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Why exy teams have yearly banquets when no other sport does this is beyond Neil. Kevin’s explanation is that it’s done in college, so it’s done after.
“You could be traded to any of these teams, at any time. You could have to work with any of these people. If the only way you know them is as rivals, it makes that transition harder.”
“Good thing you’re so nice to them, then,” Neil had shot back.
“Fuck off.”
“Happily.”
The only good thing: Andrew will be there, marking the first time in two weeks that he and Neil get to see each other. That, plus an overnight stay, makes the banquet more than worth it.
Of course, Neil’s team gets stuck in traffic—an accident. It takes the cops forty minutes to move the car out of the way, at least to the point where the bus is able to squeeze a lane over and slide through.
They’re the latest ones there.
“Fashionably late,” says Neil’s captain, Clark. “Not the end of the world. I doubt we’re even late for dinner.”
“Good, I’m starving,” Neil responds.
“Hey. Speaking of. Are you going to be okay? With Minyard there?”
“We weren’t speaking of him at all.”
Clark waves that off as irrelevant. “I know about the fights you got into, at these banquets, when you were in college. Is this going to be a problem?”
“Riko’s dead, isn’t he?”
A few stifled gasps come from behind Neil. Even after the Ravens fell to pieces, even now everyone knows the truth about Riko and Kevin, even after everyone saw Riko try to kill Neil at Riko’s last-ever game, people still feel some kind of—shame? Guilt?—when it comes to mentioning Riko’s death. Whatever feeling it is, Neil sure doesn’t share it.
“Will. Minyard. Be. A. Problem.”
“Of course not. I can handle him.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
The bus pulls into the parking lot, and Neil grins at his captain, a happy smile he’d found somewhere in his sophomore year of college, and one he’s still not entirely used to. “I can handle him,” he repeats.
“Neil Josten. There will be no fights at this banquet.”
“If Minyard gets anywhere near Neil, there’ll be hell to pay,” shouts Riley from the back.
“Thanks,” Neil says drily.
The Minyard-Josten rivalry is going strong, although why Neil’s own teammates can’t see through it is beyond him. It’s not that either Andrew or Neil do anything, necessarily, to encourage it; it’s just that they don’t do anything to discourage it, and that so much of the way they treat each other in public could be so easily interpreted as hatred. It doesn’t help that they yell at each other in Russian all the time—the time Riley went in for a punch, and Andrew didn’t even budge, and Neil hauled Riley back before her fist could connect with his face, and Neil yelled “How have you still not learned to duck,” and Andrew had cut a glance his way and responded: “Fuck you.” Riley had added: “You tell him, Neil!” and flipped up two middle fingers. Or there was the time Andrew blocked three of Neil’s shots in a row, and, spreading his arms wide, had said in Russian: “And Kevin thinks eating ice cream makes me slow!” And Neil had responded with two middle fingers, and then proceeded to run himself into the ground until he had scored three times on Andrew. Or every time they played against each other, when they could barely stop themselves from heading directly to each other, tugging on racquets, on helmets, low words in Russian meant only for each other. Their teams, at least, would realize the rivalry was a press invention, if only Andrew and Neil would speak English—but those words aren’t meant for their teams. Russian means privacy, and right now, they get so little of that.
And then there were the tweets—the tweets in which, apparently, no one could read the undercurrent of affection. The “I hate you’s” and “Better speed up’s.” Former foxes retweeting them, egging them on, fully willing to both keep their secret and rile up the press. Kevin refused to comment at all, which only served to reinforce the general feeling that the rivalry was real.
Well, Neil decides, it keeps people out of their business, mostly, and there’s no way to stop the talk without letting the press in altogether—and that’s a bit much.
So.
“We’ve got your back,” Riley promises as they leave the bus. Neil’s teammates nod. “We won’t let him get anywhere near you. It’s Christmas, and we’re gonna have fun.”
“I appreciate it.”
“Sarcasm’s not a good look on you,” she says cheerfully.
Neil doesn’t deign to respond.
They check their bags and enter the ballroom, full of players and coaches, and Neil’s eyes immediately find Andrew—surrounded by his team members, and by Kevin. Neil gives them a jaunty wave, which Kevin returns absentmindedly and Andrew doesn’t return at all—but Andrew’s eyes don’t leave Neil’s, not until Riley, who has eight inches on Neil, scoots in between them. “Christmas,” she says, poking his shoulder, “is not for feuds or rivalries.”
Neil lets it roll off his back. A few hours, and he’ll have Andrew all to himself anyway—but that thought only makes the intervening hours feel longer.
And then—“Neil! Neil Josten!”
Neil’s blood goes cold—he doesn’t want to face anyone who could make Kevin sound like that, but running away from hasn’t been his modus operandi for years—he dodges Riley and runs. His team comes after him, waving off concerned bystanders, but—
Neil skids to a halt.
Kevin is, by force of his presence alone, holding back Andrew’s entire team. Andrew is on the ground, one knee on the stomach of—Neil riffles through his brain and finds the name Sean, Sean Rowe, Andrew’s teammate. Andrew's hand is on Sean’s throat, and while he isn’t technically pressing hard, Sean must know just how close Andrew’s knives are to Sean’s sensitive, breakable windpipe.
Well, if Andrew slices him open right here, right now, that’ll be that. Neil drops to his knees. “Andrew.”
Andrew doesn’t move. Neil can see his shoulders, tense; Andrew’s hand, shaking with the self-control required not to slice Sean’s throat open. “Andrew.” Nothing. Just Andrew’s eyes, deep, dark, furious, staring holes into Sean’s face.
Neil looks at Kevin. “What’d he say?”
Kevin fidgets for a second, twisting his wedding ring around his finger. “He said.” He casts an apologetic glance at Andrew’s back. “He said he’d like to get his hands on… the butcher’s son. He, ah, wanted to see what that mouth could do.”
Neil considers that.
He could just… let Andrew give Sean another mouth.
Neil sighs. Why is it always up to him to do the right thing? He shoots a glare at Kevin—why can’t you handle this yet—and slides a hand into Andrew’s view.
Andrew’s nose flares, which Neil takes as confirmation of his attention. “Andrew, if you go to jail, we’re both screwed,” Neil says, in Russian. There’s a commotion, Kevin’s voice. Sean’s teammates are worried—Josten, hated by Minyard, might be riling Andrew up. Whatever reassurance Kevin can scrounge up—Neil stops paying attention. “I’ll get myself put away just so I can share a cell with you, and then the FBI will cart me off, if they don’t get to me first. Let him go. What can he do to me? All he’s got are his words. Besides, I thought we agreed to let me fight my own battles?”
Andrew looks at Neil’s hand. “Neil.”
“Andrew.”
“What,” he says in English, “happened when your father died?”
