Chapter Text
Andrew never liked Christmas all that much until Neil came along. It had always been a parade of not good enough and no one cares enough and this is what you don’t have and will never have.
When Andrew had finally noped out of foster care on his 18th birthday, Neil had revealed without preamble or affectation that he had several million dollars squirreled away (ha!) and suggested that maybe they should buy a house now.
So they bought a house - a neat updated split level with an oversized backyard - a huge magnolia on one side, oak tree on the other, dogwoods and crepe myrtles scattered throughout and overgrown azalea bushes lining the rickety fence that enclosed it all.
Neil had stood in the open grassy bit in the middle, spinning around slowly with wide eyes, declaring it to be the one before Andrew had even had a chance to step inside behind their real estate agent, to see the gleaming hardwood floors, the well loved butcher block counters in the kitchen, the clean white subway tiles in the master bath. Not that it mattered - because it wasn’t like he was going to tell Neil no once he’d seen that look on his face - but Andrew loved it too. They bought the little house the next day with a cash offer, and had closed on it by the first of December.
The first night in the house they had nothing but a set of keys and a place to call home that no one could take away from them. Which was lovely, which was wonderful - but they really needed some furniture. A pot to cook in. Towels.
The next day after a succinct discussion and a list tapped out on Andrew’s ancient cell phone, they took a pile of Neil’s cash, and - with his sugar glider tucked into the hood of his hoodie - Andrew systematically procured: a used red Chevy pickup truck, a small cozy loveseat from Pottery Barn (hefted into the back of aforementioned red pick up truck), a brand new laptop, and as many prepaid credit cards that he could find to purchase (which was, quite many tens of thousands of dollars - those fuckers were everywhere).
Back at their empty house they had tugged the loveseat inside, ordered Chinese food, and curled up in front of the laptop to order everything else online - a bed and mattress; towels and sheets; pots and pans and plates and forks; some tables, chairs, a rug or two; and finally, at Neil’s insistence, an eight foot tall pre-lit fake Christmas tree.
“Really?” Andrew had asked Neil, one eyebrow raised after Neil had batted his hands away from the keyboard and clicked on add to cart .
“I like trees,” Neil had said.
Now, they had eight pre-lit Christmas trees.
Eight of them.
Each year, Neil bought a new one, slowly building his own Christmas tree forest that they put up on the first of December in memory of buying their home, and which Neil wouldn’t let Andrew take down until well after New Years. They didn’t decorate them, although Neil would occasionally bring in particularly nice looking acorns from their oak tree, or pinecones that fell from the neighbor's yard. He’d tuck them in nooks and crannies of the trees, and Andrew wouldn’t find them until January tenth or fifteenth, when he was dismantling the trees and acorns started tumbling out and onto his head.
Christmas for them was a new tree in their collection and a happy sugar glider soaring across the room in his magical plastic forest. Christmas was snuggling on their loveseat, eating Chinese food and picking out their own presents on the laptop to order. Christmas was a big pot of split pea soup for Christmas Eve dinner and giant waffles Christmas morning, followed by movie watching and naps and maybe Andrew reading one of the ten novels he bought himself every December.
This Christmas Neil had insisted on a Harry Potter marathon, and they’d watched and snacked and dozed and made out and snuggled throughout the night, and most of the next day too, before waking up to a fresh blanket of snow at 10pm on December 26th.
It was beautiful and sparkling in their backyard under the moonlight, drifts piled on the magnolia leaves and the azalea bushes. Neil wanted to play, so they played; Neil as squirrel climbing the trees and then swooping towards Andrew to land on his shoulders, in his outstretched hands, on his head. Each time Andrew would carefully deposit him back on a tree trunk so he could scurry up and do it all over again. Neil should have been cold - Andrew was freezing - but they’d figured out long ago that Neil ran hot, that it must be a shifter thing since sugar gliders were technically tropical creatures.
(It was part of the reason Andrew had such a hard time getting Neil to wear clothes.)
Andrew tucked Neil up on a magnolia branch, and realized his teeth were chattering. “I’ll be right back,” he said, heading inside for a hat and gloves and maybe a glass of whiskey to warm him from the inside out.
