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“So,” Neil asks as he washes his paint-covered hands in the kitchen sink, “Christmas.”
Andrew glares. He wouldn’t go as far as saying that he cares enough to dislike it when Neil gets paint all over the kitchen (which inevitably happens every time he goes near it), but he certainly doesn’t enjoy cleaning up after him. He watches idly as Neil runs a still-wet hand through his hair to push it out of his eyes and winds up with a blue streak in his coppery red mop of curls. He says nothing.
This year, Neil and Andrew are spending Christmas with Andrew’s brother, Aaron Minyard. Aaron Minyard, Andrew’s twin whose existence was unknown to him until two months previous. Aaron Minyard, an orthopedic surgeon with a wife (an oncologist, naturally) and two daughters. Aaron Minyard, who grew up with a mother that chose him.
Or, they might be spending Christmas at the Minyards’. There’s just one issue.
Andrew takes out his phone and plays the voicemail he received earlier that morning. Aaron’s angry voice sounds tinny through the small phone speaker, and he sounds uncomfortably similar to Andrew’s when he says, “Hey, Andrew. Seems there’s something you failed to mention about Josten. I don’t give a shit if he’s your boyfriend, I don’t want him in my house. I’m not having an ex-con who looks like that around my children.” A softer, female voice that Andrew assumes is Katelyn’s starts to argue, but the voicemail ends with a click.
Aaron Minyard is a doctor with a beautiful doctor for a wife and two beautiful children. Andrew Doe is an author with an ex-convict for a husband. Andrew Doe loves Neil Josten, and Aaron Minyard does not.
Andrew is less apathetic than he used to be. He can acknowledge his feelings, sometimes, and he readily admits that is already tired of his long-lost twin brother.
“You can go without me,” Neil offers, ever the martyr. He manages to get the worst of the paint off of his hands and settles beside Andrew on the sofa, sitting close enough that their thighs press together. In silence, Andrew begins to pick the dried colours out from under Neil’s stubby fingernails.
Affection is easier, after nine years together. Or maybe Andrew’s just getting softer.
“You will go,” Andrew replies because it’s less difficult than saying I am not going without you.
Neil watches as Andrew meticulously checks over his hands for any stray patches of colour. It wouldn’t do to get paint on the sofa, after all. It was expensive.
Then again, almost everything in their penthouse apartment is. Neil is one of the few artists who has made it; his art graces the walls of museums and old, stuffy men’s old, stuffy art collections. Part of his money comes from his criminal past, too, but they don’t like to broadcast that.
“Aaron might not give in,” Neil points out. Andrew gives up the pretense of making sure Neil doesn’t stain the sofa and links their hands together. Neil rubs his thumb over Andrew’s hand comfortingly.
“I do not care if he wants you to come or not,” Andrew replies. “If he wants me there, he will have us both.”
It would be a lie for Andrew to say that he does not care about his brother at all. Once upon a time, family meant nothing to him, but nearly a decade with Neil Josten has changed that. He recognizes that Aaron wants to have a relationship with him, and he tries, sometimes, to put the same effort in that his twin does.
At times like this, though, Andrew slips a little closer toward cutting off contact with Aaron altogether.
Aaron Minyard does not seem to be a real human being. They have not yet met in person; he exists solely over Skype. He looks like Andrew and sounds like Andrew, but he is different in every other conceivable way. He is exactly the kind of man Andrew wished he could be at the tender age of six. A successful man with a wife, two-point-five kids, and a spacious yard for the yappy little terrier to play in. He is a mockery of Andrew Doe’s existence.
When it started to look like Aaron would be a permanent fixture in Andrew’s orbit, Neil asked if Andrew might ever change his last name to Minyard. The answer was a resounding no. Neil was not the least bit surprised. Doe is the name of someone who has no one; when Andrew was younger and harder, he clung to that with a white-knuckled grip. Nowadays, he is far from alone, but he wears the name of Doe with pride. No one likes to hear that he suffered at the hands of the foster system; it makes people uncomfortable. Doe shoves it in their faces.
Andrew thinks that his last name makes Aaron uncomfortable, if the way he looks away every time it is uttered is any indication. Aaron is a success story; his mother was a terrible woman, and now he is a doctor with a family. Aaron thinks: Andrew had no mother, and now he has no real last name and is living with a criminal. Aaron thinks: I have to live with this man as my brother.
Aaron Minyard is the label on a box in Andrew’s mind that is filled with issues Andrew thought he sorted out years ago.
Neil squeezes Andrew’s hand one last time and stands up. “Come on, we’re going to meet Matt and Dan soon.” He stops and smiles, just barely; a twitch of the corner of his mouth and nothing more. “We don’t have to go if you aren’t feeling up to it after that.” What goes unsaid: I know how thinking about Aaron makes you feel.
Andrew shakes his head. If he stays at home, he’ll wallow in his own misery; besides, he knows that Neil would be disappointed if they missed it.
They meet Dan and Matt in a tiny hole-in-the-wall coffee shop that is so empty every time they visit Andrew wonders how it manages to stay open. The coffee is alright at best, but Matt’s status as a famous exy player does not allow them to visit a more populous establishment. The four of them visit often enough that the staff know their orders by now, which Andrew likes because it minimizes human interaction.
Neil, Matt, and Dan start talking about Matt’s latest game against the Atlanta Jets almost immediately. Andrew contributes occasionally, but only to see the blinding smile from Neil that it garners. Neil is an exy fanatic, something one would not expect from a glance at him: a slender, fine-boned, short man usually sporting paint on his hands. His eyes seem to say I’ll fuck you up in a violent, uncomfortable way.
That look disappears, though, when he is screaming at the television after someone checks Matt particularly hard.
Finally, Dan asks, “Have you two decided where you’re spending Christmas?” In years past, Neil and Andrew have had Christmas dinner with the Boyd-Wildses. It is a raucous affair, but Andrew has grown to tolerate it after all this time. Around the table each year it is Andrew, Neil, Matt, Dan, Dan’s adopted father Wymack, Wymack’s son Kevin, his wife Abby, and Matt’s mother, Randy Boyd.
Neil looks over at Andrew, who shakes his head. He takes his phone out of his pocket and replays the voicemail Aaron left him for Matt and Dan to listen to.
“What the fuck?” Matt asks, brows furrowing in rage. Andrew may not always like being around Matt, but he does deserve some credit for being a perpetual staunch supporter of Neil Josten. “Who does he think he is?”
“How did he find out?” Dan asks, looking between Andrew and Neil.
Neil shrugs. Andrew watches the line of his shoulders rise and fall with focus he grants to almost nothing else. “Google, probably,” Neil says, making a see-saw motion with his hand. “No one knows what I was in for because it’s part of an investigation and the feds needed it to be kept a secret, but it’s online that I was in prison for two years.”
“And he just assumed that, what, you’re a murderer?” Matt demands. “That’s fucked up.”
Andrew raises an eyebrow at him. Neil has, in fact, killed people. Namely his father, the crime lord Nathan Wesninski and several of his henchmen.
Matt rolls his eyes at Andrew’s dry look and amends, “Well, he hasn’t murdered anyone who didn’t deserve to die.”
“Aaron is an asshole,” Neil says. “I don’t like him.”
Andrew feels like he should be offended on behalf of his brother, but he feels nothing. He says, “Aaron doesn’t like you either.”
“He found that you went to prison but not that Andrew went to juvie?” Dan asks. “It seems worse for someone to go to juvie for, like, actually almost killing four people than Neil’s mysterious secret crime.”
“Also, why did he call Neil your boyfriend?” Matt cuts in. “Doesn’t he know you’re married?”