It could have sent Neil back, back to where he shouldn’t go, but Andrew knows what matters. His father’s death will never—could never—be a point of trauma for him. “What do you mean?”
“Describe it.”
In English.
“Neil,” Kevin says, urgently, but Neil waves him off.
“He was shot. He was there—yelling—how dare you, how dare you come into my house—and then,” Neil says, feeling the smile curl up his face, feeling its cruelty, incapable of taking it off. A Wesninski at heart, Ichirou had called him. Perhaps this is what that meant—Nathan’s death will always make Neil the last remaining Wesninski, because it’s in thinking about that death that Neil feels closest to his bloodline. “And then—two bullets. Right to his face. Destroyed.” Neil half-laughs, overtaken again by the sheer euphoria of watching his father die, of replaying the moment, again and again, wherein his father was destroyed. Destroyed, never to look at him again, never to enter his nightmares again, never to find or hurt him again. In one quick moment, so much of what Neil was terrified of had been obliterated. “His brains were—”
“Neil,” says a horrified voice, Riley, horrified, so close, his whole team, and Andrew’s whole team.
Oops.
Neil looks down, fighting to get his face under control. Fighting to think about something, anything else—like Sean, on the verge of death.
He looks up.
Andrew is looking at him.
Neil absorbs his gaze, like a sunflower turning towards the sun, and grins. Not the happy grin he still cherishes, but the one Nicky had once called gooey, the one that annoys Andrew to no end. Don’t look at me like that. “I saw the cake,” he says cheerfully. “Biggest cake I’ve ever seen. Wanna go get some?”
“Your attempt at distraction is not subtle.”
Neil shrugs. “Is it working?”
A moment passes.
Andrew removes his hand and his knee from Sean, and stands. “Only if they have ice cream.”
“We might have to wait for that; it’s technically too early for dessert, and that has to stay frozen.”
Andrew gives Neil his hand, and pulls him up. “Two desserts, then.”
“Sounds good to me.”
They turn to walk away, and from behind them:
“He’s in love with you,” Sean says, from the floor. “Minyard, did you know? The gangster’s son is in love with you.”
Neil would be happy to walk away, but Andrew pauses, and turns back. Gestures to Neil, who turns to face him.
Andrew grabs the chain around Neil’s neck, and pulls it out from under his collar, exposing the ring that hangs from it. Andrew stares at it for a minute, and then, without sparing a glance for Sean, says—“He’d better be, we’ve been married for two years.”
Andrew turns and continues toward the cake, and Neil is happy to follow him.
“Why did you want me to smile?” Neil asks, wielding a knife, ignoring the dirty looks he gets for cutting the cake three hours too early.
“I wanted him to see what that mouth could do.”
Neil snorts. “Well. It worked. Chances of my teammates ever talking to me again?”
“High.”
“Chances of your teammates ever talking to you again?”
“Unfortunately, high. Yes or no?” He asks, as Neil sets a slice on Andrew’s plate.
“Yes,” Neil says, leaning in, and Andrew kisses him, hard, and Neil thinks of muscle memory, of how his mouth still knows how it fits against Andrew’s, and thinks, abruptly, that Andrew is claiming Neil, happy to let the rivalry rumors fly until someone thinks that, maybe, Neil isn’t Andrew’s, and Neil laughs as he pulls away.
“What?”
“There is no this,” Neil says, high-pitched and mocking. “There is no us.”
“Shut up.”
“Neil?”
Neil turns, and finds his entire team, led by an uncomfortable-looking Riley.
“High,” Andrew says, before taking a bite of his cake.
“Hi,” Riley says, uncomfortably.
Neil considers correcting her, but Andrew doesn’t seem bothered, so he lets it drop. “Sup?”
“Are you ok?”
“Never better,” he says, grinning. The fun part about having a past like his is this: any time things are even vaguely going well, he can say he’s never been better and it has a solid chance of being true.
Andrew kicks his shin.
Neil ignores him. “Do we have to—socialize with other teams? Does this count?”
“Why didn’t you tell us?”
Neil shrugs. “Didn’t think I needed to, honestly.”
“We—” She gives up, grabs him, and starts hauling him away.
“See you in a minute,” Neil says over his shoulder. Andrew stares Neil down, until Riley gets a group of people between them, people whose eyes flicker to him and away, interest in Neil Josten turning to a desperate interest in not being involved in whatever Josten’s gotten himself into this time.
Neil takes a bite of his cake.
“We can make sure you never have to see him again,” Riley says, once she’s sure they’re far enough away. The rest of the team follows, closing in around them.
Neil’s fork freezes.
“Are you FBI?”
A muscle twitches in Riley’s jaw—he must have misunderstood her. And then she misunderstood him. He hadn’t intended his question to sound rhetorical. “We can do that without the FBI. We can switch lineups around. We can move you. We can—you don’t have to stay married to him. We can help.”
“Why would I—what?”
“Has he hurt you?”
Understanding floods Neil’s veins, followed by fiery rage. He clings to his plate, desperately trying to maintain some shred of self-restraint. She doesn’t know what she’s saying. She doesn’t know why it would affect him like this. She’s trying to help. In another situation, this might be necessary. Just because she’s wrong doesn’t mean he should knock her teeth out. He holds a finger up, a silent request, while he breathes in deep, exhales slow, and relearns how to think straight.
“I realize,” he says, slowly. He will not say something he regrets. He’s getting better at this. There are more people around him that he likes, these days, than that he doesn’t. And he likes Riley. “I realize that Andrew has a past.”
“And a present,” someone scoffs, and Neil’s fury flares up again, but that’s not a fair reaction to a true statement. Deep breaths.
“Andrew would never hurt me. He—”
“Isn’t he a sociopath? How do you know—”
“Not.” He breathes in. That was angry. Abrupt. Cruel. “Riley. He’s not. He’s—you don’t even know. You don’t even know. He’s—” Mine. Perfect. Soft. “I can’t do this. Riley, I—you know. You know my past, you know who I am. Do you think for half a second I would stick around with someone who would add to my—” Neil gestures at himself, holds up one burned, scarred hand as an example. “He wouldn’t. He would never. He’s—safe.”
Riley’s seven years older than Neil, he remembers, as she takes his hand. Seven years older and divorced, he remembers. Divorced, and took a year off from playing Exy, he remembers. The reason, he recalls, why their shower stalls have doors on them. There are pieces, and he’s put them together before, and he just needs to remember the finished puzzle. Needs to keep it in mind.
“No one ever looks,” he says, an explanation, an apology. Gropes for the words he heard Freshman year—Nicky’s voice, Dan’s words. “People like us, they don’t know what to do with us, they want us to be someone else’s problem, so they look past us. And people still look past Andrew. They only look at him when it’s too dangerous to look away. He’s so much more than that.
