Forget Me Not Collection

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Neil started cooking during his final year.

Before, it had always been Nicky or Andrew cooking, but when all the Monsters (save for him and Robin) and upperclassmen graduated, Neil was suddenly left with no cooking skills, no cook, and too much time on his hands.

At first it wasn’t a big deal. Microwave meals and takeout would suffice until he moved back in with Andrew. But when Kevin visited and saw Neil’s atrocious diet, he had a fit. He dragged Neil to the store, bought a slew of ingredients, and forced Neil to learn how to cook.

So, yes, Kevin was the one who essentially got Neil into cooking, but the baking came later.

read on ao3 | note: yes, they’re already married. Andrew is just tipsy

Neil had a nightmare.

He stared up at the ceiling, the image of Lola looming over him still burned into his eyelids.

He stared at the ceiling until he couldn’t take it anymore and he slid out of bed, careful so as to not wake Andrew.

That’s how he ended up on the kitchen, staring at the oven clock until five minutes had passed.

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The day Andrew Minyard and Neil Josten settle in together is the day Andrew sets down roots, and Neil follows along.

Andrew can hear Bee and her smug tone saying progress. (Andrew knows she wouldn’t actually say it like she was bragging, but he’d like to imagine she would so he could have some fake reason to dislike her.)

But imaginary Bee is right; walking into his and Neil’s apartment is like coming home. Seeing Neil in the kitchen, shoving groceries wherever they fit, is like breathing for the first time in a long time.

This is my piece for the Forget Me Not Zine (Link to come)

Enjoy!

Read also here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21664813

The first time it happened, Neil was staring at the bunk above him. He’d temporarily moved into the monsters’ dorm after figuring it’d be easier to keep an eye on Kevin and go to night practices without having Matt wait up for him every time. He saw Kevin’s mattress shift, felt the bunk shake as Kevin climbed down, heard his feet hit the cold tiles– and still he was startled when Kevin softly called his name.

Neil turned his head a little and looked at Kevin, focusing on the shadows splayed across his face, making it look all sharp angles and moonlit green eyes.

“Yeah?” Neil murmured.

Kevin stayed quiet, rigid, his discomfort evident in the way his fingers clenched and unclenched at his sides. Neil understood immediately. He shifted on the bed, moved closer to the wall, and lifted the blankets in the empty space.

“C’mere,” he said. Kevin hesitated a few seconds more, and then gingerly got under the covers in the spot Neil offered. He laid on his back, staring at the bunk above them. Neil moved to mirror him, but turned his head slightly to the side to be able to look at him. He looked tired, and there was a trace of something dark in his eyes.

“Was it him?” Neil asked, his voice barely above a whisper. Kevin didn’t turn around or reply, but his breath hitched, and Neil noticed. He decided that was answer enough, so he turned his back to Kevin, closed his eyes, and tried not to think.

—

When Neil woke up, the bed was empty. They didn’t talk about it.

—

It happened again, though. This time, Neil woke up with a start, confused, reaching under his pillow and finding it empty. His heart climbed up his throat as he desperately tried to remember where he was. He fought the panic down as a slightly strangled “Mom” left his lips, then he felt a hand in his hair, pulling slightly, grounding him, and he thought, Andrew. He took a deep breath as his vision cleared and he turned his head around, only to find Kevin looking at him with a deep scowl.

“You’re not Andrew,” Neil said stupidly, breathing hard. Then he remembered where Andrew was, and he flopped back down on the bed. Kevin disentangled his fingers from Neil’s hair slowly, and moved from his kneeling position on the floor to sit at the edge of the bed.

“No,” Kevin said simply. Neil looked at him, the familiar scowl and the tension of his shoulders, and something eased in his chest. He closed his eyes momentarily, and when he opened them again, Kevin was looking at him with an equally familiar intensity. “You were screaming.”

Neil took another deep breath. Nathan had been there, and so had Neil’s mom. He decided he didn’t want to  think about it.

“I’m fine,” he said. Kevin glared at him, but Neil ignored it.

Kevin seemed to hesitate for a second, and Neil waited him out. Kevin looked more exhausted than usual, and Neil couldn’t figure out what had– oh.

“You miss him,” Neil said, staring hard at him.

Kevin pressed his lips together tightly. “You’re going to have to be more specific.”

Neil rolled his eyes. “Andrew.”

