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Neil Josten worked harder than God. It made Andrew exhausted just watching him some days; the urgency, the earnestness with which he approached exy and friendship and certain classes. Exhausting. Andrew couldn’t remember the last time he felt enough energy to care sincerely about something for more than an hour, hour and a half tops.
(That was a lie. He knew that even as he thought it. But lies can serve a purpose, and in this case the purpose was for self preservation. Plus, he wasn’t the one with a lying problem. He had his allowances.)
But Neil was like an inexhaustible font of energy; energy to run, to play, to do math problems, to talk in any one of the frankly offensive amount of languages he was conversational in– energy to argue in them, too. He only seemed to wind down when he was with Andrew, alone. Perhaps Andrew really was a black hole, he mused once, and he was sucking the life out of Neil while keeping him trapped in his orbit.
(Or maybe Andrew’s presence just made him quiet. Maybe Andrew calmed the Tasmanian devil slobbering rabid behind Neil’s ribs. Maybe, maybe, maybe, things were not always as doomed as Andrew tried to believe.)
Since they’d returned from Columbia, though, it seemed like the well was starting to run dry. A combination of the stress from classes starting, the first game of the season coming up, and knowing that the freshmen’s performances were nowhere near where Neil and Kevin wanted them to be had the two doing an extra two to three hours of night practices every day. They seemed to be under the desperate impression that if they just trained harder, they could make up for a whole team falling short of their standards.
Friday night’s game against the Terrapins proved that they, in fact, could not.
Neil stood in the center of the dorm living room, looking wrung out and drained. Exy will chew you up and spit you out, Andrew thought, and then another thought entered his mind unbidden:
Is it always going to be like this?
Andrew blinked and reset his mind. Unhelpful questions begot unhelpful answers, and Andrew had no time nor patience for either.
After one last glance at the door to make sure both locks were secured, Andrew walked over to Neil. He cupped the man’s face with one hand, running his thumb along the smooth tissue of the healed burn under his eye, and used his other hand to gently pull on Neil’s sweatshirt. Neil moved forward easily, tilting forward with the lightest of effort on Andrew’s part. Slumped as Neil was, they were nearly the same height. Neil lifted his head only barely, just enough to make baleful eye contact through his lashes.
“Yes or no?” Andrew asked quietly. Neil deflated.
“Yes.”
Andrew made to angle Neil’s face towards his, to kiss him and try to chase everything else out of his brain for at least a little while, but Neil surprised him. He tucked his face into Andrew’s neck and hooked his index fingers into Andrew’s hoodie pocket, pulling him a little closer as well.
It wasn’t what Andrew expected. It was gentle, intimate in that way that Andrew used to think was not for him; would never be for him. He was too rough, too scary and made up of jagged little parts for any reasonable person to choose to rest their head on. But Neil himself was patched together haphazardly, a miracle made of duct tape and spit and half a prayer. Andrew leaned his head against Neil’s and found himself pressing a kiss into his hair without authorization from his brain. Unconsciously, like it was second nature— like their jagged edges were not random broken shards but the dips and waves of puzzle pieces, sliding into place the way they were meant to fit together all along.
“You smell like ass,” He mumbled into Neil’s hair. Neil grunted.
“I showered after the game.”
“And yet your stench begs to differ.”
“My hair is literally damp.”
“Could be sweat.”
Neil groaned into Andrew’s neck, almost whiny; almost amusing.
“If this is the result of what you call ‘bathing,’ then you obviously need to be shown how to properly do it. Pathetic,” Andrew said. Neil lifted his head and looked at him.
“Are you volunteering?” He asked. It was a stupid question. Andrew decided to forgo answering it, instead gracing Neil with a withering, blank stare. He stepped out of their embrace and took one of Neil’s hands and silently led him to the bathroom.
Sometimes it felt like the shower was another world, Andrew thought as he turned the water on to heat up. Ever since the one after Baltimore where Andrew had wrapped Neil up in plastic like day-old leftovers, they’d fallen into a pattern of showering together as often as they could. It was a closed space, both a locked door and a curtain separating them from the outside world. Neil never made a comment when Andrew kept his underwear on, and he never made a comment when Andrew started taking them off, either, which he did on occasion. The hot water and steam was like a kind of magic, teleporting them away to some place where they could stand together, chest to chest, and be gentle in a way they were not taught to be in real life.
