Archive of Our Own

Wednesday mornings in the apartment are usually a clusterfuck—they all have classes, so Neil and Kevin are always bickering over who gets to shower first and Allison is constantly forgetting full mugs of coffee in the Keurig and, on top of all that, their downstairs neighbor has complained like three times about all the noise they make before 9:00am, so they have to remember to walk very softly around the apartment. This effort is probably made less effective by the fact that Kevin shouts “Tiptoe!” at them every time he can hear a step from another room.

Wednesday nights, though, are usually pretty chill as a result. Allison doesn’t get home until eight-ish, after her evening class, so Neil and Kevin are in the habit of eating a couple of their meal-prepped dinners and distracting themselves from linguistics and history by watching old exy games. They’re currently working their way through the Brazilian games. Neither of them speaks Portugese, but exy is the same in every language. ‘Cherish’ is probably a stupid word, but it’s the closest one Neil has to the way he feels about exy Wednesdays with Kevin.

Anyway, Neil has grown very accustomed to the routine of his days, so he’s thrown when Kevin walks in the door on a Wednesday with a short blond guy trailing him.

“Hey,” Neil says, blinking from Kevin down to the guy with him.

“This is Andrew,” Kevin announces. “I met him in the library.”

“Uh,” Neil says, forcing himself to stop blinking at this really very unusual development. “Hey?”

“This is Neil,” Kevin says, gesturing towards him. “He’s the one.”

“The what?” Neil asks.

“The guy he said I should meet,” Andrew says. He doesn’t look particularly impressed. “I’m not impressed.”

Neil snorts a laugh. “So sorry to disappoint. Kevin?”

“He’s violent and doesn’t talk a lot. You’re violent and talk too much. It seemed like a good balance. Chicken and squash?”

Andrew looks from Neil to Kevin and then back again. The look on his face says translate.

“Dinner,” Neil explains. “We meal-prep. I think there’s steak with broccoli or a quinoa salad, if you’d prefer that.”

Andrew repeats the head swivel, landing back on Neil, and says, “No.”

“No?” Kevin asks from the kitchen.

“No I didn’t agree to come so you could feed me microwaved diet food. Did you bring me here to join a Crossfit cult?”

Neil knows the look on his face mirrors the disgust on Kevin’s.

“We can order something,” he says instead of lowering himself to answer Andrew’s accusation. Kevin can be tricky with ordering out, though, so there’s a limit to their range of options. It’s not that they never order pizza or tacos, but Wednesday nights are a beloved tradition and he doesn’t want to fuck it up by literally forcing cheese and bread down Kevin’s throat. He thinks quickly and then suggests, “Greek?”

Ten minutes later, Neil still has literally no idea why Kevin brought Andrew home with him. He’s mostly just...sitting there, watching them. He reveals very little, other than seeming genuinely—though silently—astonished by their very serious conversation about which salad they should order.

“Okay,” Neil says, once he’s finalized the order on his phone and they can turn their attention to the TV. “We’ve been watching Brazil’s 2005 exy season—”

“Absolutely not,” Andrew says. Neil sees Andrew turn a skeptical look on Kevin right before he gives him a matching one of his own.

Kevin just scowls at the TV and drops the remote on the side table.

“Okay,” Neil says. Between him and his two roommates, he is definitely not the socially adept one. Allison can lubricate almost any situation and Kevin has that quicksilver charm he can call on in the space of a breath. All Neil has going for him is a very keen eye for observation and a total lack of filter between his mouth and his brain. He tries to think of a neutral get-to-know-you question that someone good at people might ask. “You met in the library?”

Andrew gives him a disparaging look.

“Oh, sorry,” Neil says. “I must have failed to infer the whole story from that time Kevin said ‘I met him in the library.”

He thinks he sees the corner of Andrew’s mouth twitch, but it’s so fast he’s not sure.

“We were in the quiet study room,” Andrew says, shrugging. “Some people didn’t understand what quiet means.”

“Andrew threatened them with a knife,” Kevin adds. “It was great.”

Neil stares at them. “Incredible,” he says. “You are both so much worse at this than I am.”

“You like knives,” Andrew says.

Neil blanches. “I wouldn’t say like.”

“I said good with,” Kevin interrupts. “I didn’t say like.”

Neil narrows his eyes in Andrew’s direction. “Did you come here because a stranger told you his roommate was good with knives?”

Andrew shrugs. Neil has no idea to do with this information. Is Andrew a serial killer? Does Andrew think he’s a serial killer? Is he hoping they’ll serially kill together? Neil squints at him, studying him very closely. Probably not, he decides. And he really should know. He’s met quite a few.

“Okay. Let’s go then.” Neil says, straightening off the couch suddenly. Andrew’s eyes follow him as he moves but he says nothing.

“Go?” Kevin asks. “Where? The food is coming.”

Neil jogs down the hallway to his bedroom and pulls his shoes on then digs out his bundle of knives from his nightstand.

“The food,” Kevin says, with emphasis, when Neil returns to the living room.

“We’ll be right back,” Neil says. He heads straight for the door without even bothering to ask Andrew to come. Once they’re outside, past the well-maintained lobby of the building, Neil leads him down the block to a small park that is deserted at this late afternoon hour. He picks a reasonably secluded spot among the trees, rolls his bundle open on the ground, and selects one of the knives. It’s nice, but the sheen of the blade is dull. He hasn’t spent any time cleaning or polishing them. It makes him a little uneasy to touch them that lovingly.

Neil points the tip of the blade at Andrew, and then at the tree they’re about eight feet from—as clear a pay attention as if he’d said it out loud. He rotates his wrist a couple of times, getting refamiliarized with the weight and balance of the blade, and then he flicks it expertly towards the tree.

He watches Andrew turn to see the knife buried square in the middle of the trunk, its handle still quivering. He watches it for a moment and then turns back to Neil, his eyes hungry. “Teach me.”

“Maybe,” Neil says, tilting his head to the side to study Andrew. “Show me what you can do.”

Andrew glares at him a little, but Neil stays calm and waits him out. Eventually, he ducks and picks up one of the blades, wiping it off on his shirt a little judgmentally.

Neil keeps a careful eye on the movement of Andrew’s wrist, on his hold on the handle of the knife, on the way he balances his weight on his feet. Andrew makes a clumsy but not totally wrong movement and throws the knife. It misses the tree by about an inch, spinning uselessly beyond it and into the snow.

Andrew glares at it.

“Not bad,” Neil says.

“What are your criteria?” Andrew asks scathingly.

“It didn’t end up in me,” he answers.

Neil is pretty sure the face Andrew is making at him is exasperated. He hides the smile that wants to creep up.

“We’ll have to pick another time,” Neil says, pulling out his phone to check the clock. “Kevin will kill me if the food beats us home.”

“You had a boy here?” Allison demands. “Without me?”

Kevin shrugs. “We had a person here. I believe he identifies as male.”

Allison turns on Neil, like he’s going to be of any more help.

“I don’t think you’d be into him,” he says thoughtfully. “He’s way shorter than you.”

“How way is way?”

“Uh, he was shorter than me, so maybe like 5’1? I don’t know.”

“I could work with that,” Allison muses. “Other than that, was he hot?”

Neil stares blankly at her. He can feel Kevin doing the same thing next to him.

“You two,” she says, shaking her head. “You are so useless to me. Why do I let you live here?”

“You need a stabilizing force in your life,” Kevin says. “Without us you’d have diet coke and weed for breakfast every morning.”

“And too many parties,” Neil adds. “People would steal your stuff.”

“He was blond,” Kevin says. “Short and blond. Hazel eyes, maybe? Objectively attractive, I suppose.”

“Hmmm,” Allison says. “I could have a miniature version of me for a boyfriend. That could be fun. Is he coming back?”

Kevin says “No” at the same time that Neil says “Yes.”

They both look at him in surprise.

“He asked me to teach him to throw knives,” Neil explains. “He’s coming over Saturday morning.” Ask is a very generous term for what Andrew had actually done, which was something more like demand. He doesn’t think it would go over as well with Kevin and Allison as it had with him, though, so he fudges it a little.

“Okay,” Allison says. She claps her hands together. “I can work with that. I’m dewy as fuck in the mornings.”

Neil keeps his skepticism to himself. He doesn’t think Allison and Andrew will like each other very much at all, let alone enough to date. Andrew is quiet and cutting and seems impassive if you don’t notice the gleam of amusement in his eye as people around him react to his lack of reaction. Allison is—not loud, that's not the right word, but she takes up a lot of space. Like neon or helium, she expands to fill the shape of her container. It means she’s never ‘too much,’ whatever that means, but that it’s impossible to ignore her if you’re in a room with her. It’s one of Neil’s favorite things.

Andrew, on the other hand, seems to have a well-honed expertise at ignoring. Neil thinks that could be explosive.

