Work Text:
Andrew rubbed his sore, punny hands. He had been working on his recent sculpture for the past six hours, trying to showcase the way that the woman’s bottom lip naturally stuck up in a small pout, the way that her undercut was starting to grow out and needed to be trimmed soon before it started to look unkempt, the way oversized flannel hung off her shoulder and revealed several small moles that looked like a constellation.
He stared at his latest piece.
Sure, it looked alright, but all of his recent pieces just looked alright.
There was nothing special about them, nothing captivating or jaw dropping.
They were all just piles of clay, stacked and modeled to try and make something more, but always just missing the mark.
He sighed and stood, stretching his legs for the first time in hours, resigning himself to working on the piece later. Andrew rolled out his neck and debated calling Roland but decided against it after remembering all of the sculptures of the man he had already created, even if he was in the mood to hook up.
No, he would just have to find inspiration elsewhere.
But… later, Andrew decided, after deciding he was due for a shower and a long, long sleep.
He prepared his latest stack of clay for the night, so it would be ready for him in the morning, then exited his studio and stepped into the bathroom. After a long, hot shower, he fell onto his bed, barely pulling the covers over himself before falling asleep.
~~~~~
Andrew stood in line at his favorite coffee shop the next day, waiting to order what the employees called ‘The Andrew Special,’ which was just a medium cup filled halfway with coffee and the other half filled with a combination of sugar and creamer until the drink’s color was closer to white of the paper cup than coffee, topped with a generous amount whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles.
He had only just sat down to begin people-watching when he saw his next muse.
Only a few inches taller than himself, the guy had brown eyes and even darker curly brown hair, both of which looked wrong in a way that Andrew knew solely because he spent so much time people watching. He had a splattering of freckles across his nose and cheeks, long eyelashes, thick eyebrows, and a thin scar running across his left cheek down his neck. He was lean, a runner, if Andrew were to guess. He was wearing a faded, forest green shirt that did not match his complexion matched with worn jeans, and a denim jacket with white fuzz on the inside.
The man was obviously trying not to attract any attention, keeping his head down and movements quick but sure. Andrew almost laughed. How someone as breathtaking as him could even hope to remain unseen as a mystery.
Andrew watched as the guy walked up to one of the employees behind the counter and started up a conversation. He documented the guy’s movement, how he walked, the way he gesticulated. Suffice it to say, Andrew was captivated.
This guy, whoever he was, was going to be Andrew’s next muse, after he finished his other piece.
Andrew was itching to get home to his studio and begin sketching, but he restrained himself, knowing that he would need to keep watching the man to accurately sculpt him (that, and the guy was nice to look at).
He watched as the mystery guy sat down to talk to the employee, talked animatedly, and was handed a piece of paper. The guy looked on the verge of tears, though he covered it up well. He watched as the guy walked out of the shop, taking in the way his jacket hung off his shoulders, the way his muscled thighs moved as he walked, the quick steps he took, his firm ass-
Andrew threw back the rest of his coffee and stood up, throwing his cup away on his way out and sped walked to his apartment, bursting through the door and heading straight for his studio.
He needed to finish this lady so he could start on mystery guy ASAP.
~~~~~
‘Oversized Flannel.’
That’s what he ended up calling his sculpture once it was finished.
Andrew sighed and wiped his forehead, taking a step back and looking up at his statue.
Yeah, he could live with that.
It wasn’t any of the breathtaking pieces that got him his reputation, but it could get him a buck or two.
He nodded to himself and turned back to the clay he kept in the corner.
Time to get started on his next piece.
~~~~~
Andrew was startled when his phone rang. He had clay covering his hands, a very delicate nose held in his palms as he tried to replicate Mystery Guy’s nose. He walked over to his phone and dropped his shoulders in annoyance at the name lighting up the screen. He quickly rolled up one of his sleeves using his thigh - he was not getting clay on his phone, not again - and answered the call with his elbow.
“What?” he asked, attention going back to the nose. It was simultaneously not sharp and not round enough. How did that happen?
“Hey Andrew!” Nicky answered. “How are you?”
“Busy,” Andrew said, unable to reply in more than monosyllabic words when he was so attuned to a piece.
The line went quiet, quiet in a way that meant Nicky was thinking, which couldn’t mean anything good.
“Are you working on a new sculpture?” Nicky asked, trying to come across as casual and failing.
“Yes,” Andrew bit out.
Nicky hummed. Andrew knew exactly what his cousin was doing, pretending to be disinterested when, in actuality, Andrew could practically hear him vibrating with excitement halfway around the world.
Andrew closed his eyes and took a deep breath. “What?”
“Nothing, nothing,” Nicky tried to play off, “it’s just been a while since you’ve stayed up so late working on a project, that’s all.”
He furrowed his eyebrows, glancing over at his alarm clock blinking back at him since Andrew still hasn’t reset the time from when the thing got unplugged. “What time is it?”
“4:30 in the morning, where you are,” Nicky told him.
“Oh,” was Andrew’s only reply. Nicky laughed.
It had been a while since he had gotten so engrossed in one of his projects, he had almost forgotten what it was like. He remembered the feeling, being able to create and control something entirely and shape it in his own unique way. It should be ironic that Juvie, the place where he was kept behind locked bars, was the first place that taught him that he could do more than just survive.
Taking those art classes had been a way for him to take back his own narrative, shaping that clay had been a metaphor for shaping his own future, of finally being able to control his own life. He didn’t have to bend to other’s wills, like his sculptures didn’t after they had been fired. He didn’t have to take the abuse and heartache and pain.
His life was his own, like his clay creations were his own.
For the first time in his life, at thirteen years of age, Andrew finally learned how to enjoy living.
Now, eleven years later, Andrew was still chasing that feeling.
Being in control of himself and his future wasn’t enough. He wanted to feel alive again.
He sculpted. He saw people or animals or objects or anything that caught his attention and tried to tell their story. Where is that person going? Why is that squirrel crawling up that specific tree? Who was careless enough to leave their drink and wallet on the bench?
It worked. Sometimes.
When the art teacher at Juvie first introduced him to pottery, to that form of expression, Andrew had been fascinated. They couldn’t get him to stop. He made piece after piece, some better than others, some more compelling, some more simple, each better than the last.
That could still be applied to the work he did now. Some were captivating in their simplicity. Some were more complex and gut wrenching. Each better than the last.
After Andrew left juvie and moved in with Aaron and Tilda, he kept sculpting. Tilda only allowed it when she realized that she could sell his work and make money off of him, the profits sometimes tripling the amount she had to put in for him to continue his little hobby.
Some of his best pieces were made during that time. Living with Aaron, who bore too many bruises on his skin, and Tilda, who too often bore bloody and split knuckles.
He looked at his twin brother’s face, one so similar to his, one that was his while living with the Campbells, the Wilsons, the Spears.
He sculpted.
He sculpted his demons, his monsters, his nightmares, all inspired by that haunted look that he saw staring at him every day from his own face.
He sculpted.
He sculpted pieces no one understood, creations no one could possibly hope to understand. He created the shadows he lived in, the places he would hide, the view he had from under his covers.
He sculpted.
He sculpted stories of a lost and desperate boy, begging for someone to come and save him, praying to the god most of his foster parents believed in, only to be ignored again and again and again and again.
He sculpted.
He sculpted because, as his Juvie instructor told him, everyone needs a coping mechanism, and as long as it's healthy, it doesn’t matter what it is.
He sculpted.
He sculpted the stories that no one wanted told, but too many could relate to.
He sculpted.
He sculpted not just for himself, but for his brother, to provide hope in the darkness he replicated with his art, the same darkness his brother was still trapped in.
Tilda never understood the twisting faces or the outstretched hands or limbs tearing themselves apart or claws reaching out from within or faces behind faces behind faces behind faces or figures resembling fabric more than people.
Tilda never understood the passion poured into each piece; the emotions felt by the people who could relate. The never-ending pain, the suffocating suffering, the unlethal drowning, the hopelessness, the loneliness, the heartache, the fear, the pain.
But they weren’t for people like Tilda. They were for people with demons. People like Aaron. People like Andrew.
That’s who bought his work.
Andrew will never forget - as if he ever could - Tilda’s face every time one of his pieces sold for thousands of dollars, or when museums started calling, on the verge of begging, to showcase his work.
It was good, it provided a safety net, it set up Aaron’s college fund.
It gave them something to fall back onto when Tilda inevitably fell to her own demise.
Drunk driving.
Faulty brakes.
And with her own child in the car.
So sad.
Anyways.
Her life insurance wasn’t so bad, either.
It bought them a nice car.
He thought Tilda would approve.
She had no reason not to.
She was dead.
Then Nicky left Germany to raise him and Aaron, so they didn’t have to live with the Hemmicks. Andrew had grown enough since he was sixteen to realize that leaving the one place he wanted to live and taking in two traumatized teenagers to raise when he was still a teenager would not have been something he would have been successful in doing. His gratefulness for his cousin has only grown over the years since the two met.