Andrew had just stepped back out the door, drink in hand, when he heard a screech and then loud squawking that took him a minute to realize was coming from Neil. His heart stopped, sheer panic icing his veins as he dropped his drink, tried to sprint off their porch into the yard, only to have his feet slip out from under him on the snow and ice.
He went down hard on his ass just in time to see Neil fling himself from the top of the magnolia tree, his little wings spread wide, his tiny nose pointed straight at the snowy ground, squawking loudly all the way. Andrew screamed soundlessly as a huge black owl came winging up behind him, his wingspan giant, his beak open in another screech, his piercing green eyes narrowed in on Andrew’s squirrel.
Andrew launched to his feet, scrabbled for anything - getting his hands on an old exy racket that leaned against the side of the porch - and got ready to swing, but suddenly Neil stopped squawking and folded his wings, spinning around impossibly in the air.
In the blink of an eye Neil popped into human form, his naked body illuminated in the moonlight, and then he decked the goddamned owl in the beak.
The owl went tumbling towards the base of the magnolia, tail over beak, black feathers flying and a sputtering shriek cut off abruptly as he presumably crashed into the trunk. Andrew yelled, throwing the exy racket aside to dive face-up underneath Neil, who was closing in hard on the ground in his 160 pound human body, and just managed to pop back to squirrel before landing with a tiny crumpled thump on Andrew’s chest.
“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” Andrew gasped, panicked, hands hovering helplessly while Neil righted himself, gave a good shake, Andrew desperately cataloging - four feet intact, nothing bent at an angle, nothing but pure fury in Neil’s little blue eyes. Neil went human again, naked and sitting on Andrew for the space of a second before he catapulted himself up and towards the magnolia tree.
“You motherfucker, you were going to eat me!”
Andrew got to his feet to go after him, concerned that Neil must have hit his head because he didn’t usually talk to animals - and about fell on his ass again when he heard a deep, unfamiliar voice rasp out, “You’re a shifter? ”
“No fucking shit asshole, have you ever seen a sugar glider with blue eyes and red fur before?”
“I- what’s a sugar glider,” the man asked dazedly.
“Oh my god,” Neil threw his hands up in the air and turned to Andrew in indignant supplication, but Andrew was standing stock still in shock behind Neil, staring at the incredibly good looking, incredibly naked man sitting on the ground in a heap against their magnolia tree.
Neil groaned and turned back around to point at the man. “You need to leave,” he demanded.
The man stood up and he was tall - dark hair and eyes so green that they glowed emerald in the moonlight. He was also still very naked. He put his palms up, placating towards them. “I didn’t know you were a shifter. I’m sorry. I’m just. I’m hungry,” he trailed off, staring at Neil still. “I’ve never met another shifter before.”
Neil crossed his arms, unmoved. “Not my problem.”
Andrew stepped up beside him, finally finding his words, and the owl-man’s gaze flicked to him briefly before snapping back to Neil. “Neil,” Andrew said carefully, and Neil had known him long enough that just Andrew’s tone of voice was enough to make him glare at Andrew. It was the same tone of voice Andrew used when he’d found another kid in foster care that needed their special brand of help.
“No,” Neil said, shaking his head. “Andrew, he tried to eat me.”
“I’m sorry,” the man cut in again.
Andrew held up a hand to each of them. “He’s not going to try to eat you now, are you-” Andrew turned to him. “Do you have a name?”
“Kevin,” the man said.
“Kevin’s not going to try to eat you now, okay love?”
“Damned right he’s not, because he is leaving.”
“Neil.” The voice again.
Neil threw his arms up in the air. “Fine, but he can’t have any of my goldfish,” he muttered before turning on heel and stomping inside.
Andrew looked up at Kevin. “Come on. I will make you a sandwich, and uh,” Andrew forced his gaze over Kevin’s shoulder, “we will find you some clothes.”
Andrew turned to go back to the house, but he saw Kevin hesitate and he paused. Andrew turned back, searched his face, saw something in those green eyes that reminded him why he and Neil were becoming social workers. Andrew tilted his head back towards the house. “It is safe here. I promise.”
Kevin was watching him, warily, and Andrew waited, but just then Neil popped his head out the door and shouted, “Come on you stupid owl,” and that got Kevin moving, his eyes trained on Neil in fascination, and Andrew sighed, picked up his whiskey glass from the snow, and followed Kevin into the house.