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Andrew blamed it on Aaron. One Christmas trip to Boston to visit his brother and one beautiful snowfall later - the fresh blanket of white glittering under amber streetlights, his nieces’ laughing as they caught giant snowflakes on their tongues - and suddenly he was contemplating a move somewhere up north where all four seasons made an appearance, instead of Columbia, South Carolina where winter was moody and grey and lonely and never quite cold enough for the excellent faux-fur hooded parka he’d bought himself in Boston.
Or maybe he blamed it on Kevin, who’d bothered and bugged him incessantly about coming to visit him in Foxhaven, Vermont ever since their annual Spring Writers Retreat - retreat being a rather grand word for it, considering the only participants were Andrew and Kevin holed up in cabin in Asheville competing for who could write the most words in a day. Andrew had let it slip that he was looking to move and that he was looking for snow - and not just snow; autumn leaves and atmosphere too. Kevin had only moved to Foxhaven that year, after finally finding his long lost father, one David Wymack, owner of Foxhaven’s quirky small town general store, the Fox’s Den. It would be Kevin’s first fall in Foxhaven, and Wymack had promised dazzling foliage and a quaint fall festival complete with hayrides and apple cider from local orchards - which Kevin in turn had promised to Andrew.
And really that was it, in the end. The promise of wholesome holiday goodness just like what Andrew wrote about in his novels - but had never actually experienced himself. That was the true reason he found himself in the Trojan’s Arms, a delightful pub in Foxhaven, Andrew on his fourth (very good) scotch while he watched Kevin make goo goo eyes at the (very handsome) barkeep - who also happened to be bar owner and Kevin’s brand new boyfriend, Jeremy Knox.
Andrew was a little drunk and a lot tired - any day he had to fly on an airplane was exhausting under the best of circumstances, and today he’d had to get up at 4am to catch his flight and change planes and then ride in the car with Kevin for two hours from the airport to Foxhaven as Kevin extolled the virtues of Jeremy’s brown eyes and then transitioned seamlessly to running through the plot of his latest work in progress, seemingly without taking a breath in between. So yeah, it had been a long day.
Andrew yawned into his glass and Kevin cut eyes at him guiltily. “I should get you home,” he said.
“Don’t you dare. Stay, hang with Jeremy. Like he said, he gets off in 20 minutes. If you wait, you might get off too.”
“Oh my god I can’t believe you said that.”
“Yes you can.”
“Yes I can,” Kevin sighed, but his smile was fond.
“Stay,” Andrew repeated. “I am ready to pass out anyway.”
“But I’m your host,” Kevin countered weakly, staring at Jeremy longingly across the bar.
“I am a goddamned romance novelist Kevin, I know an opportunity when I see one and I am many things, but cock blocker is not one of them. Gimme your keys, I will see you in the morning.”
“If you are sure...”
“Very sure. Pick me up a marshmallow latte on your walk of shame tomorrow.”
Kevin grinned. “You’re a good friend Andrew.”
“That’s slander. What’s your house number?”
“Um here,” Kevin said, and scribbled 418 Main St. on a napkin. “It’s just like, four blocks away, and we’re already on Main street. Just turn left out the front door.” He fished out his keys, pulled one off the ring, and handed it to Andrew. “You need your bag?”
Andrew shouldered the carry-on that he’d brought inside the bar. “I have what I need. Don’t forget - marshmallow latte - whole fat milk.”
“Yeah, yeah I know your coffee order. Seriously. Thanks.”
“Seriously, don’t mention it again. I will stab you.”
Kevin grinned, swiveling on his stool to go back to mooning over Jeremy, and Andrew left the pub. He paused for a moment on the cobblestone sidewalk, tilting his head back and smelling the clean fall air. He gave up on that endeavor pretty quickly though when he went lightheaded. Maybe he shouldn’t have said yes to that fourth glass of scotch. Andrew really didn’t drink much these days, and apparently his tolerance wasn’t what it used to be. He turned left, realized he was just a little unsteady on his feet, and carefully walked the four blocks to 418 Main St.
Andrew blinked up at the cheery bungalow from the sidewalk. It was painted pumpkin orange of all things, with a wide welcoming porch lit up by two sconce lights on either side of the weathered oak door. It didn’t look like a Kevin house, but right there next to the door were iron numbers proclaiming that this was, in fact, number 418. Maybe Kevin hadn’t had time to paint it yet, or to have it painted. Whatever, he’d only lived here six months, but Andrew would still tease him about his pumpkin house tomorrow.