Except for when said cousin decides that calling at 4:30 in the morning is a good idea.
“Why are you calling me?”
He could hear Nicky shrug. “I dunno. I just had a feeling you would be up.”
Fuck Nicky and his annoying fucking golden retriever personality and fucking kindness.
Fuck him.
“I’m going,” Andrew said unnecessarily.
“To sleep?” Nicky asked.
“Yes,” Andrew ground out.
“Alright,” Nicky said calmly, which was something he hardly ever was. “Tell me about your new sculpture when you're done?”
Andrew debated his answer. If he said no, Nicky would drop it, like he had every other time Andrew said no. But… this one was different. He couldn’t describe it, but somehow, it was. “Yes,” he said.
He could hear the smile in Nicky’s voice. “Okay, get some sleep, Michelangelo.” Andrew hung up on Nicky, ending his light-as-bells laughter.
He looked down at the nose still cradled in his hands and realized how tired he was. Sleep would be a good thing, in a bit.
Sitting back down, he grabbed an already clay covered scalpel and set about finishing the nose. It only took about 15(?) to 30(?) more minutes before he could attach the nose to the face. After a few more adjustments, pulling and shaping the clay to near perfection as he made a copy of the face of Mysterious Guy.
Andrew took a step back, then another, then another, until he was just as far away as he was in the cafe when he first saw the guy. He nodded in approval of his work and hid a yawn behind his hand. Yeah, he should definitely go to sleep now.
He checked the time.
6 in the morning.
He couldn’t remember the last time he had stayed awake this long working on a piece (that’s a lie. He could. It was a week before he and Aaron turned sixteen. He was working on what others would call an interpretive art piece of a face with skin that looked like it was melting off the sculpture, but what Andrew called Drake distorted by the poor lighting of his blue elephant nightlight).
Barely keeping his eyes open, he got ready for bed, resigning himself to the too few hours of sleep he was going to get.
He needed to go back to the cafe tomorrow.
Hopefully, a certain Mysterious Stranger would be there.
~~~~~
Waking up after not going to sleep until after six was always the first. Andrew did not want to get out of bed. He wanted to shut his eyes and continue to sleep until tomorrow.
But, even as he thought that, his eyes drifted open and over to his latest sculpture.
Still incomplete.
His hands were sore, and he needed to take a break before he set to work.
The earlier he got up, the earlier he could take a break, and the earlier he could get back to work.
With his mind, unfortunately, made up, he got out of bed.
Maybe Mysterious Guy would be at the cafe again.
~~~~~
Not only was Mysterious Guy at the cafe, but he apparently worked there now.
Now the question bouncing around in Andrew’s brain was whether or not he continued to go to this coffee shop or find another one.
Pros to finding a different cafe: he wouldn’t be around Mysterious Guy anymore and wouldn’t make a foul out of himself in front of one of the most gorgeous people he’s ever seen; plus, he’s already too familiar with the people who work here.
They know his coffee order.
They have a special name for his coffee order.
Unacceptable.
Cons to finding a different cafe: he wouldn’t be around Mysterious Guy, and current muse, anymore; plus, all the other cafes are a further walk from his apartment, and he didn’t want to have to put in more exercise just to get his sugar with a hint of coffee fix for each day.
Sighing to himself, Andrew pushed open the door and went inside. He walked to the counter and waited for Mysterious Guy to take his order. The name-tag with the word ‘Neil’ written across it let him know what the guy’s name was.
Neil was wearing the same uniform as the other employee, an off-white collared t-shirt tucked into burgundy pants with a coffee brown apron lined with pens and a small pen pad. The outfit hugged his curves just enough to be visible.
His hair was different today, the widow’s peak that Andrew hadn’t noticed yesterday making a stark appearance; his hair was pushed out of the way, revealing the soft curves of his ear that were also previously hidden.
The longer Andrew looked, the more he realized just how wrong his current sculpture was.
The reason he struggled so much with the nose last night was because it was completely wrong. It was both too soft and too sharp because it was the wrong shape. The slope of his nose was longer than the version Andrew had, and the nostrils were rounder and narrower. Neil had more freckles, and a few sunspots, though some were more distinct and noticeable than the faded ones.
The eyebrows were fuller than the kind Andrew started sculpting, the curve of his upper lip was completely different, and faint scars cut through his cheek and across his neck. There were scars on his hands and arms as well, most hidden by armbands that were a direct violation of company policy.
“Hello?”
Andrew snapped out of his thoughts, gazing up at the brown eyes lined with the tell-tell sign of contact lenses. Neil was judging him for staring, as if someone as beautiful as him wasn’t used to a little staring.
Although, Andrew was probably being a creep about it.
Better to stop and order rather than turn it into a thing.
“Andrew special,” Andrew told the guy.
“The what?” Neil said.
Andrew didn’t respond.
“Would you mind ordering something on the menu?” Neil asked, gesturing vaguely to the board behind him while his judgment intensified.
Andrew didn’t respond, didn’t feel the need to. This guy would have to learn his order one way or another, and it gave him the perfect excuse to study the shape of Neil’s eyes and the curve of his eyelashes without acting like a weirdo.
The two entered a stare off, only ending when another employee, Matt, came stumbling over. “Hey Andrew! I’ll get your drink out in a sec.”
Neil looked between the two, a little furrow forming between his eyebrows. If only Andrew could capture the way his face looked at that very second, it would be the perfect sculpture.
No.
Nope.
He had already started one of this mysterious and too gorgeous stranger, he wasn’t going to make another one.
No way.
He and Neil made eye contact again, and that time Andrew realized that the shapes in Neil’s irises were the wrong shape. His pinky twitched with the need to fix his mistake right now.
He turned on his heel and left the cage without a word, trying his best to ignore the sarcastic “have a nice day,” that followed him out the door.
Fuck.
~~~~~
His phone ringing distracted Andrew from his very important work He was sculpting Neil’s forehead and couldn’t get the small indent above his right temple that looked vaguely like someone had once removed the skin and it healed badly to look right. It was either too long or too narrow or too wide or too something.
He set down his tools a bit too hard on his rack and answered the phone as best he could with his elbows. “What?”
“Oh, sorry, did I wake you?” Nicky’s voice answered.
“No,” Andrew answered truthfully. “What do you want?”
Nicky made a noise of surprise. “I thought you would be asleep by now.”
“It’s not that late,” Andrew told him.
“Andrew,” Nicky said, a bit reproachfully, “it’s almost six in the morning.”
“No it’s not,” Andrew argued like a child, but one quick look out his window showed the already rising sun. “Shit.”
“You just check the time?” Nicky was barely containing his laughter, as if Andrew accidentally staying awake this long was hilarious.
“Shut up,” Andrew grumbled.
Nicky laughed out right but gave Andrew his silence.
He walked to the bathroom and washed his hands, cleaning ip the clay left behind in his faucet and counter. When he came back to his workspace, Nicky was humming a song he didn’t recognize. It must have been German. “Why’d you call me?” Andrew asked.
“Dunno,” came Nicky’s eloquent response. “Just had a feeling and thought I might try.”
“You’re ‘feelings’ are creepy,” Andrew informed him.
Nicky laughed again. “Believe me, I know. Aaron makes sure to tell me every time I call him to remind him to go to sleep and he’s in the middle of a study session at, like, midnight.”
“You should call him instead,” Andrew said distractedly, looking around for his pajamas in hopes to at least get some sleep before the sun was fully risen.
“I haven’t needed to,” Andrew could hear the smirk in Nicky’s voice, but he could also hear the fondness in it, as well as how proud Nicky was. “He’s been going to bed at a decent time all on his own.”
“Good for him,” Andrew responded dryly.
“Why haven’t you?” Nicky asked bluntly. The question should have been expected, Andrew never stayed up so late to work on a project, even in college or when he had a commission from a museum that he was behind on.
Yet this piece… there was something different t about it.
Andrew had never put this much detail into one of his projects, so why was Neil different?
(It’s because he’s hot.)
((Shut up.))
Andrew took the phone off speaker and stuck it between his shoulder and his ear, digging through his drawers to pull out what he needed. He didn’t respond, but that in and of itself was all the answer Nicky needed.
He cooed. “Does someone have a crush.”
Andrew stopped mid motion. “Say that again and I will fly over there personally and hit you.”
“If that’s what it takes to get you to visit me, then so be it,” Nicky said teasingly. He took a deep breath and began to yell. “ANDREW’S GOT A CRUS- “
He winced at the sudden change in volume and took the phone away from his ear before shouting into it himself. “NICKY! SHUT UP!”
Nicky stopped talking, but it didn’t stop the constant flow of laughter coming through the speakers. Andrew sighed. It would have to be good enough. “I’m going to bed.”
“Good,” Nicky said. “I’ll call you later so you can tell me about your new cruuussshhhh- “
Andrew hung up on him.