Neil nods. “He does. I guess he just doesn’t care.”
“Look,” Dan says, “if you don’t want to spend Christmas with him, you’re still welcome in our family.”
Neil glances over at Andrew and links their pinkies together under the table, away from prying eyes. “I will have to deal with him at some point,” Andrew mutters, staring down at his lukewarm coffee.
“His wife seems nice, and so does the cousin and his husband,” Neil says, mostly to Dan and Matt. “So it won’t be horrible, I suppose. If I am allowed to go.” He says this last sentence with a mocking sneer. Andrew wants to kiss him.
“He can’t be homophobic, then, if his cousin’s gay,” Matt reasons. “So it’s just a Neil thing.”
Neil puts on a fake, too-wide grin. “I’m sure he’ll just love me once he gets to know me.”
Dan scoffs and takes a sip of her tea. “I hope it doesn’t go too terribly. It’s nice to finally know who your family is, right?”
Andrew considers this question for a long time, and in the end doesn’t reply. He does not want to admit that he has already found a family, and that having more seems too good to be true. Neil looks at him and seems to understand anyway, because he drapes his arm around Andrew, slender hand tickling his collarbone. Andrew leans into him and lets his eyes drift shut. He rarely sleeps in public, but he lets himself nap on Neil’s shoulder as the conversation around him ebbs and flows.
**
Andrew ignores three calls from Nicky later that day until Neil answers for him on the fourth one.
“Andrew’s trying to ignore you, one second,” he hears Neil say after a long pause, most likely the long-winded, overemotional greeting Nicky tends to give; coincidentally, also what Andrew is trying to avoid. Neil shoves the phone into Andrew’s hand and doesn’t fight when Andrew takes the phone in one hand and Neil’s hand in the other.
“Hi, Andrew, I’m really sorry about what Aaron said to you earlier,” Nicky says breathlessly. “He’s just protective, but I promise I’ll convince him to let Neil come.”
“Neil is coming whether Aaron likes it or not,” Andrew replies flatly.
Nicky freezes for a moment before barrelling on. “Well, that’s a positive attitude, I’m glad you two are planning on coming. I really am sorry about all of this, I don’t know what’s gotten into him. Katelyn is much more pleasant, I swear. You know—”
“I will hang up on you,” Andrew interrupts. He has made significant progress in recent years; not too long ago, he wouldn’t have warned Nicky at all.
Nicky sighs heavily, used to Andrew’s curtness. “I’m sorry. I just really want this to work out. I’ll talk to him, alright? Aaron won’t be a problem.”
“Okay,” Andrew replies. Thank you is stuck in his throat, so he clicks the ‘end call’ button before it can escape.
He tosses his phone onto the side table and leans into Neil’s side. Sir and King crawl into his lap. Neil picks up Sir and cradles him against his chest. “That was almost civil,” he remarks.
“You need to wash your hair,” Andrew replies. There is still a dash of blue in his red curls. It matches his eyes.
“You can mind your own business,” Neil mutters. He tilts his head, remembering something. “I’m coming whether Aaron likes it or not? I thought you said you didn’t know where you wanted to go yet.”
Andrew pets King in his lap. He looks at Neil, cuddling Sir as he lounges on the couch, legs stretched out so his feet just barely avoid brushing Andrew’s knee. He feels distinctly comfortable. He says, “I need to deal with him at some point,” echoing his words from earlier.
Neil doesn’t seem to believe him, but doesn’t press the issue. Instead, he puts Sir on the sofa and stands up. “I’m going to shower,” he says. “You’re welcome to join me.”
Andrew considers it; he eyes Neil’s lean body and acknowledges the desire curling in his belly before letting it pass. He shakes his head. He feels content where he is, and he knows that Neil will return in twenty minutes. They will watch the Great British Bake Off or put on the news or Andrew will read on his Kindle while Neil sketches. Andrew revels in the quiet beauty of their routines. He never thought he would have this. He doesn’t know what he would do if the this he used to deny so vehemently was disturbed.
He also doesn’t know why his thoughts keep following dark paths.
It’s all Aaron’s fault, probably.
Andrew sometimes wishes he had never published his book. That way, his brother and cousin would never have found him and none of this messy family business would have occurred. When the novel began to pick up traction, Nicky stumbled across a photo of Andrew. At first, they were convinced he was a fraud using doctored photos of Aaron; then, there was some confusion because Andrew publishes under a pseudonym. Finally, after some long nights and conversations with Luther Hemmick, they assumed that Tilda Minyard had twins instead of just one boy and gave the other to the foster system. There is no way to confirm it with Tilda dead, but it seems likely enough; Aaron was chosen over Andrew.
God, Andrew hates thinking about Aaron.
He puts his brother out of mind and turns on the Hallmark channel. Andrew doesn’t like watching the cheesy, unrealistic romcoms, but Neil has a soft spot for them, so he keeps it on and tries to be glad that it’s not one that they have seen before. Neil gets out of the shower, skin pink and dry from the heat, and kisses Andrew on the cheek before curling up against his side.
Andrew looks at his husband beside him and their two cats just a few feet away; he looks at the photos lining the walls, interspersed with Neil’s paintings. He wonders where a brother and a cousin fit into this equation.
**
On December twenty-first, just over a week past their phone call, Nicky texts Andrew to let him know that Aaron has relented in his anti-Neil Josten crusade. It wouldn’t have made a difference either way, as Andrew already bought two tickets from New York to Columbia. Bee, his therapist, would want him to be happy that his brother is being more agreeable, but mostly Andrew feels nothing toward his womb-mate.
On the morning of December twenty-fourth, Andrew Doe and Neil Josten board a plane to South Carolina.
They are in first class, because they can afford it, and Andrew does not enjoy sitting so close to other people. It doesn’t help much; heights is the one fear he has never been able to best. Neil helps, as Neil always does, but Neil cannot change the fact that they are thirty five thousand feet in the air.
After what feels like ages, the flight attendant finishes her spiel. As she inspects each of the passengers’ seats, her eyes linger on the ragged burn scars on Neil’s face. Neil glares at her. When she leaves, Neil puts the armrests between their seats up so he can lean his head on Andrew’s shoulder. This is a thinly veiled attempt at comfort and distraction, and it works. In part. Andrew takes a few short breaths before he tilts his head onto Neil’s. He entwines their hands together and tries to focus on his husband instead of the terror unfurling in his stomach.
He must fall asleep before long because he blinks awake to Neil detaching himself from Andrew’s side. Andrew’s mouth tastes sour with sleep and his ears feel blocked and uncomfortable from the changing air pressure as the plane descends. Neil kisses him on the cheek with a smile and stretches, a sleepy noise escaping his mouth. Andrew feels warm.
Nicky had offered to drive them to Aaron’s house from the airport, but Andrew declined. He would like to arrive at his brother’s house on his own terms; the thought of accepting a ride from his cousin makes his chest flutter unpleasantly. Instead, Andrew and Neil have rented a car to drive to the hotel, and then later to Aaron and Katelyn’s house.
The airport is crowded and overwhelming; he can feel a headache coming on. The sound of screaming children makes Andrew want to curl up in a ball. He wonders if Aaron’s kids are loud. They are two little girls, named Rose and Lily. Twins. Something in Andrew’s chest churns unpleasantly.
They pick up the rental car and Neil drives to the hotel. The ride is blessedly quiet, save for the hum of the engine and the sounds of traffic around them. Columbia is unfamiliar, but he has been on countless drives with Neil just like this; he feels anchored in the strange city.
