critiques ended.  He closed his eyes.

“It’s been four years,” Neil said, rubbing the heel of his hands against his eyes until he saw stars.  Andrew’s hand tightened on his neck and forced Neil to look at him with a hand under his chin.  They studied each other in silence, Neil filled with exhausted relief, Andrew with cold determination.  He kneeled down on the tiles, eyebrow cocked, perplexed.

“You were fine the past two years,” he noted. Neil scoffed, running his hands over the raised scars over his forearms and knuckles.

“You were here.”  The words passed through his lips and Neil registered just how true they were.  He hadn’t had to go through the convoluted process of grieving over nothing and the continuous nightmares alone yet.  This had been the first year since his Foxes had graduated, and though the faces on his team were familiar, it felt all too much like his life before he’d become a real person.

“You haven’t slept.”  It wasn’t a question, but Neil shook his head anyway.  Andrew stood and stepped away.  Any semblance of energy he’d amounted fled with Andrew’s touch. A selfish whine pushed through his lips. “Get up.  You stink.”

Neil did as he was told with a huff, following as Andrew directed him, hand fisted in the back of Neil’s jersey.  Even with just a hand at his back, he felt supported enough to fully breathe.  He would be caught if he fell, an insurance he’d needed for too long.  He pressed the slightest bit back into Andrew’s hand.

Andrew pushed him into a stall, sending a pointed look at Neil’s uniform, and turned the water on.  Neil slowly peeled his layers off, tossing them onto dry tile, until he was naked and shaking.  His muscles couldn’t relax, buzzed from the game, from the anniversary, from Andrew. He wasn’t sure if he wanted it to stop anymore.

He walked into the warm spray, allowed himself to become engulfed by the water.  Droplets ran down his skin in small waves of minute bliss, the first pleasant thing Neil had felt all day.  He breathed in as deeply as the steam would allow.  His hands ran lightly over his chest and shoulders, massaging the tender and bruising spots.  His muscles relaxed with each passing second until he felt like he could do another ten games.

“Yes or no?” Andrew asked behind him.  Neil automatically said yes, sighing as Andrew’s fingers slid into his hair.  He leaned into the touch, humming his approval.  The longer Andrew washed his hair, the more Neil leaned on him.  He wasn’t particularly gentle, but his touch was soothing each of Neil’s open wounds.  A salve on the frayed nerves stressed by years of torture, of running, of forcing himself to be everything he was not.  He could breathe around Andrew without the immense sense of dread he used to deal with after each decision, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Andrew made quick work of the rest of Neil’s body, then set him against the wall as he washed and rinsed himself.  He’d shut the water off when Neil moved, stepping in front of Andrew and framing his face with his hands.

“Yes or no?” he asked, the beginnings of a smile flickering on his lips.  Andrew’s eyes betrayed him slightly, darting down to catch on Neil’s mouth.

His hands rested on Neil’s hips as he breathed out his yes, meeting him in the middle.  The kiss was slow, unhurried, something so unlike the rhythm they’d built up for themselves: desperate, hands grabbing wherever they could get purchase, exploring each other as if it was the first and last time they’d touch each other.  This was a slow rainfall on a cloudy day, soft, inviting, undeniably necessary after such a long time.

Neil’s hands thread through Andrew’s hair, pressing closer to him until he could feel every inch of their bodies touching.  He didn’t have the usual burn of desire coursing through his veins, but a simpler need for comfort.  Neil pulled back and rested his head on Andrew’s shoulder.

“Get dressed.  I don’t want to spend the weekend in this locker room,” Andrew said, squeezing slightly on Neil’s hips.  He nodded, but took a second longer than he needed to before stepping back.

Despite the numbness tingling in Neil’s toes, he grabbed his dirty clothes and trekked back to his locker.  He pulled his spare clothes on, only getting halfway before his arms gave out.  His shirt fell around his neck as he huffed a sigh of defeat.  His upper body wasn’t working at all.  It seemed the most he could do was keep himself upright on the bench.

“You’re pathetic,” Andrew mused, shoving his arms through his shirt.  Neil shrugged, eyes still trained on the floor.  The struggle of the last few weeks, the high of playing the game, the low of losing to such an easy opponent, the buzz of having Andrew within reach, all mixed together to make an effective cocktail of bone deep fatigue. He couldn’t argue with him.  Not when his entire existence seemed to beg otherwise.

“Thank you so much,” he drawled.  Even out of the corner of his eye, Neil could see Andrew’s exaggerated eye roll as he stepped forward.  He aided Neil’s arms through each sleeve, taking a step back.  His thumb flicked across the burn scars on Neil’s cheek. Neil couldn’t stifle the wince as if Andrew had touched raw skin.  His hand ripped back within a second.  “No, Drew, you didn’t-”

“Yes or no, Abram?”