He was fond of Nicky, even if he never let the man know, he really was fond of him. But that would never negate how much of an annoying prick he was sometimes.
~~~~~
Andrew was stuck.
He was working on the fucking sculpture of Neil, and he was stuck.
All his other pieces based on real people had been finished in half the time it was taking him to complete this one.
But no.
Neil just had to be so complex and interesting and breathtakingly gorgeous that Andrew couldn’t finish in the normal amount of time.
He couldn’t, and now his memory of the exact way Neil’s eyelashes curled up towards the florescent lights in the coffee shop was fuzzy and he couldn’t sculpt it accurately.
Which meant he had to go back to a certain coffee shop and stare at a certain barista with hair that washed him out and eyes that didn’t quite match his complexion.
Andrew sat at a booth near the back of the café, one where he had the perfect view of Neil working behind the counter.
The longer he watched, the more details he realized he got wrong. The muscles in Neil’s arms were more defined than what Andrew had originally thought, his nails were cut short and his cuticles were covered in bruises signaling that he would bite them often, his shirt was baggy despite being tucked into those tight pants-
It basically meant that Andrew had to redo Neil’s entire torso.
Great.
Another sleepless night dedicated to this absolute monster of a project he decided to take on.
Fantastic.
He would need to get closer, though, if he wanted to reassess Neil’s smaller details, the ones that could only be picked up on by a keen eye less than a foot away from him.
But Andrew wasn’t going to go back up to the counter and embarrass himself again, oh no. He would just have to study from a distance.
Maybe taking notes and the differences and putting his abysmal drawing skills to use could help him later, when his memories weren’t as sharp, and his recall was a little inaccurate.
He set to work, taking a pen pad out of the bag that he insisted he hated after Nicky got it as a Christmas present years ago when he realized how much stuff Andrew carried around on the daily, but it was the only bag he had used in years. He dug out a charcoal pencil and set to work, jotting down the mistakes he already knew he had to correct and going about drawing Neil in various positions and poses.
For reference.
When he was on the third page of his drawings and writing, sketching a close up of Neil’s face front and center, a stranger sat in the booth across from him.
Scratch that, it wasn’t a stranger.
It was Neil.
Fuck.
“What are you doing?” Neil asked, not so subtly trying to get a peak of Andrew’s drawings.
Covering them up – and realizing that he drew Neil’s eyebrows completely wrong, the little hairs didn’t lay as neatly on the page as they did on Neil’s face – he said, “none of your business.”
“Really? Because it kinda looks like you’re drawing me,” Neil retorted. “And if you’re drawing me, then that’s definitely my business, especially if you’re a stalker.”
Fuck, was Neil flirting with him? No way. He was misreading the situation. Neil couldn’t be flirting with Andrew, that wasn’t possible.
Andrew didn’t have guys as attractive as Neil flirt with him. That just wasn’t how the world worked.
“I’m not a stalker,” Andrew said, trying to come across as reassuring but he was pretty sure he failed when his normal, monotone, bored voice came out instead.
“You sure about that?” Neil asked, tilting his head slightly. He slid a hand across the table slowly and, when Andrew didn’t do anything, tapped the top of his pen pad twice. “What’s that?”
“Nothing,” Andrew said immediately, remembering all the times his drawings would get taken away from him by those who only used them to belittle and berate him.
“I mean, I don’t know,” Neil started, he looked out the window for a moment, and god his side profile was something to behold. Andrew wanted to take notes on the slope of Neil’s nose, the jut of his chine, and angle of his jaw, but couldn’t because the center of his attention was sitting directly across from him, interrogating him. “It kind of looked like you were drawing me,” Neil said, then turned his head back to look at Andrew, pining him in his seat with those dead brown eyes. “Why?”
“Would you believe me if I said I was an artist?” Andrew asked, knowing the answer was going to be no.
“Are you?” came Neil’s reply and fuck this pretty boy. This was only the second conversation Andrew had ever had with him, but he could already feel himself falling, getting lost in the distraction that Neil was surely to become, and what a terrifying feeling that was.
Andrew didn’t respond, instead choosing to remove his hands from covering the pad and sliding it over to Neil. He watched Neil’s face intently, studying every twitch, every inhale, every movement, every reaction. It wouldn’t do him any good with the sculpture, the clay being stationary, but that didn’t make Neil’s expressions or the way his face flowed like water any less fascinating.
“These are…” Neil trailed off, eyes intent on the papers. Andrew braced himself for the next word. ‘Creepy,’ ‘disgusting,’ ‘a waste of time,’ ‘odd,’ ‘boring,’ ‘really fucking weird,’ ‘disturbing,’ all floating around in his head, in the same voices as those who said it all those years ago, the people he used to look up to but would now spit on their graves.
“These are really good.” Andrew blinked, finding himself eye to eye with Neil, who look so impressed and awed and surprised and-
“You sure about that?” Andrew asked. “You sat down asking me if I was a stalker, and now you’re complementing my sketches of you?”
Neil shrugged. “Well, yeah, they’re really, really good.”
Andrew narrowed his eyes, studying Neil for a whole new reason. “Do you have brain damage or something?”
Instead of being offended, instead of throwing a fit and calling Andrew heartless or a monster or apathetic or just plain rude or any of the other insults that have been hurled his way since his birth, Neil laughed.
He laughed, and not an ‘oh, I’m just humoring you, I don’t actually think what you said is funny’ laugh, or a ‘that’s seriously messed up and I’m highly uncomfortable’ laugh. It was a genuine laugh.
Andrew had said something, something that most people would be insulted by, and viewed it as a joke. Sure, it was a joke at the guy’s expense, but it was still a joke.
“You’re funny,” Neil said, traces of the laughter lifting his voice and his eyes still crinkling with his smile.
Andrew gave him a blank look. “Now I know you have brain damage. No one’s ever called me funny before.”
Again, Neil didn’t react like everyone else. Instead of pitying Andrew, instead of looking sorrowful or mournful at Andrew’s apparent like of real-life experience, or whatever, he looked understanding.
Understanding, but still amused.
This was not good.
Neil could not react like this to the dumb things Andrew said to get people to leave him alone or allow him to hold those he cared about at arm’s length. Neil couldn’t find him funny, or amusing, and he certainly couldn’t be understanding.
That just spelled disaster for Andrew sometime very, very soon.
“Why are you drawing me,” Neil asked. “Am I just that beautiful?” He asked it jokingly, in a way that anyone else would take at face value, but Andrew could see the self deprecation hidden just below the surface.
He answered the question just like he had every other question he had been asked. Truthfully. “Yes.”
Neil looked startled, humor wiped away in an instant and mouth dropping slightly, eyebrows drawing together in confusion. “What?”
“I was looking for a new muse, I thought you looked interesting, so I picked you,” Andrew explained concisely.
Neil looked around, his breathing picking up. It took Andrew a moment to recognize the signs of an oncoming panic attack after not having to deal with them in so long. “Why… why would you do that? I’m not interesting, I’m nobody.”
Andrew had no idea how to talk this stranger down from the growing panic surrounding him; instead choosing to continue the banter Neil had brought to the table in hopes it would help calm him down. He clicked his tongue and said, “you are interesting. It’s the entire reason I picked you to be my next sculpture.”
That gave Neil pause. “Sculpture?”
Andrew nodded. “I was only sketching you to have references. I’m not an artist, at least, not the kind that draws or paints or whatever the fuck. I make pottery and sculptures out of clay.”
“Huh,” Neil responded, “cool.”
“I can show you, sometime, if you want,” Andrew offered. He had no idea why he would offer such a thing, most of his other muses never knew they were the source of artistry that would sell for thousands of dollars, and certainly not strangers.
But Neil was different. Andrew wasn’t sure how, yet, but he was different.
“Maybe,” Neil said, a far-off look in his eyes.
Andrew knew when to stop pushing, when to stop a conversation all together.
The two sat in the booth at the back of the café, Andrew still studying Neil, but Neil not looking at anything in particular, slowly winding down after his near panic attack with Andrew watching him closely, there in case anything were to happen, and he needed to help Neil calm back down.
~~~~~
The next time Andrew was seated at the café, after pulling an all-nighter working on – you guessed it- Neil’s fucking sculpture, his latest infatuation plopped down in the seat across from him again.
“I want to see it?” Neil said without preamble.
“See what?” Andrew replied, just to be contrary. He was running on zero hours of sleep and not enough coffee and the sugar in his Andrew Special was barely doing anything to keep his eyes open.
“The sculpture,” Neil paused, he reassessed his words, then asked, “you did say you were making one of me, right?”
Andrew huffed a sigh, placing his cup back on the table and giving Neil a dead stare, one that hopefully conveyed just how tired he was.
Neil, the bastard, didn’t take his stare as an answer like everyone else would have. He waited patiently for Andrew to verbally respond and that did stuff to him.