He fit the key in the door, but it wouldn’t turn. Huh. He jiggled it, wiggled it, but no luck. Andrew glared at the house number again, then glared at the key. Kevin had clearly been distracted and given him the wrong one. Figured.
Andrew let out a long suffering sigh, thought about walking back four blocks on those wobbly cobblestones, and then squinted at the lock in the steadfast contemplation of the slightly inebriated. Fuck it.
He dropped his bag, and dug a couple of small tools from his armbands. It’d been a while since he’d used his lock picking skills, but, riding a bike, right? The alcohol he’d drank was more of a hindrance than a lubricant in this particular scenario, but it wasn’t like he was in a rush, not like he was actually breaking in - his stupid best friend had just given him the wrong stupid key is all. He jimmied the hook pick next to the flat tension wrench, his tongue creeping out the side of his mouth in a habit he’d never been able to break, and then, finally, the tumblers fell, a little click, and there - he was in.
Andrew let himself soak up the little rush of satisfaction before tumbling through the door in a bit less of a dignified manner than he usually comported himself, and blinked in the low lamp light. The foyer opened up into a rather cozy den featuring the most amazing looking deep leather sofa he had ever seen (granted he might be a bit biased in his assessment at the moment). Andrew kicked the door closed behind him, locked the deadbolt - which, small town or not, Kevin should know better than to leave unengaged - and crashed onto the couch, kicking his shoes off after he’d landed. He shot a quick text off ( you should lock your deadbolt idiot ), snuggled down into the soft, perfectly distressed leather, and promptly passed out.
***
Normally, waking up to a weight on his chest would send Andrew into a full blown panic and reaching for his knives. But this weight was purring enthusiastically, and Andrew’s hand was comfortably tucked between two tiny fur-covered shoulder blades. He blinked his eyes open carefully, tilting his head up to meet the self-satisfied green-eyed gaze of a giant grey tabby cat, tufts of hair winging out of its ears, fluffy tail crooked and twitching off key to the sound of its own little throat motor - which kicked up a notch when it noticed Andrew was awake.
The cat butted its head into Andrew’s arm in clear dictatorial demand for pets, and Andrew, never one to turn down a direct order from a cat, started petting carefully between those soft velvet ears. Impossibly, the purring dropped into another gear, vibrating Andrew’s sternum.
“Loud thing,” Andrew said, letting his hand run all the way down the cat’s back. “Do you have a name?”
“I call her Sir,” an amused (and completely unfamiliar) voice floated over the back of the couch.
Andrew froze, his hand still on the cat (Sir, apparently) holding his breath. Did Kevin have a roommate - and a cat - that he didn’t know about? Unlikely. Andrew would have launched to his feet, but he couldn’t (wouldn’t) do that to Sir. Instead he sat up slowly, his head choosing that moment to start pounding, carefully rearranging himself so he could look over the back of the couch without disturbing Sir - who had dug her claws into his sweater as soon as he had started moving. Andrew noted absently that there was a bright patchwork quilt thrown over him from the waist down that he was quite certain he hadn’t had the wherewithal to grab before crashing onto the couch last night.
Andrew blinked. The whole room was fuzzy. Oh, right.
He groped around his chest and around Sir before finally locating the tortoiseshell frames that had ended up tucked under her left paw. He propped them onto his nose and turned to properly glare at whoever the hell this not-Kevin person was, but the glare faltered, sputtered, and died out before fully blooming on as face as he saw him .
Someone had molded Andrew’s personal and private wet dreams into a real man and propped him up against the kitchen wall about ten feet away from him, dressed him in rumpled red plaid pajamas that clashed horribly with his messy auburn hair, his arctic blue eyes big and bright and clear, a grin on his lips, mottled scars on his cheeks, and a giant coffee mug cradled in his hands.
For someone whose livelihood depended on an ability to come up with words, Andrew was certainly falling epically short at the moment. What he did manage to come up with, after much too long of a pause, was, “What the fuck.”
The man grinned. “Good question. This is my house, which you uh, let yourself into last night while I was walking Sir - and yes, I walk my cat, she likes it, but that is beside the point. The point being that, since I wasn’t at home I didn’t lock the deadbolt. Which is what you texted Kevin about - who, by the way, is my neighbor. Your phone was on the floor, along with the napkin from Jeremy’s bar where it seems Kevin wrote the wrong address - he lives at 416 you see, but Kevin lived here briefly while he was house hunting, and so he must have gotten confused - or maybe his attention was otherwise occupied - and he gave you the wrong address. All of which was cleared up when I texted him asking if he’d lost a short blond man. It’s moot though, really, because as soon as I let Sir out of her harness she jumped up on you and curled up and you called her King, and really that settled it didn’t it? Because if Sir likes you - and Sir doesn’t like anyone - then you must be okay. And that, Andrew, is the fuck. I’m Neil, by the way. Would you like some coffee?”