“A few years ago, I watched my father die. Shot in the face. To this day I have dreams about it, and, Riley, they’re good dreams. Watching my dad die is not a nightmare. It used to be the kind of thing I wouldn’t even dare hope for.” His face is doing it again, he knows it, and Andrew’s not here, he takes his hand back from Riley and puts it over his mouth. Studies Riley’s face. There’s horror there, and he knows if he looks around it’ll be on everyone else’s face, too. Many people wish death on others. Few watch it happen, unaffected. Fewer still watch with joy. Neil remembers Riko dying, the shock of blood, the joy, and feels his father’s smile etch itself deeper into his face, knife-like. “You know that. You know what the press knows. You know what I’ve told you. You don’t know everything. You don’t even know most of my story. Andrew knows all of it. And he stayed. He fought for me to stay. Do you like having me on this team? It’s because of Andrew. I wasn’t asking if you were FBI as a joke. I was sincere. They don’t like him. He wouldn’t let them take me. There aren’t many people who would have done that. And there are even fewer who are like Andrew.”
“What’s Andrew like?”
Neil shakes his head. Andrew is a secret wrapped safely in muscle and knives, and Neil won’t give it away. “Can I go now?”
“Why do you pretend you hate him?”
Neil turns around to look at Clark, the question’s asker. “I don’t.”
“Neil, I don’t know if you’ve heard, but there’s hundred-dollar bets on which one of you is going to punch the other first.”
Neil shrugs. “That’s not my problem.”
“Which side should I bet on?”
“Don’t bet at all.”
“No betting? Sounds like our Neil,” says a familiar voice, pushing through the crowd. And then Matt is there, and Dan, and Allison and Renee, a barrier between him and his teammates, smiling. It’s funny, Neil thinks, that the human expression of happiness is so close to every other animal’s way of expressing threat. “Anyway, we’ve got a lot to catch up on, so we’re going to go grab a table—”
“You knew them,” Clark says. “And you’re okay with it?”
Matt, Dan, and Allison look lost—but not Renee. “Perhaps it is worth remembering,” she says with a soft smile, “that appearances can be deceiving. That what is good for one person, may not be good for another—but that doesn’t make that thing bad, per se. Just not right for you.”
“And are they right for each other?”
“Look, and decide for yourself.”
And then, a group decision Neil isn’t aware of, his former teammates shuffle him out of the circle.
Andrew is waiting for him, on the other side of that wall, murder in his eyes, a nervous Kevin at his elbow. Kevin looks more relieved to see him than Andrew, who immediately checks Neil over like he expects to see blood.
“Hi,” Neil says, grinning as Andrew pats him down. “Waiting for me?”
Andrew shoots a vicious look over Neil’s shoulder, sending Neil’s pulse into overdrive; it’s always nice to see some emotion on his face. Andrew waves a hand in the direction of their former teammates, and Neil looks to them for explanation.
“Andrew said they grabbed you and hauled you off, and lo and behold, they had you in a fun little enclave,” Matt says. “We convinced Andrew to let us go in and get you.”
“And you let them?” Neil asks, a smile curving across his face.
Andrew waves a hand.
“Thanks. I like them.” He looks at his Foxes. “Thanks, guys.”
Renee smiles. “Couldn’t let things get too bad. It’s Christmas, after all.”
“Ravens,” Andrew says.
Neil, remembering how much the Ravens cared about peace and joy on Christmas, nods—and then realizes that Andrew isn’t starting up an argument, he’s staring down a group of people. Wearing numbers on chains around their necks. Ex-Ravens.
The Foxes give them a wide birth, shuttled out of the danger zone by Matt and Dan.
And immediately make a 90 degree turn, away from Jean Moreau, talking to a rattled-looking Sean Rowe.
“Nowhere is safe,” Allison gripes. “Is food out yet? Can we just get food? Are we supposed to sit with our teams? I have stuff to say, to you two, about your rivalry. I have thoughts.”
“That’s new,” Andrew says, shocking Neil into a laugh—he hadn’t expected Andrew to talk for another couple hours, at least. Allison shoots them both a glare.
“I have things to say about that, too,” Kevin says. “You should clear it up.”
Neil holds his hands up, remembers he’s still got cake, takes a bite, and, just to annoy Kevin, says as he chews: “We didn’t start it.”
“Yes, you did.”
“Nope.”
“You literally did. I was there.”
“A matter of interpretation.”
“Food’s open,” Matt says. “Can we please?”
Kevin drops it, for as long as it takes them to get food and find a table. They’re not expected to sit by team, apparently; the tables are too small for that. Not the best for making new friends, Neil thinks, but who is he to complain?
“Andrew said he hated you, on camera,” Kevin says, the second they’re all seated.
“I do,” Andrew says.
“And then you,” Kevin says, ignoring Andrew as he jabs a fork in Neil’s direction, “said, on camera, that he’s always hated you.”
“He has.”
Kevin spreads his hands, and Neil isn’t sure what he’s trying to convey: that he’s made his argument, or that he wants to strangle both Neil and Andrew.
“All you have to do is say it’s an inside joke! That’s it!”
“It’s not.”
“Look.” Kevin stabs a piece of chicken, viciously. “Court. Remember Court? Remember how you desperately need to make it? They’re worried. They want to make you both offers, of course they do, but talent is nothing if a team can’t work together, you both know that. They’re worried that your ‘rivalry’ will prevent that.”
“Then tell them they don’t need to worry about it.”
“You could end this in two minutes.”
“Look,” Matt intervenes, “did you or did you not just, two seconds ago, tell both your teams that you’re married?”
Neil and Andrew shrug identical shrugs.
“So, really, maybe you don’t have to do anything. Maybe one of them will tell.”
“No, they won’t,” Andrew says, holding a knife less like he wants to cut his pork and more like he wants to cut a person.
“And don’t tell me,” Kevin starts up again, “don’t tell me you’re not fueling this thing.”
“We’re not.”
“Denver.”
Neil grins. Denver had been fun. They’d been there for training—mountain air and whatnot—and Andrew and Neil had found a spot, a room, empty for the winter, little more than a broom closet, with enough space for them. It wasn’t their fault that a thirty-minute shared absence plus a disheveled appearance was enough to fuel a rumor of a fight. “Not our fault.”
“Your last game against each other.”
Andrew had walked, not to his goal, but to Neil—just long enough to lace his fingers through Neil’s racquet, tug on it, and say in Russian: “Don’t let this go overtime. I scheduled a delivery—Thai—for seven o’clock, and we will be there to receive it.”
He had walked away before Neil could answer.
Clark had asked him what Minyard had wanted. The answer: “Don’t ask me, Captain.”
Neil’s team had won, and he and Andrew had made it home at 6:50.
“We didn’t even talk to the press last game,” Andrew says, flat.
