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Andrew wakes on the morning of his twenty-fourth birthday painfully alone.
It’s been more than two weeks since the last time Andrew had been in the same room as Neil, even longer since he last woke up with his face buried in Neil’s pretty red curls.
His chest aches, a strange little feeling he’s become more acquainted with the longer he’s away from Neil and the rest of his family. The loneliness isn’t new, he’s intimately familiar with the hollowed-out canyon it leaves whenever it passes through him, but he’s always been able to rectify that within hours if not minutes. His family has always been within reach, no more than a single text away from being in the same room together.
Andrew doesn’t like the distance. He thought he’d enjoy being on his own a lot more than he actually does but it helps to remind himself that this is only temporary. Soon enough, he’ll have Neil back within reaching distance at all times. It may take another year, maybe more, but one day they’ll be together again.
One day.
It’s a Thursday, so he has practice he needs to go to, despite the mere thought of getting out of bed exhausting him.
He knows that even if he didn’t, he’d still have to get up so he could feed Neil’s stupid cat. The little rat has made it a mission to turn Andrew’s apartment into her own personal opera stage whenever he’s more than a few seconds late to get her breakfast. It’s the only time her normally skittish nature takes a backseat to her desires.
It’s his own fault, really. He saw Neil’s face when he showed off the tiny orange tabby a few months ago and knew that Neil would always regret giving her up if Andrew didn’t step in to give her a home and Andrew is nothing if not completely whipped when it comes to Neil.
So now he has a small, occasionally narcissistic beast he shares his space with and he only hates it a little bit.
He pulls himself out of bed, completely ignoring his phone while he’s still half asleep. There won’t be many messages waiting for him—a few from Nicky, one from Neil, maybe one from his twin—but he isn’t awake enough to deal with all of that.
His morning routine goes by between blinks, the whole thing mostly unchanged since he moved. The only difference from his final year is the startling lack of good morning kisses.
It isn’t until his coffee is brewing and Sir Fat Cat McCatterson (named as joint effort by Nicky and Robin when Neil had nothing to put in the name section at that first trip to the vet; unfortunately, and despite Andrew’s very loud complaints, it stuck) is fed does Andrew finally look at his birthday wishes.
As he predicted, Nicky sent him several sappy messages, all in caps. Andrew skims them, notes the time for the three-way Skype call he decided with Aaron, and leaves them unanswered.
Aaron’s message is a curt happy birthday, to which Andrew copies the messages and sends it back before he pours himself a coffee.
November fourth is the only day they’re guaranteed to interact with each other during the year, aside from maybe the holidays, and Andrew doesn’t see a reason to change that up this year. Maybe when they’ve spent more time apart will he decide to do something about their relationship. Maybe.
Finally, he checks the messages—because for whatever reason, there’s more than one—from Neil and nearly drops the creamer. Still, some splashes out onto the countertop but Andrew pays it no mind because Neil sent him a photo.
It’s not just any photo, though. It’s not like the ones he usually sends throughout the day of his meals or his view of the sunset from the roof of the Tower or a frog he saw on his way to class.
No.
Neil sent what is probably the most tasteful nude Andrew has ever been privy to.
Not that he’s been sent many, but Neil had dabbled a bit when they first upgraded to the newest iPhone and realized they came with far better cameras than their old flip phones did. They were cheesy and badly posed, but Andrew saved every single one of them and still sometimes flips through them when he’s feeling particularly lonely.
This one is a simple selfie, clearly in the dorm bathroom at the Tower, but Andrew throws that out as inconsequential because what’s more important is that Neil is wearing a white and orange jersey tugged up to expose one of his small perky tits, nipple hard and red and—and pierced.
Andrew nearly drops his phone when that registers. At some point since their last Skype sex session a couple weeks ago, Neil went out and got his nipples pierced and didn’t say anything. He’d almost be mad if not for the way all of the blood in his body went straight to his dick.
Most of Neil’s face is out of the frame but there’s enough for Andrew to see his flushed cheeks and still sleep heavy eyes, meaning Neil snapped this immediately after he got up.
It makes him wearing Andrew’s old Foxes jersey all the more adorable and the distance between them all the more painful.
There’s a single message underneath the photo, a small hbd paired with a blue heart. Andrew saves the photo and returns to his coffee but not before sending his own heart in return.
***
When he checks his phone before he locks up during practice, he has another message waiting for him from Neil.
He feels almost delirious, checking the locker room to make sure no one can see his screen before he opens it, because Neil rarely ever initiates things like this. It feels like a real treat, the first birthday present he’s ever looked forward to unwrapping.
This time, Neil is in his own locker room, the bright orange of the Foxes more familiar than the dark burgundy of Chicago’s. He’s sitting on a bench, facing one of the few mirrors, and completely shirtless.
Andrew saves it without a second thought and then studies it a little longer while he still has some time before he has to be on the court.