“Yes, I am marking a sculpture based on you.”
“Cool,” Neil said, nervously, clearly unsure how to conduct this conversation. Again, Andrew was the definition of exhausted and wasn’t going to be doing anyone any favors for a few days. “Can I see it,”
“Sure, whatever,” Andrew said with a dismissive flick of his hand, turning back to his cup.
“Cool,” Neil said again, getting up from his seat and walking back over to the counter, though he appeared to but more emphasis on the word, like he actually believed seeing an art piece based off of him in a stranger’s house was actually ‘cool.’
Whatever, Andrew wasn’t one to judge.
He shotgunned there rest of his drink and stop up, leaving the café to go crash on his bed.
~~~~~
What Andrew had agreed to didn’t fully register with him until the next time he walked into the café, three days later, and went up to order his drink.
Neil, standing beside the register, said, “yeah, yeah, I know what you want.” He quickly put in Andrew order and wrote it on a cup, passing it off to Matt to make. “So, when can I come see this sculpture?”
Andrew paused, brain buffering as it tried to load the conversation in which he agreed to show Neil that stupid fucking sculpture.
God, this project was going to be the death of him.
His shoulders slumped, hands holding his head gently and only uncovering his face when he heard a cup be placed in front of him.
The Andrew Special.
He looked up and made eye contact with a certain barista who way too appealing for Andrew’s fraying mind. “Neil,” he greeted curtly, taking the cup in h both hands and drinking from it gratefully.
Neil smirked as he charged Andrew for the drink. “I don’t honk you ever told me your name.”
Andrew glared over the rim of his mug. “Andrew.”
“Nice to meet you, Andrew,” Neil said, all too smug.
“Sure,” Andrew replied, not believing for a second that anyone would actually find it nice to meet him.
“So,” Neil extended the word as he pressed the buttons in the machine. “When can I came see the sculpture?”
Andrew heaved a heavy sigh, staring into the depths of his drink.
This was a bad idea.
“Whenever you want,” he said.
Neil looked up at him when he answered. “I get off at 4, can I come by then?”
This was a bad idea.
“Sure,” Andrew told him.
This was a really bad idea.
~~~~~
Andrew spent the next few hours drinking coffee, eating pastries, and watching Neil run around the café.
Bringing him to his apartment was a really, really bad idea.
Andrew couldn’t get attached, not to someone as stunningly gorgeous as Neil. He would only get his heart broken and he didn’t want force Bee to drag him out of yet another depressive episode.
Not again.
Yet, despite his rational thoughts being really fucking rational, Andrew found himself walking side by side with Neil at 4:06, making their way to his apartment building.
Andrew let them in quickly, closing the door and locking it behind them both before instructing Neil to take off his shoes.
Neil did so, then looked around with wide eyes.
Andrew’s apartment really wasn’t anything special to look at. The living room area was cluttered to hell, the kitchen was piled with dishes that needed to be put away or cleaned, his bed wasn’t made, and there were clumps of clay flung everywhere.
The only interesting, if one could even call it that, parts was where he had some of his sculptures on display, lining his windowsills.
They were small, nothing special, but each one held a deep meaning that Andrew found himself unable to part with. The one that he thought depicted his relationship with Nicky that he created during college, the one he made after graduating, and the only one he he kept from juvie that he made after he received a letter from Aaron asking for Andrew to come live with them in South Carolina. The ones he made of his foster parents or sibling one, the ones who took a sickening joy in seeing Andrew torn apart and in pain, to remind him of how far he’s come and everything he’s survived; it may have been masochistic, but they were some of his best works.
Andrew would never describe himself as sentimental, but he couldn’t part with those.
“I’ve seen a lot of different statues. My mom loved going to museums and looking at the artwork they had, but none of them…” Neil trailed off, trying to find the right words the describe his thoughts. “Most statues look cool, but there’s nothing there besides a person. These tell a story, a dark one, sure, but it’s still a story. It’s fascinating.”
Most people thought that sculptures were simply of people, not bothering to delve into the deeper meanings laid out for people to i side e and dissect like they do for other art forms. Most people thought that sculptures were high-quality, but bland.
The assumption everyone made was that sculpting was a beautiful medium was filled with soft and delicate work. Not the hard edges and never-ending suffocation Andrew created.
But Neil clearly didn’t agree.
His eyes shined with fascination and an almost childlike wonder as he studied each piece decorating Andrew’s windowsill, not leaving a single part unexamined.
And Andrew couldn’t stop looking at him, this person who was, by all accounts, still a stranger, who should not be in Andrew’s apartment studying the works he held closest to his heart and meant the most to him.
“They’re called sculptures, not statues,” Andrew corrected.
“Mhmm, if you say so,” Neil responded, looking over his shoulder with a smirk and a mischievous flint in his eyes.
This shouldn’t be happening.
And yet it was.
~~~~~
“Can I see it now?” Neil asked.
Andrew had been dreading this moment, but he moved through it without complaint, weaving through the mess he called his apartment and into his designated studio area.
The sculpture was sat upon a foldable table, set in the middle of his operations. A tarp was laid upon the ground, catching the clay that fell to the floor. A pottery wheel was placed in a corner, collecting dust from months – if not years – of not being used. A giant block of clay as tall as Andrew’s leg was sitting by a wall, positioned just right so the clay wouldn’t smear and stain the white paint.
Neil’s eyes were drawn to the sculpture in the middle instantly, mouth dropping open slightly in blatant awe. “Is that… is that me?”
“Who else, idiot?” Andrew asked.
Neil didn’t respond to his barb, too entranced with Andrew creation. He walked around the sculpture, taking in every inch. “I guess this explains all your staring, then.”
Andrew tried not to give an outward reaction; damnit, he tried to be subtle.
Looking at Neil’s expression, Andrew failed tremendously. He shrugged, trying to act nonchalantly, but apparently failed at that, too. Neil didn’t call him out, thankfully, and kept examining the piece.
Eventually, he said, “it’s beautiful.”
“It’s alright,” Andrew responded. “There’s too many inaccuracies.”
“I don’t see any,” Neil said, “and it’s my face.”
Andrew shrugged again. Fair enough.
“How did you learn to make art like that?” Neil asked, coming to stand beside Andrew and nodding at the hunk of clay standing before them.
Andrew clenched his jaw. Neil had given up a piece of his past unprovoked. It was only fair he did the same. “When I was in juvie, they had art classes. The art teacher there was the one who introduced me.” That was enough, he didn’t need to say any more.
Neil took the answer without question, eyes still trailing over the piece.
When silence threatened to take hold, Andrew turned abruptly and fully faced Neil. Neil, in surprise, did the same. “How about this,” Andrew said, “we trade truths for truths.”
“What do you mean?” Neil asked, tilting his head slightly.
“I ask a question, and you have to answer it honestly,” Neil stilled, eyes widening in what could only be described as absolute terror. Andrew continued on at a slightly slower pace, weary of Neil’s reactions. “In return, when you ask me a question, I will also answer it honestly.”
Neil hesitated before asking, “what if I don’t want to answer a question.”
“You don’t have to,” Andrew said easily. “You’re free to skip as many questions as you want, but you can never answer with a lie.”
Neil broke eye contact, looking back at the sculpture. When he faced Andrew again, he was the definition of certainty. “Okay, let’s do it.”
~~~~~
The night was filled with questions asked back and forth, truths being unraveled at the seams and revealing the scarred men underneath.
It was a beautifully scary thing to do, to lay yourself flat for another person’s examination, especially when that person was still a stranger.
But Neil wasn’t a stranger, not anymore.
With every question asked and every question answered, their relationship evolved, shifted into something more, something greater.
They moved up to the roof at some point, Andrew taking drags from his cigarette and Neil breathing in the secondhand smoke deeply from his own, their only light coming from the stars above.
It was a beautifully scary thing to do, to talk with someone for hours on end until the morning sun started to make its first appearance of the day, pulling back scars long since healed and showing what caused them.
They both had a past that was filled with demons more real than dead.
Andrew suffered from insomnia because his nightmares were plagued with picture perfect memories of the most traumatic moments of his life.
Neil was apparently in witness protection, under the supposed safety umbrella the FBI provided.
Both of their parents were dead and did nothing for them, not even their births deemed a thank you given the lives they’d been forced to lead.
Neil had stories, just like Andrew had stories.
Not all of them were told - something’s were too terrifying to reveal in the light, let alone in the darkness of the night where monsters liked to play – but enough were shared to create a sort of kinship between the two, enough of one for Andrew to offer Neil coffee in the morning and pour his cup.
When they parted ways, it was with a new number programmed into each of their phones and a promise to talk later.
~~~~~
Andrew needed a break.
After a long conversation with Nicky, who could never learn to take a hint and when it was the appropriate time to shut the fuck up and end a call, and a particularly grueling nightmare that seemed to spin the world around and drop it back on its head, the only thing Andrew was certain of was that he needed a break.