Andrew pulled Neil to him by his jacket and undressed him. It wasn’t entirely necessary, but Andrew liked the ritual of it; he was pretty sure Neil did, too. After stepping out of his briefs, Neil put a hand on Andrew’s cheek and tapped it twice with his thumb. Andrew gave a small nod, and Neil leaned in and pressed a soft kiss where his thumb had been. It nearly took Andrew’s breath away; he shivered with it, the tenderness and feeling of it all. If he wasn’t careful he’d end up leaning into Neil’s touch, and that wouldn’t do at all. He needed to control himself, at least until they actually got into the shower.
Neil stepped behind the curtain. Andrew took a slow, measured breath. He removed his own clothes, briefs still on as he wasn’t yet sure how far he was going to be able to go this time. He knew he wanted to take care of Neil, that was usually in the cards when they did this, but with himself…Andrew was just going to have to play it by ear. Neil would understand either way.
Andrew took out a small bag from under the sink. In it was a bar of soap Renee had gotten him from some fancy soap store. It smelled like honey and toffee. Andrew wasn’t sure if it was actually soap or not when she’d first given it to him, if he was being wholly honest. He hadn’t tested it, of course, he wasn’t an idiot, but the point still stood that it smelled delicious— good enough to eat.
Neil was standing directly under the water when Andrew stepped into the shower. Andrew wished he could say something cruel, that Neil looked like a drowned rat or something. But the simple fact was that he looked incredible. His face was tilted up, the water hitting it directly on and pushing his hair back. Rivulets ran down his face, down his neck and shoulders and chest and Andrew talked a lot of shit about exy, but he could at the very least appreciate what it did to mens’ bodies.
He stepped closer to Neil, putting him just next to the water, and held the soap up to the other man’s nose. Neil instinctively leaned away but opened his eyes. He looked at the bar and then at Andrew.
“It smells like a dessert,” he said.
“If you try to eat this I will not be calling poison control,” Andrew replied. Neil considered his threat.
“What about just a lick?” He asked.
“I do not have to be here,” Andrew said. “I can leave.”
Neil made to say something, but stopped himself. Very carefully, he said, “I would like it if you stayed. I promise I won’t eat your nice soap.”
Andrew squinted at him, and Neil matched his gaze. They did this too often, staring contests that communicated nothing and too much all at the same time. Eventually, Andrew broke the silence.
“Promises, promises. Yes or no?”
“Yes,” Neil answered all too fondly. It made Andrew want to throw up, or throw the bar of soap at his stupid face.
He did not throw anything, though. Instead he lathered up his hands with the soap, making sure they were sufficiently covered before shoving the bar into Neil’s hand. He then placed his hands on either side of Neil’s head and began massaging his temples. Neil closed his eyes and leaned into Andrew’s touch as he worked his way down Neil’s face, rubbing his thumbs in slow, pressured circles along his cheekbones and around his eyes, his cheeks and jawline and into the spots just behind his jaw and under his ears. Every so often he stopped to refresh the soap on his hands, and then continued. He dragged his thumbs down the underside of Neil’s head, starting from his chin and working his way to his neck. Neil allowed Andrew to move his head this way and that, not once seeming alarmed even when Andrew wrapped his fingers around his throat. He trusted him completely, trusted him to not snap his neck or crush his windpipe right there in the shower, naked and alone and vulnerable. It would be easy enough for Andrew to do, physically.
Just the thought made him want to hide Neil away from the entire world; to take him and tuck him away inside of Andrew’s chest for safekeeping.
Andrew continued the massage. He danced his fingers along the sides of Neil’s spine, then traveled to his shoulders. He took care to really press his fingers in, and Neil groaned, drooping his head forward so his forehead rested against Andrew’s.
Andrew took his time with each of Neil’s arms, wrapping his hands tightly around the top of his biceps and pulling them down, milking the muscles of all the stress and lactic acid he could. He dug his thumbs into the meat of Neil’s palms and popped the joints of each of his fingers. He knew they got inflamed sometimes, a side effect of all the nerve damage they’d suffered. Their hands were around the same size, Neil’s only slightly bigger and longer but Andrew’s a little wider. They were about equally calloused as a result of sports and life, and the drag of hardened skin against hardened skin was a little intoxicating. Andrew idly thought that he could probably do it for hours; he thought Neil would probably let him, too.