Neil is leaning forward, one hand splayed wide on the bench between his thick thighs. With the way he’s holding the phone, his arms press his tits together, creating cleavage where there usually isn’t. The small silver bars in his nipples Andrew still hasn’t fully wrapped his mind around glint invitingly in the terrible fluorescents.
He looks fucking edible and Andrew curses the miles between them for what feels like the millionth time.
He types out a quick message, willing Neil to still be available. The Foxes should be done by now, if Andrew has his timezones correct, but for the life of him he can’t remember if Neil has an early class or not this semester.
to: bunny
is this my present
from: bunny
maybe
Andrew waits a few seconds to see if Neil sends anything back, but his phone remains stubbornly quiet. He tries to think up something to get Neil to send him another one if he has any more, but his captain pokes his head in the locker room and tells him to hurry the fuck up before he can.
He’ll just have to bother Neil later then, he promises himself, and throws his phone back in his bag.
***
They get lunch catered, a nice sandwich place that Andrew has ordered from even on his days off because they’re just that good, and Andrew has another photo waiting for him.
He slowly makes his way to a mostly secluded corner of their lounge, not that anyone would be surprised to see him on his own. Andrew made it clear on his first day that he had zero intentions of making friends and no one has yet to call him on it. If someone tried, he’d probably cave but for now, he sits in his corner, blissfully alone.
In this photo, Neil is looking over his shoulder, a small smirk playing on his lips where his face isn’t hidden by his phone. He’s wearing Andrew’s jersey again but not his Fox one—it's his white-and-burgundy home Wolves jersey—hiked up to tease the curve of his ass and his pretty pussy.
He has no idea when Neil would’ve had the time to go out and snag one of those, seeing as they spent every second Neil was in Chicago helping him move together, most of that wrapped up in Andrew’s brand new, very expensive sheets.
But he must have snuck out at some point, because there his boyfriend is, as close as they can get to claiming each other publicly.
Andrew sighs, gaining a couple of odd looks from his teammates. The ache has never been so hard to ignore.
***
When he gets home, there are two more nudes waiting for him.
It’s timed so impeccably, Andrew would guess that Neil put some kind of tracker on him but that’s more Andrew’s speed anyway. The more likely scenario is that Neil planned this as meticulously as possible and the thought sends warmth through Andrew’s body.
Because of course Neil would do the most for Andrew’s first birthday alone when they haven’t ever done more than a little fooling around before. Until now, they’ve been at each other’s sides as much as is physically possible, there was little to want for when they were rarely more than a foot apart.
The first photo is nearly a full body shot, if not for Andrew’s jersey covering Neil’s collarbone where it’s bunched up to expose the rest of his naked body, scars and bush and brand new piercings and all.
All Andrew can think is that Neil looks healthy. He carries his weight beautifully, filled out where he used to be little more than skin and bones. Andrew prides himself on being a large part of that, showing Neil that food can be more than just a tasteless protein bar he shovels in his face between classes.
He would know, having gone through the same shit himself after Nicky took them in. Andrew was never grateful when he was a teenager but as an adult with many, many years of therapy under his belt, he can appreciate what his cousin did for him, even if Nicky wasn’t aware of it until much later.
It might just be Andrew’s favorite photo of Neil, second only to the one taken of them during Neil’s freshman year, wearing their matching coats, that’s still hanging in the Foxhole Court lounge.
The second, in contrast, is the nastiest photo Neil has ever sent, and Andrew’s dick perks up as soon as he opens it.
It’s of Neil bent over, the only visible parts of him are the hand holding his phone and his ass being spread with the other to show off the dildo sitting snug inside his cunt.
Andrew doesn’t wait before video calling him.
Neil’s beautiful face fills up his screen, flushed much to Andrew’s appreciation. He looks good, brighter than the last time they spoke like this.
He’s taken the distance hard, Andrew knows, but Andrew is always pleased to see these small moments of light, knowing that Neil is trying his hardest to see the light at the end of all of this.
“Hi, baby,” Neil greets with a large, dopey grin on his face. God, how Andrew misses him. “Have you checked your mail yet?”
“No,” he answers truthfully. He hasn’t had the time all day, not that he particularly likes getting his mail. It’s all trash and bills. “Should I?”
Neil nods, sending the curls that were laying on his forehead bouncing wildly. “Take me with you.”
Andrew does, keeping his phone close by so it’d be difficult for someone to see his screen without being right on top of him. Neil catches him up on the last few days since they last had the time for a longer phone call while Andrew makes his way to the mailroom downstairs. The Foxes are still all assholes and Exy is still painfully boring but Andrew eats up his words anyway.
There’s a small box waiting for him along with the rest of his mail, a little beat up and hastily taped shut. The messiness endears Andrew against his wishes.