The dream had left Andrew feeling hollow, numb in not his usual apathetic way, but in the way he would when his mind decided it was the right time to bring up Drake.
That bastard wasn’t dead, wasn’t even in jail. He was out, roaming the world as a free man. He was a part of the fucking military. What a load if bullshit their so-called morals must be if they let in bastards that liked little boys in a way no one should like children.
The dream had been made worse with the surprise appearance of a certain barista who had wormed his way into Andrew’s life.
Andrew avoided the café, not wanting to see those brown eyes staring at him when he had just seen them glazed over in pain and unshed tears before going dark and blank.
He needed a break from dim brown eyes and flat brown hair, both of which looked wrong in ways Andrew couldn’t adequately express, and annoying cousins who would never shut up and an unfinished sculpture that’s taunted him at all hours of the day.
What he needed was a distraction, a new inspiration. Something of someone else to look at and create a work of art based off of. Something to get his mind off the remaining aftertaste that followed nightmares and dark thoughts. Something to take his mind off the barista held together by barely believable lies. Something different, something new, something to take his mind off of his life and focus on something good for a while.
He went to a nearby park.
It was probably ironic that Andrew chose to go there, especially because of the reason he needed to go to the park in the first place, but, it was something that he used to do with Cass. Long walks under shaded trees, saying hello to neighbors, petting dogs that passed by.
It was a tradition they started in Andrew’s first month living with the Spears. They would go every Sunday morning, before it got too hot in the afternoon. It was a way to integrate him into the community and for them both to get fresh air. After Drake’s first visit home a month after Andrew moved in, it was a way to get away from all the terrible memories he began to associate with the house, the dining room, the living room, the hallways, his bedroom, his bed-
It was a way to escape, a way to connect with nature, a way to realign himself, as Cass would say.
It was also a way to feel closer to Cass, to remind himself what he was holding on for. He could withstand everything Drake put him through, he could withstand the pain, the suffering, the forced tears mixed with blood, the ruined bed sheets, the lewd stares across dinner, the stray hand lingering too close, too close, too-
He could withstand all of it, if it meant that he could do small things with Cass.
Baking cookies to bring to school for lunch. Going for ice cream after he passed a test. Receiving clothes that weren’t second or third hand. Going to the grocery store together. Taking long walks in the park.
Even though that house, that story, ended in nothing but heartache and misery, Andrew still went to the park.
But now, instead of walking, he found a nice bench hidden under the shade of one of the large oak trees and watched the people as they passed by.
Sometimes he would have a sketchbook to draw rough outlines of what he wanted to sculpt. Sometimes he would have a notebook and jot down a like or two about what he could create with his next piece. Other times he would sit and people watch, mind blissfully empty as he studied the people surrounding him, wondering how would make a good muse.
Sometimes finding a good muse took days, other times it took mere seconds.
Sometimes, like now, it took a total of 43 minutes before the perfect person jogged along the path he was seated next to.
Thick, toned thighs dressed in tight, navy blue running shorts. Windbreaker zipped up, covering the torso and arms completely with a nice, gray color. Hands curled into loose fists. Feet clad a pair of off-brand sneakers that were obscenely orange. Calf muscles working overtime to support and push them forward. Wrists dangling by arms that hung loosely in the shape of an L on either side. Curled auburn flowing in the wind, roots dark with sweat. Brown, brown eyes staring directly at him-
Oh shit.
The person was staring at him.
He was staring at the person and the person knew.
The person was Neil.
He was staring directly at Neil and Neil knew he was staring at him.
Oh fuck.
Oh shit.
Right as Andrew thought that, perhaps, possibly, miraculously, he found someone else to base a sculpture off of, his current muse came running into his line of sight, distracting him from part of the real reason he came to the park in the first place.
Fuck.
Neil was walking over to him.
Fuck.
“Are you stalking me, now?” Neil asked once he came into hearing distance.
“I found this place first,” Andrew argued. “Find a different place.”
Neil scoffed. “Not gonna happen.”
“Then I guess it’s you who’s stalking me,” Andrew said, not looking at the squint in the covered eyes or the perfect curl dangling in front of his forehead, taunting Andrew because he couldn’t reach out and straighten the curl to watch it jump back into place again.
It was cruel.
But so was Neil Josten, in his own unique way. At least, that’s what Andrew’s heart thought as it did flips and turns it hadn’t known it was capable of doing.
~~~~~
Andrew was driving, no real destination in mind, just the need to get away. He took turns at random, not bothering to look at the signs that signaled his position in the city. He needed to turn his brain off, and mindless driving did just that.
Until a certain someone ran across the street without looking both ways beforehand.
Andrew slammed on his brakes and honked the horn, flipping off the runner.
Then he recognized the floppy, brown hair and runner’s physic.
Neil.
He rolled down the window and yelled, “get in loser, we’re going shopping.”
Neil sent him a confused look, but got in, nonetheless. “Why are we going shopping?” he asked as he sat, getting his seat on Andrew’s expensive leather seats.
For some reason, Andrew didn’t care what condition his car would be in at the end of the drive, too focused on the boy sitting next to him. “We’re not.”
“Then why did you say we were?” Neil looked genuinely curious.
Andrew stared at him incredulously for a long moment. A car behind him honking shook him out of his shock and put his foot on the gas pedal. They took off, Andrew mindlessly taking a turn to somewhere he minimally recognized. “It’s a quote from Mean Girls.”
Neil tilted his head and, even though Andrew tried to mentally prepare himself for the question, was still blown away by the absurdity of it. “What’s Mean Girls?”
He said it as if he wasn’t aware of the cultural impact Mean Girls had on society, as if he didn’t know the debate around the word fetch or the iconic dance routine in slutty Santa costumes; he said it as if he had never watched the movie; he said it as if he had never heard of the movie before.
“This is unacceptable,” Andrew said, unable to take his eyes off the road and see Neil trying to pick him apart with his mind because he knew he would do the same exact thing. “I’m going to force you to watch it.”
Neil laughed, filling the car with a sound it had never heard before. “Is it good?”
Who was this guy? How could he not know Mean Girls? “It’s one of the most iconic movies of all time.”
Neil answered with a hum. “So, I guess I should probably watch it, huh?”
“I’m forcing you to watch it,” Andrew repeated.
“Sure,” Neil agreed easily. “I’ll bring the popcorn.”
“You know what popcorn is but not Mean Girls?”
“There’s a difference between a movie and food.”
“Not when that food is designated move watching food and you’ve never even heard of one of the most famous movies ever made.”
“Would you rather me bring that monstrosity you call coffee instead?”
Andrew ignored the smirk he could clearly hear. “Yes, I would.”
~~~~~
Andrew waited for Neil to finish closing up the coffee shop, sitting in his designated booth and copying the picture of Nicky’s dog he was sent earlier. The sketch wasn’t perfect - some of the lines were askewed and the shading was off - but it looked decent enough given the lack of animal drawings in Andrew’s repertoire.
Neil emerged from the back, bag over his shoulder and patting his hands dry on his pants. “Ready to go?” he asked as he came to a stop by the booth.
Andrew didn’t bother with a response; he organized his materials and loaded everything into his bag, taking meticulous care as to not crease any of the pages. Neil waited patiently for him to finish, and shortly the two were off, locking the doors of the café and heading back to Andrew’s apartment.
Neil flopped on the couch, chattering away about annoying customers and the most recent development with Matt and his crush. Andrew listened with half an ear, cleaning his work station to begin the process of sculpting Neil’s fingernails to perfection.
The conversation stopped when Andrew picked up a rib and set to work on Neil’s hands, glancing over occasionally to make sure the veins and tendons and length were correct. Neil obliged, turning his hands this way and that for Andrew to get the perfect view.
He had to say, the one good thing about having Neil with him while working on this piece was that it was much easier. Instead of relying on reference drawings that weren’t completely accurate nor reliable, he had the source, his muse, sitting across the room from him, ready and willing to help however he could.
It was… nice.
Was that the right word?
It didn’t feel right, not when Andrew had been exposed to so few ‘nice’ things in his life.
But, sitting with Neil in his apartment, enjoying each other’s company with little words exchanged, working on a project together instead of by himself for once.
He couldn’t think of another word to describe how this felt, how he felt, other than nice.
When the clock struck midnight (metaphorically, Andrew didn’t have a grandfather clock, but he did have a digital one that told time with very clear and bright neon lights), Neil rolled his head backwards with a sigh. “I have to go,” he muttered.
Andrew tore his focus away from the folds of the armbands resting on Neil’s sculpted forearms and faced the man instead. He didn’t say anything, just waited for Neil to continue like he knew he would.
An undetermined amount of time passed (again, metaphorically, the digital clock reported only five minutes having passed) before Neil spoke up again. “I don’t want to go,” he eventually said. Then, quieter, “I like your place a lot more than I do mine.”
“Then don’t go,” Andrew said, as if it were that easy.