Kevin stayed quiet, and that was all the answer Neil needed. It made sense, he thought. Andrew had been Kevin’s rock for almost two years now, they’d been practically attached at the hip, and now Andrew was gone. And, Neil suddenly remembered, Kevin wasn’t used to being alone.

He looked at Kevin, hard, and Kevin stared right back, like he was daring him to say something, chin jutting out slightly. The gesture made Neil’s palms tingle with something like excitement, but he wouldn’t be able to explain why. He made a decision and moved back in the bed in silent invitation.

Neil thought he saw Kevin’s shoulders sag a little bit– with relief or defeat, he couldn’t tell. This time, when Kevin got under the covers, Neil didn’t turn his back to him, but settled with one arm under his pillow and the other tucked close to his chest. Kevin looked at him for a moment longer and then settled on his back, slightly stiff. Neil closed his eyes and didn’t dream anymore.

—

It became a habit after that, and Neil couldn’t say he minded. He was used to sharing a bed with his mom, and even after a year and a half of sleeping alone, having another body by his side eased him a little bit. Kevin seemed to be sleeping better, too, if the receding purple under his eyes was any indication. Aaron and Nicky had even stopped questioning it, instead deciding to ignore it– or, in Nicky’s case, make an inhuman effort to keep his mouth shut after the look Kevin gave him when he asked, “What was that about homosexual athletes again, Kevin?”

They didn’t really talk about it, though. Neil didn’t know if it was because they didn’t want to, or because they didn’t need to– the reason why they were doing it was obvious. Kevin had always had someone beside him, be it Riko, or Jean, or Andrew. Andrew had left, leaving Kevin alone for the first time in a year and a half, and he desperately needed something, some one to hold on to.

Neil, on the other hand, had started to rely on Andrew and his promise to keep him alive more than he’d wanted to admit. Sometimes the panic and the nightmares became so unbearable he had to almost physically remind himself he’d promised he wouldn’t run anymore.

What Neil and Kevin needed, they’d reluctantly realized, was each other.

One thing Neil had started to notice, though, was that sometimes he would catch Kevin’s eyes lingering on him in the lounge during practice, and then flicking away, a frown on his face. Neil started to notice other things that he had absolutely no business noticing, too, like the heat of Kevin’s leg next to his when they sat side by side on the couch, or the brush of their arms when they passed each other during drills. It was very distracting and set Neil on edge, but he was starting to get used to it.

And then the Winter Banquet happened, and Kevin figured out who he was… and then he left for Evermore.

—

When he came back, he thought things would change. He thought Kevin would withdraw from him the way he did with everyone else, thought he’d have to move back into his own dorm. What else was he supposed to think, after Kevin’s reaction to his appearance and his brand-new tattoo? He’d probably have nightmares if they slept in the same room, let alone the same bed.

That night he went to bed exhausted, bones weary and injuries aching. He was about to give up on waiting for Kevin to join him (why was he even waiting) when he felt a dip in the mattress beside him. His heart sped up and he turned around slowly, watching as Kevin fought something inside himself and finally got under the covers. Neil took a deep breath and waited.

“Tell me everything,” Kevin said finally, voice rough and shoulders tense. So Neil did.

—

Two nights later, Kevin woke up thrashing, a raw whimper escaping his throat. Neil moved away from him, trying to be as unthreatening as possible until Kevin regained consciousness of his surroundings. Once Kevin was still, breathing hard through his nose and hair plastered to his forehead with sweat, Neil moved again, closer to him. He tried to put himself in Kevin’s shoes, tried to think of what he needed, and decided he probably wanted some gentle comfort. Neil wasn’t the best at handling these sort of situations, since his childhood had been as far from ‘gentle’ or ‘comforting’ as it could get, and his years on the run with his mom hadn’t been much better, but he knew he had to do something. After he’d gone to Evermore, he understood more than ever why Kevin was the way he was. He didn’t necessarily agree with the way he handled himself, but he understood. That feeling, that necessity to not think about himself and help Kevin instead, scared him, but he decided to ignore it for now.

Before touching, Neil asked, “Okay?” trying to make his intentions perfectly clear.