Lathering up his hands again, Andrew whispered, “Back or chest first?”
Neil hummed and said, “Back.”
Andrew flipped him around under the water and started in on his back then. He massaged the back of Neil’s shoulders, between and under his shoulder blades and along his spine. He smoothed his hands over the muscles, tracing over a couple of the larger scars that littered the tanned expanse. He rested his hands on Neil’s hips, rubbing his thumbs in aimless circles right above his ass. Using his grip, he pulled Neil a little closer, pressing a single, soft kiss to the base of his neck and dragged his nose gently against it. He could feel Neil relaxing more with every touch, could feel him trying not to just give up and put all his weight back on Andrew. It was appreciated, but in this instance Andrew didn’t mind being all that held Neil up. If he was honest with himself, which he didn’t much enjoy being, he quite liked the purpose that taking care of Neil gave him. It was something to focus on, something he knew he was good at, and something he knew Neil appreciated as well. It felt good for both of them, and good was still such a novel thing for them to feel.
With one more close-mouthed kiss to Neil’s shoulder, Andrew turned him so they were face to face again. Neil’s eyes were hooded from the relaxation, his gaze down at Andrew heavy and full. It made Andrew have to look away, too much too plainly visible in those blue eyes. He turned his eyes to Neil’s chest and moved his hands up, pressing his fingers as hard as he could into the man’s pecs. They weren’t as big as Andrew’s– Neil tended to focus more on his legs and could bench nowhere near as much as Andrew –but they were firm and strong. Scars were plentiful here, criss-crossing in such a way that if Andrew knew braille, he’d probably be able to decipher some kind of message from them: This is me. This is my life. Will you turn away?
Careful to avoid Neil’s nipples (they were very sensitive; the dulled nerves of scar tissue apparently enhanced the feeling of them being touched, which they had discovered the hard way), Andrew trailed his fingers along each and every scar within his reach, down from his pecs to his abdomen and stomach. He kept applying pressure intermittently, if only to make it seem like he was still giving a massage and not just feeling Neil up. Neil sighed and bumped Andrew’s head lightly with his own. He at least appeared to still be appreciating Andrew’s ministrations, as distracted as they had become.
Andrew started to lower himself down to kneel in the tub, pretending like he wasn’t instinctively licking his lips in anticipation of sucking Neil off.
“Wait.”
Andrew froze. He was only on one knee. He looked up at Neil, the shower water falling in his eyes and pasting his hair to his forehead. He waited.
Neil’s face and body were flushed from the heat of the water and Andrew’s hands. He bit his lip in that way he did when he was unsure, nervous.
“Can I…” Neil started, then stopped, editing his sentences as he tried to speak them. “I want to blow you. If you’ll let me. If you want me to. I’d like to.”
If Andrew hadn’t already been holding his breath, this would’ve knocked it right out of him. This fucker, he thought, this was supposed to be about him. But Andrew took an inventory of himself: he was horny, definitely; he was intending on getting himself off as he blew Neil anyways; he was in a calm, pleasant headspace at the moment; he hadn’t had any panic episodes or significant memory nightmares in the past week; and he was with Neil, who would always stop if Andrew told him to stop. He decided to try and picture Neil blowing him, just to see if the image alone gave him any hesitations.
It did not. It really, really did not.
“Yes,” Andrew said.
Neil’s whole face relaxed, and he reached a hand out and helped Andrew to his feet. He pulled Andrew towards him slightly, and Andrew let himself be pulled, pressing them together chest to chest as a little last test for himself. It was warm and wet and soapy, and the smell of sweets wafted off of Neil’s skin in the steam. Andrew had half a mind to try and eat him. Maybe Neil had been onto something before.
But most of all, it was good .
Neil brought a hand to Andrew’s face and led him into a kiss, soft at first but it gave way to the depth that they always tended to slip into no matter what they did. Prone to intensity, the both of them. When they eventually parted, Andrew tried to pretend he wasn’t gasping for air while Neil picked up the bar of soap.
“Where can I touch?” He asked, lathering his hands up. He was so stupid, and so smart, and so, so good. Andrew couldn’t stand him.