But then again, what the fuck does he know about sexual chemistry?

“Eleven,” Neil says. “He’ll be here around eleven.”

As it happens, he sees Andrew sooner—that Friday, mid-afternoon, when Andrew suddenly drops down across the table from him in the quiet study room. Neil looks up, blinks to clear the haze of early-70’s sociolinguistic theory from his eyes, and recognizes him. He opens his mouth to say hello but Andrew reaches across and grabs his chin before he can speak, turning Neil’s face towards one of the ‘Quiet Study Room’ signs posted around the room.

Neil swats at Andrew’s hand, but he keeps his mouth shut and ducks his head back towards his photocopied pages so that Andrew will maybe not notice that he’s smiling.

They sit in absolute silence until Neil starts packing up his books and shoving them into his bag. He’s interrupted by Andrew dropping a phone on top of Neil’s notebook. It’s unlocked and on an empty ‘Add Contact’ screen. He looks at Andrew closely, just to confirm that he, like, wants Neil to add his phone number. Andrew’s totally blank expression isn’t much help, so after a second or two Neil just shrugs and picks it up, tapping in his contact info: name, phone number, email.

He’s barely through the big front doors of the library when his phone buzzes with a text from an unknown number: three knife emojis. Neil stops to smile at it and gets knocked into hard from behind as just punishment for standing in the middle of a walkway—he ducks to the side of the door and saves Andrew’s number, using the knife emoji instead of his name.

The next morning, Neil is up by seven and home with eight miles under his belt by nine. He creeps quietly in the door, kicking off his shoes in the entrance and walking in socked feet down the hall so his footsteps don’t wake Kevin or Allison.

The benefit of this is that he’s in the shower before Kevin wakes up—he walks out in his towel and nods at Kevin, who’s leaning against the opposite wall looking bleary and very put upon.

“Pace?” Kevin asks.

“About six-fifteen,” Neil says. Kevin smiles sleepily and fistbumps him on his way into the bathroom. Neil changes and, adhering to another of their routines, goes to make them a couple of smoothies. He’s throwing some sliced banana on top of the kale when Kevin wanders back out.

“Allison is up,” Kevin says. “Primping.”

“Already?” Neil checks the clock on the microwave, surprised to see that it’s already 9:45. He’s come to respect that sometimes it takes an hour or two to achieve perfection. “Do you think they’ll hit it off?”

Kevin gives him a you’re an idiot look.

Neil laughs and takes the almond milk Kevin hands him, adding it and then tossing in the chopped apples.

“They could. They’re both…” Neil isn’t sure how to finish that sentence. Pretty, maybe? He’s not usually interested, but he’s also not blind, and he’s heard Kevin and Allison discuss the finer points of people’s attractiveness enough to know, generally, where people fall on that scale.

The doubt on Kevin’s face intensifies. “Do you think that’s all it takes?”

“Well,” Neil says. “No, I guess not.”

“Because by that logic, the three of us would be fucking nonstop.”

“Hard pass.”

Kevin snorts. “He might be kind of a dick. It’s hard to tell.”

“Yeah,” Neil says, “but so was Seth and it took Allison forever to dump him.”

“Boys,” Allison says, breezing into the kitchen. She’s wearing a ratty old t-shirt so faded that the design is unreadable and her hair is in some kind of weird rubber curlers, but one of her eyes is expertly made up with lightly shimmery, natural looking shadow. “What do you think? Too much?”

“Entirely,” Kevin says. “He is an angry midget. If you really want one, dating Neil would be much more efficient.”

They both flip him off.

“It looks nice,” Neil says. “Smoothie?”

“Sweet boy,” Allison says. “Definitely not.” She fucks up his hair, then Kevin’s, escaping before either of them can mess with hers in revenge.

When the knock comes, Allison shoos Kevin over to answer it. She’s perched artfully on one of the barstools, barefoot and changed into some kind of matching pajama shorts and tank top thing. It’s light pink. It’s lined in white lace. Neil thinks it’s a little much but, again, what the fuck does he know about seduction?

Kevin opens the door wide for Andrew and steps aside, gesturing grandly into the room. “You brought this on yourself.”

Andrew steps in, blank-faced, not at all moved by the spectacle Kevin’s outstretched arm promises.

Neil stays on the couch to watch the show, comfortable and bundled in a pair of soft joggers and one of Allison’s Parsons hoodies. His shoes are on. He’s actually polished his knives. He’s absolutely ready to go. But he’s not upset about watching this first.

“You must be Andrew,” Allison says brightly. “Kevin wasn’t wrong about you.”

Andrew looks from Allison to Kevin, eyes slightly narrowing.

“Can I get you something?” Allison asks. “Coffee? Tea? I make a mean smoothie.”

Kevin snorts.

Neil just watches her. He hasn’t seen her full frontal assault in the light of day before. Her eyes are slightly too wide, her calf muscles accentuated by the way she’s propped her feet on the rung of the stool. She’s leaning forward just enough that a hint of cleavage shows. The angle emphasizes the hollows above her collarbones.

“I’m gay,” Andrew says bluntly. He turns to Neil. “Are you ready?”

“Ready,” Neil confirms. He pops off the couch and shrugs at Allison as he passes her. Kevin looks like he’s about to burst into uncontrollable laughter—Neil is almost sad he won’t be here to see Allison yell at him for it.

Instead of the park, Neil takes Andrew on the subway a few stops to a row of abandoned shops. Andrew follows him to the back and watches without comment as Neil picks the locks on what he thinks used to be a kids clothing store.

He watches Andrew walk to the center of it and turn in a slow circle, looking carefully at everything before he turns back to Neil and raises an eyebrow.

Neil shrugs. “It’s easier to pull knives out of drywall than wood. Plus—” he produces a box of chalk from the pocket of his hoodie. “We can draw targets.”

Andrew gives him what he interprets as a skeptical look, but Neil ignores it in favor of drawing a roughly 5’ by 5’ grid on the dark blue wall and numbering the squares one through twenty.

“A lot of it is distance,” Neil explains. “Though you can work around that a little with speed, of course.” He shows Andrew the hand placement he learned, the movement, and then stands next to him with the knives in his hands so Andrew can practice. Neil carefully corrects his stance a few times, lightly touches his arm and guides him through the movement, and spends a while demonstrating how to be loose with your wrist before Andrew shoots him an exasperated look and starts throwing knives again instead of paying attention.

After about an hour, his knives are consistently impaling themselves into the wall at a solid angle. Neil goes and collects all the knives from the wall. “Tell me which square you’re aiming for this time around. Then we can work on accuracy.”

“How did you learn this?” Andrew asks.

“My father,” Neil says. “He was basically a mob enforcer. He liked knives.”

He says this evenly, with none of the bush-beating or shame of his late teens and earlier twenties. Andrew shoots him a level glance and then nods, turning back to the grid.

“Fourteen,” he says. The knife lands in eight. He scowls.

“Fourteen,” Andrew says again. It takes him three tries to land it in the right square, but he does it. He turns to Neil, face mostly blank but with the shine of triumph in his eyes.

“That’s great,” Neil tells him. “It took me way longer.”

“How old were you?” Andrew asks, looking skeptical.

“Well,” Neil says. “I was seven.”

Andrew takes another knife from his hand and points it at the grid. “One.”

By the time they leave, Andrew is consistently hitting the squares he’s aiming for. They’re spread around the corners, not all hitting near center, but Neil is still impressed.

“It just takes practice,” he explains as they pack up. “A lot of hours of practice. To make it effortless.”

Andrew looks from him to the wall. “We’ll come back next week.”

Neil, oddly, feels pleased by this. Andrew doesn’t need him in order to practice. He can use his own knives or buy ones meant for throwing. Strictly speaking, he didn’t actually need Neil to learn in the first place. He obviously has access to YouTube. “Yeah,” he says. “Okay.”

They lock the back door behind them and Neil turns to find Andrew standing much closer than he’d expected. Andrew says, “Lunch?” very casually.

Neil takes a minute to try to decide if Andrew is just being polite or if he actually wants them to go. He figures Andrew is not a person who would offer to do something he didn’t want to do out of obligation or good manners.

“Yes,” Neil says. “As long as it’s somewhere with a menu that would make Kevin faint.”

Tuesday afternoon, Neil walks into the grad study room and spots Kevin and Andrew sitting at one of the prime tables in the corner, partially obscured by the glass water wall that is supposed to produce soothing sounds but mostly just ensures that people have to take a lot more bathroom breaks than they normally would.

Kevin looks up, spots him, and starts clearing the scattered books off the table beside him. Neil folds himself carefully into the seat and peeks at what the other two are working on. Kevin seems to be covering the pages of his reading with an intense color-coded highlighter scheme. Andrew has a laptop but is ignoring it in favor of the open book in front of him. Neil sees no pens or highlighters or evidence of note-taking.