Andrew stared at him. “Okay,” he said, because really, was there any other possible answer he could give to that?
He (carefully) dislodged Sir from his lap and got Neil to point him to the bathroom. After taking care of the obligatory morning pee he glared at his reflection in the mirror. On a good day he was grateful for his headful of thick wavy ash blond hair, but today was not a good day. Today, his hair was doing a spot-on impression of a cockatoo. This was why Aaron kept his trimmed so short, but Andrew was too vain for that.
He pushed at his cockatoo hair, trying to tame it with finger combing, considered dunking it in the sink, and then worried that it would look like he was trying too hard if he re-appeared in Neil’s kitchen with damp hair. Andrew sighed in defeat - it’s not like Neil hadn’t already seen it. His black cashmere sweater though, was covered in Sir hair, and that he could do something about. Andrew pulled it off, leaving him in a tight grey t-shirt and his armbands. He splashed a little water on his face, cleaned his glasses, frowned at himself in the mirror critically and decided if you squinted his hair looked artfully designed to defy gravity, so he rolled with it.
Neil was waiting for him in the kitchen, tucked into an antique nook table with a second cup of coffee already poured for Andrew, cream and (he took a sip to check) sugar already added in perfect proportion.
“So, how do you feel about pie?” Neil asked conversationally.
“Pie,” Andrew repeated.
“Yes,” Neil gestured to the sideboard and the kitchen counters around them, and Andrew realized they were absolutely surrounded by pies - about sixteen of them - which must be why the kitchen smelled so divine.
“I am amenable to pie,” Andrew said cautiously, wondering if he’d woken up in some weird version of the Twilight Zone and was about to be poisoned by a very good looking man and buried in the back yard covered in cat hair. Not the worst way to go.
Neil grinned at him, and slid off of his bench, bopping around the kitchen in a bit of a practiced blur until eight thin slices of pie on eight tiny plates with eight forks lined up in front of Andrew in a half moon shape.
Andrew blinked at the pies and then up at Neil, who was watching him expectantly. “Is this normal behavior for you?” Andrew asked him.
“What do you mean?”
Andrew flapped a hand at the pies.
“Oh,” Neil laughed, ran a hand through his hair which, Andrew thought, looked artlessly and perfectly tousled and not at all like the crest of a tropical bird. “No, but the fall festival is today, and I need to pick which one to enter in the pie contest.”
“Pie contest,” Andrew repeated, and yep, it was official, he was a fucking parrot.
“Yes. Abby and I enter every year, and whoever wins gets to cook Thanksgiving dinner. It’s a tradition.”
Andrew raised an eyebrow. Apparently Neil was on a first name basis with Wymack’s wife. More than that, he was on pie-contest-Thanksgiving-dinner-cooking-competition basis with her. “To be clear, the winner of this contest gets to cook Thanksgiving dinner, so...the winner has to do all the work?”
“No, the winner gets to be in charge. There’s a difference. Abby and I fundamentally disagree on Thanksgiving menus - I think recipes should be experimented with. She wrongly thinks we should stick to tradition. This is the solution we came up with.”
“What if someone else wins?”
“They don’t,” Neil said, a small smug smile playing across his lips. “You’re here. You are amenable to pie. Consider it payment for borrowing my couch and my cat for the night. Help me choose.” With that Neil picked up the first fork and handed it to Andrew.
So Andrew ate pie for breakfast.
Really, really good pie.
The first one was salted caramel pecan, followed by a boozy cherry concoction, pumpkin praline, a tart apple pie, fudgy chocolate chess, a rum laced rhubarb pie, a blackberry pie with sage, and finally, a pear pie layered with spiced walnuts and honeyed goat cheese. Andrew took a second bite of the last one. And then a third. Neil started laughing, and Andrew frowned up at him before shoving one more bite in his mouth.
“I take it you vote for the pear?”
“It tastes like Christmas,” Andrew said, because it did - there was cinnamon and nutmeg and allspice and vanilla, the saltiness of the goat cheese and the crunch of the spiced walnuts. It tasted like Andrew thought Christmas should taste - not that he’d known much about Christmas until Kevin inserted himself into his life, and then, later, Aaron.