They check in to the hotel with only a minor fuss; a man recognizes Andrew, but Neil fends him off, fully aware of Andrew’s unpleasant mood. Their room is only on the second floor, so they take the stairs. Andrew collapses onto the bed after throwing his things carelessly onto the ground. Neil sits beside him and, the loving husband he is, takes Andrew’s shoes off for him before lying down beside him. Andrew curls against his chest, sighing as Neil pulls him closer and begins to card his fingers through Andrew’s hair.
“Nervous?” Neil asks, voice low.
Andrew does not respond for a long while, instead tangling his hand in Neil’s shirt with an iron grip. Finally, he says, “I do not know what is going to happen.”
“I think it will be fine,” Neil assures him. “And if it’s not, we can come right back to the hotel.”
Something dark and painful twists in the pit of Andrew’s stomach. He cannot pinpoint what he is feeling, except that it is bad. Usually, he talks it out with Neil when this happens, but the thought of speaking any more makes him feel sick.
If he were with Bee, she would tell him to take stock of himself and his surroundings to stay grounded. Remember where you are to stay in the present. Andrew is in a hotel in Columbia. He is with Neil in a bed with soft white sheets. One of Neil’s hands is in his hair, and the other is around his waist. He can smell Neil’s aftershave and clean linen. His mouth still feels gummy from sleeping on the plane. His heart is beating very quickly.
“Andrew?” Neil whispers. He rubs comforting circles on Andrew’s back. “Talk to me.”
Andrew pushes his face into the junction between Neil’s neck and shoulder. Neil adjusts so that they are pressed together from head to toe. It is comfortable; Andrew never wants to move again.
Neil allows this to go on for what feels like thirty seconds but was probably more like ten minutes. He disentangles himself from Andrew and sits up. Andrew stares up at him, glaring.
“We can fly back right now,” Neil offers. “Or drive. Matt and the others would take us, and I’m not sure Aaron would care much.”
Andrew shakes his head. What he really wants is to stay in this comfortable hotel room with Neil for eternity, but he must face reality sooner or later. He takes out his phone and finds several notifications from the group chat with himself, Neil, Dan, Matt, Allison, Renee, Seth, and Kevin. There is some inane conversation and a few questions about how their flight was, which Andrew ignores. Neil appears to have sent a photo of them on the plane, when Andrew was sleeping against Neil’s side. Neil is smiling, just barely, and his electrifying blue eyes are drooping with tiredness. Their friends’ replies are irritating, but Andrew saves the photo to his phone.
Andrew also finds an email from his publicist, which he reads and ignores, and a text message from Nicky. He turns his phone off without opening it.
“I texted Aaron,” Neil says eventually, sitting on the floor with the contents of his suitcase all over the floor, likely from searching for his phone charger. “I told him we’d be a little late because you aren’t feeling well after the flight.”
“Thanks,” Andrew says, but it comes out more like a croak.
Neil’s phone buzzes. “He says, ‘K’. Just the letter K.”
Andrew scoffs. Their flight was late during the day anyway; they landed at six, and it’s already nearing seven. They are going to the Minyards’ this evening for a while before returning to the hotel for the night and then spending Christmas Day with them. Andrew is tempted to skip going to see them tonight altogether, but he knows it will make the next day all the more awkward.
Neil crawls back into bed with Andrew and turns on the TV. He doesn’t know what Neil plans on watching, since there’s no exy on account of it being Christmas Eve, until he finds reruns of the Great British Bake Off. After the episode finishes, Andrew feels more like himself. Mechanically, he stands up to get ready to leave. He puts on nicer clothes and brushes his teeth. His hair looks like someone has been running their hands through it, because someone has been, but he doesn’t have the energy to fix it beyond allowing Neil to try and flatten it.
Neil doesn’t ask how he’s feeling, but the look in his eyes says that he knows how hard Andrew is trying to avoid thinking about the night ahead of them. They leave their hotel room and find their rental car; Andrew drives this time. It’s not as nice as the Maserati, but the feel of a car beneath him and the gear shift in his hand is as close as he can get to being home right now.
Aaron lives in the suburbs, which Andrew shouldn’t be surprised at. His house is quaint; not too big and not too small with a well-kept lawn and a section by the steps up to the door that is probably a flower garden during the warmer seasons. A wooden fence wraps around the property. Andrew parks on the road, because there are already two cars on the driveway.
Neil takes his hands and presses their foreheads together. Andrew closes his eyes and takes a calming breath before giving Neil a brief kiss and pulling away. Andrew gets out of the car and slams the door much harder than necessary. Neil follows him to the door, where a festive wreath with twinkling lights is hung. Neil knocks on the door and takes Andrew’s hand.
Andrew briefly considers turning around and driving twelve hours home. It would certainly be less torturous than the night ahead of him. Before he can change his mind, though, the doorknob turns. Andrew tightens his grip on his husband’s hand and braces himself.
The person on the other side of the door is not Aaron, as Andrew had expected, but Nicky, grinning widely. “Hi, guys!” Nicky greets them. “Come on in, I’m glad you could make it.”
When neither man responds, Nicky’s face falls, but he recovers quickly. He should be used to Andrew’s silence by now, from their awkward and stilted Skype sessions. Nicky leads them inside. The interior is no different from the outside; warm, welcoming, family-friendly decor. Overwhelmingly boring.
There are family photos on the mantle and rustic decorations on the walls. The mat by the door is crowded with shoes of varying sizes. It smells like fresh baking and Andrew can see the brightly-decorated Christmas tree in the living room. It reminds him sickeningly of Cass’ house.
Andrew kicks his shoes off and Neil follows suit. Nicky brings them to the living room, where Aaron, Katelyn, and Erik await them. Katelyn seems to freeze once she sees Neil. Aaron catches Andrew watching her and glares, making a subtle gesture toward Neil. Andrew sits on the empty loveseat without making any greetings and revels in quiet fury.
Neil, on the other hand, shakes Erik and Nicky’s hands. He greets them in German. Erik lights up; Andrew has noticed from Skyping with Nicky that Erik’s English isn’t perfect. He wonders if he can take advantage of that by speaking to Nicky and Erik in German all night and ignore his brother.
“Well,” Katelyn says once everyone sits down. “It’s nice to finally meet you, Andrew. And you, Neil. We’ve heard a lot about you.”
Andrew knows this is a lie, and so does Neil, but neither mentions it. “How was your flight?” Nicky asks after an awkward moment of silence.
“It was alright,” Neil answers. “Empty.”
“Well, it is Christmas Eve,” Nicky says. “You found the place okay?”
Neil digs his fingernails into Andrew’s hand where their fingers are tangled together. “Yes,” Andrew replies flatly.
Silence falls over the room, before Katelyn offers, “We have wine and beer in the kitchen if you’d like a drink?”
“Do you have red,” Andrew asks. It is a question, but he doesn’t have the energy to inflect it as such. Before Katelyn can interrogate Neil, Andrew says, “Neil doesn’t drink.”
“I’m sure we have soda somewhere,” Katelyn replies, standing up to fetch the drinks.
“Just water’s fine.”
Nicky follows Katelyn into what appears to be the kitchen. They return with a bottle of red wine and two beers as well as Neil’s water. Nicky pours Andrew a glass, and he tries not to down it. Andrew asks, “Erik, where do you work?” Andrew knows that Nicky and Erik work together, and he doesn’t particularly care where Erik works, but it gets Erik and Nicky talking for a while. Andrew notes that Aaron still has yet to say a word to either him or Neil.
