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“Are you trying to catch hypothermia, junkie?”
Neil turned his head, surprised to find Andrew sitting in the recliner by the door, waiting for him. His skin buzzed from the bitter cold of the outside. Neil was dressed in a pair of running shorts that went a little too far up his long, tanned legs. He had a loose sweatshirt on his upper half, with only a thin tank top underneath.
Sure, Neil had felt cold when he’d first left for his run just before the sun had come up, but that was the point of exercising when it was cold out, right? Raising your body temp as well as your heart rate?
“Would you miss me if I caught it and died?” Neil asked, locking the dorm door back behind himself. He turned towards Andrew, grunting when the blond reached and pinched his exposed thigh. Andrew’s eyes trailed up Neil’s figure, ‘bored.’
“What a useless question. Of course I wouldn’t.”
Andrew let Neil’s skin go with another pinch. He watched Neil go to the fridge, eyes tracking his movements.
“Liar,” Neil said, something smug laying itself along his lips. He pulled a water bottle from the fridge, unscrewing the cap, only for Andrew to come up beside him and snatch it away.
“Don’t force your piss-poor habit of evading the truth on me,” Andrew said. He placed the water bottle down on the counter, kicking the fridge door shut with his foot. Strong arms bracketed Neil’s hips, cornering him against the counter.
“Wouldn’t say I was forcing it,” Neil retorted. He stared down into Andrew’s hazel eyes, all too aware of the word that the near golden irises left bouncing around in his head: home.
“An insult is an insult,” Andrew told him. Neil might’ve smiled, if he were that sort.
Instead he shifted on his feet, careful not to brush up against Andrew. Neil rubbed his hands together, inwardly preening when Andrew reached and took hold of them. Andrew pressed them together hard between his own palms; a subtle move to coax some warmth and bloodflow back into them.
“Go change, you degenerate. Your skin is raw and red enough that it makes me want to be sick.”
“I can’t even have a drink of water, first?” Neil asked. Andrew roughly took hold of his chin.
“Not unless you would be willing to drink it scalding hot, fresh from a pot off the stove.”
Neil shivered. He’d been burned plenty of times in his life to know how painfully hot that would be, and he shook his head at the memory.
“No, thanks,” Neil told Andrew. He waited Andrew out for a couple of moments, letting Andrew look his fill at his flushed ears and the translucent skin beneath his eyes, where his blood vessels were constricted in an attempt to retain heat.
“Go change,” Andrew said again, finally backing out of Neil’s space. “Grab something out of the dryer. I left it on.” Andrew reached and popped open the freezer door, digging around for a pint.
“Is telling me to go get warm your way of prepping to shovel ice cream into your face?”
“And if it is?”
Neil’s lips twitched at Andrew’s easy way of arguing back with him. He kept them pulled together, wheeling himself in the direction of the laundry room. Neil didn’t say anything back, and Andrew was content to let him go.
The laundry room was pluming with warm, almost muggy air when Neil stepped inside. The dryer was rumbling along, only a pair of joggers and a wool sweater tucked inside. Neil pulled them out and took his time changing; sharing a dorm with just Andrew made having his exposed skin out in the open so, so much easier than last year.
Neil’s body gave a quiet wrack once the warmth from the dryer finally laid itself deep into his skin. Neil could smell the brand of dryer sheets that Andrew liked to use, and he pinched the collar of his top so he could bring it to his nose and sniff it.
It smelt so much like quiet comfort and safety that his stomach flipped.
“ ‘Drew?” Neil called, coming back to the kitchen sometime later. He glanced inside, didn’t see Andrew, and instead moved into the next room. Andrew was sat on the cushioned window seat, staring out the frost-bitten window.
“Here,” Andrew mumbled, just loud enough for Neil to hear. His posture was loose and relaxed, his tub of ice cream cradled in one hand while his other held a spoon.
“Do you want me to grab a chair?” Neil asked, coming up beside him. Andrew turned his head to consider him. Something in his eyes danced.
“Does it look like we’re lacking in room?” Andrew said sarcastically. He kicked his legs out to prove his point and spread them, leaving a nice cozy spot for Neil to crawl between them if he so chose. A blanket was folded at the end of the window seat and Neil grabbed it on his way to clamber into the spot Andrew had made for him.