He looked up again, and Neil was watching him thoughtfully, and Andrew might have just then considered being embarrassed about the whole weird morning - including the pie he had all but inhaled and that had definitely gone most of the way to curing his hangover - except there was a knock at the door, and then there was Kevin, spewing apologies for the mixup to Neil and Andrew, three lattes in hand and an invitation for Neil to go with them to the Fall Festival.
***
Andrew narrowed his eyes at Kevin as he sipped his latte. They were properly ensconced in Kevin’s house now - a clapboard craftsman painted a respectable shade of dark blue, and with decidedly less furnishings than Neil’s - with a plan to meet up with Jeremy and Neil in a couple hours to head to the festival. Kevin was scrambling eggs and refusing to meet Andrew’s eyes, which, Andrew knew from long experience, meant his friend was up to something.
“Kevin,” Andrew said, in a particular tone of voice.
Kevin paused briefly, but didn’t turn around, stirring the eggs a little too enthusiastically.
“Kevin Day,” Andrew said, in an escalated version of that particular tone of voice. Kevin sighed, moved the eggs off the heat, and turned around to face him.
“Yes?”
“What in the fuck are you up to?”
“Nothing.” Kevin was still refusing to look at him, but the corner of his mouth was crooked up, which meant he had a secret.
“Spill,” Andrew demanded.
“Okay but don’t be mad.”
“Not a good start,” Andrew said.
“If I had told you about him you would have refused to meet him.”
Andrew raised an eyebrow. “Neil, I presume.”
“Neil,” Kevin agreed, and he was trying to keep that grin off his face again.
Comprehension was dawning and it was not pretty. “Tell me you did not invite me up here to try to hook me up with some guy.”
“Not some guy. Neil.”
“You’ve never mentioned him,” Andrew said. “You lived with him, and you never mentioned him.”
Kevin considered Andrew. “I always thought you two might be perfect for each other. More than perfect. That is why I never mentioned him. What was the point, if you lived five states away?”
“Have I mentioned before that I will stab you?”
“You know the more you threaten stabbing without following through, the less I think you are gonna do it.”
“Asshole,” Andrew grumbled. “I did not ask you to play matchmaker.”
“You didn’t look too upset eating his pie this morning,” Kevin smirked.
Mother fucker. Andrew just realized what Kevin was so damned smug about. “You gave me the wrong house number on purpose,” he accused him.
“I have no idea what you are talking about,” Kevin deflected, smirk widening.
“Kevin.”
“How was I supposed to know you were going to break into his house?”
“Have you even met me?”
Kevin scoffed. “You don’t do that stuff anymore.”
“Clearly I do.”
“Whatever. I just thought that, you know, Neil would see you trying to get into his house, come out, talk to you, take you to my house. A proper meet cute.”
“The fuck Kevin. A meet cute?”
“What? I read your books.”
“I hate you. I really do.”
“Yeah, I know. But seriously. Tell me. What’d you think of Neil?”
“Fuck you,” Andrew said pleasantly, flicking him off for good measure before stealing a bite of eggs and heading for the shower, Kevin’s laughter mocking him all the way down the hall.
***
Andrew felt like he was living in one of his novels, and this, this, was definitely all Kevin’s fault. Meet cute indeed.
The four of them loaded up into Kevin’s jeep, Andrew and Neil tucked into the backseat with Neil’s pie propped carefully in his lap, and drove the five miles out to Farmer Someone-or-other’s field for the Annual Foxhaven Fall Festival. The weather was pure perfection - sky the kind of blue that looked fake in photographs and not a cloud in sight, gold and red leaves swaying in a brisk breeze along the country road - exactly the kind of weather that Andrew would send his fictional characters walking arm and arm in through a hay field. It was obnoxious.
The fair was in full swing when they arrived - whimsically decorated food booths and craft vendors scattered between fair games, and pumpkins everywhere. Andrew could see a stage set up in the far distance, and notes of fiddle and banjo music floated merrily over the crowds. There were indeed hayrides in progress, giant draft horses pulling hay carts through the nearby fields, and off to the left of the fair there appeared to be a truly epic corn maze - which Andrew maybe (really) wanted to investigate. They dropped Neil’s pie off first and then Kevin and Jeremy disappeared - mumbling something along the lines of seeing a man about a cow and catching up later - leaving Andrew standing in a crowd of happy tourists with Neil, who looked edible in a thick blue flannel button down that was doing magic things with his eyes.