“That’s another great example, the last time the press asked you about Neil!”
The question: “What did you say to Neil Josten last time you two were face-to-face? Why didn’t he respond?”
The answer: “I told him not to waste my time. He didn’t answer, presumably because if he had, it would have been a waste of my time.”
“It wasn’t untrue,” Andrew says, in the present. “Actually, it was entirely true.”
“What did you say?” Allison asks.
“Not to let it go into overtime,” Neil responds. “He’d scheduled a Thai delivery to our place, and didn’t want to miss it.”
“Had to say it in Russian, though,” Kevin scoffs. “Couldn’t say that in English. Oh no.”
“I wasn’t inviting the rest of Neil’s team back,” Andrew says.
“Look. I get why you don’t want the press in your relationship.”
“Yeah, where is Thea?” Dan asks, craning her neck around.
“Socializing. Like we’re supposed to be doing.”
“You’re not socializing.”
Kevin waves that away as irrelevant.
“This is the one place you could feasibly have a good time socializing,” Neil points out. “You can talk about exy for the entirety of this dinner and have someone talk to about it.”
“So could you,” Andrew says, “and then you wouldn’t have to bother me with it.”
Neil ignores that, and Kevin ignores both of them.
“The difference between me and Thea and the two of you is this: when I needed the press out of my business, I made sure they didn’t think Thea and I had any relationship. As far as the press is concerned, you two do have a relationship, and it’s a bad one. If you wanted reporters out, you shouldn’t have started anything.”
“We didn’t start anything,” Neil says. “They read into it. And that’s—”
“Not my problem,” half the table says, a tired chorus.
“The new I’m fine,” Matt says through a piece of broccoli.
“It’s not and I am,” Neil says, unrepentant.
“Who’re you texting?” Allison asks Renee.
Renee glances up and smiles. “Nicky. He’s furious that he’s not here for this.”
Andrew raises an eyebrow. “Tell him he’s getting my uncaring face.”
“That’s every face,” Matt says, prompting Andrew to turn his uncaring face on Matt, and for a moment, Neil feels oddly dizzy—in his head, Andrew punches Matt so hard he falls over, Allison lies face down on the ground with Andrew’s knee on her back, Andrew says I was seven—and then he’s back again, sitting around a table, listening to Andrew make a joke.
“What?” Andrew asks.
Neil shakes his head. “Nothing.”
“And you,” Kevin says, picking up right where he left off, “said you’d tear Andrew apart next time you faced him. You like this.”
Neil considers this, and nods. “That’s the first true thing you’ve said all day.”
“Why?”
“It’s hilarious.”
Kevin points a fork at him. “That’s usually called a bad attitude.”
“I’ve had one for years, I’m not stopping now.”
“Court is on the line. And so, therefore, is your life. Cut this shit out.”
“Thanks for the reminder, Kev. Do you ever think about how the Day Spirit Award has your name on it but will literally never have your name on it?”
Kevin glares at Neil, who glares right back.
“What’s the point of fighting for a life I’m not allowed to live?”
“What’s the point of fighting for a life that will lead to an early demise?”
“My train of thought is the one that helped me survive. Yours would have had me dead before I hit 20, alone.”
“Sometimes you need to switch things up a bit. If you had signed to the same team in the first place—”
Neil shoots him the darkest look he’s capable of scrounging up on a moment’s notice. It is, given who Neil is, enough to shut Kevin up.
Andrew’s team had had the space, when Neil had graduated. Had made Neil an offer. Neil had brought that offer home, had left it on the counter while Andrew was home, and it had, somehow, made its way to the trash.
Neil had accepted the offer from his current team, instead.
When Neil was lonely, it seemed like cruelty—from Andrew, to Neil. A rejection. Don’t get in my space. An empty house and an empty bed and a different goalie at his back. When he faced Andrew on the court, it changed, moment to moment: Fun, one second, to see if he was good enough, to test himself against the best; the next second utter callousness, from Andrew, to Neil, forcing them to fight, bringing animosity into their relationship.
When Neil was thinking clearly, it was cruelty—from Andrew, to Andrew. Everything ends. Last time I let something in, it nearly killed me. And Neil wasn’t exactly the type to play it safe, and the Moriyamas existed, and there were all the daily risks—car crashes, plane crashes, allergens not discovered until too late, food inhaled unchewed. Some would react by staying inside, giving up. Andrew reacted by forcing space. By throwing up a barrier. If Andrew didn’t see Neil every day, then Neil’s death wouldn’t kill Andrew. It was digging fingernails into his palm to stop him from reaching for what he wanted, in case it wasn’t there when he closed his hand. It was never practicing exy in case he couldn’t get good enough.
So, when he needed to, Neil sat in bed and counted. To ten, past ten, higher and higher, in every language he knew, drawing on every ounce of patience that his mother had to have, in some form, passed down to him. Andrew’s barriers were his, and Neil had earned the right to build a door in most of them, and to walk through that door. He wouldn’t reward that trust by picking up a sledgehammer. And he isn’t going to let Kevin Day bring it up.
Renee—once the conversation is clearly over—starts a new one. A charity, one she’s been thinking about for several years. She’s been talking about it for several years, too, but never seems to be able to settle on what she wants it to do. Help kids get into exy? Pay therapy costs for the disenfranchised? Save the planet? It is, even after three years, a lively discussion. She’s content, for now, to donate to various existing charities, but, well, fraud, and there are bad charities, but on the other hand creating a charity is a commitment, so it should be one she’s truly committed to—
And others join the table. Thea, wrapping a hand around Kevin’s. Laila and Alvarez find them, and find chairs, and make space. Jean and Jeremy, too, once they realize where Laila and Alvarez are. Riley, with a tentative glance at Neil and Andrew, sits down, and three minutes later is part of the conversation, now focusing on Chicago nightlife. Neil joins in—he and Andrew have spent a couple nights there—and Andrew seems reasonably interested. So they stay, and their friends come to them, until they overtake a second table and squash the two tables together, all of them still squeezing together to fit.
Under the table, Andrew’s pinky brushes Neil’s hand, and Neil links his pinky through Andrew’s.
Neil glances at Andrew, and—Andrew is looking at him.
There’s something odd about it, which is this: Andrew can only be so vulnerable. In the privacy of their own home, where Andrew is comfortable, he can touch Neil and look at him at the same time, and Neil can look at Andrew, and on a good day, clothes aren’t necessary. On a very good day, neither are the armbands. From there, Andrew puts up more barriers—a hotel room means Andrew is a light sleeper. If he’s out of the house, he’s got his armbands on—although whether or not there are knives in there, these days, is a toss-up. And so on. And in public, in an unfamiliar place, surrounded by people—vulnerability is a rare commodity. Interest in the conversation is a lot; touching someone else is a lot more. Andrew doesn’t often look at Neil in public, not without the veneer of aggression, or physical separation.