Kevin looked at him with a start but nodded. Neil propped his head up on his elbow and sought Kevin’s left hand beneath the covers, carefully touched his fingertips to his scars, tracing each line with a softness he didn’t know he was capable of. Kevin was looking at him intently, but he didn’t move, so Neil didn’t stop. Finally, Kevin relaxed enough to shift and settle back down on the bed, never removing his hand from Neil’s. He turned on his side and his gaze bored into Neil, intent and with a level of intimacy that unnerved him. But Neil didn’t back down, staring back all the same. Eventually Kevin closed his eyes slowly and his breathing deepened. It was only then that Neil pulled back his hand and rested his head back on the pillow, facing Kevin. For the first time since he took that plane to West Virginia, his normally reeling thoughts were quieted as he nodded off, watching Kevin’s chest rise and fall slowly.

—

Sometimes they talked, sometimes they didn’t. Sometimes they spoke about Andrew, and sometimes Kevin was drunk and loose-tongued, and he’d tell him about his first year at Palmetto, about that time he tried to recruit Andrew, about everything that had changed since then. Neil knew the story from the papers and Nicky and Aaron, and Jean had talked about the reason Kevin hadn’t insisted, but he wanted to hear it from Kevin himself.

“He didn’t care,” Kevin said, and there was a glint in his eye that Neil knew was a reflection of his own. “He was so good, and he just didn’t give a damn. He still doesn’t,” he added, with a hint of bitterness. Neil kept his eyes on him, watched the alcohol-induced droop of his eyelids, and knew it bothered Kevin greatly that he hadn’t been able to get through to Andrew yet.

“He does care,” Neil said, with more confidence than he felt. He wanted to believe Andrew cared more than he let on.

Kevin shrugged, noncommittal. Neil decided to bring up what Jean had told him.

“Why didn’t you insist on getting him to join the Ravens? Why didn’t Riko? Jean said–”

Kevin looked unhappy at the prospect of Jean sharing anything about him with anyone, even Neil, but explained anyway. “Yeah, Riko wanted Andrew to be a pet. He wanted Andrew to be like Jean. He wanted him to be ‘my pet,’ but he would’ve been his anyway. Andrew couldn’t be that. I wouldn’t let Riko have him.”

Neil watched the heat rise high in his cheeks with fascination and decided to leave it at that. He pulled Kevin down beside him by the collar of his shirt, wincing at the sudden sting in his arms. Kevin settled next to him with a huff, prying Neil’s fingers carefully away from his shirt, annoyed at Neil’s carelessness. They were closer than they usually slept, but Neil decided to blame it on the alcohol. He’d noticed Kevin got a lot touchier during nights like this, and he found he didn’t mind too much. Since he’d joined the Foxes, he’d discovered he craved physical contact in a way he never had before– that he’d never realized he did.

Kevin lifted his hand and pressed his fingertips to Neil’s tattoo, making Neil shiver slightly. Kevin frowned, but didn’t pull his hand back, just left it there, his thumb brushing against Neil’s cheekbone. Then he finally let his hand fall, but he didn’t move away. Neil could feel the warmth of his breath on his face, smelling of vodka and mint, and he closed his eyes, letting out the air he didn’t know he was holding. When he opened them again, Kevin was asleep.

—

The night before Andrew was supposed to get out of Easthaven, they skipped night practice to go to bed early. As they settled under the covers, Kevin told him about his relationship with Andrew. He was way more sober than Neil expected him to be to have that conversation. Kevin said they’d been hooking up before Neil joined the team. Why– if– they had stopped, Kevin didn’t say, and Neil didn’t ask. He guessed he’d find out soon enough.

According to Kevin, Andrew had made the first move. After Columbia, Neil thought that made sense. They had been out at Eden’s, Kevin was tipsy but not drunk, and Andrew had taken him by the back of the neck, had asked him “Yes or no?” and Kevin, confused but not unwilling, had said yes.

After that, it’d become a habit. Except it wasn’t just at Eden’s, but in the dorm, in the locker rooms, sometimes during night practice on the Court. Kevin’s cheeks blushed a faint pink as he explained, but he didn’t give any other hint of his embarrassment, just kept on telling Neil about it.

And oh, Neil realized, Kevin didn’t think it was just a hook-up. He didn’t say it, he certainly didn’t even imply it, but Neil knew. After years of watching Kevin, and after the last few weeks watching him closely like nobody else did, Neil could tell how much he cared about Andrew, beyond his wasted potential on the court.

When Kevin stopped talking, they laid in silence for a few minutes. Neil could hear the sound of a video game in the living room, and the faint sound of Nicky and Aaron’s voices.