Andrew felt slightly less annoyed about the whole damn set up when he realized that Neil clearly wasn’t in on Kevin’s schemes. Instead, Neil had frowned at Kevin and Jeremy’s abrupt and awkward departure, staring after them in clear confusion for a moment before wiping the frown off his face and turning to Andrew. “I don’t know what that was all about, but I could go for some hot chocolate - you in?”
“Sure,” Andrew agreed, because he’d just been abandoned by his host for the second day in a row and because he rather liked hot chocolate and as peeved as he was at Kevin about this whole thing, he rather liked Neil too (damnit).
Andrew followed Neil, who wove through the crowds like a pickpocket before rocking to a stop in front of a stand fronted by a giant painted plywood cutout in the shape of a marshmallow.
“Hey Neil!” the women behind the stand greeted Neil and he smiled at her, but the smile faltered when she said, “and this must be Andrew,” turning her gap-toothed grin on him.
She was looking at Andrew expectantly, but he was distracted by the slight frown that had settled back on Neil’s face. “Yes, this is Andrew. How did you know that Maggie?”
“Oh well,” Maggie flushed a bit and looked down, busying herself with pouring two hot cocoas. Andrew rolled his eyes. Apparently Kevin had accomplices. Great.
“Oh well, what?” Neil pushed.
“I mean, we knew Kevin’s friend was coming into town, figured this must be him. Anyway! Let me hook these up for you.” She winked conspiratorially and pulled a little bottle of Kahlua from under the counter, tipping a splash into each before handing them over. “On the house boys!”
Andrew startled at that. He was thirty - it’d been a while since anyone had called him “boy.” But Maggie looked to be pushing seventy, grey hair cropped close, and she was beaming at them, so he figured he could let it slide.
Neil hesitated, and then pasted his smile back on. “Thanks,” he said, clearly deciding to drop it.
“Was that weird?” Neil asked, when they’d walked a few booths down. They paused to eyeball the line of game booths stretched out before them.
Andrew considered clueing him in, but Neil looked so adorably confused he couldn’t quite do it yet. “I don’t know Neil,” he said instead. “You are the one who fed me eight pieces of pie this morning, so what even is weird?”
“You are the one who broke into my house and passed out with my cat.”
“I think we have established that that was Kevin’s fault,” Andrew noted drily, leaving out the fact of exactly how much Kevin’s fault it actually was.
“Yes, but.”
“But?”
“It’s just...eh, fuck it. Nevermind.”
“Tell me.”
“No, I'm being paranoid. It’s my nature. It’s fine”
“Is it?”
“Yes. How do you feel about crossbows?” Neil gestured at the colorful tent in front of them, targets at twenty paces and crossbows lined up across the makeshift counter, cheery stuffed animals pinned haphazardly across the lean-to ceiling.
“I feel like I could kick your ass,” Andrew said, tossing his empty hot chocolate cup into the nearby trash.
Neil’s smile lit up his face. “Challenge accepted.”
They worked their way down the row of game booths: crossbows, ring toss, water shoot. Neil was good, but so was Andrew, and by the time they reached the end of the row - Neil whooping out loud when he won the softball toss by two baskets - Andrew realized he was having a really good time. Neil was funny, and snarky, ribbing Andrew good-naturedly and smiling cheekily at all the game vendors - all of whom knew Neil’s name (and Andrew’s too).
The last booth was a hatchet toss, which Andrew had actually done before with Kevin at a brewery on one of their writing retreats. Victory was his to be had: he threw all three of his hatchets dead center bullseye, while Neil only got two, his third going wide and thudding into the ground next to the target.
“Damnit,” Neil sighed. “Best out of three?” he asked hopefully, those disarming eyes sparkling, his cheeks flushed with the autumn air.
Andrew shook his head, eyeing one of the prizes hanging on the wall behind Neil’s head. They’d turned down the prizes at all the previous booths, even though one or both of them had won big at most of them. He caught the eye of the booth attendant and nodded at the giant stuffed pumpkin, and once it was in his hands he presented it to Neil.
Neil clutched it warily. “What? Why?”
“It matches your house,” Andrew said.
Neil stared at him, and then the pumpkin, and laughed. “I like my house asshole.”
“Good. Now you have a pumpkin to match. Are you hungry?”
“I could eat,” Neil grinned.
They got roasted corn and strolled the craft booths munching, the giant pumpkin bouncing against both their legs and Neil nodding at people along the way.
“You know everyone in this town,” Andrew noted.
“It’s not a big town,” Neil said.
“But you aren’t from here,” Andrew said. He couldn’t quite place Neil’s accent, but he certainly wasn’t local.