Neil stares right back.
He knows it’s the look, the one Andrew doesn’t like, the one that says maybe you’re my answer. But Andrew doesn’t say anything.
There’s an odd look on Andrew’s face, and it’s not odd because Neil has never seen it, it’s odd because Neil’s never seen it in public. Affection. Love. Whatever emotion it was that caused Andrew to go batshit in Baltimore. Something.
“Neil, what’s the name of the theater?”
Neil looks away so fast he worries for a moment that he’s snapped his own neck, leaning forward, trying to block Andrew from the rest of the table, trying to give him a minute to get it together. “What?”
“The theater,” Allison repeats. “The theater in Montana. It was, like, the only one in the whole state. What was it called?”
Neil responds, and falls back into the conversation, almost. Andrew is tracing the scars on his hand, sending shivers up Neil’s spine, distracting him, making it hard to breathe, making it easy to want—
He gives in and looks back at Andrew, who looks almost surprised. Distracted, himself. Andrew stops tracing Neil’s hand, looks away, drops back to his pinky.
“How tall was Steinberg, Andrew?” Jeremy asks, leaning forward. “You played him, right? Do you remember? I wanna say 6 foot 5, but he seemed so much bigger than that.”
Almost reflexively, Neil opens his mouth—we can google it, you’ve all got smartphones—
“6 foot 7,” Andrew says. “With hair two inches tall.”
Neil shuts his mouth.
He looks at Andrew.
Andrew ignores him, focusing on the conversation.
Well.
That’s the evening, then.
And it is. They stay there. They go up for dessert—there’s ice cream, now—and go back to the table. And, once in a while, Andrew speaks, and not just to redirect a question to someone else.
The ballroom where they’re having the banquet is in a hotel, the one all the athletes are staying in—easier, safer. Andrew and Neil go to their separate rooms when the banquet ends. Neil grabs his duffel—overpacking is overrated—and goes up two more floors, to find Andrew’s door cracked open and Andrew waiting on the edge of the bed, flipping through the four free TV channels.
It’s a relief, to shut the door, to drop his duffel, to go sit on the bed with Andrew.
“Yes or no?” Andrew murmurs, and yes, and Neil buries his hands in Andrew’s hair, and experiences that strange paradox: a world, narrowed to Andrew’s mouth on his, that somehow feels so much larger than the world he usually inhabits. Andrew’s hand up his shirt is firm, pushing, and Neil goes, pliant, comfortable, pulling Andrew down on top of him.
For a runaway, Neil thinks fleetingly, he sure does like the weight holding him in place.
And then Andrew pulls away. Just an inch or two. Not far at all.
Neil feels the distance keenly.
“What am I like?” Andrew asks.
Neil stares at him. “A weighted blanket?”
Amusement, there and gone. “You weren’t very quiet, when your team had you sequestered. He wouldn’t let them take me. There aren’t many people who would have done that. And there are even fewer who are like Andrew. But when she asked you what I’m like, you asked if you could leave.”
“Didn’t realize I was being that loud.”
“I doubt anyone else heard you. They were paying attention to not-you. What am I like?”
Neil considers. Removes one hand from Andrew’s hair to trace a delicate line down his neck, to see the shiver Andrew can’t hide. “Sometimes, you look at me, and I see it. You’re not as good as hiding it as you used to be.” Neil grins. “I doubt anyone else sees it. They’re paying attention to not-you.”
Andrew waits, unimpressed. But there it is. Neil pokes Andrew’s cheek, right under his left eye.
“You give a shit. You’re like—a—soft.”
“A soft.”
“You like ice cream. Sweets. Fleece sheets. I didn’t mean to make that rhyme. You pet cats, and fill up their water bowl when it’s empty. Sleep with your arm under my head. You care. You’re like—a—” Neil grasps at concepts. Tugs gently on Andrew’s hair. “When Seth died, you didn’t care. Sure as hell you got us all home safe, though, and kept an eye on Nicky and Aaron while they grieved. In an apocalypse, you’d go back for five people. You don’t care about having things, but your car is always the best one you can buy, tricked out beyond belief. You like cooking shows. House Hunters pisses you off. You—” Neil snorts. “In Baltimore, I was sitting in a hospital bed, negotiating for the right to say goodbye. The FBI agents,” he continues, ignoring the dark look in Andrew’s eyes, “said there was no point—you were all probably on your way back to Palmetto already, already out of my reach, and I knew you weren’t. The team wouldn’t leave without you, and you wouldn’t leave without me, and you gave a shit.” Andrew’s on top of him, and that should be close enough, but it’s not. Neil tilts his head, presses his forehead against Andrew’s. “You like wordplay, and Much Ado About Nothing, and we have the same sense of humor, and—the first time you sparred with Renee, the first time I was there for, anyway, she came in limping, and I knew she’d been with you, and I didn’t know why, but I knew you’d hit her, and it felt like I’d stepped into an alternate universe. I’d known you for a couple months, and I could already see that you wouldn’t have just hit her, and your own family thought—” Neil sighs. Old anger, to be released. “And you love me.”
Andrew considers, studying Neil. Taps a finger against the smooth burn scar on Neil’s cheek. Folds his arms on Neil’s chest and rests his chin on his hands. Neil waits, content to study Andrew, hazel eyes and blond hair.
“I don’t,” Andrew says, slowly, “want to hold you back.”
“We don’t even play on the same team,” Neil says. It’s not the answer to the statement, but Neil’s not entirely sure what the statement meant, and an exy answer is at least guaranteed to needle Andrew into clarifying.
Andrew’s eyes flick up, and then back down to Neil’s. “I don’t want you to leave your friends to be with me. I don’t want you to stay silent because you’re protecting me. I don’t want you to—” he gestures, two fingers on one hand flickering out, and falls silent.
Neil waits. Tries counting to ten. Makes it halfway, and gives up. “I have no fucking idea what you’re talking about.”
Andrew taps out a drumbeat on Neil’s collarbone. “I’m talking about: I’m a violent man with a past, and a present, who doesn’t socialize well with others, and has to be thanked for not murdering my husband’s exy team for committing the crime of taking you out of my sight. I’m talking about: I don’t know that I will ever not be this. I will never sit there in public and hold your hand over the table. You could have—”
“Andrew? Shut up.”
Andrew opens his mouth, and Neil puts a hand over it—not touching him, but close enough.