“He’s going to be back tomorrow,” Neil said, searching Kevin’s face.

Kevin held his gaze. “I know.”

Andrew Minyard was not good with words.

Actually, scratch that. Andrew Minyard was very good with words. Cutting remarks and biting insults and sarcastic responses. He was very good at all of those. It was the simpler words he had problems with.

Words like love and relationship and trust.

“Hey,” Neil said, knocking Andrew’s shoulder with his own. They were on the roof, as they usually were this time of night. “What are you thinking?”

I’ll miss you when I graduate. I wish you could come with me. I don’t want to lose this.

Instead, Andrew took a long drag of his cigarette. Instead, Andrew shrugged too tight shoulders. Instead, Andrew wrapped a hand around the back of Neil’s neck and brought him in for a cigarette laced kiss. It was the only thing he knew how to say right now.

When he pulled back, Neil was grinning. “Is that what you were thinking?” Andrew shoved him back with a hand to his face and took another drag of his cigarette.

****

“I don’t know how to say words.”

Bee raised a brow at him. “No? I’d say you have a gift with words, Andrew. I’ve never head someone describe things as succinctly and as to the point as you do.”

“That’s not what I mean.” Andrew shook his head. He didn’t even know how to say this to Bee. He sighed and rubbed his face. Played with the edge of an armband. Jiggled a leg. Bee watched him patiently, waiting for him to get his thoughts in order.

“I’m graduating soon.” Bee nodded. “Neil is not.” She nodded again. “I don’t know how to say words.”

“Ah,” Bee said, finally getting it. “You would like to express some things to Neil, but you don’t know how to put them into words. Is that it?”

Andrew gave a tight nod.

He tried to show the words physically. He could feel them, when they were alone, and it was dark, and they were tangled together in sheets with warm breaths and gentle hands. He tried to say so much in those moments, because he couldn’t say it out loud.

A kiss behind Neil’s ear. I want you. A finger lightly trailing a scar. You’re perfect. A hand on a jaw, foreheads touching, breaths mingling. I love you.

Was it enough?

“I’m worried,” Andrew told Bee. “For when I’m gone, and Neil is here. We’ll have to communicate via phone calls and skype and…” Bee waited patiently again. “I just want to be able to say it out loud when we’re not in the same place. I’m worried it’ll be different.” I’m worried he won’t want me anymore.

“Hmmm,” Bee nodded and made a note of something. “Well, there are a lot of other ways for you to say things to him. I think Neil probably knows that speaking your emotions and feelings out loud is not something you claim to be proficient in. And I think he would understand that, even when you’ve left PSU. But let’s talk about some ways you can express what you’re feeling without having to put it into words out loud.”

Green light filtered through the window. It made the room feel like it was under water, or on some foreign planet. Andrew dropped his arm over his eyes trying to block it out, trying to will himself back to sleep for another hour. Or three. Nobody was counting.

A sharp pip sounded from somewhere outside. A minute passed, and it sounded again. And again. Andrew dropped his arm and glared out into the greenish dawn. A little bird hung from one of the branches of the giant vine that clung to the side of the house. It stared at him, cocking its head to the side, bright eyes considering. Pip!

“You’re an asshole.”

The bird gave a self-satisfied pip and flew off. Bastard. Just what he needed, an alarm clock with a mind of its own.

He yawned and stretched, taking inventory of what hurt. Knees. Left thumb. Right hip. Better than yesterday. He left his cane where it was, leaning against the wall.

Going down the narrow stairs that his physical therapist had assured him were a terrible idea, he entered the tiny kitchen and grumbled at the landscape of boxes he could see stacked in the living room. The coffee maker was the one thing he had set up yesterday, and he listened to the gurgling sounds as the water dripped through while he looked over the boxes. Finding the one labeled Dishes, he dug through and pulled out a bowl and a mug.

He took his meager breakfast out onto the patio. The cracked concrete was shot through with weeds; the abandoned furniture peeling and rusted. The little pipping bird was back to sitting in the vines. He couldn’t figure out why it was there; other than the vines that were assaulting the house and a few coarse weeds, the yard was bare dirt, hard and unwelcoming and littered with junk. It was ugly as hell, but Andrew didn’t really care. All he had to do was lift his head, and the view was spectacular: rolling mountains, the caps slowly baring themselves to the spring sun, the slopes a mix of trees and green expanses that he knew from photographs were covered with flowers. Someday, he’d walk there. Someday, he’d reach the top.