The conversation eventually, turns back to Andrew, no matter how hard he has been trying to steer it away. Finally, Aaron asks, “What do you do in your free time? Writing isn’t exactly a nine-to-five, is it?”
Andrew shifts his gaze away from Aaron before replying, “I visit a lot of schools to talk to the kids.” Aaron’s comment felt like a jab; Andrew finds himself angry, even though he thought that he didn’t care.
“Wow, that’s impressive. You don’t really seem like the type who likes kids,” Nicky says, bulldozing through the tension. “But it must be nice for them to meet an author they like in real life. Have many of them that you’ve spoken to read your book?”
Andrew shakes his head. “Most of them can’t afford it.” He specifically visits schools in low income communities. His book is a young adult novel about a foster child, so the kids in the less well-off neighbourhoods are his target audience. It started out as a therapeutic project suggested to him by Bee, but with enough encouragement from Neil, he decided to get it published.
“He gives a bunch of free copies to the schools for the kids to keep,” Neil interjects. “It’s really nice.”
“Wow, that’s so cool,” Nicky gushes. “There should be more people like you.”
Andrew doesn’t reply to that but privately disagrees. “Have you read his book?” Neil asks. Andrew gives him a look. It would be an innocent question from anyone else, but Neil is too much of a shit-stirrer.
“I read it,” Erik says. “I really enjoyed it. I think it’s appropriate for anyone to read, even adults, even though it is young adult.”
Nicky nods in agreement. “Very gritty. But I thought it was amazing, you’re a great writer.”
“We have a copy on the shelf, but I haven’t gotten around to reading it yet,” Katelyn says apologetically. “Being a parent and a doctor is pretty time-consuming. We do have the book Neil illustrated, though. The girls love it.”
“Well, that was all Jean,” Neil answers modestly, referring to the author. “But thanks.” Andrew takes note of how Aaron studiously avoids looking directly at Neil. Something in his chest stings, like he’s breathed in broken glass.
“You drew the cover for Andrew’s book, too, right, Neil?” Katelyn continues. “It’s beautiful.” Neil thanks her, and the conversation runs out of steam, no thanks to Andrew’s quietude and Neil’s inability to take cues.
In an effort to break the silence, most likely, Aaron asks, “How long have you two lived in New York?” Andrew detests small talk, but diverting the conversation would require his participation, so he lets it be. It feels like they are mimicking some other normal family’s conversation. Since when does Neil do small talk? Since when is Aaron civil? Everything sounds scripted and uncomfortable.
“Nine years,” Neil replies, drawing Andrew from his thoughts, “but Andrew has been there longer.”
“I moved to New York for college, but I lived in Attica for a while a few years ago,” Andrew inputs. He usually does not like to reveal so much information at once, but he wants to see how Aaron will react to why he moved to Attica; Nicky will inevitably ask.
On cue, Nicky presses, “Oh, why did you move to Attica?”
“So I could visit Neil more often while he was in prison,” Andrew explains blandly.
Nicky’s eyes widen, but he recovers quickly. “Oh. That must have been hard.”
Andrew shrugs. “I worked from home at the time anyway, it wasn’t difficult.”
“You were there for two years, right, Neil?” Aaron asks.
Neil nods. Aaron opens his mouth, but Neil cuts him off. “Don’t ask why I was there.”
“I mean, you were only in for two years. It can’t have been that bad, can it?” Aaron presses. Andrew guesses that he started to drink before they arrived, because his face is a little too red and his words are beginning to slur.
Neil shrugs. “If that makes you feel better.”
“Is anyone hungry?” Katelyn asks, just this side of too loudly. She puts a hand on Aaron’s thigh, and he relaxes slightly.
Andrew shakes his head, and Neil says, “We’re good.”
“I think I’ll have some of Santa’s cookies, I don’t think he’ll mind,” Nicky says, voice strained. He takes one of the sugar cookies off the plate on the coffee table. Erik follows suit.
“Rose and Lily helped us make those,” Aaron says. “They’re asleep now, but they were excited to meet you.” His eyes are sharp and keep flickering between Neil and Andrew.
“We’ll see them tomorrow,” Andrew replies flatly. Aaron glares. He wonders how much longer this night will go on; he can only take so much small talk, and his brother seems to have a stick up his ass that even alcohol is incapable of dislodging.
“So, Neil,” Katelyn says, “you’re a pretty famous artist. How did you get started?”
Andrew fights back the urge to roll his eyes. He used to work as an editor for a magazine, and he imagines this is what the awkward holiday work mixers would have been like if he ever bothered to attend them. Neil is well used to putting on a facade to blend in, but Andrew knows that beneath the mask, he must be dying of boredom. He wraps his arm around Neil’s waist, relishing Aaron’s frown.
“Well, I got my degree at NYU, but nothing really worked out until a few years later. I did a few pieces on the abuse of inmates in prison after I got out which got some traction, and it’s only been uphill since, I guess,” Neil explains with a bland smile. He leans into Andrew’s side, a silent plea for relief.
“Did you guys meet at NYU?” Nicky asks.
Andrew nods. “We met during my second year there, so Neil’s first.”
Nicky coos with a soppy grin. “College sweethearts, just like Aaron and Katelyn.” Andrew does not respond to this, and a glance at Neil says that he seems to have reached his capacity for boring small talk.
Katelyn looks at her watch and then back up. Andrew can relate. “What do you two usually do on Christmas?” she asks, and then appears to cringe; Andrew doesn’t care that he did not have a biological family to spend the holidays with before this year, but it amuses him to see his sister-in-law (and what a strange thought that is) uncomfortable.
“We spend it with our friends,” Andrew says.
“That’s nice,” Katelyn says a little too cheerfully.
Andrew shrugs. “I’ve never cared about Christmas.” Silence descends over the room as everyone is reminded of Andrew’s tragic childhood.
“Well, I’m glad you’ve finally found us,” Nicky says, voice watery in a way that indicates he is close to tears. Andrew knows by now that Nicky is an easy crier, but he is not in the mood to deal with it right now. “It’s a real shame,” Nicky continues between sniffles, “that you never got to meet your mother.”
“Because she was such a wonderful woman,” Andrew says coolly, watching with mirth as the blush on Aaron’s cheeks spreads until he is tomato red with anger. Aaron had confessed during a late-night Skype session that Tilda Minyard had abused him and gotten him addicted to drugs; she spent all of her money on her addiction and did not seem to care much for Aaron. To Andrew, it was black and white; she was a terrible person and a worse mother. Aaron, for some reason, defended her like she was the second coming of Jesus. It is one area where Andrew knows they will never reconcile.
“You didn’t know her,” Aaron says. “You don’t get to have an opinion on her.”
Andrew raises one unimpressed eyebrow at his twin. “But she was my mother too, brother dearest.”
“She didn’t raise you.” Aaron’s hands are clenched into fists in his lap, eyes narrowed with fury.
“I’m glad that she didn’t,” Andrew says, though that is not entirely the truth. It’s not a lie, either. Being raised by Tilda Minyard would have been better than how he grew up, but not by much; it simply would have been a different kind of hurt.
“Fuck you,” Aaron snarls. Neil tenses, but Andrew puts a hand on his knee to calm him; he can deal with this himself.
“Aaron,” Katelyn mutters. Her wide brown eyes oscillate between Aaron and Andrew before resting on the latter, giving him a pleading look. Andrew resists the urge to stick his tongue out.
“No. You don’t get to talk about my mother like that,” Aaron says. “I’m sorry you didn’t fucking have one, but you don’t know the first thing about her, asshole.”
“Look, I’m sorry for bringing her up,” Nicky interrupts as he wrings his hands together. “Can we just move on?”