Neil, on the other hand, has a paper to write, so he opens his laptop, sets his books next to it, and stares at the cursor.

“Essay?” Kevin asks.

“Literacy and inequality,” Neil answers. “You?”

“Leading the class discussion on this,” Kevin says, gesturing to the pages in front of him like Neil would understand their contents with anything short of a History for Dummies book. “The guy who did it last week was obviously just winging it.” His face creases in distaste.

“He’ll feel like an idiot,” Neil says solemnly.

He turns his gaze to Andrew, who seemed to be ignoring them but who lifts his head immediately when Neil looks at him. Andrew says, in that very specific voice grad students use to name the seminal texts in their fields, “Theorizing the Neoliberal Welfare State for Social Work.”

“We’re going to go to the student center for dinner in a couple of hours,” Kevin says. “After the rush dies down. So we’re getting as much done as we can now.”

Neil and Kevin have always worked well together. They share a similar ability to focus completely on the task in front of them. When they’ve tried to add a third to their study sessions in the past, it’s usually gone poorly—Neil loves Allison, but they very quickly learned they couldn’t all three sit around in the living room to work if they hoped to get shit done. Andrew, though? Andrew being there feels natural. Neil finds his eyes drifting to him instead of unfocusing on the wall when he needs to think something through before writing it. About half the time, when he looks at Andrew, Andrew is already looking at him. It should probably be distracting, but it isn’t; Neil just lets his eyes wander over Andrew’s features while his mind works.

There aren’t a lot of people Neil likes to have around. The idea that Kevin happened to find one by way of stabbing threats in the library is ludicrous. And yet.

He wraps up a first draft of his essay about five minutes before Kevin’s designated dinner break. He spends those five minutes stretching his arms out and rereading, making the occasional face when his points are muddy or he’s put too much sentence into a sentence. He has his arms clasped behind his back and stretched out as much as possible, his face uncomfortably close to his screen, when Andrew taps a pen on the books next to Neil.

“I can read it,” Andrew says. “If you want.”

“Yeah?” Neil says. “Thanks, that would be great.”

Allison twirls a little in front of them, smoothing down the flared skirt of her strapless red satin dress.

“I don’t know,” Kevin says. “It might be a little fancy for a house party.”

“But it’s a house party of fashion students,” Allison points out. “Won’t they be fancier?”

“Or will they be less fancy and you’ll look like you’re trying too hard?”

Allison turns to Neil with a questioning expression.

He shrugs. “You look like you’re going to a cocktail party on tv.”

She taps her finger against her chin a couple of times and then turns on her heel, heading back for her bedroom. The next time she comes out, she’s in black joggers, a loose t-shirt that’s randomly less opaque in some places, and what looks like half a dozen scarves.

“You overcorrected,” Kevin says.

When Allison looks at Neil, he says, “You look like that girl in the movie with the dreams.”

“You’re lucky you’re basically a baby animal,” Allison says. “Otherwise I don’t know what you’re good for.”

“You get to practice dressing him up,” Kevin muses. “And he’s an excellent squash partner.”

Neil shrugs. “Just find something that makes Kevin want to bone you.”

“Gross,” they say in unison. Neil smiles innocently at them.

The next time she comes out, she’s in a long, pleated skirt in a robin’s egg blue. It’s sheer enough that Neil can clearly see the outline of her legs when the light hits her. She’s topped it with what Neil has been told repeatedly is a crop top—it looks like a miniature sweater to him, but the color matches the skirt exactly. She gives another little twirl.

Kevin watches her closely, then nods. “Perfect.”

She turns to Neil and gestures at herself expectantly.

“Yeah,” Neil says. “It’s nice.”

“High praise,” Allison says drily.

They watch her float out the door.

“Speaking of squash,” Kevin says, “the gym is still open a few hours.”

Neil says, “I’ll get my shoes.”

He’s rereading his essay when he notices a little picture of Andrew pop up on the toolbar. He sees Andrew’s red cursor appear in the middle of his first paragraph. He watches, riveted, as it occasionally pops up in different places. The cursor highlights one of the thesis lines in his first paragraph—Andrew must be about to write a comment. Neil clicks on the chat bubble and types you're up late. The highlight disappears. A minute later, Neil’s phone buzzes with a message.

🔪: google docs chat really?

N: we were both there

🔪: we are also both here
🔪: were you watching me?

N: you make that sound dirty

🔪: you must watch very weird porn

Neil chews his thumbnail. Eventually, he closes his laptop and puts it on his nightstand.

N: I closed my computer

🔪: too late
🔪: you killed the mood

N: it’s my special talent

🔪: knives and mood killing?

N: yeah
N: what are yours

🔪: being menacing
🔪: and telling idiots they’re idiots

N: you forgot glaring

🔪: 🖕

Neil grins and hovers his fingers over the keypad on his phone. He knows how to text, of course, because it’s the 21st century. He just doesn’t do a lot of conversational texting. What does the emoji mean? Is that a goodbye? Neil doesn’t think he wants it to be one, so he types something else. Texting shame is lost on him anyway.

N: why don’t you like exy?

🔪: why would anyone like exy?

N: best sport ever

🔪: useless category
🔪: useless honorific

N: so what do you watch?

🔪: the news
🔪: documentaries

N: is that why you look so bored all the time?

🔪: okay fine
🔪: weird comedies
🔪: and I read a lot

N: I’d say that’s obvious but I don’t think you mean grad school

🔪: what is wrong with you

N: I get that a lot

🔪: I would ask what you do but I think I can guess
🔪: sports

N: guilty
N: did undergrad on a track scholarship
N: Kevin and I play squash

🔪: oh okay
🔪: jock
🔪: go to sleep
🔪: I’ll try to remove the ball references from your paper

Neil stares at his screen until it goes dark. It’s been a really long time since he made a new friend. And to be totally honest, he’s not usually a very active participant in the process. He just tends to get adopted by people. Andrew is different. Andrew is definitely not adopting him. He’s not sure what it is instead, though. Andrew doesn’t seem particularly interested in befriending anyone, and yet he’s folded seamlessly in with Kevin and Neil.

He resists the urge to open his laptop back up and watch Andrew edit. Instead, he plugs his phone in and wills himself to sleep.

He comes back from a mid-morning run to find Allison perched on a barstool waiting for him. “Neil!” she exclaims. “Get ready. We’re going to get pedicures.”

Neil considers himself—it was a light four-mile run and the weather is cool, so he’s not actually gross. “Sure,” he says. “I’ll go change.”

“I left clothes on your bed.” She smiles brightly at him. “None of them are denim shorts.”

“It’s been a year,” Neil complains.

“Josten, I will still be mentioning it at your funeral. Now hurry up. I want to get the good chairs.”

The good chairs are, as Neil well knows, the ones near the front where you can see and hear what everyone else is getting done. They’re still open when they get there, so Allison hustles Neil over to the color wall, grabbing a deep purple for herself and holding up a few bottles in front of Neil’s face until she decides on a pale blue. The glass bottles clink together as Allison closes them both in her hand and bee-lines for the chairs she wants, directing Neil into the chair closest to the window and taking the one with a better view of the room.

Neil obediently pushes up his sweats and puts his feet in the hot, bubbling water.

“So,” Allison says. She reaches over and takes the remote control for his chair. “Tell me about this hot guy you keep hanging out with.”

“Andrew?”

“Aha! So you admit he’s hot.”

Neil considers. ‘Hot’ isn’t usually a word he uses to describe people. “I mean, he’s attractive. But so are you and Kevin. And Matt. Wait, don’t tell Matt I said that.”

“It would be too cruel to lead him on,” Allison says brightly. “But hot and attractive are different.”

“Are they?”

Allison sighs. “Attractive is….oh, look, a person whose features are objectively well put together. Hot is like, oh look, that person and I should definitely be touching. Maybe with our faces.”

“So you’re asking if I want to touch Andrew’s face with my face?”

“You are totally hopeless. But yes.”

Neil thinks about it. The answer, surprisingly, is not an immediate no. He thinks about what it might be like to be that close to Andrew. To share space with his warm, muscular body. To be breathing his air. It sounds...good, actually.

“Ugh,” Allison says. “You look like you’re writing a thesis. I guess that’s a no.”

Neil shrugs. It’s not a no. It’s a maybe. It’s also irrelevant. As far as he can tell—and he has gotten better about it the last few years—Andrew is not hitting on him. Not in any way Neil can recognize. But one great thing about being ambivalent about sex and dating is that you don’t really have to worry about getting all invested in someone who isn’t interested. He’s seen friends go down that road a few times and it looks like it sucks.

“You should meet him,” he says instead. “For real.”