Neil shrugged. “I’ve been here for ten years. Plus I kind of work everywhere, so. I get around.”
“Everywhere?”
“Yeah. I fill in. For Wymack, for the florist, at the bakery. I bartended at the Trojan’s Arms when Jeremy had the flu.”
“You don’t have a regular job?”
Neil shrugged again. “Don’t really need one. Oh, there’s Renee.” Neil stopped them in front of a colorful booth with a colorful woman standing in it surrounded by colorful quilts. It was a lot of color.
“Neil,” Renee said warmly. She was short - almost as short as Andrew - her hair a riot of rainbow curls piled on top of her head, and she was dressed like Stevie Nicks. It was disconcerting and soothing all at once. “And you must be Andrew. Welcome to Foxhaven, it’s nice to meet you.”
Andrew nodded, but Neil groaned next to him. “Renee you have to tell me what is going on. I know you know. Kevin is being weird and everyone knows this is Andrew. It’s getting spooky.”
Renee smiled. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“Liar,” Neil huffed, but it was fond.
“Maybe,” she agreed, still smiling. “Any chance I can talk you into manning my booth for me while I grab some cider?”
“Like I can say no to you,” Neil smiled back at her.
“Lovely, thank you. Andrew, why don’t you help him?”
“Not like I have somewhere better to be,” Andrew agreed with a shrug.
They switched places with her and as Renee wandered off Andrew ran a careful hand over the quilt nearest him. “These are impressive,” Andrew said.
“Yeah, she’s really talented,” Neil agreed, but he was frowning again.
“What?” Andrew asked.
“Well, that was definitely weird - Renee would never impose on someone else that wasn’t, well, me. I don’t know why she would ask you to stay too. You can go find Kevin if you want.”
Andrew sighed. Neil looked well and truly frustrated and it was probably about time to put him out of his misery.
“Kevin is trying to set us up.”
Neil whipped his head around. “What?”
“Yep. And I’d wager he has half the town in on it too.”
“I-” Neil was gaping at him. “Did you know about this?”
Andrew shook his head. “Not until today.”
“Huh,” Neil said, staring at Andrew’s face, but just then a couple stopped by the booth, ooing and ahing, spreading out a few quilts, and Neil was distracted with the sale for a moment (and Andrew was distracted by watching Neil).
Neil turned back to consider Andrew thoughtfully once they were gone. “I guess this has kinda felt like a date. I just thought, I don’t know…”
“You just thought what?”
Neil shrugged and looked a tad sheepish. “I just thought we were hitting it off a little?”
Andrew scrambled to get his face in order. “Are the two mutually exclusive?” he asked carefully.
“I’m not entirely sure actually. I don’t usually, uh. Date. Or hit it off with people.” Neil said, running a careless hand through his hair. “But I also don’t usually have men breaking into my house to snuggle my cat.”
“And this is something you find attractive?”
“Apparently.”
Before Andrew could say anything to that, Renee’s rainbow hair bobbed into view, her smile still warm, a hot cider clutched in her hands. “Oh good, you sold the Serendipity quilt. I hope it is going to a good home. Thank you Neil. Andrew.” She nodded at both of them.
“Andrew told me,” Neil said.
“And what did he tell you?” Renee asked, assessing Andrew over her mug.
“That Kevin wanted us to meet - and that it looks like he’s told half the town.”
“Mmm,” Renee nodded, sipping her cider.
“Seriously Renee? I’m surprised you went along with this.”
“Seems to me the two of you have gone along with it too. Spent the day together haven’t you?” She inclined her head to the stuffed pumpkin sitting on a stack of quilts between them.
Andrew snorted. He kinda liked this woman. Neil rolled his eyes. “I don’t know what I have done to deserve this,” he muttered.
“Yes, how dare your friends care about you and want you to be happy,” Renee agreed, her eyes twinkling.
Neil started to sputter, and Andrew was impatient to go back to exploring the concept of mutual exclusivity, so he rescued him. “Race you through the corn maze,” he challenged.
“Oh, you’re on,” he said, eyes glinting, turning to stalk in that direction. Andrew dusted off his two-fingered salute from his college days for Renee, and she grinned at him and waved them off.
***
Neither of them won the race, because Neil - the plush pumpkin tucked into the crook of his arm like a football as he sprinted past Andrew - skidded in his tracks when he realized that Andrew was strolling along at a reasonable pace through the maze.
Andrew, who never had any intention of actually running, was subsequently dragged into a reluctant jog by a cheekily grinning Neil who hopped backwards, tugging Andrew along after him by the corner of his sleeve (a move that Andrew really would have stabbed just about anyone else for attempting).
