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Andrew slowly comes back to the world of the living curled up in the backseat of Bee's minivan. It's uncomfortably warm. Mid-morning sun streaks through the garage windows, turning the airless space into a natural oven. The minivan, like a tin-foil wrapped burrito; Andrew, the reheated contents — the kind that should have been tossed out at least a week ago. He blinks with sandpaper eyelids, and discovers a whole new meaning of the phrase death warmed over.
He's incredibly sweaty, hair plastered to his forehead and every article of clothing soaked. Peeling himself from the dampened upholstered seats into a sitting position is an unpleasant experience to say the least. And then — like being vertical has sloshed around his alcohol-steeped brain, knocking something loose — memories of the night before start coming back to him, rising up in the back of his throat, and the unpleasantness twists into a very real and present danger of throwing up directly into his lap.
There's not many other options. Bee always reminds them to gather their trash before exiting the vehicle like an unflappable flight attendant. Understandable, considering the biohazard-on-wheels that is the twins' shared Subaru.
Luckily, there's an overlooked empty McDonald's cup that has rolled under one of the bucket seats. Andrew grabs it just in time for his body to protest, vehemently, the decision made last night of several Jägerbombs on top of half a bottle of Bacardi.
After, he digs around for the lid and straw. He caps it over the mess, neat and contained. If only he could say the same for… everything else.
He crawls out of the minivan, rolling the door back into place behind him with a click, and tosses the cup in the garbage can by the door. The trash is not even half full, but the wafting scent on the heated air reminds him of the way the dark alleyway behind the house had smelled last night — his hand fisted in Neil's shirt, shoving him up against the brick wall a foot away from the dumpster. Do you regret it?
Looking back on it he can admit that, if anything, it was an apt setting for the ruin of his whole life.
He lets the lid fall back down. The slam of it makes his temples throb.
Moving on stiff legs, he opens the door leading into the house and takes a deep, palate-cleansing breath of conditioned air, the warm smell of bacon and batter replacing the stench of trash and regret. Sadly his stomach, still on the fence even after emptying most of its contents, doesn't react with its usual Pavlovian response to the scent of Bee's pancakes. His mouth waters, but it's nausea more than anything that he has to swallow down.
Bee is indeed at the stove when he steps inside, manning the griddle, armed with a dripping ladle. She’s as unflappable as ever, smiling in the face of his leftover-burrito state, her expression somewhere between fond and that perceptive look that always picks him apart faster than he can put himself together.
“Good morning,” she says. “We were wondering where you got off to.”
Andrew walks over to the cooling rack stacked with strips of crispy bacon and snags one, putting it between his teeth as a defense mechanism against questions rather than out of hunger.
Shuffling over to the fridge, he spots Bee's handwritten note wishing them a safe night, a gentle warning against the graduation party not getting too out of hand, still pinned under a yellow bumblebee magnet. Next to it is Abby's more utilitarian list of detailed instructions on how to stay hydrated, the signs of alcohol poisoning, and a list of phone numbers of every adult over the age of thirty they know, plus the number for poison control. Because she's Abby, more sugar than salt, she softened it with a little purple hand-drawn heart at the end.
Andrew snags said purple pen waiting in a magnetized cup on the side of the fridge and adds a more aftermath-appropriate doodle in the minimal blank space: a stick figure with X's for eyes, tongue lolling out morbidly, and crosses out the number for poison control to write in the number for the local funeral home he's seen on billboards.
Deed done, he tosses the pen back and opens the fridge. The rush of cold feels good on his skin as he reaches in for a bottle of water. He lets himself lean into it for a moment, pressing the chilled plastic bottle to the nape of his neck as he chews on his bacon, slowly, testing the waters. It stays where he puts it when he chokes it down. He does a mental fist pump.
Condensation drips down his spine. He leans back out of the fridge, slamming the door closed, which causes another internal cringe for himself and a visible flinch from the person slinking in through the kitchen doorway.
