Chapter Text
Neil’s shoes were filled with water. His jacket, which usually only served as a light cover-up, became heavy and damp with the accumulated rain as he trudged along the long grassy field ahead of him. With each step he took, he sunk further into the muddy ground. He was cold, uncomfortable, and tired, but had nowhere safe and dry to wait the storm out, so he begrudgingly kept moving.
He wiped his sleeve against his eyes in attempts to clear the water that blurred his vision, but his wet sleeve only made his predicament worse. The rain was coming down hard, and Neil could not recall the last time a storm made him this worried. He swore under his breath. He hoped his bag wasn’t completely unsalvageable- if his binder was ruined, he knew he had everything memorized and could replicate it if he wanted, but it would be a pain and he would rather not have to do that.
Neil scanned the endless field and saw a house up ahead. There were a few lights that shone through the windows, but Neil didn't see any other signs of life. There was a long porch that stretched across the perimeter of the house, and Neil debated if he should push his luck and camp out on the porch until the storm had cleared.
Neil looked up to the sky. It was night but he could still see the dark clouds that stretched for miles overhead. The rain was relentless and showed no signs of stopping. He sighed. Might as well.
Neil made his way to the house and climbed onto the porch. He sighed in relief at the sudden dryness, and, although he was now more aware of how cold he actually was, was immensely grateful not to have to continue walking for who knows how long for a dry area to rest.
His decision to stop may have been a stupid one, but he was not a complete idiot. He sat on the brick steps, making sure he had an easy exit if he needed to leave, and also because he wasn’t too keen on trespassing strangers' homes.
Looking out into the dark field, Neil felt his eyelids become heavy. Stay awake, stay awake, stay awake. His body shivered against his own will, and Neil thought about his mother. When he was younger, he and his mother got caught up in a spring storm. His mother had been angry at him that he took too long stealing medication from a pharmacy, causing them to become soaked on the way back to the hotel; however, she had huddled him in blankets when they got back to their room. She dried his hair with a towel while reprimanding him, but at least she cared to make sure he was warm. Now, sitting on the steps alone in the cold, dark night, Neil was hyper aware of empty space that occupied his side.
He doesn’t know how long he sat there for. Although he told himself to stay awake and alert, after two days of being on the run with maybe only 3 hours of sleep in total, Neil drifted off.
-
A loud bang startled him awake. Momentarily, Neil forgot where he was and why he was there.
“What the fuck do you think your doin,” a gruff voice sounded behind him.
Neil looked behind him to an older man holding a shotgun. A little girl was behind him, holding a stuffed animal close to her chest.
Neil froze, his heart threatening to jump out of his chest.
“ Get the fuck off my property!” The man yelled and cocked his gun.
Neil didn’t need to be told to leave twice, and he picked up his duffle and left in a sprint. Reentering the cold rain jolted him awake, but did not ease his looming panic. He was careless for falling asleep and letting his guard down, especially when he forgot that it is more common for farmers to own guns, even in South Carolina.
“You better keep runnin’ boy!” He heard the old man continue to yell.
Neil picked up his pace despite the rain that blurred his vision, he didn’t want to risk it any further. Even if the man was just using it to scare him away, older people had less of a care when it came to using violent means to protect what was theirs.
He continued to run, his lungs and sore body screaming at him to slow down, but his heart was racing and screaming at him to keep moving .
Rain continued to pelt his face, and his vision refused to stay focused. Maybe that's why Neil didn’t notice when the grass stopped and turned into pavement. Maybe his racing heart that was stuck in fight or flight told him to keep moving fast, and not care where exactly he was going.
Neil stepped out into the road.
There was a screech of a tire, and Neil looked over in time to see a car barrel towards him. There was a momentary pause, everything becoming silent, and then Neil saw black.
__
Andrew
Everything was getting on his nerves, and he was out of cigarettes.
Nicky would not shut up. He was yelling on the phone to Eric about how much he missed him and how he couldn’t live without him and blah blah blah . Despite being a room away, his voice was like nails on a chalkboard banging in Andrew’s ears. Kevin currently sat next to him on the couch in the living room, rambling on and on about exy plays that they could instill in the upcoming season. A rerun national championship game played on the old tv at a volume that was far too high. And Aaron was sitting there silently with his arms crossed, eyes glued lazily to the tv, but him just existing there was pissing Andrew off. And he was out of cigarettes.
Andrew stood abruptly and grabbed his keys.
“Hey! Where are you going, we still need to talk about defense,” Kevin threw his arms up like the man-child he was.
“Out,” Andrew left, slamming the door.