Both of them knew it would never, could never, be that easy. Not with their pasts lingering on the edges of their shawdows, biding their tone with baited breath for the perfect opportunity to drag them back down to the deepest depths of hell.
“I wish I could,” Neil told him regretfully, lifting his head and looking all too miserable for Andrew to handle. “But I can’t.”
“Will you get turned into a pumpkin otherwise?” Andrew asked, still holding out the foolish hope that Neil could stay, when it was in the realm of impossiblities.
Neil didn’t respond, but when he did, his comeback was a simple and confused, “what?”
“I’m going to pretend you didn’t just say that,” Andrew said, turning away from Neil and back to the lump of clay that sat by his wall, slicing off a chunk and throwing it on the table next to him.
From the corner of his eye, he could see Neil check the time and start to bounce his leg. “I’m serious. I need to leave.”
Andrew didn’t say anything as he grabbed a hand towel, stood up, and walked to the door. He cleaned off his hands and waited for Neil to approach before opening the door.
Neil looked dejectedly between Andrew and the hallway that laid outside his dwelling, and took a step to exit. Andrew held up a hand and pushed back Neil’s chest, preventing him from leaving quite yet.
“What?” Neil asked, confusion lining his face and voice.
Andrew reached into his pocket. Before he had a chance to second guess himself, he grabbed Neil’s hand with his free one, cradling it as he layered his other hand on top, pressing the key firmly into Neil’s palm and forcing his fingers to close around it.
“What?” Neil asked again, this time with no less confusion, but with the odd inclusion of wonder.
“It’s just a key,” Andrew told him blankly, trying to keep his own roaring emotions hidden and buried.
After studying the key, Neil held it tightly in his fist and looked up at Andrew with something akin to determination and fascination whirling in his eyes. “You know it means more than that,” he said with the knowledge that only someone else who knows the significance of receiving a key knows
Not bothering to respond verbally, and not wanting to test the limits of his voice when he was so emotional, he pushed Neil out the apartment, slamming the door shut after he made sure Neil caught his balance against the opposite wall.
Stupid Neil, making Andrew experience stupid emotions he thought he was no longer capable of stupidly experiencing.
~~~~~
“Yes or no?” Andrew asked into the dead of night, Neil by his side as they sat on the rooftop, smoke swirling around them in intricate patterns from burnt out cigarettes.
“What do you mean?” Neil asked, turning his attention away from the lights passing as cars on the highway far ahead of them to Andrew.
Andrew swallowed, his throat unexpectedly dry at sudden and unwanted nerves.
Andrew didn’t get nervous, he didn’t get butterflies or any of the mushy gushy stuff Hollywood liked to show on screen.
But, as he looked at Neil, butterflies was the only word he could think of to describe the fluttering feeling in his stomach.
“To kissing,” Andrew told him, trying – and probably failing - to keep his voice as blank as possible, to not show his nerves or apprehension. “Yes or no?”
Neil looked away and Andrew felt his heart drop. But Neil didn’t look disgusted or embarrassed on Andrew’s behalf; he looked thoughtful. Andrew could almost see the cogs turning in that idiot’s brain as Neil thought of an answer.
“Yes,” Neil eventually said. This yes was better than any other Andrew could have imagined being given; this yes was given after serious consideration, which he should have expected after dropping a question like that out of nowhere, which was the best show of consent Andrew was going to ever receive.
Andrew raised a hand, holding Neil’s cheek delicately, the same way he held the sculpture of Neil downstairs. This boy, this beautiful, beautiful boy could never be described as fragile, not in a million years. But that didn’t mean he didn’t deserve to be held gently, to be shown kinder touches and the soft palm of a hand caressing his skin instead of sharp slaps that left nasty bruises.
Perhaps, one day, once Andrew has worked through more of his trauma with Bee and has come to a place where he feels comfortable with Neil’s hands on his skin, then he would be treated the same way. As something precious to cherish.
For now, the soft glide of this lips touching for the first time as Andrew guided Neil’s mouth to his would have to be enough. And it was enough.
Neil’s lips weren’t soft, not by any measures, but neither were Andrew’s. It reflected them, the harshness of the skin rubbing against each other represented the sharp and jagged points of themselves.
But with the stars and the moon as their witnesses, they learned to adapt. The sharp lines eroded to smoother curves and their lips melded to one another. They created a flow, a back and forth of desperation that echoed with each press of their teeth.
This was something Andrew had been waiting for, something he was only slightly ashamed to admit he had daydreamed about, and it was everything he wanted. It was more than everything.
As they backed away for much needed breaths, Andrew pulling away but keeping his hand on Neil’s face, caressing his cheek bone and seeing Neil’s hands held tightly in between his thighs, Andrew only had one thought playing on repeat in his mind.
He’s perfect.
~~~~~
Andrew’s phone buzzed at 05:51, a full 30 minutes after he had fallen asleep.
Usually, he would just ignore the device and go back to sleep, but the incessant buzzing forced his eyes open to locate his phone on the nightstand and bring it closer.
“What,” he said groggily after he answered the phone, not bothering to see who was calling him at such an ungodly hour.
“Andrew?” Neil’s voice was so small, so scared, and Andrew was sitting up wide awake in a heartbeat.
“What happened?” Andrew demanded. “Are you okay?”
Neil’s laughter was shaky at best, and Andrew’s worry spiked at the sound. “No,” Neil, the liar, answered truthfully. “But you will be.”
Andrew barely had time to ask “what?” before Neil was talking again.
“I’m sorry, Andrew,” he said. It sounded like he was crying, or on the verge of tears. Andrew’s heart clenched; he had no idea what was happening, no idea where Neil was, and no idea how to make it better. “Thank you, for everything.” Andrew knew there was hidden meaning, that he was meant to read between the lines, but he was so preoccupied with not letting his anxiety take ahold of him to even bother trying. “You were amazing.”
And then the line went dead.
Andrew pulled the phone away from his ear slowly, a sense of dread building in his stomach.
Something happened.
Something happened to Neil.
Something that Andrew was completely unaware of.
Something that made Neil call and say what almost sounded like a goodbye.
~~~~~
Andrew walked into the café at noon, the same time he always had, and walked up to the cash register. He waited not-so-patiently for someone – for Neil – to walk out from the back room, ring up his order, make a joke or two, and hand Andrew his cup as he called it a monstrosity.
His heart dropped when Matt walked out instead.
“Hey,” Matt said, looking a little confused. “Do you know where Neil is? I know you two were close, and he kind of disappeared off the face of the earth- “
Andrew didn’t wait to listen to Matt’s unsure laugh. He turned on his heel and walked straight out the door, ignoring the growing sense of unease that was haunting him.
~~~~~
It was midnight.
It was midnight and Andrew had wasted the day away by staring at Neil’s clay face.
He couldn’t get himself to work on the piece, couldn’t get himself to make any changes.
Who decided this was how their story should play out? That they would stumble into each other’s lives, lives that had been filled with nothing but pain and bloodshed, just to be violently ripped away and forced to endure even more suffering.
Who got to decide that?
Was it god? That same god that Luther droned on and on about?
How was this ‘kind?’ How was this ‘good?’ How was this ‘merciful?’
Andrew finally found someone who understood him on a level that no one else even knew existed, and that person was gone.
That person was gone, and Andrew had no idea where he was, or if he was okay, or if he was alive.
And it was killing him.
Fucking Neil, making Andrew experience emotions he never thought he was capable of experiencing.
He stared at the sculpture, and for the first time since he was seven years old, felt a tear slip down his cheek.
~~~~~
Andrew stared at the sculpture.
He stared and stared and stared.
He stared as if it would bring Neil back, as if he could make Neil appear out of thin air and explain himself just by looking at a not quite mirror image of him.
Andrew couldn’t do this anymore. It hurt too much.
He had no idea what happened, no idea what caused Neil to disappear.
Maybe Neil didn’t need a reason.
He was a runaway, after all.
That’s what runaways do.
They run away.
Andrew couldn’t think about it, he really couldn’t; thinking about it too long caused him to feel a type of panic he hadn’t felt since before Juvie, and he didn’t want to think about anything that happened before Juvie.
He grabbed his pen pad, hoping to distract his mind until it forgot about his worries, at least for a while.
He flipped through the pages, intent on going to the last one to start drawing a bowl of fucking fruit or something but his eyes caught on the pages he had drawn of Neil. The ones that initiated their first conversation in the booth in the back of the café.
Andrew knew he shouldn’t look at them, look that the poses he drew Neil in, knew that it would cause him just as much grief as looking at that fucking sculpture he couldn’t get himself to finish, but he did anyways.
He studied Neil, studied the drawings he had created of this boy who used to be a stranger once upon a time.
A boy who had gone missing and was on the run from people who wanted to kill him and could make him disappear forever.
He looked at the drawings, that same desperation crawling back up his throat, the hope that just by looking at Neil’s sketched eyes, he could get him to come back.
