Work Text:
Andrew appeared next to him, leaning against the counter. He sipped at his hot chocolate and regarded the mess in front of Neil with a cool look. "These look horrible."
Neil cursed, moving back to properly look at his own handiwork. "Shit."
The kitchen counter was a mess of cream coating and sprinkles, and he found himself being glad that Abby had a soft spot for him. Had he been Nicky, there'd surely be an earful to hear.
Neil huffed, wipping icing off of a poorly cut cookie—he'd been trying to get it to resemble an exy racket, but to no avail. "This is way harder than it has any right to be."
Behind them, Dan laughed as she mixed together ingredients for a cake. "Or maybe you just suck at everything not exy."
"Thanks Captain. Such great faith you have in me," he grumbled, eliciting more laughter.
Unlike last Christmas, the Upperclassmen had decided to stay at Campus for the winter holidays. Neil did his best to think that it was because Renee was volunteering as a part of the hosting team of a food drive here, and not beacuse of the fact that it was the girls' last Christmas in Palmetto.
He glared at the cookie in front of him, wiping it clean to start again with more force than necessary. It ended up breaking.
Neil let out a long suffering sigh, and Andrew raised an eyebrow at him. When Neil turned his glare at him instead, he leveled Neil with an unimpressed look.
"Your skills in the kitchen are on par with those of a toddler."
"Shut up," Neil said, beacuse 1) he had a point, and 2) for some miraculous reason, Andrew knew how to cook even when half the time he lived off of ice cream and all things sugar.
Matt arrived in the kitchen at that moment, looking way out of breath. "Dan, help. The children are racking havoc in the living room."
A loud crash followed his words, and Dan cursed, shoving the cake mixture into the baking oven. "Turn that to sixty minutes for me."
Neil watched her leave. "Newbies causing trouble?" he asked when Matt approached his side to do as he'd been told.
"As usual," Matt grinned, "though I don't think you have any right to judge."
"Mind you, I never broke any of Abby's furniture. Where is she anyway? Coach and her were supposed to be here—" Neil glanced at his watch "—fifteen minutes ago."
Matt shrugged. "The food place messed up the order, Christmas rush and all." He peered over Neil's shoulder and winced at the mess. "Why's the icing everywhere but the cookies?"
Neil huffed, and Matt patted him sympathetically on the back. "Well, you'll get the hang of it. I'll go help Dan." He passed Neil a box of tissues as he left.
Neil worked quickly, wiping the counter and putting any salvagable treat onto a tray. When he threw the tissues away and looked at the tray again, he found Andrew munching on his abominations.
An involuntary smile crept up his face, and he did little to fight against it. "Not that bad, huh."
Andrew looked him right in the eye as he said, "Worst things I've ever eaten," and took another bite. "Barely edible," he said, taking another.
Neil let out an amused hum. "You've got icing on your face."
Andrew stared at him for a moment, then poked out his tongue to lick his lips. When he completely missed, Neil rolled his eyes and grabbed another tissue. He held it up and tilted his head in a question, an offer, and, when Andrew gave him a small nod, wiped it for him.
And then suddenly they were standing close, too close. A chill went up his spine despite the heating system as Andrew grabbed his hand and turned it over.
And then, brining it close to his mouth, he pressed his lips against Neil's pulse point, and licked.
Neil blinked. "Uh—"
Andrew let go. "You had icing on your hand," he explained, sounding bored, but his eyes betrayed him as he stared at Neil's hand like he'd never seen it before.
"Thanks," Neil replied, dumb and unsure, just as a flash of light covered the kitchen.
Nicky squealed from the kitchen doorway, fumbling with the phone in hand. "Shit. Uh, hey guys! Pretend you didn't—I wasn't—"
Neil felt his ears heat a bit at having been caught doing whatever it was they had just done.
"Nicky." Andrew said, his voice calm, but even Neil heard the edge to it.
Nicky's rescue came in the form of a car honking.
"Oh! I think Coach and Abby are here. I'm gonna—" he gesturedly vaguely over his shoulder, "—yeah. See if they need help." And then he was gone, leaving Neil and Andrew alone.
They stared at each other.
"They're probably going to put that on the wall," Neil said at last.
Andrew slanted a pointed look towards the doorway. "Not if Nicky mysteriously goes missing."
Wymack chose that moment to enter the kitchen, bags of food crowded in his hands, and very much not aided by Nicky. He glanced briefly between them as he set the food on the counter, eyes narrowed. "Is there a reason you're planning to murder Hemmick on Christmas Eve?"
Andrew picked up his hot chocolate again and took a careful sip. "Who?"
Wymack huffed. "On second thought, I don't want to know."
As he walked out though, Andrew called after him as an after thought, "You might want to look for new backliners."
Wymack cursed and Neil snorted.
Later, when Neil sat with all the others in Abby's much too cramped living room, he couldn't help but think how different this winter break had been from the last.
Back then, he'd been alone in the Nest at Evermore, at the mercy of Riko's knives. Now, he was free and Riko was dead. For the first week they had booked a cabin(much thanks to Allison's generous pocket) and finally went on a much awaited skiing trip.
It had been great, and Andrew had been by his side the whole time.
Neil hid his smile in his forkful of noodles.
He knew that when a few weeks later a picture of them standing together in Abby's kitchen would show up on the locker room's ever growing picture-plastered wall, Andrew wouldn't even try to remove it.