“Start at my shoulders, do not press too hard,” Andrew said. His voice came out soft and hoarse. “I will tell you what part you can move to next and when.”
“Okay,” Neil said. Slowly, he placed his hands on Andrew’s shoulders and began rubbing his thumbs in circles. His pressure was lighter than what Andrew had been doing, and something about it made part of Andrew want to goddamn cry.
“Biceps,” Andrew whispered. Neil’s hands slid down, the amount of soap he was using causing only a light drag against Andrew’s arms. Neil’s fingers tapped and smoothed circles around his muscles and sent a shiver throughout Andrew’s whole body. He placed his hands on Neil’s hips to steady himself, ground himself in the present. He didn’t want to get lost in the heady feelings, not yet, not while there was so much build up to cover. He didn’t want to risk ruining it.
With every body part he named– “Pecs,” “Ribs,” “Abdomen” –Andrew watched as Neil watched him carefully, both his face and his body, and glided his hands further. He resoaped his hands and palmed Andrew’s chest, fit his fingers in the barely-there divots of his ribs, thumbed at his abs, up and down and side to side. Every touch was gentle but firm, and slowly, achingly so, Neil began to lower himself. Andrew moved his hands to Neil’s shoulders and gripped them tightly so he wouldn’t shake from it, the care with which Neil handled him.
“Can I kiss your stomach?” Neil asked, settled now on his knees.
“...Yes,” Andrew replied.
Neil leaned in and started pressing slow, near worshipful kisses all over Andrew’s stomach. A kiss to each stretch mark, each freckle, each ab, practically each hair that led down to the edge of his briefs. All the while, his hands stayed on Andrew’s hips, never straying below the band of his underwear. It was a little thing, and maybe he didn’t mean it as a statement, but Andrew saw it just like he saw everything. It made him Feel. He squeezed Neil’s shoulders.
“Stop and lean back,” He said. Neil listened. Andrew reached down and lowered his briefs, just far enough so his cock could come out. Andrew held in a hiss at the sudden cold hitting the warm, wet skin. This wasn’t the first time Neil was seeing his dick, but it was the first time his face was so close to it. But Neil kept his eyes trained on Andrew’s face, jaw clenched and focused like he was determined not to look until Andrew said he could.
“Keep your hands on my hips,” Andrew said lowly, “Mouth only.”
Neil nodded and immediately opened his mouth for Andrew, and fuck it was a better sight than Andrew could have imagined. Neil’s lips weren’t even on him yet. Andrew was doomed. He was never going to forget this. What a curse his memory was; what a fucking blessing, if Andrew believed in them. He moved his hand to Neil’s cheek and shut his mouth.
“Do not try to take me all the way down your throat,” Andrew said. “Pull off when you need to breathe, or breathe through your nose. Pause or stop when you need to. I will not push you further down. If you use any teeth I will pull them out of your skull with rusted pliers.”
Neil raised an eyebrow. “How do I make sure my teeth don’t touch you?”
“Figure it out. Not my teeth on the line here.”
“It’s your dick on the line, though.”
“Are you saying my dick is in danger?” Andrew asked, raising an eyebrow back at him. Neil rolled his eyes.
“No, it’s not. I’ll figure it out. Your dick has never been safer than this moment, I assure you.”
Andrew hummed. “You are talking far too much for someone who is supposedly giving me a blowjob.”
The corner of Neil’s lips ticked up, and he looked up at Andrew in that way that made it obvious to everyone that saw it that he was utterly and completely gone on him.
“May I?” Neil asked. Andrew took a deep breath.
“You may.”
Neil opened his mouth again, and Andrew gently put the head of his cock onto Neil’s waiting tongue. It felt a little strange– soft and textured, wet and warm and cool. Neil moved his tongue, exploring and caressing the tip, getting used to the feeling, the shape and the weight. He licked around the head like he was collecting the drops of a melting ice cream cone, flat-tongued and slow. He pulled back slightly and licked his lips– were they always that red, that puffy, or was Andrew just going insane? –before diving back in and closing his mouth around the tip.
Everything was wet and warm now, and the undulation of Neil’s tongue sent goosebumps cascading across Andrew’s skin. Neil bobbed his head forward slightly, down far enough that his lips met Andrew’s hand, and then he drew back. He did it again, and looked up at Andrew as he bumped his lips against his fingers once more. Like he’s kissing them, Andrew thought, and then Neil actually sucked as he drew back again and Andrew was no longer thinking anything.