He gives Neil a quick glance only to see him watching back with such a lovesick expression on his face it almost infuriates Andrew. How someone like Neil could look at him like that…Andrew will never understand it, but it’s not really for him to understand, he knows that now.
“Stop looking at me like that,” he says anyway, because that’s their script. Neil, ever the studious costar, just grins.
When Andrew returns to his apartment, he tosses the other bits of mail on the coffee table to deal with at some other point in time (meaning, he will never look at any of those envelopes again) and takes the package into his kitchen.
He sets his phone up against his utensil jar so he can see Neil without any issue.
“I get to watch, huh?” Neil asks, face calm but the slight wave to his voice betrays his nerves. Whatever it is, Andrew is all the more interested now.
He pulls the only knife he keeps in his armband these days to open the package with. Neil watches him very intently but he keeps quiet—for once.
Andrew almost calls him out on his sudden appreciation for shutting his mouth but the contents of the package catch his attention before he can. That warmth he feels whenever Neil does something nice or stupid, not that there’s much of a difference when it comes to Neil, hits him like a sack of bricks.
His bunny is so ridiculous, doing something like making a fucking care package for him, along with everything else he’s sent today, for the first of his birthdays that they aren’t spending together.
Andrew pulls everything out, one by one, making sure to show it all off to the camera. Neil sent him several bags of his favorite candies, something the team nutritionist will surely hate if she ever catches wind of it, a new bottle of his go-to cologne, one of Neil’s own hoodies that still smells so strongly of him, and at the very bottom, snuggled in with a ridiculous amount of packing peanuts, is a black gift bag.
Andrew, of course, recognizes it instantly. It’s the same bag he used to give Neil the dildo he made, modeled after his own dick.
As to why Neil thought it fit to give it back, Andrew’s at a loss.
He sets between him and his phone, whatever is in the bag making a dull thud when it makes contact with the counter, and stares Neil down. Usually, it doesn’t take very long for Neil to crack, to confess everything on his mind, but the distance and impersonality of the phone makes it easier for Neil to hold out.
Eventually, Andrew’s curiosity wins out. “What’s in the bag?”
The smile Neil gives him is sharp and mischievous, the kind that never fails to heat Andrew’s blood. “Why don’t you open it up and find out?”
Andrew rolls his eyes but does as asked. He upends the bag on his counter and a fleshlight tumbles out.
It’s a soft brown, not too far off of Neil’s skin tone, and slightly warped around the edges, giving it a handmade feel.
Andrew thinks back to Neil’s joke after using the dildo for the first time—do you think they make pussy versions of these?—and almost rejects it outright because no. Neil did not go out and find a DIY fleshlight kit and fucking make a toy for Andrew in return.
That would be—Andrew doesn’t even know.
But the toy is sitting on his countertop all the same and very much real. He has to ask.
“Did you—?”
“I did,” Neil agrees, his smile growing impossibly wider. He’s almost giddy with it, infectious even through a screen.
Andrew’s heart thumps wildly in his chest, his feelings almost too big to stay inside him. Neil is so fucking ridiculous. Andrew hates him so much, but he hates the distance more.
“Are you alone?”
The shift in Neil’s expression tells him all he needs to know, but he still waits until Neil says, “All night,” before he moves to his bedroom.
His laptop is still on his bed from their last Skype call since he’s been too lazy to move it somewhere else. He’s grateful now for his unwillingness to think about just how little he sees Neil lately.
Andrew makes quick work of setting up the call, stripping naked while he waits for Neil to answer.
Neil doesn’t take long, thank fuck, and Andrew is greeted by a shot of Neil in his (what used to be their) dorm bed, his body on full display.
It takes Andrew a few seconds of staring, of cataloguing the most important person in his life, to notice that Neil still has the toy inside him.
Just how long has Neil been stuffed full, waiting for Andrew to initiate this? It doesn’t matter, whatever the answer is will drive him crazy all the same.
He gets in bed and props himself up against his pillows, sitting with his legs spread on either side of his laptop, giving Neil an unimpeded view of his cock. Andrew is already painfully hard since he’s basically been sporting a half chub all day but he won’t touch himself just yet.
“Drew,” Neil says softly. His fingers linger around his lower stomach, teasing the crease of where his thighs meet his hips. He’s so inviting, it’s a crime Andrew can’t put his hands on him right now.
Andrew gives Neil another once over and then he leans over to grab the lube in his bedside table. It’s too full, too unused. Andrew catches his frown before Neil can see it.
He slicks himself up under Neil’s watchful gaze. He can’t feel it on his skin like he can when they’re in the same room together but he feels seen either way. It’s as close to what he wants as he’ll get for the next few weeks anyway, so he won’t complain.
“You’re staring, bunny.”
Neil just hums, attention instead on where Andrew’s hands are idly stroking. He sucks his bottom lip between his teeth, and Andrew doesn’t think he’s even aware he’s doing it.