“God,” Aaron croaks, collapsing into a chair at the bar, slumping over with his forehead pressed to the tile. “It's so bright in here.”
Jeremy and Katelyn come in after him like sunshine after a rain cloud, looking both chirpy and thoroughly hungover at the same time, the dark circles ringing their eyes and clammy sheen to their skin not dimming the amused smiles on their faces.
“Breakfast?” Katelyn asks.
“Good morning,” Bee greets. “There’s pancakes and eggs. Also bacon.”
Aaron's groan is thick with nausea.
“It smells great.” Jeremy manages to actually sound enthusiastic about any prospect of food in a show of admirable strength and stubbornness as he pulls out the stool next to Aaron, rubbing his hand up and down Andrew's twin's back absentmindedly, ruffling his hair. Katelyn stands behind them, leaning down to kiss Aaron's shoulder.
Andrew feels a stab through his frontal lobe just looking at them and agrees with his twin; it's too fucking bright in here. Morning people, he thinks, stuffing the last of his bacon through his lips. How disgusting.
“I think I'm dying.” Aaron lifts his head, eyeing the decorative bowl of fruit in front of him with a squinty look that makes Andrew think it might be utilized in the way of an empty McDonald's cup in a couple of seconds.
Andrew reaches back into the fridge and chucks a fresh water bottle across the kitchen at his brother, who catches it after it hits his shoulder with a dull thud, but before it can roll to the ground. Aaron glares at him, the effect dimmed by the queasiness that makes his eyes go crossed. Andrew himself feels a wave of shivers down his spine and his stomach nearly rejects the last bit of bacon from the sudden movement. He has to catch himself on the edge of the counter as his knees buckle. Aaron seems to recognize his punishment is already being doled out, and he looks satisfied as he opens the bottle, sipping gingerly.
“You're doing better than that one guy,” Jeremy says brightly, his hand still moving up and down on Aaron's back. With his free one, he grabs an orange from the fruit bowl in a continuation of his act of being a normal functioning human and not a hollowed-out, hungover husk through to the end. A bead of sweat makes its way down his temple. The corners of his mouth wobble. He puts the orange back. “I think I saw him sprinting for his life through the living room at one point. He's pretty athletic for a little dude.”
“Oh, Nicky's friend,” Katelyn says. “Tim, I think?”
“Who the fuck is Tim,” Andrew and Aaron say at the same time, then make an identical face of disgust at each other.
“Could you grab a plate for me?” Bee directs Katelyn to a cabinet with a distracted wave of her hand, flipping the last of the pancakes.
Jeremy grins, nudging Aaron. “Just a typical night with the Foxes, huh?”
Bee pivots from the stove with a veritable mountain of pancakes piled high on the dinner platter. Jeremy pushes the bowl of fruit out of the way so she can set it down, the stack wobbling precariously. “Breakfast is almost ready,” she says, though she's brandishing her ladle like she plans to keep churning out pancakes on an infinite loop until everyone's uneasy stomachs can't physically hold any more. “Is Abby still doing the rounds?”
“Making sure everyone is still breathing,” Katelyn confirms.
Andrew starts making a line for the exit. Bee clocks the movement and turns to him, ladle cocked, pinning him with that look again like a bug on a board.
Andrew reaches out as he passes and grabs a pancake, burning his fingers and the roof of his mouth as he stuffs it between his lips as another defense. He shrugs innocently, moving backward around the counter, out of range of her omniscient mother instincts, motioning at his full mouth like, I would explain if I could but as you can see I'm currently choking on my own repressed feelings about it.
He turns to leave, ignoring Bee's quirked lips and knowing eyes, cheeks puffed and mouth dry with half-chewed pancake. There's a rustle of paper that makes him look over to a silent witness he hadn’t noticed before, sitting quietly at the kitchen table with the newspaper propped up in front of her face. One corner flips down, allowing Renee to give him a look over the front page.
Her smile is just a little too smug to be commiserating. Andrew wonders what it is about his personality that attracts all-knowing entities. He slyly flips her the bird as he goes by.