“Invite him over,” she says breezily. “Or we could do brunch. Is he a brunch guy?”

Neil laughs.

Later, Neil opens his paper and looks for Andrew’s comments. He’s picked up on a few basic syntax things that need changing, several places where Neil puts together a sentence too convoluted to make his point, and even thrown in some questions and comments that really clarify what Neil was thinking. He grabs his phone and sends a text: thank you for editing. A few minutes later, he gets Andrew’s response.

🔪: it wasn’t terrible

N: if it was would you block my number?

🔪: yes

N: are we throwing knives saturday?

🔪: yes

N: do you want me to come to you?

🔪: yes
🔪: I know abandoned places we can destroy

N: send me the address
N: 11?
N: Allison told me to invite you to brunch

🔪: is she taking the gay thing too far?

N: there were other suggestions
N: board games
N: bowling
N: makeovers

🔪: terrible options

N: board games are fun
N: if you’re competitive
N: Kevin likes to win

🔪: I don’t care about winning
🔪: it just happens

N: wow
N: this should be fun

Neil wakes up a little later than usual Friday morning to a squash? text from Kevin. He could go for a run first, but then Kevin would probably beat him pretty easily, and no one wants that. He sends back a thumbs up and pulls on longer shorts and white-soled sneakers. Once they get onto a court, they swap victories a few times before switching to their favorite exercise: working together to see how long they can keep the ball in motion. They don’t quite make it to their record of 23 minutes, but they’re both drenched and breathing heavily by the end, so it’s a success.

Saturday morning, he makes his way to Andrew’s modest apartment. Andrew lets him in and watches him as he turns in a circle and looks at the room. It’s nice. Neil thinks it’s somewhere he’d live if he didn’t have roommates. There isn’t a lot of space, but Neil likes that about it. Everything is very contained. No one can sneak up on you.

“Take it in,” Andrew says blandly. “An apartment a grad student can actually afford.”

“Oh,” Neil says. He turns back around to look at Andrew and jams his hands into his pockets. “Our place is Allison’s. Her family is rich. We just pay the utilities and stuff.”

Andrew stays still and silent for a moment and then shrugs. “If you like that sort of thing.”

“Where are we going?” Neil asks. “Are you doing the breaking and entering this time?”

They end up having to scale a fence and a series of crates and equipment to step through a broken-out window into the second floor of an abandoned warehouse. There isn’t drywall here, but there is a lot of wood. He helps Andrew lean planks against the wall and hands over the chalk so Andrew can number them. This time, Andrew pulls out his own set of throwing knives—they are noticeably cleaner and more polished than Neil’s, but then, of course, they are brand new.

It’s a little tougher this time, because there are voids between the 6-inch planks and if you miss, the knife clatters uselessly against the stone wall behind. He can tell Andrew has been practicing, though, because he doesn’t miss very many.

It occurs to Neil again that he is not so much teaching Andrew knife throwing at this point so much as they’re hanging out and practicing together. Neil starts entertaining himself by seeing if he can throw his hard enough that it lodges in the wood and bounces the plank out of its lean.

Eventually, he wanders off and leaves Andrew to the throwing while he pokes around at the old equipment. He doesn’t notice the knives have stopped thudding into wood until he feels Andrew’s presence at his shoulder.

“The roof,” Andrew says, pointing towards the stairway door in the corner. Neil has learned enough about Andrew by now to know it’s an offer.

He jogs up the stairs and throws the door open. Andrew emerges a minute or two behind, puffing hard, and joins Neil to lean against the safety barrier. Almost immediately, he pulls a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and lights one up.

Neil clears his throat.

“Do not,” Andrew says suddenly, pointing the cigarette at him.

“Sorry.” Neil grins. He is not sorry. “Does Kevin know?”

Andrew averts his eyes quickly. “It hasn’t come up.”

“Well,” Neil says. “I support you. And your habit.”

He does not. And Andrew can obviously tell, because he carefully puts the cigarette pack and lighter away, freeing up his hand to flip Neil off.

At lunch, their phones buzz in unison. Curious, Neil picks his up to see a new group text from Kevin: Pub trivia monday. 7pm. Very important. Must dominate.

Allison has sent through thumbs-up and flexing arm emojis before Andrew has even unlocked his phone. Neil adds his own thumbs up and hits send in time to see Andrew make a vaguely disgusted face at his screen. He looks at Neil.

“Better than brunch?” Neil asks.

Andrew scowls back at his phone and taps at the screen quickly. A whale and a burrito appear on Neil’s screen, followed almost immediately by three little pulsing dots.

What does that mean?, Kevin sends. Is that a yes? Are you even good at trivia?

Neil watches his screen closely for a response, even though he can see that Andrew hasn’t touched his phone again.

Andrew, Kevin sends. What does whale burrito mean? Are you going to be there? I have to beat this third-year asshole.

Neil looks up at Andrew, who is holding his phone loosely in one hand and putting together a bite of curry with the other. He makes no move to touch the screen.

It doesn’t matter. I decided. You’ll be there.

Finally, Andrew taps his screen. He takes another second to flip through his options and then sends, without any commentary, the emoji of an arm holding a phone.

The three little dots appear, disappear, then appear again. Neil watches Andrew smirk as he sets down his phone.

Neil starts laughing so hard tears squeeze out of his eyes; he gasps for breath as Andrew ignores him in favor of picking around the vegetables in his bowl.

Monday night, Neil walks into the living room to head to trivia and is immediately turned bodily around by Allison.

“No,” she says. “Absolutely not.”

“What?” he looks down at his clothes, which are usually her problem. They’re fine. He’s in regular jeans and an NYU sweatshirt. These are normal clothes. “These are normal clothes.”

“You look like you’re going to the post office,” Allison says. “To get something notarized.”

“That is weirdly specific. They’re just jeans.”

He knows better than to fight her or Kevin on his wardrobe at this point, though, so he sits obediently on his bed while she flips quickly through his closet—well, through the part of his closet that’s full of clothing she has bought him. She tosses a pair of lightly ripped black skinny jeans at him and turns back to his shirts while he changes into them.

“I’d pick something slinkier,” Allison muses, “if it wasn’t some Kevin Day history nerd shit. So we’ll do a button-up.”

She tosses him a dark gray short-sleeved shirt with a floral print. He strips off his hoodie and starts to button it up over his New York Mercury shirt, but Allison makes a chastising noise without even looking away from the closet.

“Okay,” she says, while he strips off his shirt and starts buttoning the new one. “I can put you in one of these awesome sport coats you never wear or my leather jacket.” She turns, expectantly, for Neil’s opinion. He just looks at her blankly.

“Fine,” she sighs. “I swear, that face is such a waste on you. I’ll grab you something of mine.”

Something of hers turns out to be some sort of jacket that’s mostly denim but has knit sleeves and a hood. He dutifully puts it on and turns in a circle for her.

“Good,” she says, reaching out to gently muss his hair. “Much better. You can be seen in public with me.”

He looks at Kevin, assuming he’ll be irritated with the delay, but Kevin just shrugs. “Image is important,” he says. “Now you’re worth looking at.”

“Thanks,” Neil says drily.

Andrew is already there when they arrive. The streetlight to his left lights him dramatically. Neil is drawn, moth-like, to the golden glow around him. Something with a million wings comes alive in his core. Andrew is leaning against the wall with one foot braced out and the other flat against the bricks behind him. He’s smoking a cigarette. He’s in tight black jeans and a black jacket. Neil stops and stares—he looks like a fucking movie poster. If it was anyone else, he’d think they’d posed for dramatic effect.

He’s still standing frozen when Andrew looks up and spots them. Andrew takes a last drag on his cigarette and drops it to the ground to crush beneath his boot.

Neil feels starstruck. He watches Andrew walk towards them. He watches Andrew’s eyes slowly take him in from head to toe. He’s still staring dumbly at the gold in Andrew’s eyes when he hears Kevin say, “You smoke?”

“Nope,” Andrew says.

“You—” Kevin starts, but Andrew interrupts him without looking away from Neil.

“I came,” Andrew says. “You’re welcome.”

He gestures for Kevin to lead the way but hangs back, casually blocking Neil from following until Allison has fallen into second place. Neil winds through the crowd after Allison, sliding into a booth before Andrew and feeling like he’s been herded. It’s not really a bad feeling, since he’s been herded to a comfortable, dimly-lit booth with three of the very short list of people he likes most in the world. His toes bump blindly against other shoes beneath the table. Andrew is somehow so close that Neil can feel the heat radiating off of him but still far enough away that their sleeves aren’t even brushing.

Allison, across from them, looks intently at Andrew and then back at Neil.

Neil does not like the look on her face.

Luckily for him, Kevin starts talking before she has the opportunity to say anything—at least for now.