They emerged triumphant from the other side, Neil’s cheeks flushed a delightful shade, and neither of them mentioned that Neil’s fingers were still hooked in the fabric of Andrew’s sweater.
“Come on,” Neil said, giving one more little tug, leading Andrew towards a large barn and sliding the huge door just ajar enough for them to slip through. It was warmer inside, sunlight filtering through open hatches in the ceiling and a few expansive, dusty windows along the walls. The barn was filled with bales of hay, and what looked like an overflow of decorative pumpkins piled up in the corner - as if they couldn’t find one more nook at the festival to decorate. They could hear the crowd and the music still, but it was muffled, far away. Neil collapsed onto one of the hay bales, and Andrew sat next to him. They were inches from each other, not touching, just breathing and looking up at dust motes in the sunlight.
“So you might move here,” Neil said, breaking the silence.
“Maybe,” Andrew said.
“It’s a good place to live.”
“Is that why you picked it?”
Neil considered him. “Truth for truth?”
“If you like,” Andrew agreed.
“It’s not like it’s a secret, not really. My father was a mobster. A monster. I testified to the FBI, helped to put him away. They put me in WITSEC for a while. He was killed in prison ten years ago and I got to move on with my life.” Neil shrugged. “I looked at a map. Picked Foxhaven because I liked the name.”
Neil had tilted his face back and closed his eyes, but his face looked soft, relaxed. Andrew wondered about the scars on his sharp cheekbones - wondered if they had to do with his monster of a father - but he wouldn’t ask. “That is a big truth,” he said.
“Like I said - not a secret. Speaking of, why do you know how to pick locks?”
Andrew thought about that, decided to drill it down to the simplest answer. “Lived on the streets for a while, after noping out of foster care. I learned to be resourceful.”
“Quite the story arc, from foster care to street rat to romance novelist,” Neil said.
Andrew snorted. “I got caught stealing a car, got sent to juvie at sixteen. Funny thing about juvie. They make you go to class, take the SAT. Found myself with a scholarship to Palmetto State.”
“And found yourself with Kevin Day for a roommate.”
“He told you about that?” Andrew didn’t know why he was surprised, but something felt fluttery and off-kilter, knowing that Kevin had talked about him to Neil.
“Yeah, when he was living with me. Said he hadn’t had a roommate since you. He said a lot of things about you, actually.”
“Like?”
Neil had opened his eyes and was gazing at Andrew, his weight tilted back on his hands. “That you are his best friend. His family.”
Ah, and there it was. The source of the flutter. Because yes, he and Aaron had finally found each other - after Aaron had recognized his own face on the back of one of Katelyn’s romance novels - and they were tentatively weaving together something that looked like a relationship, but it was Kevin who had always been there, Kevin who was his best friend. There was a reason Andrew was sitting here in a hay barn with a rather interesting man in a tiny town called Foxhaven, that he was considering resettling his whole life here. There was a reason he was here and not in Boston, with Aaron, where this whole idea had sprung up in the first damned place. Kevin was and always would be his family.
“Yes,” Andrew said eventually. “But if you tell him I agreed I’ll have to kill you.”
Neil grinned. “Noted. Tell me something dumb.”
“I’m a romance novelist,” Andrew deadpanned.
Neil laughed. “That’s not dumb.”
“It is actually. But I am good at it.”
“Why romance novels?”
“Kevin. He wrote. He wanted to be a novelist. I didn’t have a plan, so I stole his. Realized I didn’t hate it.”
“But romance?” Neil asked.
Andrew shrugged. “I googled what the top selling genre of fiction was. Romance novels were at the top, so that’s what I picked.”
“How practical,” Neil said, amused.
“Your turn,” Andrew said. “Something dumb.”
“I hate pie,” Neil said.
That startled a huff of a laugh out of Andrew. “That’s unfortunate,” he said.
“I know. I don’t love sweet things.”
“Lucky you that I broke into your house then, since you were in dire need of a pie taster that didn’t hate pie.”
“I would have made Kevin come over to do it anyway,” Neil said.
Andrew hummed. “I would have come with him.”
“And we would have met,” Neil said.
Andrew noticed just then that Neil’s eyelashes were quite long, and he thought maybe they were having a moment and he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it yet, so he just said, as steadily as he could, “It seems we were going to meet anyway. One way or another.”
“Yes,” Neil agreed. He had leaned forward then, hands at his sides on the hay, holding Andrew’s gaze for just a moment too long, and Andrew couldn’t stop his little intake of breath. Andrew quite suddenly decided that exact shade of blue was his favorite color.