Stepping into the living room, he opens his water bottle and gulps the first half of its contents to help the pancake go down. He drinks the other half to make it stay. The food doesn’t help with the way his mouth feels furry and tastes like something crawled inside and died in it, it's just that now it has mingled with bacon and pancakes for something truly horrific.
He stumbles upon the first corpse almost immediately.
Kevin is dead to the world, head tilted back on the arm of the couch at an unnatural angle, mouth open in a way he can never seem to prevent even when the Foxes have spent countless away game bus rides stuffing small pieces of trash in there until he eventually wakes up with an indignant splutter and a flurry of spit-slicked candy wrappers. There are none in there now, from what Andrew can see — and he can see all the way back to Kevin's tonsils —but as he looks around the room, he decides that it's probably more a lack of consciousness, and therefore opportunity, from the others rather than courtesy.
The only one awake in the room is Jean, trapped under Kevin's body, his face lit up in the dim room by his phone as he scrolls through it, unconcerned about the dead weight of a six-foot athlete on top of him. Dan, Allison, Laila, and Cat didn't make it to any furniture and instead collapsed around the coffee table in the middle of what looks like a furious game of Uno. Multicolored cards stick to their skin and in between their tangled limbs as they lay in a pile on the rug like napping puppies. Andrew steps over hurdles of knees and elbows as he makes his way to the front hall.
The bathroom door is open and Matt is leaning against the doorjamb, watching Abby as she gently but firmly coaxes a still moderately drunk Nicky into swallowing some Advil down with what looks like a gallon of Pedialyte. Nicky is in the bathtub, long legs cramped and clothes rumpled. He has one of Abby's snake plants hugged to his chest, the fronds tickling his face and tangling in his hair as he tilts his head back to drink, taking frequent pauses to talk at anyone who will listen.
Matt glances over his shoulder, catching sight of Andrew. He gives a nod of greeting, then jerks his head toward the stairs in an all-clear. Andrew salutes him as he passes, keeping his footsteps quiet on the steps to avoid attracting any more mothering than he can conceivably take this early in the morning.
As he makes his way up, Nicky’s voice from the bathroom grows fainter. “You know, I’m technically not a teenager anymore, Abby. You don’t have to—” a hiccup “—baby me. Even if I secretly like it. Oh, did you meet my friend? He’s from my—” another hiccup “—improv class. He’s very nice. Kind of boring. I didn’t really see much of him after he went outside, but I was in charge of replenishing the jello shots at that time so maybe I just missed him…”
Upstairs is far less densely populated. Andrew doesn't encounter any more bodies — until he pushes open his bedroom door and sees Neil sitting on the edge of his mattress, directly in a square patch of sunlight from the window.
He looks over, messy hair outlined in gold like it’s caught fire. He smiles, but his eyes hold a fair bit of uncertainty amongst all the blue. “Hey.”
Andrew is suddenly about to throw up all over again.
He rushes over to the bathroom, slamming the door shut behind him. His mouth waters, stomach roiling, but he forces everything down, including his rising panic. He thought Neil had left. Neil had run from him last night, in the alley. He was supposed to be gone.
Andrew stumbles over to the sink. He’s still clutching the empty water bottle in his hand and he fills it up under the tap, then drinks it all down, hoping more water will fix everything. It doesn’t, so he sets it down and brushes his teeth instead, heart pounding and blood roaring in his ears. It’s not enough to drown out the noises from the other room. The bed creaks as Neil stands up, his footsteps coming close to the door. There’s a tentative knock.
“Andrew?” Neil asks, voice muffled and a little strained. “Can we talk? I’m— I’m sorry about last night. We… It doesn’t have to change anything, yeah? If that’s what you want.”