Neil moved his head up and down like this, slowly, licking and swirling his tongue, sucking and pausing to breathe through his nose as he’d been instructed to. Between the heat of Neil’s mouth, the heat of the shower water beating down around them, and the heat radiating out from his chest and groin, Andrew felt like he could pass out at any moment from the headiness of it all. He moved his hands into Neil’s hair, gripping the soaking red locks hard in an effort to both steady himself and hide how shaky he was. Part of him wanted to close his eyes, to bask in the feeling, float in it. The other part couldn’t look away from how Neil’s lips stretched around him; how his eyelashes fluttered in concentration (and maybe enjoyment); how rivulets of water traced down his scarred and freckled skin, flushed from the steam.
With his hands out of the way, Neil went further down Andrew’s cock, far enough that Andrew felt the back of his throat. He hissed and dug his nails into Neil’s scalp, and the feeling of Neil moaning made a violent shiver travel all the way up Andrew’s spine. He dug his nails in even harder, holding on for dear life as Neil sped up. It was wet and sloppy, and not at any sort of even rhythm, and it had Andrew’s eyes rolling back into his head. He almost lost himself in the motion of Neil’s mouth, in the steady stable grip of Neil’s hands still on his hips.
Andrew pulled Neil back with a harsh yank of his hair. Neil popped off with a gasp, thin trails of a mix of precum and spit connecting him to Andrew’s dick quickly destroyed by the shower spray. Neil’s chest was heaving. He looked up at Andrew with dizzied, wide eyes.
“What?” Neil asked, voice raw. Andrew fisted his cock roughly and squeezed, trying to contain himself.
“I,” He said, evenly as he could manage, “Am going to cum.” Neil’s eyebrows shot up.
“Oh,” He said. “Did you not want me to swallow it?”
Andrew was not a praying man. He did not believe in either organized religion or in “God” as a general concept. The times he came close, though, were usually the fault of Neil Josten. Like now, for instance, as Andrew clenched his jaw and asked the Universe what he’d done to deserve this kind of punishment. Was it the pre-meditated murder? The drugs? All the various instances of assault? Andrew closed his eyes and took a deep, measured breath before opening them again.
“I figured it would be decent to not surprise you with a load down your stupid throat on your first blowjob,” He grit out.
“Oh,” Neil replied, and blinked dumbly. “Thanks. How do you want to cum then?”
Andrew stared at him. He watched a drop of water travel down from Neil’s hair, pin-balling between scars and freckles until it reached his chin, his thin jawline. Andrew traced the path with the pad of his thumb.
“On your face,” He said.
It was an unexpected answer, but Neil nodded and breathlessly said, “Yes.”
One hand cupping Neil’s face, the other wrapped around his cock, Andrew stroked himself once, twice. He met Neil’s eyes, clear icy blue but the warmest they had ever been, and Andrew came. Neil quickly closed his eyes and mouth as white streaks painted themselves across his cheeks, his nose and lips and forehead and eyelids.
It was an incredible sight. Even as the shower water immediately began washing it off, Neil looked amazing. Andrew couldn’t take his eyes off of him; he was stunned.
And then Neil licked his lips, catching the cum there on his tongue, his cursed fucking tongue. His brows furrowed slightly as he tasted it. He tilted his head, like he was thinking it over, and then his face relaxed like he’d decided it wasn’t so bad. He carefully opened his eyes and looked up at Andrew again, radiating contentment and self-satisfaction.
This was for the pre-meditated murder, Andrew decided. Definitely for the murder.
Andrew fell to his knees and took Neil’s face in both hands. He kissed his stupid, aggravating, cum- and water-streaked face, and tried to convey just how much Feeling he was doing, and how much he hated Neil for being the root cause of it all. Neil threaded his fingers through Andrew’s hair and tried to pull him even closer, impossibly so, and matched him strength for strength, intensity for intensity. Where one ended on that bathtub floor the other began, filling the dips and waves of each other like they’d been designed to fit together, right there.
When they parted, lips bruised and heavy, Neil rested his forehead against Andrew’s own.
“Thank you,” Neil whispered.
“Shut up,” Andrew said, and he kissed him again.