“That guy,” he says, pointing discreetly towards a table in the middle of the room. “In the hoodie. He’s my nemesis. Don’t look.”

They all, of course, look—three heads swiveling in unison to stare at a guy in jeans and an NYU hoodie. Neil can’t decide if he should use this as grounds to protest their earlier judgment of his clothes, or if their point has just been irrevocably proven. The guy, unsurprisingly noticing a table of people staring at them, gives Kevin a little wave.

Kevin buries his head in his hands. “Now we really have to win.”

They win. They win the fuck out of trivia. Allison has basically all of pop culture covered. Kevin is a walking history textbook. Neil wouldn’t say he’s the most well-rounded member of the group, but he has an excellent grasp on geography. And Andrew...Andrew is a revelation. He knows about the 2018 Convention on the legal status of the Caspian Sea. He knows that the Starland Vocal Band sang the 1976 hit “Afternoon Delight.” He can name all nine of Michael Jackson’s siblings.

By the end of the night Kevin is sloshed and heaping praise on Andrew. When he tries to sling an arm around him, though, Andrew quickly and deliberately shoves him off. Kevin is too drunk to mind; instead, he holds his arms up Rocky-style and does a very undignified victory dance as they await their hard-won prize: four tickets to see the new Top Gun movie in IMAX.

Neil dodges Kevin’s waving arms and slots himself against the bar next to Andrew instead.

“I think he loves you now,” Neil says. “He doesn’t even have notes. I’m jealous.”

Andrew gives him a very unimpressed look.

“Really,” Neil says. “He once gave me a PowerPoint on the most efficient way to store my shampoo in the shower.”

Andrew, as blank-faced as if Neil hadn’t said a single word, lifts his hand and very precisely picks up the hoodie-string of Neil’s jacket, rubbing it between his fingertips. He tugs at it lightly once, then again.

Which is, of course, when Allison arrives and slings an arm around Neil’s shoulders. “Boys,” she says lightly, in contrast to the shark-like way she’s eyeing Andrew. “I’d say we should after-party but I’m pretty sure we all have class tomorrow.”

When Andrew puts Neil’s hoodie string down, he does so very carefully. His knuckles brush Neil’s chest.

“Oh no,” Allison says when she comes home and finds Neil and Kevin sprawled on the floor, color-coding a calendar. “Not another training schedule.”

“Half marathon,” Neil confirms.

Kevin points a green highlighter at her and says, “You should sign up.”

“Hard pass,” Allison says lightly. She steps easily over Kevin’s torso and Neil’s legs to flop onto the couch. “I will stick with Soul Cycle and not shitting myself in public, thanks.”

“We’ll do core training days on Sunday,” Kevin says. He drops the green highlighter and picks up a pale pink one. “You can join us for that.”

“Deal,” Allison says. She turns enough to drop one foot and wave it at Neil in an obvious demand for a foot rub. Obediently, he sits up, sets his back against the couch, and allows her to drape her leg over his shoulder so he can start massaging.

“Andrew and I will come,” she says. “We’ll make glittery signs with your names on them and hold them up at the finish line.”

Even Kevin stops highlighting to consider the likelihood of that. “You know,” he says, tapping the highlighter against the calendar, “I can’t decide if he would actually never or if he would do it just to be unpredictable.”

“Neil,” Allison demands, holding her hand out, “give me your phone. We’ll find out.”

She types for a disconcertingly long time. Neil only remembers the massage when she shakes her foot up and down at him.

She keeps typing. Neil keeps rubbing.

Eventually, Allison tosses the phone gently to the carpet beside Neil and says, “He’ll be there.”

“Do they make black glitter?” Neil asks.

“Yes,” Kevin and Allison say in perfect unison.

Later, in his room, Neil picks up his phone and opens his messages with Andrew.

N: this is Allison.
N: our boys are doing a half marathon in a few months and I cordially invite you to join me at the finish line with t-shirts and glittery signs to humiliate them with our love.

🔪: not interested

N: bullshit

🔪: why would I be?

N: you don’t fool me
N: plus
N: sweaty men in small shorts
N: and we get to go home with 2 of them
N: and of course my sparkling company

🔪: not convinced
🔪: will there be food

N: even Kevin eats like a king after

🔪: I will not hold a sign

N: t-shirt it is

🔪: 🔪🔪

N: don’t worry I’ll make it goth
N: 😘

He taps his fingers on the back of his phone rapidly, trying to decide what to follow that up with. Like, what is Andrew trying to fool anyone with? And what the hell kind of t-shirt does Allison think can be sparkly and goth? Is Andrew even goth?

N: you don’t have to wear a shirt

🔪: too late I committed

N: Allison says they make black glitter

🔪: they do
🔪: I have the nail polish

N: I’ve never seen you in nail polish

🔪: come over tomorrow
🔪: I’ll do yours

N: 4:30 okay?
N: I can bring food

🔪;: yes
🔪: bring me more Greek

Their place, Andrew’s place, and NYU form a triangle—well, technically, any three points form a triangle, but this triangle is fairly evenly spaced. Neil is knocking on Andrew’s front door less than forty minutes after he gets out of class, the Greek food he’d called ahead to order hanging from his arm. He’s been here before, when he’d picked Andrew up to throw knives, but they hadn’t spent any significant time inside. Still, it feels familiar when Andrew lets him in.

He doesn’t resist as Andrew immediately claims the bag of food, instead occupying himself with a closer look at the apartment. The tiny living room is mostly dominated by a desk that Andrew has covered with an impressive amount of paper. There’s a small couch—maybe a loveseat—across from a TV so large it looks comically out of scale. Neil spots a door that he suspects leads to a bedroom, but he’s not going to stick his head in there unless Andrew invites him to.

“Sit,” Andrew says as he emerges from the closet-sized kitchen with the food in his hands and a couple of bottles of water. He gestures with his full hands in the direction of the couch, so Neil goes and carefully presses himself into its far corner, the one that looks less used.

“This TV is bigger than ours,” Neil says. “You should let us come watch exy on it sometime.”

Andrew gives him exactly the look he’d expected to get.

Neil beams at him.

“Eat,” Andrew says. He picks up his phone and presses some buttons and then some kind of chill electronicish music is playing from a speaker somewhere. The room is so small it could honestly be coming from anywhere.

He thinks it should be awkward, sitting on a tiny couch with Andrew eating in relative silence. They’re so new to each other, it shouldn’t be as comfortable as it would be with Allison or Kevin or even Dan and Matt. Somehow it just...is. Their knees press together a little, spreading warmth all the way up Neil’s leg. Andrew notices that he’s not eating his peppers and starts stealing them right off his plate.

The very moment they finish, Andrew is clearing the plates away and dumping everything off somewhere in the kitchen. He comes back with a little bag and a bottle of black nail polish.

“Hands,” he says, holding his own out expectantly.

Neil obediently places his in Andrew’s, who lifts them and examines them very closely.

“Your cuticles could be worse,” Andrew says.

“Kevin and Allison are big on moisturizing.”

Andrew nods, approvingly, Neil thinks, and then sits sideways on the couch next to him. Neil turns so they can be facing each other, his hands still lightly held in Andrew’s warm, dry palms. Andrew squeezes some kind of oily shit around his nails and tells him to rub it in. Neil does this and then watches, fascinated, as Andrew uses some kind of rubber spatula thing to push at what he has been told are cuticles.

“Wash,” Andrew says once he’s finished. “Bathroom is through there.”

When his hands are very clean he comes back and sits cross-legged on the couch facing Andrew. He puts his hands very carefully on Andrew’s leg where he points and then watches as Andrew starts carefully and precisely painting a base coat on each nail.

“You’re good at this,” Neil says. “How did you learn?”

“I was gay and emo as a teenager,” Andrew says drily. “How do you think?”

“As a teenager?”

“Fuck you,” Andrew says easily. “What were you like?”

“Not emo.”

Andrew gives him another of his don’t be stupid looks.

“I was really weird,” Neil says. “My mom and I were on the run from my father, so we never stayed anywhere long and my hair was always dyed and I always had brown contacts in.”

Andrew looks up at that, straight into Neil’s now blue eyes. “She was trying to make you forgettable?”

Neil shrugs. “I have my father’s eyes and hair. Anyway, I had no hobbies other than staying alive. Friends were a liability. Good grades were a liability. Bad grades were a liability, too. Most sports were out of the question, but running was okay. Good practice, I guess.”

He watches as Andrew finishes the clear coat on his left pinky and ducks his head to blow smoothly back and forth across Neil’s fingertips.

“We should play a game,” Andrew says, between streams of air.

“What kind?”

“Truth game. You tell me something true, I tell you something true.”

“True like everything you knew at trivia last week? Because I might have to do some research.”

“No,” Andrew says, sighing. “Idiot. True like you were on the run from your mobster father and didn’t have any friends until you grew Kevin in a lab.”