Scoffing at himself, at his stupid impossible dreams, he creaked to his feet and went in to take his medications.

~

Andrew’s house was full of strangers. If he hadn’t just bought the thing two days ago, it would’ve been tempting to set it on fire.

They weren’t technically strangers, as Allison had pointed out, given that he worked with them. But when Renee had said she’d be stopping by to help him unpack, he would’ve preferred it if she’d mentioned she’d be bringing half the town. He glared across the room at Renee, who pretended not to notice while she helped her girlfriend unpack cooking supplies. There was banging overhead where Kevin and Matt were putting together his bed. On the one hand, he was glad he was going to be able to stop sleeping on his mattress on the floor. On the other hand…

Movement outside caught this eye, a flash of reddish brown in his front yard. “What—”

Renee paused in her silverware sorting and followed his eyes. “Oh good! Neil came.”

“What, you hadn’t brought enough people?”

His words were punctuated by a crash from upstairs, followed by Matt’s voice calling a strained, “Everything’s okay!”

“Neil’s a gardener,” Allison said, as if that should have been obvious.

“Great.” More help he didn’t want. He made his way outside, but Neil had disappeared. Grumbling, he walked around the house, only stumbling twice. A slender man stood at the edge of his backyard, facing the mountains. Andrew tried to pretend that the man didn’t improve the view considerably, and stepped up to his side.

The man gave him a slashing glance, then a matching smile. “You must be Andrew.” He held out his hand, shrugging when Andrew didn’t take it. “Neil. I’m a friend of Allison’s.”

“What fresh hell do you have in store for me?”

Neil laughed easily. “Depends on what you want. Clean all this trash up to start; after that it’s up to you.”

“Up to me.” So far not a damn thing had been up to him, despite Renee’s lip service. “In that case, can you get rid of the assholes who have taken over my house?”

“Sorry, no,” Neil said, grinning. Andrew couldn’t take his eyes off of him, and he cursed himself for his weakness. “You know how it is. Once you’re in Renee’s clutches, you will help people and you will like it.”

“I most definitely will not.”

Neil laughed again and turned back to the yard, picking up one of the discarded plastic buckets that littered the space. “I better get started.”

It was rapidly becoming familiar, getting dismissed in his own house. He would have stayed just to watch Neil work, but Dan called his name and he headed back inside to prevent a book-arranging disaster.

~

The rumble of a truck pulled Andrew out of the mental cocoon he went into whenever he started working on his book. The week had been blessedly quiet, save for his avian alarm clock, but it appeared that was at an end. Grumbling, he forced himself to his feet, leaving his cane leaning against the couch.

Neil was standing on his front walkway, rubbing a hand sheepishly through his hair. “Morning.”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m here to figure out what we’re doing with your yard. Didn’t Allison tell you?”

Andrew thought of Allison’s parting words on Friday. “You’re welcome!” He hadn’t known what she meant and hadn’t cared. Evidently he should have. “Why?”

Neil looked at him, nonplussed. “Because having that yard basically being a wasteland of dirt is criminal?”

“Hey, it’s my wasteland of dirt.”

That damn smile made a reappearance. “You deserve more than that.”

“That’s such bullshit. Nobody deserves anything.”

Neil cocked his head to one side. “Do you really believe that?”

Andrew studied his face, the faded scarring across his cheeks, the stubborn set to his jaw that made the smile a lie. “How much is Allison paying you?”

He looked genuinely startled at that. “Nothing. I volunteered.”

“Why? What do you get out of this?”

Neil looked away, color staining his cheeks like a sunrise. “Everyone deserves a little beauty in their lives.”

Andrew wondered what it was like, going through life with the evidence of other people’s viciousness on your face, and believing in beauty anyway.

~

Slowly the garden took shape, each Sunday adding a little more. When Andrew greeted him the third Sunday leaning on his cane, the truckload of gravel went back to where it came from without a word. The next week, he came outside to find Neil laying out paving stones in a sunburst pattern where the concrete had once been.