It didn’t work – of course it fucking didn’t. Why would it?
Why would anything work for Andrew Minyard?
He looked at the drawings some more, apparently keen on causing himself as much harm and psychological damage as possible, when his eyes snagged on something scribbled on the back of the last page, the page that was just a close up of Neil’s face.
On it, in Neil’s chicken scratch, was written:
Dear Andrew,
I’m writing this in the café, waiting for you to return from the bathroom (you drink way to much coffee, by the way).
I want to start this off by saying I’m sorry.
I never meant for it to get this bad, or for them to find me.
But they did, Andrew. They found me.
I remember what you told me, how you had stood up and fought against the demons of your past and made them stand down, how you turned sob stories into beautiful and captivating pieces of art. So, I tried to do the same.
It didn’t work.
They’re coming for me.
I don’t know how much time I have left, but I promise I’ll call you when they come.
I won’t be able to say much, they’ll be listening, but I promise to call.
This isn’t fair to you. It isn’t fair for you to have to go through the pain of losing someone else, not when you have only just started to learn what family means. But it’s like you said, the world isn’t fair, and we shouldn’t pretend that it is. Not even for a second.
You said it was a cruel world, and I said that it was the people in it.
Remember that, for me. Remember that it wasn’t the world who decided my time had run out. Remember it was the people. Remember it was the people who were cruel and remember that the world still has some good in it, no matter how small that goodness is.
You were the one who showed me that.
You were the last bit of goodness the world decided to show me.
Lastly, I won’t say that you deserve better, even if you do, nor will I say that I wish things had gone differently, even if I do.
All I’ll say is this - thank you. Thank you for all of it: the keys, the trust, the honesty, and the kisses. Thank you for being you.
I’ll never forget you for the rest of my very short life.
Yours truly,
Neil Josten
FUCK.
~~~~~
Andrew laid on the cold floor, curled in a ball, reading the note over and over again.
Why- how- who gave him the right?
Who gave fucking Neil, of all people, the right to affect Andrew like this?
Fuck him.
No, seriously, fuck him.
Andrew was so over that fucking liar.
He wouldn’t wallow any longer. He pushed himself up roughly and stalked around the room. He grabbed the first thing he could get his hands on – a plate he forgot to put up after drying it – and smashed it into the ground.
He stared at the shattered pieces, breathing my heavily.
He grabbed another plate.
SMASH.
It wasn’t enough.
He stomped out of the kitchen, eyes darting around his apartment for the next thing to destroy.
The rage inside his chest was a wild, untamable beast that couldn’t be stopped.
Andrew let it loose.
He smashed a lamp on the floor, punched a hole in his window, upturned his armchairs, threw the blankets off his bed, all the while trembling from his anger.
Before he knew what he was doing, completely blinded by his hatred, he had a fist through Neil’s neck.
Andrew froze, staring in horror at what he had done.
Slowly, so fucking slowly, trying not to cause anymore damage, he pulled out his hand.
He could only watch in terror as Neil’s clay face, the last thing that remained of him, fell to the ground.
Tears streaming down his face, all previous anger gone in a flash, Andrew dropped to his knees, hands hovering in the air above the block of clay.
He gently pried it from the ground, but it was no use; Neil’s head had been destroyed.
The only tangible thing Andrew had left of the boy he had become so infatuated with, the boy stitched together with lies and dark secrets, was gone.
The last time Andrew had cried, actually cried, was when he was seven years old. It was the first night of many, the first night he muttered ‘no’ and ‘please’ and ‘stop’ and nothing happened, the night when he realized his suffering was benefiting others for reasons he couldn’t understand.
He had made a promise to himself, then. It was the promise that defined how important all following promises would be: he wouldn’t cry. He would be tough. He wouldn’t give in to the pain and would rise above it. He wouldn’t cry.
But, sitting on his calves in the middle of his studio, curled into himself almost completely, hands clutching clay that once used to be the most beautiful person Andrew had ever seen, someone who was gone and was never coming back, he sobbed.
He let out deep, fear-curdling screams of anguish as tears mixed with the clay still glued to the floor, turning it far too wet to be of use.
He cried. He sobbed. He wailed.
There was nothing else for him to do.
He cried.
~~~~~
Andrew’s face hadn’t been dry in days.
Tear streaks were a near constant.
Every time his phone rang, he pounced on it, only to turn it away every time the name that appeared was someone other than Neil.
His head pounded from dehydration, but he couldn’t get himself to replenish the water his body was releasing.
He could barely get out of bed.
All he could do was stare.
Stare at what once had been a sculpture, one of the best Andrew ever created, but was now a detailed limp of clay missing a significant portion that was thrown onto a nearby foldable table.
He couldn’t do anything.
He curled his knees up against his chest and tugged his blanket closer.
He stared.
He couldn’t do anything.
~~~~~
He sat in his living room, legs pulled against his chest and arms loosely circling them.
He had fully sunken into that numb feeling.
Apathy was a coping mechanism, one that took and Bee years to undo, and they still had a long road ahead of them if Andrew was ever going to feel emotions like everyone else.
Apathy was a demon that should be daunting and terrifying but gave the warmest hugs and provided a sense of security that nothing else could.
Neil was gone.
Andrew would never see those brown eyes or that brown hair or those scars or that lithe body ever again.
He and Bee tried to prepare for situations like these, moments when emotions would be so intense that he would wish to dip back into that familiar apathy.
But there was a difference.
What he and Bee were preparing for were moments, not days spent in constant agony and crushing grief.
Apathy was a demon, but Andrew had been called monster enough to know that labels don’t mean anything beyond people’s preconceived and incorrect assumptions.
Apathy was a friend, the only one Andrew could count on to be reliable, to sit beside him and help him forget the hole in his chest where his heart should be.
~~~~~
“You have to stop punishing yourself,” Bee said over the phone. Andrew barely remembered calling her, barely remembered picking up his phone and dialing her number, barely remembered telling her what was wrong. “It’s not your fault, Andrew. You didn’t know. Neil purposefully didn’t tell you to keep you safe, like the letter said- “
“Safe from what,” Andrew interrupted, because that was something, wasn’t it? Neil said he was protecting Andrew, but from what? It didn’t make sense and he needed it to make sense.
“I don’t know,” Bee said, sounding all too sympathetic for his tastes. “But I do know Neil also wrote that you deserve better, and he wasn’t lying. You do deserve better, and you deserve to not punish yourself for something you couldn’t have known was going to happen.”
Andrew didn’t respond, pulling his blanket up around his shoulder and staring at the broken sculpture.
~~~~~
“Did you hear the news?” Aaron asked. It was their once a month call, though Andrew was sure Aaron wasn’t aware of either how little they talked, or how much they talked. Even after all these years, the two had never been good at reading each other.
“What news?” Andrew croaked from under his covers. What he needed was water, but that would require getting up and he wasn’t sure if that was something he would be able to do that day.
“About one of your old foster families,” Aaron answered, he looked off to the side, clearly reading over a headline or article or whatever. “Drake Spear. Does that name sound familiar?”
‘Does that name sound familiar?’ Aaron could bet his sorry ass it does.
“What about him?” Andrew asked, voice harsher and shaper than he intended it to be; the difference must have been noticeable because Aaron gave him a strange look. Despite all the years that their relationship had existed, despite after everything they had been through, Andrew still didn’t know the details of what Tilda did to Aaron or the kind of brainwashing he endured, not did Aaron know the details of what happened to Andrew or the types of things the people he was forced to live with did to children.
“I found an article about it earlier today,” Aaron explained, which did nothing to answer Andrew’s question. “Apparently he was found dead yesterday.” He didn’t sound particularly interested, but Andrew knew the side eye and repeated finger tapping meant the opposite.
Andrew, despite how much he tried to appear unaffected, froze at the news.
Dead? Drake was dead? How was that possible?
He could barely feel his breathing pick up, could barely hear Aaron’s concern flowing over the phone.
Drake was dead. Drake was dead. Drake was dead.
It was a dream. It was a prayer. It was a fantasy.
It couldn’t be real. Not in a world so intent on causing Andrew as much heartache and pain and suffering as possible.
It couldn’t be real.
And yet… his mind drifted back to the letter, to the words Neil wrote in a desperate attempt to provide some clarification for his sudden disappearance. He thought about the way Neil’s chicken scratch reminded him of the idiot’s words – as if Andrew would ever be able to forget anything that revolved around a certain barista – and how there was still good in the world.
Was this Neil’s way of proving his point? Even long after he was gone.
Of course that cheeky little shit couldn’t stand to not get the last word in.
Andrew him up on Aaron mid sentence and rolled over.
In his dreams, his mind replayed that conversation on a loop, over and over again.
“The world is a cruel and unforgiving place,” Andrew had said, glaring over the edge of the building. “It will chew you up and spit you out without a care of how it damages you.”