Andrew ignores Nicky completely. “You’re right, I did not have a mother, or a father, or any family, but I have dealt with that. It’s not my fault that you can’t accept that you didn’t have much of a mother either.” He has not felt this kind of rage boiling beneath his skin in a long time, but it is not unfamiliar. He wonders if Aaron Minyard, an orthopedic surgeon with a picket fence and wholesome family photos lining the walls, is feeling it too. If he has ever felt it.
Aaron opens and closes his mouth several times, lost for words. Finally, he spits out, “Why did you even come if you’re just going to start shit? You’ve barely said anything of substance all evening. What’s the fucking point?”
And that’s the question, isn’t it? Why is Andrew here? He has spoken to Bee and Neil extensively about this, and he thinks that he is here because he does want to have a family. Somewhere, deep down, he wants to be a person with a brother and a cousin and nieces. Or, he thought so; the look on Aaron’s face is making him regret that. Andrew says without thinking, “How do you expect me to wax poetic about your mother when you can barely stand to look at my husband?”
Aaron’s mouth closes into a thin line. The silence is deafening and overwhelming. Nicky and Erik stare in horror at the twins while Katelyn nudges Aaron, trying to get a response from him. Neil’s face is twisted in hot rage. Andrew is thoroughly impressed that he has managed to keep his mouth shut.
“We’re leaving,” Andrew announces suddenly. He lets go of Neil and stands up. “See you tomorrow.”
Neil follows him out the door, and none of the others say goodbye.
They get back in their rental car, and Neil begins to swear up a storm; Andrew doesn’t pay attention, but he finds comfort in Neil’s matchstick temper, unchanging even as they age. Eventually, he runs out of steam; they sit in familiar, welcoming silence until they arrive at their hotel.
Neil, who stands staunchly against clothes that aren’t too-big joggers and ratty t-shirts, changes so quickly out of his nice clothes that Andrew thinks something might be chasing him before crawling into bed. Andrew follows at a more reasonable pace, changing into sweatpants and one of Neil’s sweaters. He sits on the bed with his back against the headboard and tugs on Neil’s hair, lightly enough that it doesn’t hurt. Neil gets the message and shifts so his head rests on Andrew’s thigh.
“What a nice family reunion,” Neil bites out after a long period of silence.
“What are you talking about,” Andrew replies. “That went swimmingly.”
Neil laughs, only a little bitterly. Andrew relishes the sound. He feels many things, most of them bad; he is not in the right headspace to parse anything that happened tonight. He is content to play with Neil’s hair and enjoy this time with his only family member that he loves and trusts unconditionally.
**
Andrew wakes up at seven on the dot. The bed is empty and cold, but the shower is running and Neil’s runners are haphazardly strewn across the carpeted floor; he must have just returned from his morning run.
The disastrous evening at the Minyards’ doesn’t seem real. It sits at the edge of Andrew’s consciousness just out of reach; a nightmare he is trying not to think about. The thought of returning there makes him feel nauseated. He considers not going at all, but he remembers that he has two nieces that he has never met, and it all floods back. He does want a family, even if the brother he is stuck with is less than easy to get along with.
He misses Neil, absurdly; he aches for his husband’s presence like he has been gone for years instead of a few short minutes. It takes him a moment to remember that he doesn’t have to wait. He crawls out of bed and opens the door to the bathroom, making sure to be as loud as possible so Neil isn’t surprised by his presence and can ask him to leave if he so wishes. When no complaints arise, Andrew peels off his clothes and steps into the shower. Neil, in the middle of washing his hair, smiles brilliantly. Andrew rinses the soap out of his husband’s hair and gently pushes him against the wall of the shower. Kissing Neil is something that Andrew could never grow bored of. Nor will he ever tire of the feel of Neil’s hands on his skin, or Neil’s faint stubble tickling his neck, or the way that Neil bites on his bottom lip just so.
They do not go any further. They kiss languidly until Neil complains that his fingers are pruning, and then they dry off and get dressed and kiss some more. Andrew backs Neil toward the bed, hands wrapped firmly around his hips, but in their distraction, Neil bumps into the nightstand beside the bed. He must hit the alarm clock because the radio comes on; some crooning Christmas song plays through the low-quality speakers. Neil grins.
“What,” Andrew says, steering him back toward the bed. Neil loops his arms around Andrew’s shoulders and pushes him in the other direction until they are in a relatively clear space.
“Dance with me,” Neil says. “Think of it as a Christmas present.”
Andrew rolls his eyes. “You’re impossible,” he murmurs, but he can’t deny Neil his wishes, so he rocks back and forth with his husband to the slow, romantic song. It barely constitutes as dancing, until a faster song comes on and Neil drags him into a terrible, out-of-time waltz. It is so absurd that Andrew can’t hold back a laugh; they kiss happily, merrily, lovingly. Near the end of the song, Neil tries to dip Andrew, but they fall to the ground in a fit of laughter.
Andrew pulls Neil half on top of him and allows himself, just this once, to grin unabashedly with his face hidden in his husband’s collarbones. He knows that even if the day ahead of them goes terribly, he already has all the family he needs.
“Are we supposed to wait until we get there to do presents?” Neil asks, rolling off of Andrew. “What do you do on Christmas morning?”
Andrew shrugs. “With Kevin and the others, we usually do.” If he had gotten Neil something personal and expensive, he might suggest that they exchange gifts on their own, but neither of them has ever cared much about Christmas. Their gifts are thoughtful but usually simple, which is how Andrew likes it.
They drive to Aaron’s house for ten o’clock. It is Katelyn who lets them in today, which Andrew is grateful for; he doesn’t know how he would react faced with Aaron on his own.
“Good morning, guys,” she says with a warm smile. “Merry Christmas!” It looks surprisingly genuine, considering the events that transpired the night before.
“Merry Christmas,” Neil echoes, sounding a little lost.
Katelyn looks down at the bag in Andrew’s hands. “You wanna put all your gifts around the tree?” He follows her inside and does as she says; the twins lock onto him and Neil immediately.
A tiny blonde girl sits on Aaron’s hip. “This is Rose,” he says. “Rosie, this is your uncle Andrew, say hi!” Rose burbles and reaches out toward Andrew. Aaron kisses her on the cheek and holds her tighter, taking her hand. Andrew holds back a sigh.
“And this,” Katelyn says, scooping the other twin out of Erik’s arms, “is Lily.” She has the same wispy blonde hair as her sister; it reminds Andrew uncomfortably of himself. The girls are not exact clones of Aaron; they have Katelyn’s bright green eyes and wide nose. Andrew feels a burst of relief at this realization; he does not know how he would handle seeing children who looked exactly like him. “That’s uncle Andrew and uncle Neil,” Katelyn stage-whispers in Lily’s ear. “They brought you presents.”
Lily squeals in excitement. Andrew suspects she cares more about the colourful wrapping paper than any actual gifts. Aaron, Katelyn, and their daughters gather round the tree while Andrew, Neil, Nicky, and Erik congregate on the sofa. The twins waste no time tearing into the gifts lovingly wrapped and signed by ‘Santa’. It makes something in Andrew’s chest ache.
He remembers learning about Santa in kindergarten, having been the only child who wasn’t aware of the concept. He also remembers asking the foster parents he was with at the time about Santa Claus and being screamed at. He wants, with a ferocity that surprises him, for Rose and Lily never to experience that.
“Daddy, please!” Rose shrieks, drawing Andrew out of his melancholy introspection. “Open?”