Neil was interesting and unpredictable, some days working for hours in silence, others chattering at length about plants and birds, on this continent and others. Sometimes Andrew helped, raking the dirt in the raised beds, then setting the native perennials Neil had picked out gently into the sun-warmed soil. Sometimes his hands wouldn’t close on the tools, and he sat in the shade of the house and talked or read aloud from the book he was writing. Once he stopped, uncertain if Neil was even listening; his friend raised his head from where he was setting out a bird bath. “Is that it?” Neil asked, disappointment coloring his voice, and Andrew bit back his smile as he turned back to his book.

Neil arranged shrubs around the house and planted a couple of flowering trees for shade. Soon Andrew’s little pipping bird had friends of his own, and he woke to a melodic cacophony each morning. One afternoon, they sat in silence on the new furniture Andrew had ordered, sipping lemonade and watching fat bumblebees tumble in and out of hot pink flowers. The garden was almost done; the summer had already passed its peak. Andrew looked at Neil, at his summer-sky eyes and his autumn hair, and he swallowed back the grief as he realized these Sundays were drawing to a close.

~

The singing was not enough to stir him. He heard it, dimly, through the haze of pain, but he closed his eyes and drifted back into the darkness.

~

“Andrew?”

He knew that voice; it wrapped itself around his heart and pulled, forcing him into consciousness. Stifling his groan was impossible, and Neil was at his side in a flash. “How can I help?”

“I need to take my meds.” His voice sounded like gravel, and he tried to clear his throat but it was too dry to make a difference.

“Bathroom?”

Andrew hummed, and Neil disappeared, only to reappear in a second with his pill case and a glass of water. “Can I?” Neil asked, hovering an arm over Andrew’s shoulders. Nodding didn’t hurt, at least, and Neil slipped an arm gently behind him and coaxed him into a sitting position against the headboard. He held the glass so Andrew could suck some water through the straw, then handed him the pills, one at a time. When he was done, they sat there like that for a while, Andrew avoiding Neil’s eyes. He hated this, hated that Neil found him like this. Hated that this was the new reality of his life, where he could be going along okay and then suddenly be incapacitated by pain.

It hadn’t struck him down like this since he first got sick; he would never forget that panic, being alone and unable to move without screaming, having to drag himself to the bathroom. Then the weeks of doctor’s visits and tests, the medications that helped the pain but messed him up otherwise, until they finally found a cocktail that worked, more or less beating his immune system into submission. He had moved here out of sheer stubbornness; maybe he should call it stupidity. But he needed this. He needed the mountains out there, calling to him. He needed to believe that one day he would climb up there.

“Why are you here?” he asked, shattering the silence.

“It’s Sunday.”

But the garden is finished, he wanted to say; you are wasting your time with me.

Neil reached out like he was going to touch his hand, but refrained when he saw the red, swollen joints. “Did you think I was just coming for the garden?”

“Why else would you bother?”

“Andrew…I could have finished that garden in two weeks, if I’d wanted to. That was my plan, at first.” He laughed, shaking his head as if at himself. “But then you wouldn’t let me cut down that damn vine because that sparrow likes it…”

Andrew closed his eyes, hearing the unspoken words behind Neil’s soft tone. “I will never be more than this, Neil.”

“You’re Andrew. What more do you need to be?”

~

There was music in the trees. A symphony composed of wind through tree boughs, of the singing of birds, the chattering of squirrels, the baseline of leaves crunching underfoot. Andrew paused for breath, gulping down some water. The early springtime air traced cool fingers through his hair, and goosebumps erupted down his arms.

Recapping his water, he followed the sound of footsteps in front of him. His walking stick was worn smooth where his hand rested, and he rubbed his thumb in the glossy spot as he negotiated his way over some roots.

“It’s just up ahead,” Neil’s voice called from somewhere out of sight. Andrew took his time, even though he knew he would follow that voice anywhere. He had waited a year for this; he could wait a few minutes longer.

The trees finally opened up to a scene out of a movie. Flowers, blue and purple and white and yellow, all bowed before the wind that tore across the meadow. Neil stood on a little rise, one hand shielding his eyes, staring west. Andrew climbed up to stand next to him. He could see their house from here, the windows glinting in the sun. When he squinted, he could discern the blossoms on the flowering cherry Neil had planted near the bedroom. The tree was still small, barely taller than they were, but it bloomed with reckless abandon. Warmth crept through him that had nothing to do with the springtime sunshine as he thought of their tiny tree, and the nest the sparrows were building in its branches.

Neil bent down and kissed him, soft and lingering. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

me, finally getting exposed as the sap i am