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Neil gets out of bed clutching his side. It’s been hurting for the past few days. Andrew has been giving him the look that means he knows Neil isn’t telling him something. Andrew wakes up almost seconds after Neil, both are light sleepers.
“Josten. Your side hurts.”
Neil stands up straight and struggles to keep his voice from cracking, “I’m fine.”
Andrew stares at him, “No one likes a liar, idiot.”
“You do.”
Andrew sits up and makes his way off the bed. “You can’t play in the game today and you know it. Now sit down while I make breakfast.”
Neil follows Andrew to the kitchen, “I promise I’m actually fine. I can play today. I’ve played with much worse injuries and you know it. I can handle this and if it becomes unbearable I can get subbed out.”
As Andrew gets the required ingredients and utensils to make pancakes he responds to Neil’s pleading, “You’re an idiot, but I can’t stop you. If you don’t take care of yourself I’ll kill you.” Andrew’s voice has enough bite in it that anyone, but Neil would be terrified of.
“Yes or no?” Neil says.
“Yes.”
Neil kisses Andrew on the cheek and goes back to their room to get his gear out. After a little walking around, his side isn’t hurting all that much just a bit of pain here and there. Andrew drenches his own pancakes in an ungodly amount of syrup and Neil grabs a few pancakes for himself and only puts a small amount of butter on them. They eat in silence mostly because it’s early and both of them are tired. It’s game day and they need to rest up as much as they can. Andrew finishes first and gets his gear from their room and grabs the keys to the car.
They pull into the court’s parking lot and before Andrew unlocks the car, he looks at Neil. “Josten, are you sure your side isn’t hurting.” It wasn’t a question because Andrew knew the answer.
“I’m fine.”
Andrew looks at Neil directly in his eyes, “I stopped believing that seven years ago.”
“But that’s when we started dating?” It took Neil ten seconds to connect the dots. “Oh.”
“Yeah. Oh.”
When the game begins everything is looking fine. Neil can run as fast as he can like usual. Andrew is playing like he somewhat cares, which still means he’s blocked every shot so far. Andrew gets the ball to Neil during the second half. Then when Neil is almost ready to take the shot, his mark checks him so hard he’s knocked into the wall. He slides down the wall, clutching his side.
Neil is down. Neil is unable to take in any oxygen, but somehow manages to puke. His side is in so much pain. His eyes are closed but he can tell someone is taking him off the court. It’s Andrew. He immediately begins scolding Neil in Russian about how much of an idiot he is for playing and not telling Andrew that his side was hurting really fucking bad. Neil manages to squeeze in a quiet “whoops” before Andrew scowls at him. Neil closes his eyes and drifts off.
At the hospital, Andrew is sitting by Neil’s bed waiting for him to wake up. He gets a million texts from Nicky asking “Is Neil alright?!?” “What happened???” “Is he dying???” Andrew responds with a one word text saying “appendicitis” and then turns off his phone to wait for Neil to wake up in peace.
Earlier when Neil got to the hospital he was rushed into surgery. The injury hurt like hell, but it’s nothing that Neil couldn’t handle. Andrew was told by the doctors that he could wait at home and get a call when Neil woke up, but the scowl on his face made the doctors way more compliant with Andrew’s wishes.
Andrew sat by Neil’s bedside for thirty minutes, holding his hand loosely, before Neil’s eyes began to slowly flutter open. Andrew stands up as fast as possible to get closer while still holding Neil’s hand.
Neil’s speech is slurred when he looks up at Andrew and says, “Who are you?” The first thing Neil does after waking up from surgery is attempt to flirt with whom he considers a stranger. Albeit a gorgeous stranger who happens to be holding his hand.
Andrew stares at him for a bit just to confirm that Neil really doesn’t have a clue. “I’m Andrew. We’ve been dating for seven years.”
Neil’s eyes widen and his mouth forms the goofiest smile Andrew has ever seen. “Seven years? Holy shit. I hit the jackpot.” Neil notices Andrew’s deadpan expression and says, “Are you sure?”
Andrew squeezes Neil’s hand lightly. “Yes and I hate every inch of you.” With this confirmation Neil’s stare focuses directly into Andrew’s eyes with the fondest expression. “Stop looking at me like that.”
Neil can’t take his eyes off of Andrew. “I can’t help it. You’re so pretty. Are you positive you and I are dating? I can’t believe I’m dating someone as pretty as you.”
Andrew can feel a slight heat rise to his cheeks. Andrew can’t blush, it’s never happened to him, but he knows that if he was able to now would be the time that his face would be completely red.
“Since we’re dating...does that mean...does that mean I’ve kissed you?” Neil is completely in awe at this possibility.
Andrew sighs, “Yeah you have. Multiple times.”
Neil touches his own face. He almost attempts to cover up his smile but his control of his body isn’t quite good enough for that just yet.
“No way,” Neil says in complete disbelief, “We’ve kissed?” Neil looks down at his hand intertwined with Andrews and quietly asks, “Can we kiss right now?”
Andrew looks away for a few seconds wondering if anyone will come in. It’s one thing to be angry at teammates walking in, it’s a completely different thing to be angry at doctors walking in. Neil is embarrassingly shy as he asks, “Does that mean no?”
Andrew looks back at him, “Yes or No, Josten?”
Neil’s face lights up, “Yes. Oh my god yes.”
Andrew leans down and gives Neil a chaste kiss. Neil looks like he desperately wants to do more. Andrew would like to do more too, but the hospital isn’t really the best place to start making out.
“Seven years? I’ve been dating you for seven years…” Neil says mostly to himself before turning back to Andrew, “We must make each other really happy then, right?”
“Yeah. We do. Rest up Josten so we can go home soon.”
“We live together?” Neil says this with as much excitement in his voice that he has when he’s playing on the court.
“Yeah, we do. We have an apartment with two cats.” Andrew on the other hand sounds like he’s reading out of a dictionary.
“What are their names?”
Andrew sighs knowing that Neil either won’t believe him or will laugh so hard he’ll start crying. “We didn’t name them, our friends did. Their names are Sir Fat Cat McCatterson and King Fluffkins.”
It was the latter. Neil started laughing right as he heard the first name and crying by the time he heard the last name. Neil’s laughter was genuine, it was beautiful. Neil was clutching his stomach and tossed his head back because it was unreal to him that they had cats with such ridiculous names while dating the most beautiful, and stoic person on earth.
“Go to sleep. You can see our cats when you rest up enough to get out of the hospital.”
Neil’s smile was impossible to look at and not feel a pang of warmth in his heart. “I want to see them so bad. I want to kiss you again even more.”
Andrew looks at Neil skeptically. “If I kiss you again will you go to bed?”
“Yes.”
Andrew leans down again and cups Neil’s face. He gives Neil another gentle kiss before he sits back down and makes Neil promise to close his eyes and rest. Neil does what he’s told but he can’t stop smiling as he slowly repeats, “Seven years.”