“I know I have friends. If I want to hang out with them and you don’t feel like it, I will, but 99% of the time, I’d rather be squirreled away in our bedroom with you, watching House Hunters for the express purpose of yelling at the TV screen, than hanging out with them. No. Shut up. Listen. I will protect you, for the rest of my goddamn life, whether you like it or not, because I want to, because I need you to be safe, as safe as you can be. I didn’t marry you because I thought it would make you forget how to use a knife, I married you because you’re you, and if you change, well, great, so will I, and if you don’t, well, great, some things stay the same. I love you, Drew, as you are, now, and you’re gonna have to get used to that, and you know I’ll wait, but it would be a lot easier if you’d stop arguing. Stop pushing me away and acting like you’re doing it as a favor to me, or for my sake, because it’s not.”
“You’re the worst,” Andrew says, after a moment, but there isn’t an ounce of heat in his voice.
“If loving you makes me terrible, I guess I should put some of my money to use and build myself a lair.”
“Shut up.”
“Make me,” Neil challenges, folding his arms around Andrew’s head.
And Andrew does.
Before they go to bed, Neil unhooks his necklace—choking to death in his sleep would be a dumb way to go—and moves the ring from the chain to his finger. He rolls back over to see Andrew taking his armbands off, pulling his ring from its place in his left band, and putting it on his finger. Neil grins, gooey, and takes Andrew’s hand, kisses the palm, kisses the ring.
“Are you all right?” He whispers, nuzzling Drew’s hand.
Andrew takes Neil’s left hand, taps the ring, twines their fingers together. Curls in closer, forehead to forehead. “Yes.”
Neil closes his eyes. He’s not yet asleep, though, when Andrew murmurs an I love you, soft as an exhale into the sacred space between them. He falls asleep smiling.
And in the morning, when they have to leave, Andrew squeezes Neil’s hand. Neil gets back on the bus, ring back on the chain around his neck, tucked under his shirt. Hands empty, but that’s all right.
And so it goes, for a couple weeks. Sean Rowe keeps quiet, and so does the rest of Andrew’s team; there are no unexplained absences or bruises, and Andrew doesn’t mention any violence on the phone, so Neil assumes all is well. The Minyard-Josten rivalry comes up in interviews, so clearly, everyone who knows it’s a lie kept quiet about that, too. Sports sites snark about rivalries, echoing each other’s excitement regarding the upcoming Court signing season; the Olympics are a couple years out, and Court will be making the rounds after the pro teams’ signing season.
“Minyard is one of the best goalies in the country, maybe I’d even say internationally,” says Yarrow Davison, sitting at a desk in front of a camera with three other exy reporters. Coffee with Rosetti is, in Neil’s opinion, one of the only sports shows worth watching. “Certainly, we all saw his raw talent in college—”
“Anyone else remember the Ravens taking 150 shots on goal?” says another—Grant Hally—“He held the goal for the full game, and only let in 13 shots.”
“Precisely,” says Davison, “but none of us expected him to improve, he certainly didn’t seem to want to, and for him to improve at this pace is incredible—”
“Then it’s time to talk about our favorite topic,” says Gianna Rosetti, injecting some sarcasm into her voice. “The Minyard-Josten rivalry, because Josten is one of the best strikers out there—in line with Jeremy Knox, and, of course, Kevin Day, all already on Court, with Janus Forster up for retirement, leaving that spot open, the assumption is that Josten will take it—”
“It’s pretty clear they can’t stand each other,” Davison says. “Josten and Minyard, they’ve said it time and time again—”
“But that doesn’t mean they can’t work together,” Rosetti interrupts. “They did it through their college years, which, by all accounts, were some of the roughest for them. It’s been nearly two years since they worked together, but I think they’ll be able to hold it together for the sake of the game.”
“One of my sources in the U.S. Court says that their rivalry is a sticking point,” says the fourth reporter, Jane Donnelly. “It’s great to take all the best players our country has and stick them on one team, but if they can’t work together, it’ll fall apart—we were just talking about their college years, and the Foxes turned around in Josten’s first year, but for years the Palmetto Foxes were a disaster, and not for lack of talent, but because of an unwillingness to work together.”
“It comes down to professionalism,” Rosetti says. “Former teammates have said that Day isn’t exactly as warm as his name implies, and Day and Josten have had their differences in the past—and of course, there was clearly severe animosity among the Ravens, between Riko Moriyama and Kevin Day—”
“Is it appropriate—”
“Yes, yes it is, because what I’m saying is this: It’s possible for teammates to hate each other and still work together. Moriyama didn’t overnight learn to hate Day enough to break his hand. He must have hated day for years leading up to that point.”
“And if the Minyard-Josten rivalry ends with that kind of violence?” Davison asks. “Neither of them is what you’d call a pacifist.”
Rosetti holds up her hands. “In their college years, it never got there. On Court, when they’re not required to live and study and eat together, they’ll likely have an even better shot at maintaining civility.”
And then there’s the increasingly desperate texts from Kevin, asking when Neil and Andrew are going to let Court reps know that the rivalry is non-existent; he namedrops the Moriyamas once, half-threat, half-warning, and Neil feels it hovering over his head. But he shares the clip of the reporters arguing, tagging it #TeamRosetti, and hopes all involved get the hint: professionalism is the name of the game, and Neil is willing to play.
Regardless, he doesn’t hear from the Moriyamas, so he assumes all is well there.
But all things must end.
It starts slowly—just a small erosion of Neil’s privacy.
His team is playing against Denver, and Neil is in for the first and fourth quarters. They’re winning, but—the game pauses to swap out players, Neil’s turn to take a break—and there’s a thump as someone takes out their frustration on a ball, and Neil turns, not fast enough, too fast, and it hits him in the throat.
He gags, chokes, pulls in a breath, and barely manages it. The throat guard that probably kept his windpipe from bursting is now too much—he scrabbles at it, and, finally, manages to unclip it and haul it off. He sucks in air—it’s very nice, breathing—and realizes the crowd is roaring, and not in anger. He glances up; the cameras are on him, of course—in case he’s injured, the crowd will be the first to know. And there, on screen, sparkling in the stadium lights, hanging out of his shirt, is his wedding ring.
Whoops.
Well—
Andrew’s probably watching. They have a habit of watching each other’s games, when possible, and this one is no exception.
Neil kisses the ring and holds it up to the camera, for Andrew’s viewing pleasure. I’m all right. Don’t worry. I love you. He tucks it back down his shirt and heads into the locker room, letting Maria take his place on the court, letting the team medic examine him. A few bruises, and none on his neck; there’s a few mutters of fucking Harrison, can’t just hold onto the ball like a normal person, has to fucking beat it into the wall, no goddamn control, this is why he’ll never make Court, and then Neil is allowed to stretch, check his phone, and get a drink.
The bigger problem comes after the game, when the first question out of fucking Yarrow Davison’s mouth is:
“So what does your wife think of the match? Barely scraped a win, but you still got it.”
“We did win, thanks,” Neil says. “And we’re very happy about it. Denver is a good team, and we’re happy to take what we can get.”
“And your wife?” Yells someone in the back.