“Oh. Okay.” Neil considers. “I might not be that good at this. I’m not very interesting.”

Andrew gives him a very exasperated look and picks up his bottle of black, sparkly nail polish to shake it. “Yes,” he deadpans. “I keep putting up with all of your stupidity because I enjoy how boring you are.”

“You do think I’m interesting,” Neil says slowly, realizing. “That might be the nicest thing anyone has ever implied about me.”

“Stay still,” Andrew says. He points the bottle of polish at Neil sternly. “Don’t fuck up my work.”

When he ducks his head, Neil can very clearly see the fan of Andrew’s golden blond lashes across his cheeks. He can count the individual freckles on Andrew’s nose. When he watches Andrew’s hands, he admires how steady they are—one curved under Neil’s fingers to hold them in place, the other very carefully applying polish in a three-stroke pattern. His fingers are wide and blunt, lightly calloused; they feel very warm where they’re tucked beneath Neil’s.

Later, when they’re all painted and blown on and Andrew has given Neil strict orders to keep his fucking hands still and not touch anything, he picks up his remote and points it at Neil. “One game,” he says. “And then you have to watch what I want.”

“Deal,” Neil says. “As long as it’s not baseball.”

The look Andrew gives him is more disparaging than the one he’d gotten when he asked about Exy the first time.

On his way through the living room at home, Neil tells Kevin, “Andrew has a 76” television at his place.”

Kevin immediately picks up his phone.

By the time Neil makes it to his bedroom, he has a text from Andrew: I hate you.

Kevin is a force of nature, so Neil fully expects they will be watching the play offs at Andrew’s apartment.

Instead, Kevin comes into Neil’s bedroom two days before the first game and flops dramatically onto his bed. “He’s being impossible.”

“Who?”

“Andrew.” Kevin squints an eye open at Neil accusingly. “Do something about it.”

“Do what?”

“Whatever,” Kevin says, waving his hand dismissively. “Either convince him or buy us a bigger TV.”

One of those things is way more doable on a grad student’s stipend, so Neil picks up his phone and opens his messages with Andrew. The last one is Neil’s most recent entry in the meme-off they’ve been having: an image of a coyote on a tree-lined pathway with the caption “Coyote $21,000 in debt after wandering through University campus.”

N: Kevin is asking me to conspire against you

🔪: Kevin isn’t giving me any incentives

N: so you can be bribed

🔪: make me an offer

N: I’ll order 100 lbs of junk food and if Kevin complains we make him listen from the kitchen

🔪: ice cream

N: yes

🔪: pizza

N: done

🔪: cupcakes

N: his head will explode

🔪: I’m in

“Okay,” Neil says, tucking his phone into his pocket. “We’re good for Thursday.”

Kevin squints at him again. “What did you do?”

“What did you do?”

“I explained how much more easily we’d be able to see the plays and footwork on a larger screen.”

“Oh,” Neil says. “Okay, that makes sense.”

“How did you convince him?”

“I promised him junk food. And that you wouldn’t complain about it.”

Kevin glares.

“Just think,” Neil says, “about how much better you’ll be able to see the plays and footwork. It will help you endure the cupcakes.”

“Cupcakes.”

“And pizza. And ice cream. And something else, really sweet. I haven’t decided yet.”

“Smoothie bowls?” Kevin asks hopefully.

“Delicious,” Neil says. “But no, definitely not.”

Neil dips into his blood money reservoirs to order a truly obscene amount of sugary food for the playoffs.

He and Kevin leave two hours early to make sure they can stop everywhere and pick their shit up: Dough for a half-dozen giant donuts, Apple Hills Creamery for 4 pints of ice cream, a dozen cupcakes, and Junior’s for the devil’s food cheesecake Neil has had them decorate with “exy sucks.”

They arrive, as planned, about fifteen minutes before the pizza is scheduled to be delivered. Neil is holding the box with the cheesecake, but he’s loaded Kevin up with all the other bags of desserts for the sake of enhancing the despair and impatience on his face.

It pays off—Andrew looks pleased when he opens the door.

“This is absurd,” Kevin tells him. “Neil could have just bought a bigger TV instead of all this shit.”

Andrew shrugs and reaches out to take the box from Neil’s hands. He opens it, reads the cake, and looks up at Neil, the corners of his mouth lifting. “We finally found something you’re good at.”

“Bribes?” Neil asks.

“He runs a sub-six-minute mile,” Kevin protests.

Andrew shrugs again. “Boring. Come in.”

Kevin is so awed by the size and proximity of Andrew’s TV that he doesn’t even complain about the food. He eats a couple of slices of pizza, has a cupcake, picks at a slice of cheesecake, and keeps his eyes trained on the screen when he’s not breaking down the teams’ techniques and strategies. Neil tries to keep up with Andrew, but it’s nearly impossible. He manages a small bowl of ice cream, half a donut, and a cupcake before he has to call it quits. He loses track of how much Andrew puts away.

During a commercial, Kevin eyes the almost empty pint in Andrew’s hand and says, “You don’t even do cardio, do you?”

“Gross,” Andrew says. He digs a little more ice cream from the bottom of the carton and eats it with great satisfaction.

“How do you eat like that?” Kevin asks. “And look like that?”

“Like what?” Neil asks, feigning ignorance. He keeps his eyes trained on Kevin but he can see Andrew smirk from his nest on the floor next to the couch.

Kevin glares. “You know what I mean.”

“I don’t,” Andrew says. “Please explain.”

“I hate you both,” Kevin says. “Stop talking over the game.”

Later that night, Andrew sends Neil a picture of himself on the couch, the whole remaining cheesecake on his lap; his feet are up on the coffee table. The TV looks like it’s playing that comedy cop show Andrew had made him watch at his house.

Neil sends back a photo—the book on his lap resting on his crossed legs, his ever-present water bottle on the duvet, the polish on his now mint-colored toes just visible.

He spends a while looking at Andrew’s photo, though. He doesn’t really know why, he just...wants to look at it. Andrew’s sleeves are short and his armbands are off. Neil can see the silvery lines of scar tissue Andrew had shown him on one turn of their truth game. He thinks Andrew’s pajama pants have tiny skulls with bows printed all over them. He likes Andrew’s hands, he realizes. There’s something weirdly comforting about them. Also, he realizes, he’s been looking at this picture way too long. He turns off the screen and drops it to the bed next to him, resolving to ignore it until he’s finished this chapter.

They’ve learned how important it is to cut all of the vegetables into consistently sized pieces. Their first go at this, they’d had an unpleasant mix of overcooked and undercooked sweet potatoes. Eight months in, Neil is pretty sure he can chop things into 1-inch cubes with his eyes closed. He adds the sweet potatoes to the cauliflower, carrots, broccoli, and fingerling potatoes, then dumps in olive oil and spices to toss them in. Next to him, Kevin is carefully trimming and seasoning chicken tenderloins; he’s already used foil to divide the baking tray into three separate compartments to keep their marinades and sauces from blending together. They have 25 identical bento boxes stacked and ready on the side of the counter, and are debating the virtues of quinoa versus wild rice when Allison arrives.

“We’re having a party tomorrow night,” she announces.

“We?” Kevin asks. He doesn’t even look up from the rub he’s preparing.

“Fine,” she says. “I am having a party and your attendance is required.”

“Will we know anyone at this party?” Kevin asks.

“You’ll know your date,” she answers airily. “Whoever that is. Neil, invite Andrew.”

Neil grabs his phone and tunes out of Allison and Kevin’s party negotiations in favor of opening his message with Andrew, typing gingerly with one finger to get as little olive oil and rosemary on his phone screen as possible.

N: apparently we’re having a party tomorrow night
N: you’re invited
N: but if you don’t want to come I can make up an excuse

🔪: I don’t need excuses
🔪: I just say no

N: I can try that but probably you’ll be having emergency oral surgery

🔪: I’ll come
🔪: what time?

N: she says 8:30
N: but
N: 8 if you want to help dress me
N: I don’t need help getting dressed
N: I do actually know how to put on clothes

🔪: 8

Within five minutes of his arrival, Andrew and Allison have apparently bonded for life over the impoverished state of Neil’s wardrobe. Allison sits him on the end of his bed and tells him to stay put, and then she and Andrew insert themselves into Neil’s closet and start sharing some kind of language of mutual acceptance and rejection that requires no words whatsoever.

“Here,” Allison says after a few minutes of hanger-clattering and exchanging grimaces with Andrew. “Go put this on.”

He takes the jeans and fairly basic looking shirt from her hands and looks at her suspiciously. “Are you trying to get rid of me so you can purge my closet again?”

From behind her, Andrew says, “Yes.” He points at the door in a way that entertains no arguments.