“Five reasons I should move here,” Andrew asked, resolutely not staring at Neil’s lips or eyes or cheekbones. Their hands were pressed flat, an inch apart. Andrew’s pinky twitched.
“Ah. Well, we have a really cool name - I mean, Foxhaven, come on. Small town charm. Good people. Renee and Wymack and Abby are pretty great. And Jeremy of course - you haven’t met Matt and Dan and Robin yet but them too.”
“That’s a list of people, not reasons,” Andrew countered.
“Can’t people be reasons?” Neil asked
“Not usually, not for me.”
“Mmm. I’m a person. I’m here too.”
“Neil are you flirting with me?”
“I think so, is it working?”
“Yes,” Andrew said, because god dammit he was a romance novelist, and this was definitely a moment. He leaned in, Neil met him halfway, and Andrew kissed him.
It was brief, and sweet, Neil’s lips firm and soft all at once. It was a small thing, warm breath and the tip of Neil’s tongue against the edge of Andrew’s bottom lip, but something cracked and crumbled in his chest, making space for his heart to beat faster as Neil opened his mouth for him, let him in, let them tentatively press at the edges of this beginning that came out of the blue to wrap them up and hide them away in a hay barn in the middle-of-nowhere Vermont, a squishy plush pumpkin smushed between them.
Insistent buzzing in both their pockets broke them apart, and Andrew fished his phone out first. “Kevin - he says the pie judging is in five and they will meet us there.”
“Oh fuck. Andrew - let’s go!” Neil stood up quickly. Andrew’s head was still spinning and he stared up at him for a minute.
Neil held a hand out. Andrew hesitated, and then he took it, twining Neil’s warm fingers with his. Neil grinned, Andrew’s heart skipped a beat, and then they were weaving through the crowds again, Neil with his pumpkin in one hand and Andrew in the other.
***
They barely made it before the pie judging started, Kevin and Jeremy rolling up next to them a moment later.
“Fancy meeting you two here,” Andrew said drily.
“I thought we talked about your meddling problem Kevin,” Neil said.
“It’s not meddling if it works.” Kevin was grinning, and Andrew realized he was still holding Neil’s hand. He tightened his grip out of pure stubbornness.
“Literally no one asked you for your help,” Neil said, his eyes trained on the stage where two men and two women with badges were tasting the pies and making notes.
“Sometimes you just need a friendly push, Neil,” Jeremy grinned affably at him.
“So not what I meant when I said I don’t swing,” Neil mumbled.
Andrew looked at Neil. “What does that even mean?”
“It’s what I told him the last two times he tried to figure out if I liked guys.”
“Looks like you are swinging now,” Kevin said.
“I will stab both of you,” Andrew said.
“You can’t stab Jeremy,” Neil said, shaking his head. “The town will riot.”
“Thanks Neil,” Jeremy laughed.
“Kevin though, stab away.”
“You wound me,” Kevin said.
“That’s literally the point,” Neil said. “Now shut up they are announcing the winner.”
Neil’s pie won, because of course it did - Andrew had picked the best one. Neil whooped, tugging at Andrew’s hand and grinning at him fiercely. “Abby won the last two years, it was about damned time. Stay for Thanksgiving?” he asked, but his face colored with surprise the moment the words were out of his mouth.
“Thanksgiving is in a month,” Andrew said carefully, giving Neil a chance to back out.
Neil’s face softened and resolved all at once. “So?” He bopped Andrew’s hip with the pumpkin. Andrew searched his face, the cheering around them white noise, Kevin and Jeremy calling Wymack and Abby over, Andrew vaguely thinking that he still hadn’t met Kevin’s dad, that he hadn’t seen most of the town even, that he needed to go get King if he was going to stay, and just like that - with that thought - he knew he had already decided.
“Only if you make the Christmas pie again.”
“Okay,” Neil said, the corners of his mouth tugging up, and he bopped Andrew with the pumpkin again.
“And I have to go get my cat,” Andrew added.
“Okay,” Neil said again, his grin widening.
“Oh fuck,” Andrew groaned.
“What?” Neil asked.
“Kevin is going to be insufferable after this.”
“Yes, yes I am,” Kevin agreed, having turned his attention back to them after calling his dad and Abby over. Neil whollaped him in the face with the pumpkin, and Kevin gave chase as Neil sprinted away laughing, and Andrew decided that maybe he really didn’t mind living in one of his goddamned novels for a while.