He paused on the front porch, the rain was coming down hard. He reached for his front pocket, momentarily forgetting that he had smoked his last cigarette that morning. Of course .
He walked to his car, not caring that he was getting wet- he welcomed the cold distraction to everything that was getting on his last nerves.
The drive to the convenience store had been fairly slow- the rain made it hard to go as fast as he wanted to. But once he had tossed cash at the moody cashier in exchange for a pack of cigarettes, the night didn’t seem to be doomed to be complete shit.
Andrew made his way back to the car, this time at a quicker speed, eager to have that familiar calming sensation of smoking the first cigarette of a brand new pack. Once safe in the front seat, he sat in the parking lot until the cigarette had been burned down to a small stub.
Andrew knew he had a problem when driving through a storm for a pack of cigarettes sounded more reasonable than going a night without smoking, but he would rather be killing himself a little on the inside each day by his own volition than be killed a little each day by his rotting mind, something that was out of his control.
He checked the time and sighed. 11:21.
On the way back, Andrew drove more recklessly, inching up to higher speeds. He fiddled with the radio, until he decided everything playing was obnoxious and turned it off.
He thought about Kevin, how he probably was waiting for him back at Abby’s, pathetically making a dent in her living room couch. Aaron had definitely called it quits by then, he didn’t seem to particularly care that much about anything- but who was Andrew to judge about caring for things. Unfortunately, Kevin cared a little bit too much. He was stressing more than normal because he and Wymack had not been able to find a replacement striker for the recruit who had tried to kill herself.
Most potential prospects turned down their offer after seeing that it came from the Foxes. Not many people were eager to sign up to only become a public embarrassment.
Andrew continued down the empty road at a fast pace- definitely faster than he should’ve been going in this rain. There had been a hurricane warning this past week, but all that came was heavy rain and strong winds.
Him and the rest of the bunch had been stuck at Abby’s. They stayed for the summer partly because Nicky couldn’t go back to Germany and he and Aaron didn’t have a home to return to, and partly because Kevin insisted on staying to prepare for the upcoming season.
Andrew had been growing restless at the house, and took any chance he could to go out on a drive, to get away from the suffocating and overwhelming presence of everybody.
The windshield wipers swung back and forth at the highest setting, and the rhythmic thump lulled Andrew’s thoughts.
Out of the corner of his eye, Andrew saw a quick blur emerge from the field to his right. He slammed on his breaks, but he was going too fast to completely stop in time. A figure emerged on the road, and Andrew saw the split second the person recognized that they had made a grave mistake. Andrew’s car slowed significantly, and he swerved to avoid the person, but his efforts weren’t sufficient enough.
A loud thud sounded as the front side of his car hit a body. Andrew maneuvered his car as it slid along the pavement until it finally came to a stop.
His heart was beating a little too fast, and he didn’t like it. He sat in the car for a moment, hands still firmly on the wheel, staring ahead of him. Stupid people and their inability to look both ways.
He got out of the car, immediately being assaulted by the freezing rain. Even better.
There was a body on the side of the road twenty feet away from him, and Andrew jogged over. Although he was mad at this careless stranger, he could also recognize he was going a little too fast for the conditions of the road, and that it was as much his fault as it was this dumbass’.
The body belonged to a young looking man with dark hair, although he couldn’t tell if it was because of the rain or not. Nothing seemed to be broken or grossly out of place at first glance, thankfully, but there was a worrying stream of blood dripping down their forehead. And the fact that he wasn’t awake didn’t help ease his concern that he could’ve just killed someone.
Fuck.
He crouched beside the man and looked down both sides of the road. He doubted anyone else would be driving by anytime soon due to the storm.
Fuck.
He reached out to the strangers neck and checked for a pulse. There was a strong, steady beat that allowed Andrew to finally take a deep breath.
You fucking idiot.
Now that he was assured that the moron was alive, an anger seethed inside Andrew. Sure he was going fast, but who in their right mind would run out into a road, at night, in the rain, wearing dark clothes, and expect everything to be okay. Unless he was running from something and wasn’t thinking . Andrew looked out into the field from which he came, but couldn’t see far due to the heavy rain. Something unpleasant settled in his stomach.
Andrew wasn’t quite sure of what he should do. His phone was back at Abby’s so he couldn’t call an ambulance or even Abby for help, and he couldn’t just leave this person to die on the side of the road.
The one fucking time I forget my phone.
He looked at the stranger more closely, this time noticing a small scar running over his eyebrow. His eyelashes were long and his cheeks were tinted pink. His nose was curved softly and looked unnaturally red, probably because of the piercing rain- at least, hopefully that and not because he just took a car head on and lost. His clothes were soaked- but , Andrew thought, probably wasn’t that big of a deal just by how raggedy they already appeared to be.