Andrew’s eyes squeeze shut. He bends over the sink and spits toothpaste into the basin. As he wipes his mouth, rinsing it out with another mouthful of water, this time straight from the tap, he thinks about last night. The kiss, sober, happening so naturally between their typical banter as they were pouring the jello shots into their tiny containers to chill before everyone got there. Neil had absentmindedly sucked his thumb into his mouth, licking off a stray splash of red strawberry and Andrew had gone temporarily without brain function as he reached out, pushed Neil’s hand down, and leaned in.
But he was thinking, of course. He was thinking about how he had wanted to do this for a long time now. Years. He was thinking about how he was almost entirely sure that Neil felt the same way at this point, and they were only waiting for someone to make the move. He was thinking, over the rush of his pulse, that Neil’s lips were just as soft as he always thought they would be.
Neil kissed back. He hesitated for only a second — a second that had Andrew’s heart seizing as he braced himself to move away —and then Neil was pushing into it, leaning forward. He followed Andrew’s lead, tilting his head whichever way Andrew nudged him, taking the tiniest cues easily, like he always did when it came to Andrew. He sucked on his bottom lip, brushed their tongues together, giving everything back tenfold.
And then the front door opened. People poured into the house. Their friends. They broke apart as Kevin barreled through the kitchen, barely pausing to raid the cabinets for snacks before snatching up the bottle of vodka all for himself and starting a completely unprompted conversation about Neil’s plans for the next year, now that he was the last one left still in high school. Neil was red-cheeked and flustered, his expression dimming the way it always did when he was reminded of the fact that he was being left behind for an entire year.
(He wasn’t. Nearly all of the Foxes were sticking around after graduation, going for the less expensive option of furthering their education at the state college only an hour’s drive away, Andrew included. Still, he knew Neil only saw the distance for what it was and dreaded being left with no one but his uncle for company.)
There hadn’t been time to talk about it. The kiss. Between the Foxes and their friends and copious amounts of alcohol flowing all around, there was not another moment where Andrew could get Neil alone. There was plenty of time to overthink it, however, and watch Neil from across the room, looking more melancholy and upset than Andrew would’ve expected after finally crossing the line from friendship into something else.
Unless he was regretting it.
It was hard not to think so, and left alone with his thoughts and a large selection of cheap liquor and badly mixed drinks, Andrew did. He holed himself up in the kitchen, drinking from any and all cups and bottles in his reach until the world felt wobbly and malleable under his feet. Changeable. He could do something. He could talk to Neil, shove some of these messy horrible feelings at him and hope he could make sense of it, the way he always seemed to be able to. They were always on the same page, weren’t they? Andrew hadn’t misread six years of things, had he?
Nicky’s voice rang out from the living room, following a worryingly loud crash. “Shit. Here, let me— Thanks, Neil. Could you take that out to the dumpster before someone accidentally cuts— Oh, you’re an angel!”
Andrew turned away from the kitchen door as it opened, grabbing the nearest bottle and downing its contents as he heard footsteps make their way to the backdoor. He drank, waiting for the sound of the door sliding open and shut before putting the bottle down, wiping his mouth, and following.
The alley was dark, barely lit by the streetlamp all the way at the far end of the road, casting a weak orange glow. Neil must not have heard him exit the gate behind him because when he turned from throwing the bag containing whatever broken thing from the house into the dumpster, he squeaked in surprise. Andrew didn’t give him time to recover before grabbing his shirt collar and pressing him against the brick fence.
The dumpsters smelled bad. Neil smelled bad too, or not like he had earlier, like he usually did —like Irish Spring and warm skin and something vaguely woodsy that must come from his uncle’s house. He smelled like someone had doused him in a tub of Axe body spray and pink lemonade vodka. Maybe Nicky had gotten a hold of him at some point?
Whatever it was, Andrew ignored it, tightening his hold. The words he’d been chewing on for hours as the party raged on pushed past his teeth. “Do you regret it?”
“Wh—What?”
Andrew realized he was too drunk, too angry to properly do this. He was making a mistake, he knew, but he couldn’t stop the rise of emotions clawing up his throat, making it go tight in a way that it hadn’t in a long time. Embarrassed and barely holding on to his senses, he let go of Neil for only a second, only long enough to pull one of his knives from its sheath in his armband.