“Smart ass,” Neil mumbled. He sat with his back towards Andrew and didn’t make a move to lean back on his own. Instead he waited for Andrew to wind an arm around his front, allowing himself to be pulled to recline back against the goalkeeper.
“Takes one to know one.”
Andrew let Neil cover them up with the blanket that he’d brought to the window with him specifically for this reason. He hooked his feet over Neil’s strong legs, keeping them in place.
“You gonna give me a bite of that or keep it all to yourself?” Neil asked. He turned his head, hissing when Andrew pressed the full-length of the cold pint to his cheek. “You ass,” Neil said with a scowl.
“Don’t get bratty with me. You’re the one who left without so much as a by-your-leave before the ass-crack of dawn,” Andrew said, unforgiving.
A frown laced Neil’s lips. He rubbed at his cold cheek, icy irises gazing at the window. The frost on the other side was thick enough that Neil could only make out the blurs and odd shapes of campus, and for a dizzying moment he thought that perhaps he understood Andrew’s carefully veiled and contained agitation.
“I worried you,” Neil said, not quite a question. He stared at Andrew’s face as best he could in this position, watching Andrew’s brows furrow.
“I don’t worry about restless runaways.”
“Except for when you do.”
Andrew slowly capped his ice cream. He set it somewhere off to the side and unhooked his legs from atop Neil’s. Andrew instead gripped Neil by the arms and too-nonchalantly showed off his brute strength by flipping Neil over. Neil let himself be turned with a soft ‘oof’ sound punching from his lungs and he laid, chest down and with his face now buried in Andrew’s pecs.
“I don’t worry. You just instigate with your stupid choices and decisions. Idiocy runs in your blood.”
“Thank you.”
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
“From you it is,” Neil said, allowing himself a rare trace of a smile. It was something a little manic and bizarre, and Andrew took hold of the back of Neil’s neck with a bruising grip.
“Just my back,” Andrew told Neil, and the redhead allowed his hands to move and wander.
“Okay,” Neil said. He slipped his still-chilly hands under Andrew’s shirt, unable to miss the way Andrew shivered. Neil rested his cheek against Andrew’s chest, feeling the blond pull their shared blanket up higher to cover his shoulders.
Firm fingers found their way into Neil’s wild curls, and everything felt so, so warm.
“Is that a no to sharing your ice cream?” Neil asked, tone lazy and eyes half-lidded.
“Yes. Idiots who wander out into subpar temperatures just to get their rocks off do not deserve a treat.”
“Then what is this? Isn’t this also something nice that I get to enjoy with you?” Neil mumbled. He nuzzled against Andrew’s chest, and he felt Andrew stiffen.
“This is nothing,” Andrew said quietly.
“I think I like nothing, then. Forget the ice cream.”
Hazel eyes watched as Neil’s body slowly started to relax. Andrew traced the edges of Neil’s face for the dozenth time. He wrapped an arm protectively around Neil as the redhead slowly fell asleep, and only when he was sure he wouldn’t disturb Neil did Andrew let his other hand move.
“Running little rabbit,” Andrew mumbled, reaching and locking the window back. The locking mechanism was cool to the touch and Andrew shivered, refusing to sit with the too-loud relief that he’d felt once he’d seen Neil finally round the corner of the main road that led through campus.
He wouldn’t tell Neil that he’d continuously poked his head out the window, the freezing cold outside be damned, several times over the hour that Neil had been gone running.
Andrew wouldn’t say that he’d angrily stormed through the dorm, snatching up Neil’s favorite loungewear to wear in the wintertime so he could chuck it in the dryer for when Neil got back.
And Andrew also wouldn’t say that he already had thoughts of soup in mind for breakfast, just to get Neil to smile that almost gooey smile whenever he got to taste the first warm sip.
No, Andrew wouldn’t say these things. But that didn’t mean that they didn’t hang in the air, thick and persistent as the frost and snow outside.
And even for all his idiocy, Andrew knew how smart Neil could be. He could see the easy way Neil saw through him, and the thought left a chilling sensation under his skin.