Andrew has, through years of exposure, learned how to not descend into an anxiety attack at hearing a child say ‘please’; he still does not like it. Neil puts his hand on Andrew’s knee to help calm him. It works, mostly. He forces his gaze up to find Rose sitting in her father’s lap. “You can open this one, pumpkin,” he says, putting the box labelled To: Aaron, From: Nicky + Erik in her tiny hands. Andrew does not pay much attention to what it is, tuning out the over-exaggerated thank-yous and toddler screaming. He focuses on Neil’s grounding touch in the midst of the overwhelming sounds of the room.
Nicky and Erik open their gifts from Aaron and Katelyn before giving their gift to the twins. Next, the others open the meticulously-wrapped presents from Andrew and Neil. (Andrew wrapped them, of course, because Neil is hopeless at it.) Nicky and Erik seem happy enough with their expensive wine, and Katelyn is speechless at their gift for her and Aaron: one of Neil’s paintings. It is abstract, and significantly brighter and happier than most of Neil’s other pieces. Aaron begrudgingly thanks them, not without a sideways glance at Neil, while Katelyn seems overjoyed.
Erik and Nicky open the gifts they bought for one another, and Aaron and Katelyn follow. Andrew hopes that no one is expecting either him or Neil to get as weepy as the others did. Andrew finds the red-and-green wrapped box in the sea of colourful paper and tosses it in Neil’s lap. Neil tears into it as quickly as Rose and Lily did with their presents. As expected, he smiles upon seeing the box’s contents: a new set of paintbrushes, the particularly expensive kind that Andrew knows Neil has been eyeing from the store Neil likes to drive forty minutes to buy supplies from.
For Andrew, Neil has bought a box set of Andrew’s favourite series of bodice-rippers. Nicky laughs before he realizes it’s not a joke; Andrew used to work as an editor, and these kinds of novels were his favourite. He knows that they are objectively terrible, but they are so unrealistic and historically inaccurate that he finds them more amusing than any other novels, much to the dismay of his past professors.
“That’s not all,” Neil says, gesturing toward the card wedged in the box. Andrew fishes it out and opens it; it is a year’s subscription to the New York Times crossword puzzles. Neil gives him a lopsided smile. “I saw you playing that crossword app on your phone, so…”
Andrew, despite the turmoil of spending Christmas with his biological family, feels warm and happy, even if only for a moment. He gives Neil a quick kiss, murmuring thank you against his lips before pulling away.
“Okay,” Katelyn says, clapping her hands together. “Erik, you and I are starting on dinner. I trust you boys won’t get up to too much trouble?”
“No promises,” Nicky says with an easy grin. When Katelyn and Erik disappear to the kitchen, Nicky scoops Lily up off the ground and kisses her on the cheek. “Do you want to go put all your new Hot Wheels on the track in your room?”
“Yes, please!” Lily squawks. “Rosie, come on!” Rose toddles out of her father’s lap and takes Nicky’s free hand.
Nicky gives Neil a pointed look. “Do you want to help us carry their toys, Neil?”
Neil looks at Nicky, and then at Andrew. It’s clearly a ploy to get Andrew and Aaron alone to work out their issues. Andrew nods at Neil, who picks up the brand-new toy packages as directed by Nicky and the girls. If they were in another situation, Andrew might smile; Neil is absolutely hopeless with young children. Unfortunately, they are not alone and Andrew does not like being vulnerable enough to bare a smile around his brother.
“So,” Aaron says, voice flat, “did you get back to the hotel okay last night?”
Andrew scoffs. “Don’t pull this bullshit again. What do you want?”
Aaron scowls. “All I wanted was that you don’t start shit on Christmas, but I guess that’s too much to ask. I know you’re a standoffish asshole, but Christ, I didn’t think it was this bad. What’s your problem?”
“I told you what my problem is,” Andrew snaps. “You don’t seem to give a shit, so why should I put in any effort to make your picture-perfect Christmas all that you want? You knew what you were asking for when you invited us here.”
Aaron’s scowl worsens. “I only invited you, not Neil.”
“That’s the whole fucking problem,” Andrew snarls. “You used to be an addict and a thief, so what’s your problem? You’ve got no ground to stand on when you call him a criminal, so don’t get all righteous.” He finds himself wishing for the comfort of his old knives sheathed in his armbands, though it has been years since he carried them.
“I know that I’m not going to hurt my children. I have no reason to trust him, though. He could be a fucking murderer for all I know, Andrew.” Aaron breathes in deeply, trying to calm himself. Andrew would laugh at the accuracy of Aaron’s statement if they were in any other situation. “You don’t get it, you don’t have kids.”
Andrew feels a flame of white-hot rage at the implication that not only does Aaron think Neil might hurt his kids, but that he thinks Andrew would allow someone like that around his kids. He is upset that Aaron seems to think that he can change after his own unsavoury past, but no one else is allowed to. Andrew scoffs. “I have told you time and time again that Neil is the opposite of a threat to your goddamn children. Also, your perfunctory research seems to have some gaps.”
“What?”
Andrew takes a deep breath. He sort of wishes Neil were here to hear what he is about to say. “You cannot get over the fact that Neil was in prison for two years, but technically it should not be public record that he has a criminal record; he chose to reveal that because of his art. I assume you read an interview where he talked about it or his wikipedia page; nothing will confirm why he was in, for how long, or where other than Neil himself. On the other hand, I went to juvie for four years for nearly killing for men who attacked me. That is not common knowledge because I publish under a pseudonym, but you could have found it with a little digging if you were truly so concerned about my husband and I’s criminal records. Instead, you read the first article you found on him and decided you don’t like that he wears his past proudly. Just admit you don’t like him.”
Aaron, whose face blanched more and more the longer Andrew spoke, looks away. “You and he aren’t the same. You had an excuse.”
Andrew huffs. All Aaron knows about Andrew’s childhood is that he was in the foster system and abused until he aged out; he does not know the details. He knows almost nothing about Neil’s past, either, not that he has ever cared enough to ask. “You know nothing about Neil. I promise you that he had a right to do any and all of the things that he did; if he hadn’t, he wouldn’t be alive today.”
“How would I know that? You don’t tell me anything,” Aaron snaps, scowling with a ferocity that probably could break some kind of record. “Don’t expect me to know all this about you when you barely ever speak to me.”
“Have you ever asked?”
“I didn’t think you were interested in small talk about our lives since you never fucking talk. It’s not like you pay attention, anyway.”
Andrew is running out of patience for his brother, but the urge to prove him wrong is too strong. “I know that Katelyn is an oncologist, and you two met at Palmetto State University. Rose and Lily’s birthday is October seventh, and this year you took them to Disney World. You had to get into PSU on a sports scholarship because your grades were so terrible thanks to your mother. You prefer Coke to Pepsi and dogs to cats. Go fuck yourself.”
He does not wait for a reply. He storms outside and lights a cigarette with shaky hands; he’s been trying to quit, but at moments like this, it’s hard. He chain smokes two cigarettes at an alarming speed, and as he lights his third, the door creaks open. Neil appears beside him and sticks his hand out. Andrew gives him a fresh smoke and leans his head on his husband’s shoulder.
All of the houses that surround Aaron’s look like clones; they have marginally differing decorations and marginally different cars, but they are functionally identical. It’s strange; Andrew used to dream of living in this kind of neighbourhood, but now, the thought makes him uncomfortable. He no longer wants to force himself into the cookie-cutter mold of a perfect, happy man, he supposes. He has revised his ideas of happiness and success.
He flicks the butt of his cigarette into the garden to spite Aaron. Neil, less rudely, drops his and crushes it under his heel. They sit on the wooden steps, staring at the empty street; everyone is probably locked inside, spending Christmas with their perfect, happy families.