“Hey.” He nudged the person's shoulder, hoping by some miracle it would work. But the boy just laid there limply.
After waiting a minute, he got up and made his way to his car to retrieve a blanket in his trunk- at the time he was very annoyed at himself for not having the foresight to keep an umbrella alongside it. He laid out the towel on top of the front passenger seat before checking for any damage to his car. There was a small dent along the hood that could be easily popped back out, hopefully meaning that he was able to slow down just enough where the man wasn’t at risk of having any internal bleeding.
On his way back over, he saw the man turn over to his side. He was groaning lowly and clutching his right arm.
“ Shit.” The stranger's voice had sounded, coming out cracked like he hadn’t had a sip of water in a week.
“Good, you’re awake.” Andrew stood above him at a distance, not wanting to overcrowd him as he was catching his bearings.
The stranger’s body jolted in surprise, showing he didn’t see or hear Andrew approaching. He saw the man’s chest stop- Andrew recognizing being struck with a panic so great that it made it hard to breathe.
“I hit you with my car.” Andrew decided to say.
The boy rolled over to look at Andrew, and slowly sat up, pinching his eyes because of the pain. Andrew could see that some of his hair was sticky with blood.
“You ran out in front of me like an fucking dumbass, and I tried to swerve but still nicked you. Just from the look of it, I think you have a head injury. Do you feel anything broken.”
The stranger just scowled at him. He rolled his shoulders and shook his legs before feeling his rib cage, an action that looked as if he had done it before.
“No.” Was all he said.
Andrew debated just leaving him there, but despite popular belief, he wasn’t too keen on being the reason someone died if he could help it.
He looked at the stranger, making eye contact with him. Although it was hard to tell in the dark night, the stranger’s eyes were a deep brown. His eyelashes were long and perfectly framed his eyes, drops of rain clinging to them. Or maybe it was blood.
“Well, my car is over there, and I'll drive you to the hospital.” Andrew stayed a few feet from the man.
The stranger quickly shook his head, but immediately showed regret, clutching both sides of it. “No, no…” his voice was weak, “No hospital.”
“I can’t leave you here out in the rain after I just hit you with a car, so I can atleast drive you home.”
The man turned and clutched a bag that was strewn carelessly on the side of the road, probably being thrown after the initial impact. “Fine.”
Andrew rolled his eyes at the attitude, even if it was justified. “Do you need help getting to the car, or are you okay to get there on your own.”
“I’m fine.” The stranger stood slowly, pausing halfway to catch his breath. He slung his damp duffle back around his left shoulder- the one that didn’t appear to be in any pain. Andrew doubted that he could make it all the way to the car on his own in his state.
The idiot limped slowly to the car, not putting much pressure on his right leg. Halfway there he tripped over a crack in the road and fell to the ground with a grunt.
“Fuck.”
Andrew saw that coming from a mile away, but the man said he was fine, so he let him be.
“Can I help you to the car? Or are you gonna keep proving you're a dunce?”
The man fisted his hands against the concrete, “Fine.” His voice came out gritted and angry.
Andrew made his way to his sprawled out body and reached down to grab his left arm. He helped him stand slowly, letting the man do most of the heavy lifting- only being there as support.
The walk to the car was even slower- the last fall probably knocking the wind out of his already injured body.
When they arrived at Andrew's car on the side of the road, Andrew removed his support and opened the door for him.
“I can throw the duffle in the back for you.”
Once again, a wary and slightly annoyed glare met Andrew’s, letting him know he wasn’t going to be separating the stranger from his bag anytime soon.
He watched as the man slowly got in the car, grunting in pain as he finally took a seat.
“Don’t bleed all over the leather.”
With that he slammed the door shut.
He paused before getting in the driver's side. All I wanted was a damn cigarette.
Once in the car, Andrew turned on the ignition. He saw the man’s body shivering from the cold, and could now see how wet he actually was. He was clutching his duffel bag in front of him, as if it would be able to bring him some warmth. But, his duffle only sagged sadly from its dampness, and Andrew doubted it was providing any comfort.
Andrew sighed and turned on the heat full blast. He was cold and wet himself, and he felt his hair stick annoyingly to his forehead.
He took out a cigarette and lit it.
The stranger glanced over at him, and Andrew noticed his shoulders sag slightly.
“You smoke?” Andrew said with the cigarette between his lips, offering the pack to the weird stranger.
“No.” Was all he said.
Andrew shrugged and put it back in his pocket.
He started driving, this time at a slower speed- not wanting to have to chauffeur another body home.
“Where to?”