Neil’s mouth snapped shut.  The sound of that name elicited a contradiction of reactions. Andrew’s voice, the soft way he’d said the name, spread a contented warmth through his stomach.  The sound of his mother’s voice layered on top rose bile in his throat.

“Yes,” he bit out because Andrew’s presence was stronger.  Andrew set his hands on his shoulders, swinging a leg behind the bench, effectively placing himself mostly in Neil’s lap.  The other leg swung over and Neil’s hands darted toward Andrew’s waist.  He caught himself at the last minute as his hands hovered an inch above his skin.  After Andrew nodded, Neil’s arms tightened around him like a lifeline.

“You’re at Palmetto State, inside the Foxes locker room.”  Andrew pressed a kiss to the base of the knife scars across Neil’s jaw.  “You’re Neil Josten, number 10, starting striker.” Andrew trailed up the thin lines, lips dragging against hypersensitive skin.  “Nathaniel is dead.  You’re never going back to Baltimore.”  He turned to Neil’s other cheek, letting the kiss linger just a second longer than the others.  “You’re staying here.”  He punctuated it with a kiss to his lips.  No longer than a heart beat but more than enough to steady Neil.

Andrew’s hands dipped into the sides of his shirt, fingers playing idly with the puckered skin of old scars.  His nails scraped against some, sending sharp tingles throughout his body.  He couldn’t stop the smile spreading across his lips.

He buried his face into Andrew’s chest.  The smell of stale cigarettes and after shave wiped away the rest of the lingering doubts, solidifying him in the present.  Andrew pressed his face into Neil’s wet hair, the feeling of a phantom kiss ghosting across his skin.  It only deepened his smile.

“Thank you.”

“374%.”

[rewritingthestars]

Ive been watching a lot of horror movies about mermaids and got inspired to write mermaid neil aus so have the first part of the chapter

Warnings- graphic descriptions of violence and murder

Humanity doesn’t belong in the ocean. That’s what Neil’s parents taught him.

In the depths of the abyss only the ruthless survive. The darkness is endless and the predators are vast. You kill and you eat and you hide and keep moving forward until something more dangerous gets the better of you. Humanity has no place in a sea of monsters, no place in primal savagery.

Neil grows up and watches his parents lure and drown and skin humans alive. His mother teaches him how to sing and change his features to theirs, and his father teaches him how to rip out the thorax to get to the heart.

You are an animal first, and a person second. His father once told him, Never forget that you are separate from them.

Neil knows what a mask feels like, knows his face and hands and voice are only a masquerade, only a ploy, only a cover of what lies underneath. He is nothing more than blood thirst and instincts and clever adaptations to trick creatures above to their death. Mermaids aren’t people, they’re animals, cold and emotionless and cruel. They care only for prey, for food, for shelter, for survival. They are not humans, just the monsters that were made in their image.

And yet.

His mother taught him their language through the songs. Their words are strange and the sounds are too loud when spoken but they have a meaning to them that he can’t seem to get across in the chirps and hums of his native tongue. When he was younger his mother would sometimes let him swim just beyond the shoreline, and he’d watch as they danced and laughed and sang around bright flames the color of the sun. When he first lures a sailor to his fate, the expression on his face churns Neil’s stomach and his last breath breaks something deep inside.

Just before 12 moons of 12 moons pass his father tears the chords from his mother’s throat and eats her heart still beating. Neil wonders if all monsters feel the gut retching agony of losing a mother or if there’s something wrong with him.

Older but not much wiser, Neil sings and lures and murders for his clan, for his father, for his own survival, and pretends the hollow feeling inside of him is from an empty stomach and not of the misery that comes with being a killer.

-----

If Andrew had a choice whatsoever in his life, being a fisherman would not be his first. Or his second. Or his third. Possibly his fifth, right after falling off the side of a building.

But Andrew is fairly use to not getting the things he chooses, if he is given choices at all.

“Minyard!” Wymack yells, for the eighth time today, and Andrew makes a point to look like he’s been doing absolutely nothing, which isn’t too hard considering he is.

“Which one?” Andrew says, pointlessly. It’s never the other one, but it always succeeds in making Wymack’s face all the more redder.

“Don’t fuck with me you damn midget, get your ass over to the other deckhands and help them get the fish out of the net!” He shouts out, rain pulling his hair sideways and fish scales covering his life jacket.

Andrew hasn’t slept for more than four hours in the last twenty four hours and has been overhauling net after net for the last ten hours and the last thing he wants to do is look at another damn fish, which is rather hard considering the piles and piles of twitching fish that litter the deck’s boards. The rain has only gotten worse since the morning, pounding down with the viciousness of bears, wind blowing it in a way that nearly throws Andrew overboard, waves smashing into the boat to the point that it’s at a constant forty five degree tilt each time it rocks back.