“What are you thinking about?” Neil asks quietly.
Andrew sighs. He brushes his lips across Neil’s cheek, finding comfort in the uneven skin of his burn mark. “Aaron doesn’t like you.”
Neil laughs bitterly. “I know.”
“I told him I went to juvie, and why.” Andrew scoffs. “He still thinks you’re the monster under his kids’ bed.”
Neil tilts Andrew’s chin toward him and cups his face in his hand. “He wouldn’t be the first person to think that. Is it bothering you that much?”
“He’s a hypocrite,” Andrew snaps.
“How do you mean?”
Andrew thinks about this. He knows there is one underlying issue here; he feels slighted and senselessly angry, but he cannot pinpoint exactly the cause. He says nothing, instead leaning forward so he and Neil’s foreheads are pressed together. Neil kisses him softly, moving his hand from Andrew’s cheek to the base of his neck to pull him closer. Andrew chases the acrid, familiar taste of smoke in his husband’s mouth. He loses himself in the sensation for a few seconds before pulling away, relishing the way Neil tries to follow his lips for half a moment before realizing. Andrew knows that any unsuspecting neighbour could have looked out their bay window and seen their kiss, but he can’t find it in himself to care.
“We should go back inside,” Neil says, voice rough from the cigarette and the kiss. “I’m sure Aaron is dying to have you back.”
“Mmm,” Andrew says. “How was watching the kids?”
Neil shudders. “They’re so loud. And sticky. I’m glad we don’t have any.”
When they go back inside, Andrew and Neil are accosted by Nicky. Apparently, it is tradition to watch Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer every Christmas. “It started with just me and Aaron when I took him in after Tilda died,” Nicky explains. “Believe you me, he did not voluntarily participate in this back then. It stuck, though, and all of us have watched it together, or as together as we can with Erik and I in Germany, every year since.”
There are a few jokes about Andrew and Aaron being elves, but otherwise, things go smoothly. The others seem to have a plethora of inside jokes and personal stories to do with the film, but Nicky tries to explain them as best as he can. Andrew appreciates it more than he wants to.
Neither Neil nor Andrew have ever seen Rudolph before; no one seems surprised at this, but everyone is appalled. Andrew doesn’t understand their love for it; the message it sends is pretty grim. Neil agrees, but when Andrew tries to point out that Rudolph only became loved when he was useful, Nicky shushes him, proclaiming, “It’s a classic, Andrew, morals be damned. You have to like it.”
After the excitement over the movie passes, Erik takes the girls into the kitchen to decorate the cookies that he and Nicky made for dessert. Andrew follows. He likes the girls; he knows for certain that he will never have any kids of his own, but he has always been good with kids. It was a necessity when he was younger.
Lily reaches up toward Andrew. He looks at her with a critical eye and says, “I am not your father.”
“Unkie,” she says. “Up.” Andrew sighs and picks her up, resting her on his hip.
“What colour icing do you want, Rosie?” Erik asks. He finds a stool tall enough so that when Rose stands on it, she is tall enough to see the counter.
“Lellow,” she says decisively, pointing at the appropriate tube of frosting.
“What do you say?” Erik asks, ruffling her hair.
“Pleeeaaaase,” she whimpers. “Lellow.”
Andrew closes his eyes for a moment, grounding himself. Before he can get too lost in his head, Lily mumbles, “Down now?”
Andrew puts her down on the stool beside her sister. “Thank you,” she says, reciting it as if she is repeating a script before taking the yellow icing from her sister’s hand. Rose begins to scream. Andrew can feel a stress headache coming on.
Once the twins are settled and relatively quiet, Erik asks, “Do you speak German like your husband?”
Andrew nods. “He learned when he lived in Germany for a while, and he taught me.”
Erik hums in response, and for a few minutes, they watch as the twins make a mess of the countertop. Erik says quietly in German, “I’m sorry your brother does not accept Neil.”
“It is not your fault,” Andrew replies in the same language.
“Still,” Erik replies. He pauses to wipe some frosting off of Rose’s face before continuing, “Aaron used to be… not kind, to Nicky and I. Their family, they were homophobic; it is not Aaron’s fault that he was raised with their beliefs, but for many years even after his mother’s death, Aaron was homophobic toward Nicky and hated me. He has grown now, and whatever he has against Neil is most likely something else, but I know how hard it is.” Erik gives Andrew an encouraging smile, as genuine as one of Renee’s. “I know it must be harder for you to have your life changed like this.”
Andrew frowns. “I wouldn’t say it’s changed that much. I have a family already, with Neil and the others back home,” he corrects.
Erik nods. “That’s not what I meant, sorry. I mean that Aaron and Nicky had parents and family, and while they did not know about you, it’s not as if they would have had a completely different life with you in it. You would have been another brother or cousin to play with. I don’t mean to say that that is insignificant, or that you would have been only a small part of their family, but it’s different for you.”
Andrew thinks about this for a few moments. Erik is right, and he hadn’t thought about that before. “It would have been very, very different for me,” he says quietly. He knows this already, of course. He went through the foster system; how could he not consider what might have happened if his birth mother kept him? But never before had he considered that Aaron and Nicky might not think about it like that, that they might only have mourned, like Erik said, another brother or cousin to play with instead of an entire childhood.
Suddenly, Erik looks toward the entry to the kitchen; Andrew tries to pick out what has caught his attention. It becomes obvious immediately: he can hear Aaron and Neil talking. Their words are too low to pick out, but the cadences of their voices are unmistakable. He and Erik make eye contact before returning to helping Rose and Lily with the cookies. Andrew decides that will intervene if he hears shouting, but not before.
They soon finish the cookies with minimal screaming from the girls and put them away for later. Andrew finds Neil sitting in the living room with Katelyn, Nicky, and Aaron with It’s a Wonderful Life playing quietly on the TV. Rose and Lily put an end to this; they don’t have the patience for the old movie, instead insisting on playing some sort of game only they understand the rules to. Andrew doesn’t get the opportunity to ask Neil about what he and Aaron spoke about until an hour later when the group disperses. It’s time for Rose and Lily’s nap, so Aaron and Katelyn disappear to the girls’ room to put them to sleep. Andrew grabs Neil’s sleeve and pulls him into the kitchen.
“What happened with Aaron?” he asks. He finds himself looking over Neil’s face as if checking for injuries.
“He was asking about you,” Neil replies, which is the last thing Andrew expected to hear. “He wanted to know if you’re always this quiet or you just don’t like him.”
“And what did you say?” Andrew asks when it starts to look like Neil’s not going to continue.
Neil grins mischievously. “I told him to bother you instead of me if he wanted to learn how to be your friend.”
Andrew appreciates that more than he can say; he knows he’s prickly, quiet, standoffish, and dark. If Aaron can’t accept that at face value, then he is not prepared for the even worse parts of Andrew’s personality. Neil kisses him on the cheek and gently steers him back into the living room, where Aaron and Katelyn have returned. The rest of the afternoon passes in relative civility. The awkwardness is expected and mostly bearable. Finally, the twins wake up and before Andrew knows it, it’s time for dinner.
Once they are all seated around the Pinterest-decorated dinner table, Nicky leads everyone for grace. Andrew is pretty sure he is the only one who is actually religious, except for maybe Erik, but he goes along with it. As soon as it’s time to dig in, Rose asks, pointing at Neil, “Mommy, what’s on his face?”
“Rosie, you can’t just ask that,” Katelyn scolds. “It’s rude.”