The familiar weight of the handle instantly grounded him. He put his hand back on Neil’s collar, the other one holding the knife out to the side, the blade catching in the weak light.
Neil gasped and started trembling, which caught Andrew off guard. Neil wouldn’t be scared of Andrew holding a knife. He would know that Andrew wouldn’t use it on him, that it was just a way for him to feel protected from his own feelings.
Maybe he and Neil really weren’t on the same page. Had never been.
“You’re such an idiot,” Andrew growled, not sure if he was talking to Neil or himself. He said it again. “You’re such an idiot. For letting me— do that if. If you didn’t want it. You didn’t,” he said, mouth tasting sour. “Did you.”
“I’m sorry,” came the breathy reply. “I don’t. Please—”
Andrew stepped back like he’d been slapped. The ground he’d been standing on felt as if it had been tugged out from underneath him, refusing to hold him up. He caught himself against the dumpster, his knife falling to the ground. “You don’t,” he said, and felt like he couldn’t catch his breath. “You don’t —love me back, do you?”
But Neil was already scrambling for the back gate, throwing it open. Backlit by the lights from the kitchen, Andrew could barely make out his outline as he sprinted for the house. And then Andrew couldn’t see anything but the ground as he bent over and heaved up everything he had in him until there was nothing left.
He wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and slowly straightened. He couldn’t go back in the house and risk seeing Neil smiling and talking and laughing with everyone like nothing had happened. So he went into the garage instead and climbed into the backseat of Bee’s minivan, heartsick, like an animal crawling away to lick his wounds and bleed out in peace.
He comforted himself, as the small space spun and dipped around him even with his eyes shut, with the thought that he would be going to college soon. Only an hour away, but Neil would still be here for an entire year. It would give them space, if that’s what Neil wanted —which, given his reaction, seemed highly likely. He could do that.
He could. He would gladly pretend like none of this ever happened, if that’s what Neil wanted.
It doesn’t have to change anything.
“Andrew?” comes Neil’s voice from the other side of the bathroom door. “Can you open the door?”
Andrew straightens up, avoiding looking at himself in the mirror. He already knows that he looks just as bad as he feels. Sweat has started to dry uncomfortably on his skin, somehow feeling greasy and gritty, his hair crunchy with it and poking his face where it hangs down. He brushes it impatiently aside as he reaches out and yanks the door open.
He levels Neil with a flat look. “Fine.”
Neil takes a step back, surprised. “What?”
“It won’t change anything. That’s what you said, right?” he challenges.
The bump on Neil’s throat dips as he swallows. “Okay. Just…” His hands twitch at his sides, fingers flicking in a familiar nervous habit. “You’re okay? I didn’t see you much… after.” He blushes. “I just want to make sure that I didn’t, you know, push you or anything. I didn’t mean to, honestly.”
Andrew has no idea what the fuck he’s talking about. “I pushed you, idiot. Remember?” His lip curls in disgust, all of his apathetic pretense dropping away. Was Neil drunk too? He never considered it — Neil never drinks. And also Andrew had sort of a monopoly on all the booze last night so if Neil was throwing back enough liquor to be on even remotely the same level as Andrew was last night, enough to lose his memory, Andrew would’ve known.
If he does remember, and he’s apologizing for rejecting him—
Andrew’s hands clench into fists. He shoves Neil out of the way, stepping around him to walk into the bedroom. As he goes, he notices that Neil is still wearing yesterday’s clothes, but he must’ve showered because he smells the same as always, completely different from how he had in the alley. Irish Spring. No trace of any alcohol. He doesn’t even look hungover, the asshole.
“You didn’t,” Neil says, turning to watch him walk over to his bed and plug his phone in for nothing better to do. “You didn’t do anything I didn’t want. I kissed you back, didn’t I?”
“Oh, and I just suppose your reaction in the alleyway was you wanting me, was it?” Andrew replies coldly.
“What?”