Neil makes it to two before he gives up. “I don’t have a wife.”
“But you have a wedding ring,” asks someone else—Flavia Martin. “It was five feet tall on a screen above our heads, and as someone who owns a wedding ring myself, that was one.”
Neil spends half a second debating: tell them? Don’t tell them? But, well, she said it, didn’t she? It is a wedding ring, and there’s no real way around that. And Allison’s advice—just tell the reporters what they want to know. “Yes.”
“Are you coming out as gay?” shouts someone Neil can’t see.
“No. Does anyone have any questions about the game?”
After five minutes of blatantly ignoring every single non-exy question—wouldn’t Andrew just love this shit, Neil’s one-track mind being the only thing capable of protecting their privacy—he makes it back into the locker room, to safety.
Riley claps him on the shoulder. “Great job out there! The press loves you.”
Neil waves her off. “I’m not looking for their love.”
“Better than their hate,” Maria replies, more upbeat than he’s ever heard her—but then, she loves some drama as much as anyone.
Neil’s home and in bed before he dares open up Twitter.
It’s a mess.
“Maybe he isn’t married? @Josexy” suggests one tweet.
“y kiss it tho @Josexy,” answers another.
“Drama @Josexy”
“He’s married. NB? @Josexy”
There’s zoomed-in photos of the ring, establishing that it is, in fact, a wedding ring; there’s threads of every single candid anyone’s ever caught of him, and most of them are either alone or with his teammates. There isn’t a single one of him with Andrew; by the time they left college, and people started taking candids of them, they were already as committed to their privacy as was physically possible. It helps that they can’t drive to see each other; they have to fly, and then either rent a car or pick each other up. Their license plates never show up at each other’s house.
Neil contemplates deleting his account.
Every single tweet is showing up in his mentions. He has more notifications than a person should rightfully have.
Fine.
He tweets: “Not gay, demi. I don’t swing. More like a compass, and my husband is true north, and no one else matters. Not telling who. Stop @ing me, I won’t answer”
What everyone thinks of that, Neil doesn’t know, because they stop showing up in his notifications, and he’s not stupid enough to search his name.
What the Foxes think of that, on the other hand, is the only thing he sees in the morning—Nicky spent his morning in the group chat, spamming the word gooey, and there’s no shortage of smiley faces and agreement from the rest of them. Except Andrew, who hasn’t texted at all.
Well.
Can’t spend all morning waiting on his approval. And it wasn’t Andrew’s secret, anyway. He’s not in this at all.
Except he is, he finds out three minutes into Coffee with Rosetti.
Gianna herself—and Neil vows to repay her for it one day—is uninterested in the confluence of Neil’s husband with the Minyard-Josten rivalry. “It’s certainly interesting that Neil is the latest player to come out as queer,” she says, “and his identity is certainly the one we know the least about—we’ve got the L, G, B, T, and I, I suppose it was only a matter of time until a player let us know he was a whole other letter—”
“But he’s been very secretive, hasn’t he,” says Hally, “and you have to ask why. Because most players aren’t. And he’s not the first queer player in exy, and he doesn’t exactly have any family that would be disappointed in him—”
“Grant,” Donnelly says, reprovingly.
“He doesn’t, and that’s a fact. His husband has never been to so much as a single game. The only incident I can think of that was even close to this was—”
“Theadora Muldani and Kevin Day,” Davison says, “who of course kept their relationship under wraps because of the Ravens’ violence, and of Riko Moriyama’s, specifically—”
“Which has nothing to do with Josten and his husband,” Rosetti interrupts.
“Unless Josten was keeping his husband under wraps for fear of violence—”
“Not much homophobic violence in the exy community,” Donnelly says. “Certainly, with the money Josten makes, he can afford a good security system, a bodyguard—”
“Unless,” Hally continues, undeterred, “the person he’s protecting him from is Andrew Minyard, known for just how little he cares about—”
Neil flicks the TV off altogether.
That’s plenty.
And then signing season is upon them.
Neil has a range of offers.
Many of them are willing to pay him quite a bit more than his current team does, and his one-year contract is up—the one-year contract is a courtesy performed for new pro players. It says you are untested and unproven; if you don’t like us or if we don’t like you we don’t have to continue this.
But his team comes back with an offer good enough that Neil has no problem turning down the others; if a couple million one way or the other is enough to send the Moriyamas running to his doorstep, they’re doing worse than he imagined. And he doesn’t particularly want to change teams. It’s nice to have his team know the truth; nice to look forward to training in Denver and not having to meet Andrew in a closet. Nice to not have teammates asking if he’s going to be okay, being in any kind of proximity to Andrew. Neil announces his decision on Twitter, to widespread cheer from all involved.
Three days later, they play Andrew’s team.
Neil doesn’t even turn on the news, that morning. Gianna Rosetti may not contribute to the bullshit, but she doesn’t stop her co-hosts from doing just that, and he isn’t up for it. She knows what gets views. She won’t stand in the way of that.
The heat in his veins as the game approaches is half for the game, half for Andrew. It’s been a month since the banquet, and their schedules haven’t lined up at all—any time Andrew was in the Southeast, Neil’s been in the Northwest, and vice versa. And Neil misses Andrew, viciously, painfully, so much he barely notices Clark avoiding him, pre-game.
Except, that, well, Neil doesn’t not notice things. He may not have Andrew’s memory, but he’s got an ability to read the room, and that ability has never left him.
“Clark!” He calls across the locker room, and, no, it’s not his imagination, Clark jumps guiltily at the sound of his voice and moves grudgingly to Neil’s locker.
“What’s up?”
“Any advice? For me, specifically.”
“No?”
Neil examines Clark, for just a second.
Well.
Whatever it is, he’ll deal with it. “Cool.”
One pep talk, some pre-game reporter questions that Neil doesn’t have to be present for, and then he’s on the court.
And he’s not on against Andrew.
It’s—Andrew’s been their starting goalie, all year. The switch in lineup came late. When Neil leaves the court after the first quarter, he shoots Andrew a text, which goes unanswered.
When he finally gets back on court for the fourth quarter, he has to stop himself from crossing the whole damn court to grab Andrew. Settles, instead, for staring him down: Are you ok? What’s with the switch? Why didn’t you answer my text?
It’s a mistake, he realizes, as the crowd gets louder. Neil glances up, and sees his own face on the screen—two seconds before, his eyes had been locked, furious, on Andrew, and there’s nothing a crowd loves more than a good rivalry.
Andrew’s team wins.
Neil fumes, as he pulls his helmet off. His whole team has been following a strategy when facing Andrew’s team: best goalie goes in first half, because Minyard won’t let jack shit into his goal, so the best we can do is prevent them from getting any goals on us, and hope that Josten can score a couple times. Best strikers play fourth quarter, when the second goalie will be tired, and we’ve got a better chance. It’s a shitty strategy, and they’ll need to work harder on actually scoring on Andrew when—
“Neil,” Clark calls, heading for reporters.