If it wasn’t raining to the point of danger and if Andrew wasn’t in a place of potentially getting hit in the face with a jellyfish he’d look to the sky with all the disdain and annoyance he could muster. As it is he looks to the floorboards for pity and finds only a flopping fish on top of its brethren.

“Fuck.” Andrew says, but it’s lost in the rain and Kevin’s loud panicked shouts of district lines.

-----

Neil isn’t suppose to be this close to the surface. His father would punish him for this, his mother would kill him for this, but the skies are clear for the first time in months and the stars and galaxies so far away are finally clear up above. Neil likes to look at them, stare at them, tremble in the wake of knowing that the ocean isn’t the only place filled with darkness.

Neil has no excuse for being this close to a boat, this close to sailors. If Neil was more like his father he’d get the rest of his clan and sink the ship to the bottoms of the sea. If neil was more like his mother he’d go back to the cove his father has staked out and never speak of what he saw again. But Neil is neither his father nor his mother and instead treads in the shadows of the waters and peers up in hopes of a glimpse at the life above.

Sailors don’t come this far out anymore. It’s been moons since the last ship came through, a storm following its wake and tipping the boat over, dooming the survivors to a fate worse than drowning or hypothermia. Neil had silently wished that none would come after but Neil should know better by now that wishes are meaningless.

“What are you waiting for Junior?” He jolts, the sounds of her voice ricketing up his spine and constricting his throat. Lola swims next to him and grins, all of her sharp razor teeth out, her eyes covered by her second lid. “Well? Did you really think you could take an entire ship for yourself? Or were you thinking of some else all together, hm?” She laughs then, irritatedly high pitched squeals that pierced his ears and make him wince.

“I was just assessing the situation. It’s not usual to get ships this far out.” Neil says, hoping to play off the deep rooted fear she causes him.

Lola opens her black lids to roll her eyes, something she learned from her last victim. “Gods you’re just like your mother, if you won’t start it I will.” With that she breaks the surface and screams.

“Help! Help me please! Help!” She cries, splashing around like she’s struggling. “Down here, please hurry!”

It takes a few minutes of her act before someone above notices and shouts, a series of lights and people scrambling up above, and Neil feels his heart plummet as one of them unfastens a liferaft and makes to lower it into the water. Three humans are on it as they get closer. It’s not a lot but it’ll be enough. Lola must have alerted the rest of the clan because Neil can see the others start to surround the main ship.

Lola goes under with a shout before the humans can reach her and she gives Neil a wide grin, her skin darkening gray and her mouth widening. “You’re up Junior.” She says, grabbing his arm harshly to move him upward.

Neil lets himself break the surface, startling the men looking over their life raft for Lola.

“Wha-” One of them starts to say but Neil doesn’t waste time before shushing him, moving to the edge of the raft with the smile his mother taught him to wear.

“You’re far from home aren’t you? How lonely you must be.” Neil says softly, reciting the words he’s said thousands of times before. “Would you like to spend the night with me?”

The humans are already under the spell of his voice, their eyes glazed over, leaning towards him subconsciously. Neil traces the arm of the man closest to him, feeling the odd hair of it and the way it makes the human shiver. Neil looks up from under his eyelashes. “Do you want to kiss me?” The man nods mouth gaped and moving closer to his. Neil pulls back as he goes forward until the man’s face is underwater and Neil unhinges his jaw and bites his neck open. There’s a muted gurgling sound as the man struggles against him and shouts above from his comrades but Neil can already hear Romero and his father pull the others down. Neil feels for the bone that connects the neck and snaps it, pushin the slightly twitching body downwards towards Lola who snatches it and immediately digs her teeth into the body’s chest.

Neil sinks down and his father, with a mouthful of gore gives him a look that speaks danger if he does not comply. Above the water, lights and panicked yells indicate the rest of the humans looking for their crewmates and Neil steels his face and goes above the surface once more, letting out a shaky breath before opening his mouth and sings.

-----

It does not take long, after that, for the rest of the crew to go down screaming.

-----

[badacts]

learn to live right

inspired by @requiemofkings‘ EXTREMELY HURTFUL ART

To call Neil ‘stoic’ is such an understatement as to almost be funny. 

Then again, how applicable it is to someone like him - who has never been allowed to slow down for anything, including pain, and never had the opportunity for anything else - is debatable. He isn’t like Andrew, whose feelings are dulled grey anyway by the complicated chemistry of his brain. He was just never taught the intricacies of it, or maybe instead taught the intricacies of acting rather than the simplicity of emotion.