“It’s okay,” Neil cuts in. “It’s just a burn, Rose. Someone burned my face and it left a mark.”
Andrew looks away. ‘Just a burn’ is an understatement. He remembers the day Neil received that burn with excruciating clarity. It was just after Neil’s college graduation, just over four years since the death of his father. He had been working in the kitchen of a shady restaurant at the time. On the walk home, Lola and Romero Malcolm kidnapped him and tried to drive away with him, but Neil crashed the car. They cut his arms to hell and back and put a dashboard lighter to his face before Neil managed to escape their hold and kill Lola. Romero escaped before Neil could get to him too, but by that point, Neil had lost too much blood to get to safety. Someone found him on the side of the road in the middle of the night and took him to the hospital, luckily. The hospital called Andrew since he was listed as Neil’s emergency contact, but he wasn’t allowed to see him because they weren’t legally family. After Neil had made a full recovery, they wasted no time going to the courthouse to get married to see that nothing like that ever happened again. When Romero was finally caught a few months later, Neil was brought in by the FBI. After days of interrogation, it was decided that Neil would not be charged with the murder of his father, Lola, or any of his men, but he had to serve two years for the crimes he had committed to survive on the run; forgery, identity theft, stealing, and countless more.
Neil’s hand on his draws him from his thoughts. “Andrew? Nicky asked how you decided to become a writer.”
Andrew takes a moment to collect himself before shrugging. “I love to read books, so I made one of my own.”
The conversation continues on like that for a long while; dinner passes in easy monotony. Andrew is bored out of his skull, but it’s not… terrible. It’s nice, he supposes, in an objective way that he is spending Christmas with his biological family. Or, it would be nice; he notices Aaron is still avoiding eye contact with him. He hopes Aaron’s issues get sorted out tonight, or else Andrew isn’t sure he’ll care enough to deal with it later.
“You must have a lot of free time, being an artist,” Aaron asks when everyone is almost finished their dinner. The girls are playing in the next room over where Aaron, Katelyn, and Erik can clearly see them. “What do you do in your spare time? Painting?” It’s similar to something he asked Andrew the night before, and it is equally grating.
Neil narrows his eyes at Aaron. “Well, painting is my job that I am paid to do, but I do like to do it when I have free time, too, I guess. I volunteer at the animal shelter near our apartment most weekends.”
“Oh, that’s so nice,” Nicky gushes. “Do you like animals?”
“I like the cats,” Neil says. “Sir and King don’t like it when I come home smelling like other animals, though.”
“That’s so cute. I love cats, but I’m allergic,” Katelyn says, sighing. “One day, we’ll get one of those ugly hairless cats.”
“Oh, there’s one of those at the shelter. No one wants to adopt her because they think she’s ugly, but I’m holding out hope,” Neil says, grinning. “The kids usually like her, but the parents always say no.”
“What a nice life that must be,” Aaron says, voice filled with malice.
“Aaron,” Katelyn says sharply.
“No, I’m being serious,” Aaron snaps. “You’re rich off stolen money, and now you doodle for a living and play with cats on the weekends. The two of you are set for life. Isn’t that nice?”
Andrew is well used to Neil’s explosive temper, but no one else in the room knows him even remotely well. That’s why no one is expecting it when Neil says, “You know what? Fuck off. I’ve tried being civil for all of your sakes, but I’ve had enough. I’m sorry your mother beat you and you had to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars to go through eleven years of schooling only to find out that your poor, foster-child, long-lost gay brother with a felon for a husband is richer than you, but don’t take your insecurities out on me. Why don’t you tell us what’s causing that thorn in your side once and for all so we can get on with dinner, asshole.”
A resounding silence falls over the table. Finally, Aaron sighs. “Do you really want to have this conversation right now? I mean—”
“Yes, I do,” Andrew interrupts. “Get on with it.”
Aaron scoffs. “Look, it’s not a big deal. I just don’t trust Neil. That’s all.”
“I don’t think that’s it at all,” Andrew says.
“So—”
“If you didn’t trust me, why would you ask Andrew, quite rudely, by the way, what he does with all of his free time? Because his life is so easy, he must have time to do whatever he wants, right? And if you didn’t trust my criminal past, you wouldn’t trust Andrew either. I can promise you that what I was charged for was much less violent.” Andrew almost breaks into a smirk at that; Neil has actually killed people, which is significantly worse than anything Andrew did, but technically, he was acquitted for those crimes.
“You never tell us anything,” Aaron says after a long, tense pause. His voice is filled with more emotion than Andrew thought he was capable of. “You’re living this rich, fulfilling life up in New York and you don’t seem to want any of us in it.”
“That doesn’t make it okay for you to disrespect us like this,” Neil snaps. “Don’t act like you’re innocent here.”
“I don’t know what you want me to do,” Aaron retorts. “I’m sorry I don’t love you as much as Andrew does. Is that want you want?”
“I want you to seriously examine your issues before you come for mine,” Andrew cuts in.
Nicky frowns. “Andrew, I don’t think—”
“No,” Andrew spits out in a voice so vicious Nicky physically recoils. “Neil has been my only family for almost ten years. I don’t care if we do not fit your nuclear family ideal, or we don’t have nine-to-fives, or he has too many tattoos or piercings or scars, or we don’t want kids or whatever you’re so pissed about. It’s nice that you grew up with a real family, but I didn’t, so I made one. If you can’t accept that, I am going to leave, and you will never see us again.”
It takes all that Andrew has to stay seated. He stares down at the table, waiting for some kind of response. He feels empty and numb after baring his soul to the others, but Neil’s comforting hand rubbing circles on his back is a grounding force.
“Look, Andrew, I’m…” Aaron trails off, sighing. “Sorry. To both of you.”
Andrew nods.
They finish dinner.
**
The rest of the night goes pretty okay, all things considered. Once the girls are put to bed, they gather in the living room once again. Andrew feels like he could sleep for years. Instead, he curls up in Neil’s lap as Katelyn regales stories from when she and Aaron first met. Aaron is buzzed enough to be tolerable, and Andrew has had a few drinks himself. It makes the atmosphere less tense and Andrew’s heart warmer.
Finally, Neil makes the executive decision that it’s time to leave after Andrew yawns for the millionth time. It takes Herculean effort to get off of the sofa, but Andrew manages, even if he ends up leaning heavily on Neil.
“It was nice to finally meet you in person,” Nicky says, smiling warmly. “If you ever want to come to Germany, you’ll always have a place to stay.”
“Thanks,” Andrew says flatly. Nicky seems to understand the sentiment that Andrew can’t seem to express anyway. He turns to Aaron. “I will… try to be more open,” he promises, voice stilted and uncomfortable.
Aaron nods. “That would be nice.” He looks down. “Again, I’m sorry for everything.” He glances between Andrew and Neil. “Come back soon, the girls love you.”
“We do too,” Katelyn adds. “Drop by anytime. You’re always welcome here.”
Andrew leaves the Minyards’ feeling warm and happy. When they flop into bed back at the hotel, Neil grins at him. “That wasn’t so bad, was it?”
Andrew scoffs. “I guess it turned out fine in the end.”
Neil rolls over so his back is pressed against Andrew’s chest. Andrew loops his arm around his Neil’s torso, clutching him tightly. “Are you happy you went?” Neil asks curiously.
Andrew considers this. He considers his brother’s barbed words, but he also considers how strongly Aaron seems to care for his family. He considers how unconditionally loving Nicky and Erik are, and how kind and welcoming Katelyn is. He considers Rose and Lily’s wide eyes and curious hands. He considers the family that he doesn’t need, but he thinks he might want.
“Yes.”