As he leaves, he thinks he hears Allison say, “No, he really likes that one.”

He’s doomed.

When he comes back a few minutes later, neither of them even bothers to look at the jeans and dark henley they’d sent him off with. There’s a new pile of clothing on the floor tucked discreetly between the closet and his nightstand.

“What’s in that pile?” he asks.

“Garbage,” Andrew says. He points at another set of clothes on the bed and then at the door again. “Try that.”

When he comes back this time, the pile is gone. Somehow, he doesn’t find that reassuring.

He says, “Um,” to get their attention, and then picks uncomfortably at the mesh-type fabric that’s clinging to his stomach. The jeans he’s wearing are so tight he’s pretty sure he couldn’t do even an 11-minute mile in them.

They both turn and survey him. Andrew’s eyes lock on Neil’s plucking fingers, but Allison scans him up and down with an increasingly skeptical eye. “I don’t know,” she says. “It’s a little too gay club.”

Andrew gives her a sardonic look.

“Fine,” she says, exasperated, “we’ll set it aside for when we do go to a gay club. But it’s going to be a little bright in here for that tonight. I don’t think he’s prepared for what he’d be advertising.”

“You guys,” Neil says. “I’m standing right here. You’re both literally just wearing clothes. This is nuts.”

He shrinks under the identical glares they give him. “Sorry, sorry. What’s next?”

“This is a $300 skirt,” Allison says. “Andrew’s shirt is vintage Valentino.”

Andrew points at the bed again. There’s a new pair of jeans and one of those short-sleeved button up shirts Allison likes putting on him so much. He grabs them and flees to the bathroom before they try to further impress upon him all of his ignorance about fashion.

This time, when he comes back, only Allison is there to greet him.

“Where’s Andrew?” he asks, as Allison smooths down his collar and adjusts the sleeves of his shirt.

“He stepped out,” she says vaguely. “He was right about this color on you, though. I don’t usually do the lighter rinse jeans, but with this shirt they really work. I’m going to buy you more emerald.”

“Stepped out to do what?” Neil asks.

“I like him,” Allison says, dodging the question expertly. “I trust him with you.”

“He followed Kevin home the first time because he thought I might like stabbing people.”

“When you find your tribe, you grab them and hold on with both hands.”

He hears Andrew’s footsteps in the hall before he can even being to interpret what Allison meant by any of that, and then she’s turning him around by his shoulders to face the door. “What do you think?” she asks.

Andrew’s eyes are very serious as he examines Neil’s outfit. He seems to linger over all the details. Eventually, he nods and says, “Good.”

Predictably, he gets separated from Andrew amidst the crowds of Allison’s fashion school friends. He’s fielding his second or maybe third offer to be a menswear muse when he finally spots Andrew through the window—or, at least, Andrew’s hand, tapping his cigarette over the edge of the fire escape. He excuses himself (probably) (he thinks) and beelines for his bedroom so he can climb out and join Andrew.

Andrew’s back is against the wall, which leaves most of him tucked in the shadows. He’s a lot less visible there than he would be closer to the railing which, Neil assumes, is exactly why he’s done it. When Andrew finally acknowledges his presence, he just rolls his head toward him, leaving it tipped back against the wall. His eyes meet Neil’s. He blows the cigarette smoke out of the other side of his mouth. The music is down to a dull throb out here and the air isn’t particularly cold. Neil feels something unfamiliar curl deep in his stomach.

“Can I have one?”

Andrew watches him for a few seconds before crushing out the one in his mouth and letting it fall between the grate on the floor. He taps two out of his pack and puts them in his mouth, lighting them both before handing one to Neil.

“Are you hiding?” Neil asks.

Andrew shrugs. “They’re boring.”

And that, well—Neil can’t argue with that. “Truth?” he asks.

Andrew nods. “It’s your turn.”

“Why do you like us?”

“You’re assuming I do,” Andrew says. “Are you going to smoke that?”

“Oh.” Neil looks at the cigarette held loosely between his fingers. “Not really. It just reminds me of my mom. If you don’t like us, why do you put up with us?”

Andrew takes the cigarette out of his mouth and rests his wrist on his knee, twitching his fingers until the ash drops off its end. “You could be worse,” he says.

Neil watches as Andrew brings the cigarette back to his mouth and takes a long drag off of it.

“You know,” Neil says thoughtfully. “I don’t believe you.”

“You think you couldn’t get any worse?”

“No, asshole. I think you do like us.”

“You keep saying ‘us’,” Andrew says. “If you want better answers, ask better questions.”

Neil frowns at the cigarette held loosely between his fingers. He doesn’t really know what to do with that. It’s not that he doesn’t think of himself as an individual person, because obviously he does. It was actually really hard for him to see himself as a part of a group when he first had a place in one. But Andrew had come home with Kevin and then taken on Neil, too, and he seems to have some weird mind meld thing with Allison sometimes. Neil thinks it’s maybe not that he thinks of himself only in the context of a package deal, but that he’s thinking of Andrew as another part of that package. He’s aware that it’s a weird package. Despite Allison’s best efforts, they’re not a sitcom-worthy social group.

When he looks up, still unsure how to articulate any of that without sounding like the most socially inept person alive, Andrew has turned to watch him intently. Neil hadn’t realized how very close they’d gotten—he must have shifted closer to Andrew’s side for the body heat or to hear him better over the music or...something.

He doesn’t know where Andrew’s cigarette has gone. He stares at where it should be until he realizes he should probably stop; when he looks up, he sees Andrew’s eyes—close enough to pick up the flecks of gold—steadily meeting his own. Neil inhales sharply and realizes, when he exhales, that they are mere inches apart. His back isn’t straight against the wall anymore. He’s angled towards Andrew without meaning to.

Andrew says, “Neil,” very quietly. Neil feels his name as a whisper of air against his lips. He’s about to answer when he hears Kevin shout for him from inside—first distantly, from the hallway, then obviously from inside Neil’s bedroom. He turns quickly, the instinct to assess danger whenever someone shouts his name still deeply ingrained in him.

When he looks back, Andrew seems further away. His spine is straight. The cigarette is back in his mouth and his expression is perfectly blank. Whatever Neil thought was about to happen, he must have imagined it.

He’s even more convinced he imagined it after the three of them meet up for another study session in the library. Andrew’s class gets out the latest, so Neil and Kevin are already ensconced in their reserved study room by the time he gets there.

Neil says, “Hey,” when Andrew comes in and collapses into the chair across from him.

Kevin pushes the smoothie they’d gotten him across the table without looking up from his book.

Neil knows he must be looking at Andrew with unusual intensity, scrutinizing his face to see if there’s anything different or annoyed or uncomfortable there, but there isn’t. Andrew is as steady and disinterested as always. If anything, he looks a little tired.

Andrew nods at him instead of responding and picks up the smoothie cup to sip at it gingerly.

“Coffee and cacao,” Neil says. He’s only said four words, but he still kind of feels like he’s babbling.

“He wouldn’t even let me add boosters,” Kevin says. “Not even flax seed oil.”

Andrew looks to Neil for a translation, as has become their custom.

“Improves cardiovascular function,” Neil explains. “He’s worried about your heart and lung health.”

“And you’re not?” Kevin challenges.

Neil shrugs, a little sheepishly. He obviously doesn’t want Andrew to die in a week of lung cancer or high blood pressure, but he knows that isn’t really what motivates Kevin. To Kevin, nothing says I love you more clearly than helping someone you care about be the best version of themself. Health and prosperity: if Kevin can see his friends thriving (in both bank accounts and lab work) he can sit back and rest in the knowledge that he’s given to them as generously of himself as he could.

“If he dies,” Neil says slowly, “We’ll start a charity marathon in his honor.”

“I can’t believe I’ve done this to myself,” Andrew sighs. “I’m surrounded by jocks.”

“Excuse me,” Kevin says. “We are also academics.”

“That makes it worse.”

And everything is...fine. Things are incredibly normal. Whatever he’d thought was looming on that fire escape, it had to have just been in his head.

Kevin has a date with a fourth-year sociology doctoral student. Because they all apparently live in each other’s closets, he tries out half a dozen outfits on them before he’s willing to leave the house. Neil hated all of the crisp, pressed slacks he came out in but Allison despaired of the jeans. Neil tries to pitch a pair of overalls, mostly for the sake of the looks his roommates give him. Ultimately, Kevin walks out in something he and Allison have decided is just the right “mood” for a first date with a woman 3 years older than you. Whatever that is.

That done—and with what Neil thinks is an embarrassing number of condoms pressed upon Kevin by Allison—Neil goes to get changed for his own ‘date’ with Allison. They’re heading to the Queens Night Market, and usually Neil would just throw on jeans and a hoodie, but this time he’s decided to surprise her with something more—-he doubts ‘fashionable’ is the word she’ll use, but maybe ‘acceptable’?

