no one is alone, truly.

Thanks @rackiera for the idea

so first ill start with andrew since it was a quote from him that got me down this rabbit hole. but basically, it's very very clear in the text that andrew does not like being lied to, and he makes countless remarks about neil's lies. on multiple occasions, he responds with anger at being lied to, or what he counts as lying. in the very first book, when kevin doesn't tell him about the ravens coming down south, he calls kevin a liar straight to his face, which makes kevin flinch and pretty much start begging andrew not to abandon him, basically. some of that could be sourced from kevin's own trauma from riko—who has also been outspoken about his distaste for being lied to, at least with neil—but it wouldn't surprise me if it was just kevin knowing how much andrew doesn't like liars/being lied to and worrying andrew would break their deal. or it could have just as easily been both.

either way, that was just one example among multiple where andrew expresses discontent with dishonesty. ironically, so many of those examples involve neil, but ill get to that in a minute. what initially caught my interest was how andrew lied in the first book, because andrew's usually portrayed as never lying (which isn't entirely accurate, he definitely does, it's just that he rarely does), and the text puts a whole lot of emphasis on his distaste with lies in general.

there's a scene in tfc where he says he knows about neil's "ouchies" bc he took a look at neil's file, then goes on to flatout state that he didn't read neil's file and that he made it up. now, personally? it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest if he read neil's file lmao, but whether he did or not, in one direction or another, he lied about it. either he lied to say he did when he didn't, or he lied to say he didn't when he did. what sent me into this spiral was this specific quote:

said to neil: "you don't believe me, do you? i know you don't. that's probably for the best."

a fun thing about andrew is he's unusual in how he speaks, with his riddles and games and wordplay, and sometimes, it's clearly his way of skirting the truth or avoiding offering it, rather than outright lying. it's also common for the things he says to have a lot of layered meaning to it, things that can be overlooked easily etc, so this caught my attention, because i was so sure that if i knew one thing about andrew minyard, it's that he doesn't like not being taken at his word—and that quote above is about the stalls in the locker room, and he's actually telling the truth. why then would it "probably be for the best" if neil didn't believe him?

and so i went looking to make sure i wasn't off in my initial analysis, and i came out the other side of it certain andrew absolutely does value being taken at his word (being seen as honest), and he also takes it as a borderline unforgivable slight when someone does not do that. directly from the text, we have examples to indicate this:

said to neil, about luther: "he chose not to believe me at all, and that's a thousand times worse, you see."

said to aaron: "i did what i said i would do, and fuck you for expecting anything else."

said where all the foxes could hear, about tilda: "i told her what would happen if she raised her hand again. she had no right to look so surprised."

so, clearly this is a guy who means what the fuck he says, and takes some form of offense at not being taken at his word. he's also the promise guy. they're a big deal for him, as are the deals he makes with people.

i got even more curious and found multiple instances of andrew either seeking out reassurances that people believe him, or calling attention to people not believing him.

just a handful of direct quotes:

said to kevin: "i promised you, didn't i? don't you believe me?"

also said to kevin: "it'll be fine. you believe me, yes?"

said to neil, about bee: "i told her it was a mistake to let you stay, but she didn't believe me."

said to neil, about pig higgins: "i knew he wouldn't believe me, so i didn't waste my time trying."

said to aaron: "because i made you a promise. i did not forget it just because you chose not to believe me."

he says it at least twice that people make the choice not to believe him, which makes it sound like he sees it as a targeted attack, with malicious intent behind it. and obviously it doesn't feel good when people don't believe you, especially when you're being honest, but for andrew, it appears to be a layered problem for him. one i think began in his childhood, likely treated as the foster kid with plenty of behavioral issues, brushed off or repeatedly let down, even from an early age. by the time he makes it to the spears, he actively chooses not to tell anyone about drake, specifically cass, and is willing to keep his silence to keep her. and while there may have been many reasons for that, i wouldn't be surprised if a big one was due to him presuming she would not believe him to begin with.

either because of evidence in his youth, or even evidence in the present, or because he just doesn't have a hopeful view on life in general—andrew does not believe that people will believe him, whether he tells the truth or not. which is very clearly an issue to him, and for him, something that bothers him, and so i reached a conclusion.

that very first quote where he says that he knows neil does not believe him, and that it's probably for the best, i think he says it bc very few people ever really believe him, and the ones that do, he ends up getting attached to in some form or fashion. (bee and renee, where it counts, just as examples.) so, if neil was someone who believed him, who saw him as someone who is true to his word, who is honest, that would mean something to andrew. which, as we know, neil went on to do exactly that, so not only was he the attractive mystery andrew was reluctantly infatuated with, he was also the one who saw him in a way no other ever did and came to believe him/believe in him in a way that he never got before (and likely always desperately wanted).

now onto neil, who is a bit simpler in this.

neil is a pathological liar to a tee. he doesn't even deny it when it's pointed out to him either. wymack says it directly, that he was told neil was a pathological liar, and neil's reply to that is ironically very honest. he says "it's what i was raised to be." which is the truth.

he lies frequently and accepts that being a liar is what he is. he once tells matt "you probably shouldn't believe anything i say." he lies with a goal in mind. his lies are elaborate. he does it for survival, or to manipulate people and situations in his favor, and he doesn't initially feel bad about it at all. as the trilogy progresses, we watch him start to feel guilty and weighed down by his lies, even though he always finds it in him to brush off that guilt out of necessity so he can cling to his lies. to be fair, his circumstances are so complex and dangerous that lying is (and has been for a very long time) extremely necessary for him.

his outlook on being seen as a liar and lying in general is the complete opposite of andrew, but because dishonesty was so tangled up in necessity and survival for him, he yearns for the truth. he associates honesty with safety, and given that he's gone so long without that, he's resistant to the feeling at first, which we see in how he struggles when he's giving a lot of his earlier pieces of truth to andrew. it terrifies him, but it also progresses into him wanting to do it even more.

because he associates honesty with safety, andrew being how he is draws neil to him, and there's a whole arc in the very first book that sets up the foundation for why and how neil's feelings for andrew progress.

in an early scene in tfc during a night practice, one of the first talks andreil properly have alone, andrew tells neil that kevin said he'd be court one day. neil instantly doesn't believe andrew and wholeheartedly assumes that andrew is lying to him. neil believes this from around the beginning of the book to around the end, where kevin is quoted saying that very thing, and then it's reinforced on the show with kathy when kevin reiterates it, confirming that andrew had been telling the truth. neil's initial thought about the fact that andrew hadn't lied was that it was "disturbing" lmao, but after that, we start to see more and more progress during their little truth4truth games and how relieved neil starts to become with how andrew unflinchingly accepts his truths.

then, eventually, neil starts really hating keeping things from the foxes as he grows attached to them, andrew especially, and he starts really wanting to be honest with them, or just wishing he could. he started making plans to tell people, wymack and andrew specifically, and then after baltimore, as soon as he considered himself safe/safe enough, he lets himself be honest. he goes as far as refusing to speak with kevin in french in front of matt, because he doesn't want to lie anymore. and a big thing for him during what happened in baltimore was being afraid he would die a lie, then the sheer relief afterwards when he realized he wasn't going to.

but it was andrew, ultimately, that neil was initially the most honest with. andrew found a way that neil could be honest long before he felt safe enough, which essentially made him into a safe space that neil was never given before (and likely always desperately wanted).

which brings me back to my original point, which is how insanely compatible andreil are, even though neil is a liar and andrew values honesty. because what matters more to neil than lying is being given the chance to feel safe enough to tell the truth, and what matters more to andrew than being lied to is being believed/believed in.