Neil looks up. Clark’s got their goalkeeper John with him, and it’s not Neil’s turn to face the press. But Clark is waving him over, and bypassing the reporters altogether—forcing them to follow Clark, hauling cameras and microphones with them to the middle of the stadium, where Clark meets Andrew and Andrew’s captain, Rita.
Neil follows, watching Clark and Rita shake hands. The microphones cut back on as someone adjusts the power cords, and the interview comes out of the speakers; not loud, not like a game announcer, but there for the diehards who like to listen to the post-game interviews in-stadium.
“—simultaneous interview?” A reporter asks. “Certainly easier for the listeners.”
Clark laughs, as does Rita.
“We’ll have to keep it in mind,” Rita says, as Neil comes to a halt a few feet away. Andrew isn’t looking at Neil, so Neil won’t look at him either. “But actually, we have a joint announcement.”
“It is signing season,” says one reporter. “Are you signing each other?”
“No,” Clark says with a grin. “We’re swapping goalies.”
Neil's eyes snap to Andrew.
Out of the corner of Neil’s eye, he sees Clark and Rita gesturing to their respective goalkeepers. He sees cameras move—the reporters have understood. He knows what they’re expecting. Mouthy asshole Neil Josten, faced with the prospect of working with his rival? Good ratings, at the very least.
But Neil can’t look at them.
Andrew finally, finally, looks at Neil, and Neil understands. This, this is why, this is why Clark was avoiding him and was so relieved when Neil decided to stay with the team, this is why Andrew didn’t answer his text.
He tries to speak, and, after a moment, manages a: “Really?”
“Yes or no?”
Yes, really.
Neil practically dives at Andrew, whispering yes just before Andrew’s hand comes up, Andrew’s gloveless left hand, gold ring on full display, warm against Neil’s cheek as Andrew pulls Neil down for a kiss. It doesn’t last—it can’t; Neil is grinning too wide to be a good kisser—but that doesn’t matter. Andrew’s coming home, and they won’t have to survive on stolen nights, on the three weeks before pre-season training starts, on kisses stolen in hallways and closets. No more barriers. No more pushing Neil away. Andrew is all in. Neil bumps his forehead against Andrew’s. “Thank you,” he murmurs.
“I don’t believe what we’re seeing,” says a delighted voice—Gianna Rosetti, Neil realizes. “Boys, boys—if I could just get your attention—”
Neil considers, and sees the same consideration in Andrew’s eyes, and they agree: yes, yes she can. They turn to her, and she gives them her brightest smile.
“Does this mean that—should you both get offers from Court—you won’t have any trouble working with each other?”
“You said it best, Gianna,” Andrew says, “It comes down to professionalism.”
Neil grimaces. “Neither of us are very good at that, is the problem.”
Andrew shrugs.
“The Minyard-Josten rivalry, then—” Rosetti says, breaking off, hopeful.
“We didn’t start that fire,” Neil says. “It’s not our fault the press decided it existed.”
“Did you,” says someone else to the left, “Or did you not repeatedly say, Minyard, that you hate Neil Josten?”
“I did. And I do.”
Neil nudges Andrew’s hand, and Andrew stretches out a pinky. Neil links his pinky with Andrew, grinning so hard it feels like his face is going to break. “Andrew hates lots of people. It’s not a concern.” He looks at the nearest camera—the one held by the man with the Coffee with Rosetti logo on his shirt. “And, hey, Court recruiters? You can just send both of our offers to my house.”
“How long have you been married?” Rosetti asks.
Neil strangles a sigh. He should’ve known he couldn’t just deliver a cool line and walk away. “Two years.”
“Two—whoops. And we’ve spent the whole time talking about how much you hate each other.”
“You tried to make your co-hosts see sense,” Neil responds. “We heard you.”
“Nice to know you two are fans! Well, we’ll let you go now,” she says, with a smile that says: exclusive feature?
“What’s it like being married to someone who says they hate you on national television?” Calls another reporter.
“Pretty great,” Neil answers, avoiding Rosetti’s betrayed look.
“You should probably go now,” Andrew says to Neil. “I ordered dinner.”
“From where?”
“That little Indian place.”
“Andrew, they don’t do scheduled delivery!”
Andrew shrugs. “Better run.”
Neil huffs, half a laugh, and when Andrew tilts his face up, Neil darts down to press a kiss to his mouth before waving at the reporters and dashing back to the locker rooms.
He’s barely in there before Riley has a hand in his face, which Neil high-fives. “You knew?” He asks.
“Yup! We’re gonna be unbeatable.”
“Thanks for letting me know.”
“The surprise was half the fun! Aren’t you gonna stop and chat? Press’ll be in here in a minute!”
“Can’t, Drew already ordered dinner,” Neil calls as he heads into the showers.
Ten minutes later—after the world’s fastest shower—Neil heads outside, abandoning his teammates to the press; he’ll give Rosetti her exclusive feature, and until then, his presence will just make the post-game take double the usual amount of time.
Andrew’s waiting for him at the car, ring gleaming in the parking lot lights. Andrew leans back against the car, grabbing Neil’s hands and slowly, cautiously, pulling Neil against him. Neil goes, carefully, slowly, until Andrew stops and tilts his head up.
“Yes or no?” Neil asks.
“Yes,” Andrew says, thoughtfully, and Neil leans down, slowly, and kisses Andrew, their hands intertwined at their sides, until Neil’s universe consists of Andrew, and Andrew’s hands, and Andrew’s mouth, and Andrew, until they pull away, searching for air, searching for closeness, resting cheek to cheek. Distantly, Neil hears the sounds of people finding cars, pulling into a line to get out of the parking lot, but the athlete’s parking lot is still quiet.
“What changed your mind?” Neil asks.
“You.”
Neil closes his eyes, grinning. Turns his face, just the inch required, to brush his lips against Andrew’s jawline. “I guess I can be pretty persuasive.”
“Didn’t want you to get lost.”
“Hmm?”
“Without your true north.”
Neil snorts. “It’s a way of explaining it.”
“Not true, then?”
Neil hums, dipping his face farther to brush his lips against Andrew’s neck. “Not what I said.”
Andrew pushes, and Neil goes. “Let’s go home. Dinner’s on the way.”
“Wanna drive?”
Andrew holds his hand out, and Neil gives him the keys and walks around the car to get in the passenger side. He gets in the car, buckles his seat belt, and places his empty, open hand between the seats.
Andrew starts the car, sticks it in drive, and pulls out of the space, carefully—almost, Neil considers, like he doesn’t want to die in a fiery car crash. And then Andrew places his hand in Neil’s, and drives them home.