“Maybe,” Neil agreed. “But I think it’s the people in it that make the world cruel, not the other way around. I think that there’s still some good left out there somewhere, waiting to be found.”
“How can you believe that,” Andrew asked, completely bewildered and incredulous.
“Because I found you, didn’t I?”
~~~~~
“Why don’t you fix it,” Nicky suggested during their FaceTime call. If Andrew had the energy, he might’ve laughed. But, as it was, he was too exhausted from waking up to do anything more than give Nicky an unimpressed stare.
“I’m serious!” Nicky tried to defend himself. “It might make you feel better.”
“How,” Andrew ground out and, god, it sounded like he was gargling rocks in his spare time.
“People deal with grief in different ways,” Nicky said slowly, giving Andrew the idea that his cousin had talked to Bee about what to tell him. Andrew would’ve felt touched if he was capable of feeling anything besides the crushing weight settler deep in his chest.
“Part of the reason why you’re so depressed right now is because you ruined the sculpture after finding out Neil may never come back.” That was putting it nicely. “Maybe what you need to start moving on and healing is to make amends. Fix the sculpture.”
Making amends was a dumb concept, you can’t make amends with a dead man.
But fixing the sculpture, perhaps he could do that.
~~~~~
After thirty consecutive hours, Andrew took a step back and, maybe admired isn’t the right word, but examined his work.
Attaching the head was the first order of business, and the one that took the least amount of time. Next, was reshaping the neck, carving Neil’s scars and the hollow of his throat.
He worked his way upwards, taking care to get every detail as accurate as he could possibly do.
It was hard work that took up long hours, but he did it.
It wasn’t the same as the sculpture from before, and Andrew couldn’t decide if it looked more accurate because his skills had sharpened with sleep deprivation, or because his memory of what Neil looked like was fading.
The thought scared him.
It would mean that one day, all Andrew would have of Neil was his stupid brown hair and stupid brown contact lenses with the barest hints of scars marring his skin.
He didn’t want that, but perhaps it was what he deserved. No matter what Bee or Nicky or Neil said, Andrew didn’t deserve better. He deserved exactly what he got.
And if what he got was a fleeting memory of this mysterious stranger, then so be it.
At least the sculpture was finished.
~~~~~
5 Months Later
~~~~~
Andrew walked through halls lined with paintings taller than he was, barely pausing at any to do more than glance at the canvases lined in fake frames.
He was on a mission, looking for a specific section of the maze that cosplayed as a museum. He had never been one to like going to museums before, not even for inspiration. As vain as it may sound, other artists came to him for inspiration, not the other way around. No one else had a style similar to his, one that could even come close to comparison.
It didn’t matter; he was here now, and he tried to follow the confusing signs to the sculptures section.
After way longer than necessary – mostly because he refused to ask anyone for help – he saw the first statue and immediately took off in that direction.
The giant hall was lined with statues and sculptures of all kinds, some smaller busts even doting the middle of the walkway.
He gave each piece the same courtesy he gave the paintings, a brief glance on his way to visiting his real target.
It was located at the end of the hallway and was the entire reason he had come to this museum in the first place.
He had put it up for sale, auctioning it off to the highest bidder; well, that was the plan, at first.
Really, he just wanted it out of his studio and wanted to make as much money off of it as possible, but when some prestigious, world renowned museum in New York called asking to display the piece, he couldn’t say no.
So, here he was, standing in front of his latest creation, on display for all of New York and its tourists to see.
The Martyr.
He stared at it, he didn’t know for how long, but enough to see that all the mistakes he was convinced he made weren’t there.
The eyelashes curled the right amount, the jaw was at the right angle, the hair fell in just the right messed-up way. The shape of the cupid’s bow dipped down enough, the almost nonexistent stubble was almost nonexistent, the rings of the contacts were still visible. The damage inflicted during his tantrum wasn’t even noticeable anymore.
He felt a presence settle by his side, yet he refrained from looking, keeping his eyes on the man he had once claimed to hate to hide his other feelings from everyone, even himself.
“It’s beautiful,” the person beside him said.
Andrew hummed in response. If the person wanted a conversation, they would have to work for it.
“Do you know what happened to him?” the person asked.
Andrew didn’t dare remove his gaze from the fake eyes, keeping himself as calm as possible. “The police don’t know, but they suspect he was killed.”
“I’m not asking what the police know,” Andrew could see the person turning to face him in his peripheral vision but kept his gaze steady and still. “I’m asking if you know,” and oh, how Andrew has missed hearing someone speak with that much sass.
He hadn’t heard anyone put that much snark into their comments since before that damned phone call all those months ago.
“All I know is that he better be alive,” Andrew said.
“And why’s that?” the person asked, tilting their head.
“Because I made him a promise,” Andrew replied steadily.
“A promise?” the person was growing more confused. “What kind of promise?“
“I told him not to die,” Andrew said. “I promised that I would be the one to kill him, no one else.”
Instead of being insulted, instead of calling Andrew rude or insensitive or any other insult that have been hurled at him, the person laughed.
Andrew closed his eyes, swallowing tightly.
When the person calmed down, they said, “well, I have it on very good authority that the guy wants you to be the one to kill him, too.”
“And how do you know?” Andrew asked, voice steadily falling apart just like he was.
The person shrugged; Andrew heard the movement as he slowly opened his eyes. “Who knows. I could be wrong, I have been told by someone of supreme intelligence that I can be a little slow, and that I’m an idiot.”
Fuck.
“Who told you that?” Andrew asked, voice no longer steady but brimming with hope that refused to stay squashed and buried.
“Who knows,” the stranger said again, and Andrew could all but hear the smile in their words.
Giving in, he turned and was greeted by a face that was so similar but much too different. There was stunning auburn hair and bright blue eyes replacing what used to be a dead brown. Prominent, new scars lined a cheek and blotted out the other. But the way his hair fell into place was the same and the way his eyelashes curled was the same and the way his smile turned upwards was the same and the way his eyes crinkled from joy was the same.
“Did you dye your hair?” Andrew asked, his will the only thing that kept his pride from shattering and tears from overflowing.
“No,” the person said, though they seemed a little disappointed by the answer. “I’m letting it grow out. Besides, I was told not to.”
Andrew couldn’t decipher the hidden meaning in those words; he would have to come back and dissect them later. “What about contacts?”
Neil’s smile pulled a little higher. “Doc said I don’t need them anymore.”
It was the same meaning as the hair, a meaning Andrew was missing out on. “Scars?”
Where anyone else would be flabbergasted by his audacity to ask such a question outright without any padding or niceties, the person’s face dimmed, and he shrank into himself. Where anyone else’s reaction would be wholly ignored by Andrew, this person’s reaction left him scrambling, scared that he had already messed up the tentative thing they started rekindling. “It was a… bad accident. I’ll tell you more about it later, if you want.”
It was an invitation. It was a welcome mat set out on the front porch after months of being away from home. It was the beginning of a hug, arms outstretched and ready to embrace. Andrew took it gladly. “I would like that.”
The person’s face lit up a bit more, not quite replacing all that was lost by Andrew’s dumb question, but enough for now.
“So,” the person said, not letting the silence turn awkward, facing the art once more, “the statue- “
“The sculpture,” Andrew interrupted.
The person waved a hand dismissively. “Doesn’t matter how many times you say that; it’s always going to be a statue.”
“Except it’s not,” Andrew replied, jumping into the lighthearted debate just as easily as before, something easing inside his chest he hadn’t known was coiled at the back and forth.
“Which one of us has actually been to Europe before?” the person asked, turning to face Andrew again.
“And which one of us actually creates art?” Andrew retorted.
The person clicked their tongue. “Fair enough.”
Before the silence could stretch too long, before their conversation could stretch too thin, Andrew blurted out, “I think I deserve some answers.”
Not his most graceful approach, no, and the person’s cringe confirmed they thought the same. “You’re right, you do.” They sighed, looking around anxiously, then tuned back into Andrew. “How about a name to start?”
“A name?” Andrew asked, heart beating loudly in his chest, hope that should be dead a hundred times over blooming in his chest.
The person looked thoughtful, as if debating how to answer, or which answer to pick. They eventually decided, “Abram.”
Andrew hummed. “I haven’t heard that one before.” Out of all the names and secrets spilled between cigarettes and stars and car rides and park benches and cups filled with more sugar than coffee, the name Abram was never mentioned.
The person shrugged again. “My mother was British. Maybe that’s why.”
Andrew could read between the lines of that answer easily enough. It was because of their mother, that same mother they had been so cagey about. But now, they were opening up, or at least willing to.
“I like it,” Andrew replied honestly.
Abram smiled, genuinely happy to earn Andrew’s approval. He held out his hand and said, “come on, I have a lot to tell you.”
Andrew looked at the offered hand and didn’t hesitate to grab it, dragging Abram to the exit of the museum.
It was a start, for both of them.
And maybe this start could have a happy ending.