To accomplish this, he’d had to go to the mall and beg the help of a salesman, who he was pretty sure had been gay, and who he was pretty sure thought he was very straight.

It was an interesting half hour.

He’d come away from it with a pair of green pants (sage, he was told) and an incredibly soft, close-fitting hoodie in a color he’d been told was ‘natural’ but which he’d actually describe as ‘light gray.’ The gray had been the selling point. He pulls on the brown leather sneakers Allison tries to make him wear more often and ducks into the bathroom to replicate the product and scrunch technique she usually does on his hair.

Allison knocks lightly on the door as he’s trying to arrange his hair the way she seems to like it.

“Let me see you,” she says. “What level of tragedy have you achieved today?”

He’s more than a little smug when he steps out and she gapes speechlessly at him.

“Oh my god,” she breathes. “Neil?”

“Yes,” he says drily. “It is I.”

“Is that linen?” she asks, reaching out to rub the sleeve of his hoodie between her fingers.

“Yeah.” He looks down at it and pushes the sleeves up his forearms a little. “That’s what the guy said.”

When she looks at him, her eyes are especially shiny. Neil wonders, uncomfortably, if she’s about to cry.

“Did you do this for me?”

He shrugs. He had, of course. All of the work was for her. She really likes making him look nice. Neil kind of thinks the effort she puts into it is the part she really enjoys, but maybe, just maybe, she’d also appreciate having the effort put in for her.

The next thing he knows, she’s pulling him into a tight hug. Allison has a few inches on him in bare feet, so even in short heels she’s able to tuck his head under her chin.

“You look great,” she says, her voice wavering. “I’m going to send Andrew a picture.”

“What? No!”

“Oh, don’t worry.” She fucks up his hair and then, realizing there was actually something to fuck up this time, immediately sets to fixing it. “I’ll be subtle.”

Neil says, “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” even as he stands totally still and lets her groom him.

A couple of hours later, though, when she pulls Neil under the long strands of lights and hands her phone to two middle-aged wives to take a picture of them, he doesn’t protest. Even though he knows she’s going to send it to Andrew.

They luck into a couple of outdoor chairs at a coffee shop, snagging them just as the couple before them finished their drinks. Allison orders a couple of hot chocolates and takes her shoes off so she can prop her feet up in Neil’s lap. Instinctively, he drops his hands and starts kneading her arches.

“Kevin texted,” she says. “He sent some weird emojis. It’s either good news or he’s wasted.”

“Could be both,” Neil offers. “He’s still charming after a bottle or two of vodka.”

“It’s too bad I don’t want to fuck him. We could adopt you and all keep living together. Think of the stunningly attractive family portraits.”

Neil realizes he wants to ask, what about Andrew? but he’s not sure he’d like her answer. He’s not sure he’d dislike it, either, he just doesn feel equipped to hear it.

It’s a moot point, anyway, because Allison’s phone buzzes and she turns her eyes to it, laughing as she reads. “Okay,” she says. “We have to go rescue Kevin.”

“Rescue?”

She turns the screen towards him. The newest message from Kevin, beneath the incoherent string of emojis, says guys I lost my phone.

Thursday night, Allison has a friend over, someone they’re all comfortable enough with that they don’t surrender the living room entirely. They all order thai and eat it while Kevin watches exy on mute, Allison and her friend chat, and Neil searches for good knife-throwing places to break into with Andrew on Saturday.

He’s weighing the pros and cons of an old power plant and an abandoned grain elevator when Allison says something that catches his attention: “You should meet this guy Neil is dating.”

“Wait,” Neil says, looking up quickly. “What? Who am I dating?”

“Andrew,” Allison says. She’s looking at him like he’s an idiot.

“Andrew? No, we’re not— I mean, he’s not—” Neil flounders, then says, lamely, “We’re just friends.”

“Oh my god, Neil. Are you serious?”

Neil, his computer still balanced very carefully in his lap, lifts his hands helplessly. “I mostly know when people are hitting on me now. He doesn’t….”

“He 100% does,” Allison says, her spine going ramrod straight. “Kevin? Kevin!”

Kevin, finally tearing his eyes away from the game, looks over and hums questioningly through his frown.

“Pay attention,” Allison says. She snaps her fingers at him. “Is Andrew interested in Neil?”

“Oh,” Kevin says. His eyes stray back towards the screen. “Yes.”

“Yes?” Neil asks.

Allison snaps her fingers at Kevin again, exasperated.

“Yeah, he asked me about it,” Kevin says. “Right after we met. He asked if we were dating.”

“He asked if we were dating,” Neil repeats dumbly.

Allison sighs. “What did you tell him?”

“I told him no. And that Neil doesn’t date. And that he doesn’t like to be bothered about it.”

“Oh my god.” Allison buries her face in her hands and moans despairingly. “You are all idiots.”

“Um,” her friend says. “So are they dating or not?”

“They definitely are,” Allison says. “I’m just not sure either of them fucking realizes it.”

“I don’t—” Neil frowns. “I don’t really know what you mean.”

“Neil, baby. That boy is so into you. I thought you knew. But you really don’t like to be bothered about it, so I didn’t want to pry. I thought you were at least getting there. Have you really never...anything?”

Neil frowns harder. “There was one time. At your party. Almost—I thought almost, but then I thought I must have imagined it.”

“Did you even notice the way he looks at you? The way you look at him? The way you cram yourselves into 40% of a seat anytime you’re sitting next to each other? Or how you hang out with him almost as much as with your roommates? Or how you’re constantly texting each other?”

“Oh,” Allison’s friend says, laughing. “They’re definitely dating.”

“Am I an idiot?” Neil asks. He thinks about it very hard. This whole time, has he been missing something fundamental about his relationship with Andrew? Even he knows he feels differently about Andrew than he does about anyone else, even Kevin, Allison, Dan, Matt, random kittens he passes on the street. All of the time he’s spent staring at Andrew’s hands, his mouth, the selfies he sends—all the time he’s spent trying to figure out what to say next in their text thread. It coalesces into the realization that, for the first time ever, he might genuinely have a crush on someone. “I might be an idiot.”

Kevin says, “If you like him, you should just tell him. Can I watch the game now?”

Neil sets his computer down and then stands up so suddenly the blood rushes from his head. “I should—” he says. “Maybe I should…”

“Go,” Allison says. “Get your man.”

He’s already on the train before he realizes he hasn’t even asked Andrew if it’s okay for him to show up right now. He digs his phone out of his pocket, almost dropping it in his haste, and taps out a quick message: can I come over?

Andrew’s little dots appear and disappear a few times and then Neil’s phone finally buzzes with yes.

Fifteen minutes later, he knocks nervously on Andrew’s door, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet to get his blood flowing. Andrew opens the door and squints at him suspiciously. His pajama pants have little rainbows on them. His hair is messy. Neil finally has a word for the fluttering in his stomach.

“Where were you coming from?” Andrew asks.

“Home,” Neil says. “I kind of forgot to text.”

Andrew steps back, holding the door open, but his gaze is still sharp on Neil.

“Um,” Neil says. He slides into the room and shoves his hands into his jeans pockets. “Are we dating?”

Andrew opens his mouth and then shuts it again quickly. Neil can see the gears turning in his head—moving, he imagines, through the range of insults and dismissals he could use to cut Neil’s knees out from under him. After a very long minute, Andrew says, “Kevin said you don’t date.”

“I never have,” Neil admits. “I’ve never really liked anyone before.”

“Before,” Andrew says blankly.

Neil pulls his hands out of his pockets and rubs them on his face. “I’m really bad at this. I think about you all the time. Allison told her friend that we were dating and I didn’t think ‘ew, no,’ I thought ‘wait, is that possible’ and then Kevin said you’d asked and I got on a train and came over. If she was wrong, though, if it’s too late or whatever, I can go and we can just agree that I’m dumb and never talk about it again.”

“Jesus,” Andrew huffs. His brows come together in a scowl and Neil feels his stomach sink. He balls his fists up a few times, preparing himself for the rejection he’d always been so smugly certain he’d never experience.

“I don’t know,” Andrew says slowly, “which one of us is stupider. You for being an actual idiot, or me for being so into it.”

“You are?” Neil asks.

“Yes. Dumbass.”

Neil’s shoulders sag in relief, then perk up again when something occurs to him. “Does this mean we could have been kissing this whole time?”

Andrew looks directly up at the ceiling like it can offer him some kind of relief from his suffering.

“Stop talking,” he says. “Come here.”

Neil is still incredibly nervous, but Andrew’s hands are sure and steady on him and his mouth tastes sweet and smoky. By the time the backs of his knees hit the side of Andrew’s mattress, Neil has almost forgotten about all the time they wasted on doing anything other than this.