At Neil’s completely baffled tone, Andrew looks up from his phone to see Neil’s brow has drawn down. “The alleyway?” he asks.
Andrew scoffs. “Just how much did you have to drink last night? Did the girls sneak in a shit load of Smirnoff while my back was turned?”
Neil takes a step forward. “Andrew, I genuinely have no idea what you’re talking about. I didn’t drink anything besides water last night.” He shakes his head. “What happened in the alley?”
Something besides nausea grips Andrew’s stomach for the first time today, a strange sort of dread mixed with something else. Something lighter and too fragile to call hope. “You were taking out the trash after something broke in the living room,” Andrew says slowly. “I followed you. You don’t remember?”
“I didn’t take out the trash,” Neil says, still frowning as he recalls. “Allison dropped a glass and I helped Nicky pick it up, but then—”
Nicky bursts into the room, startling them both. He looks a little better than when Andrew last saw him; he ditched Abby’s snake plant somewhere along the way at least. “Hi,” he says, barely sparing them a glance as his eyes dart around the room. “You guys haven’t seen Jim, have you?”
Neil and Andrew speak at the same time. “Who the fuck is Jim?”
“From Improv!” Nicky hangs off the doorjamb, waving one hand in emphasis. “About your height. Nice guy. He volunteered to take out the trash and then never came back, and then —” He pulls out his phone, showing them the screen. “He texted me this morning, and while at first I was just glad to know he’s not, like, dead, it was a really cryptic message. Andrew, did you do something to him? He mentioned something about my cousin pulling a knife on him and telling him—”
“Get out.” Andrew stalks to the door, physically shoving Nicky out and slamming it in his face. Nicky keeps trying to talk so Andrew bangs on the wood a few times, hard enough to give himself a headache and to also drown out anything more Nicky has to say until he goes away. It works. Andrew drops his hand and listens to blessed silence, even though he knows it won’t last.
“So,” Neil says, dragging the word out. Andrew closes his eyes, still facing the door. “I think something got mixed up here.”
He sounds amused, of all things. Andrew whips around to see it for himself, the way Neil’s eyes have lit up, his mouth twitching at the corners. He takes it down a notch when he catches Andrew’s expression, but still, there’s an air about him that seems overall brighter.
This is the worst. Almost worse than it actually having been Neil in the alley, instead of some stupid stranger. It all makes more sense now, but also he knows he’s going to have to explain and that is almost too much to bear. He’d talked himself so firmly into the belief that Neil didn’t want him that he still finds it hard to let go.
They’re standing closer together now, so when Neil takes a step, he closes all the distance left between them. “Tell me one thing?” he asks and some of his amusement dims just a little. “Did you regret it? Is that what you said in the alley?”
Discarding what happened by the dumpster, because that hadn’t been Neil, Andrew thinks about what Neil has done. Everything he’s said this morning, since the kiss. I just want to make sure that I didn’t push you or anything. You didn’t do anything I didn’t want.
“No.” Andrew says. He thinks about pulling a knife — for comfort again, but also to confirm that Neil would know why, and would never flinch. He doesn’t because he knows. And it’s that knowledge that he has now, sober and able to think clearly, that makes the rest of it easier to say. “I never regretted it. I thought you did. So I wanted to ask.”
Neil shakes his head. “I’ve wanted to kiss you for a long time.”
“I also,” Andrew continues, his heart thumping hard in his chest, “asked if you loved me back.”
“Oh.” His eyes go wide, then his expression softens, melting. “Can I give you the answer now?”
Andrew nods and keeps nodding when Neil holds up a hand in question. He puts it on Andrew’s shoulder, sliding his palm up to cup the side of his neck. “I do,” he says, leaning in. “I was scared to at first because — I didn’t know what I was doing, but. Yeah. I love you back, Andrew.”
They both lean in. Their second kiss doesn’t taste of strawberry jello shots; it tastes like toothpaste and leftover sleep. They’re slow with it this time, exploratory.
It’s sweet all the same in its certainty.