The thing is - Neil can learn. He’s been studying since he crash landed in Fox Tower, even if he didn’t realise that’s what he was doing. Laughing at a joke from Nicky, smiling at Andrew in the cool autumn afternoon, affection towards Matt and Dan in the guise of a hug or a warm greeting in the morning - they’re all things he’s learned.

It’s a hill he’s been rolling down, and with the momentum he’s been building - his mouth to Andrew’s, the light in his expression sometimes, his devotion - it’s only so long before he collides with something that hurts.

No one can run from anything forever.

Dan institutes compulsory socialising amongst the Foxes in Andrew’s junior year, backed by her inwardly dubious but outwardly supportive vice-captain. Andrew would quite happily avoid them. When he says as much to Neil, Neil shrugs and says they’re compulsory.

Andrew says, “What will you give me for it?”

Neil replies, “Nothing. They’re compulsory.”

“Are you going to bench me if I don’t go?”

“Are you implying that that would be a punishment for you?” His face curls with humour as he says it, crinkling around his eyes with simple pleasure. 

So, Andrew goes. Neil is always more interesting when he doesn’t back down.

The Foxes in the midst of spring championships when Dan makes them all sit down to watch a movie that Andrew ignores in favour of almost dozing towards the back of the room. He comes fully awake when Neil’s phone buzzes in his pocket and he leaves the room to answer it.

They don’t pause the movie, but there’s the sound of shifting in the room when Neil doesn’t return after ten minutes, then fifteen. 

“If he’s not going to bother staying, why do the rest of us have to?” one of the little assholes down the front mutters. 

“Do you think he’s coming back?” Nicky hisses to the upperclassmen, utterly unsubtle in his concern. Neil, as the staunchest supporter of any movement towards team unity, would never leave without a good reason.

“Why doesn’t someone go check on him?” Renee suggests sweetly, like the preschool teacher she is at heart. “We can pause the movie for a moment.”

Everyone looks to Andrew, because they’re predictable. Andrew, who assumed it was Wymack calling until five minutes passed - Coach isn’t fond of long conversations - goes after Neil.

He does say, before he goes, “Don’t bother waiting.”

They’ve taken over the court lounge for the event, because none of the suites are big enough to hold the entire line now. Andrew goes straight out to the parking lot on the kind of hunch that comes from knowing someone, and finds Neil standing by the Maserati, cigarette smoking in his hand down by his hip.

“I’m coming,” he says. He drops the cigarette then, but doesn’t grind it out. It rolls over the asphalt still smoking silvery in the dark.

His voice sounds normal. His expression is one Andrew has seen before, twice: once in this same parking lot, when he asked Andrew to come pick him up so he didn’t run away. And once on the floor of a hotel room in Baltimore. It’s the face of a man who is trying very, very hard not to break. The face of a man looking for a reason not to.

“Who was on the phone?” Andrew asks. That expression makes his hands tingle.

“The feds,” Neil replies.

It’s been more than a year of silence. Andrew shouldn’t feel his muscles bind at the mention of the FBI anymore, but with his memory it’s inevitable. They wanted to take Neil away. Andrew hasn’t forgotten that yet, nor Neil asking if he could stay, looking so sure Andrew would turn him down. 

“What do they want?” Andrew asks. His voice comes out lower, a rumble. A threat.

“They,” Neil says, still level, and then pauses like he never does, grasping for the words. “They found my mother’s body.”

Ah. This, then, is the collision.

Neil touches a hand to his chest, which is jumping with his breath. He looks to Andrew and there’s confusion written in the crinkle of his forehead. “I don’t-” His eyes spill over.

He cries like he’s fighting it and losing, all clenched teeth and staring eyes. He cries like he’s helpless to stop. He cries like it hurts.

“I can’t,” he tries again, weak and wet. His voice breaks, and he’s holding himself together with white-knuckled, touch-starved hands. It’s not a panic that he can snap out of. It’s grief which has been dammed up for years, finally broken through in a torrent.

An ex-teacher once called Andrew a ‘spectator to his own life’. It was one of those meetings where he got dragged before whichever person in power had taken on the task of turning him into a real boy that week, just so they could lecture him about purpose and promise and not ending up in jail. 

It wasn’t true back then in every way that mattered, and it also isn’t true now. Andrew, who could stand here and watch and offer nothing at all, reaches out.

Curving a hand around Neil’s nape is at this point almost second nature. His other goes to the quivering small of Neil’s back. There’s no resistance - Neil falls straight into him, forehead to collarbone, his hands desperate in their grip on Andrew’s shirt.

Neil, falling, holds hard to Andrew like an anchor. And Andrew, who has gotten so used to standing his ground, keeps finding new uses for the skill when it comes Neil.

No one ever taught Andrew how to be gentle, either. It turns out that he can learn too.