“Ready?” Andrew asks, because he can’t just reach up and pry Neil’s lip free.
Neil sighs, more visibly than audibly since the microphone on his laptop is shit, but he nods. “Yeah, let’s do this.”
Andrew tucks the strange mood away in the back of his mind to examine later and feeds his cock into the toy slowly, mimicking the way he’d like to fuck Neil if he was in Andrew’s bed right now.
Logically, Andrew knows he wouldn’t have the patience to go slow if Neil were actually with him. But he aches for their lazy days, for the unhurried sex they used to have on Sunday mornings when alone in the Columbia house, slowly rocking and grinding against each other while pretending they didn’t have any responsibilities.
He can only imagine what those days will look like when they live together again. Time can’t go by fast enough.
Neil moves in tandem, pulling the dildo out so he can push it back inside him at the same pace. He waits until Neil gives him the okay, which comes almost immediately since Neil’s been ready for a while, before Andrew braces his feet on the bed and fucks into the toy.
The toy feels good, so close to the real thing if Andrew just closes his eyes so he can focus on the feeling and Neil’s tinny moans, if he ignores the lifelessness of it.
But as much as Andrew wants to pretend, he keeps his eyes fixed on his laptop. He doesn’t want to miss a single second, doesn’t want to waste the opportunity of using his stupid memory on something good for once.
He sets a quick pace, thrilled when Neil doesn’t hesitate to follow.
Neil looks so beautiful like this. Andrew wishes he could be there to touch him, to smell him, to taste him.
It’s torture being so limited in the senses he can take Neil in through, even if he knows what Neil feels like under his hands or what his every day deodorant scent is or what his slick tastes like just after he comes.
No matter how good Andrew’s memory is, it’s no match for the real thing. Andrew is tired of the facsimile in his head. He wants Neil within reach, his whole body aches for it.
“Oh, baby, fuck,” Neil gasps, letting his legs fall further apart. Andrew squeezes himself tight at the view of Neil stretched around the toy to keep himself from coming on the spot.
That ugly flash of jealousy hits him again, as it always does whenever Andrew watches Neil fuck himself with the dildo Andrew made, but he’s well practiced in ignoring it. He might not actually be the one fucking Neil, but Neil certainly acts like he is and that’s enough of a substitution to allay the possessive beast inside him.
Neil moves his other hand to his clit, rubbing in tight, quick circles. He’s close, it’s so obvious, even if Andrew didn’t know every little thing about him.
But still, Andrew drinks in every single one of his moans, every twitch and curl of his body. They may not be physically together right now but that won’t stop Andrew from engaging in his favorite pastime.
He watches, enraptured, as Neil’s orgasm hits him. His back arches off the bed, shoving his cunt against both of his hands, pushing the dildo further inside him. He twitches, legs shaking, and Andrew knows exactly how that feels—Neil wrapped around him, pulsing as he rides out the waves. He can almost feel it now, his hand clenching in a poor approximation.
“Shit.” The moan slips out before Andrew can hold it back, though he’s unsure of why he would even want to.
For how quiet he used to be during sex, Andrew is unusually so tonight. At some point in the four years they’ve been together, he stopped feeling like taking pleasure from being with a man was something he couldn’t indulge himself in. He started talking, started moaning, started letting his wants be known.
Neil gave him space to learn to be comfortable, so maybe that’s why. It’s just that Neil isn’t here.
Andrew follows him over quickly, choking out a soft Abram as he spills inside the toy. It’s sticky and kind of gross but no worse than when Andrew paints Neil’s back in cum and licks it off him. Really, Andrew would prefer that because it would mean Neil was here.
That’s what everything seems to return to lately—the distance. It’s distracting, a splinter in his foot he can’t ever seem to dig out.
They still have six months until Neil graduates, even fewer before he has to choose where to play out his rookie year. It might be the rest of the time they're forced to be apart, even if Andrew knows he's deluding himself. Chicago doesn’t need a striker right now, especially not one as well paid as Neil Josten will be but he can’t help himself from wondering what if.
His daydreams are a fool's errand but Andrew has never been anything but when it comes to Neil.
“Happy birthday.”
The soft murmur brings Andrew back to himself. Neil is watching him, having tossed the dildo who knows where so he could curl up in his covers.
The top blanket is easily recognizable as the one Neil stole from Andrew’s apartment right before his flight back to Palmetto for summer training. It had only spent a single night in Andrew’s bed but they had decided on it together.
Andrew knows it was probably the only thing Neil felt comfortable taking, aside from the couple of sweatshirts he always manages to steal, but he still melts at the sight of it, unable to stop the words from slipping out. “You certainly made it so.”
Neil hides his face in the blankets and Andrew takes the opportunity to pull the fleshlight off his cock, tilting it away from the mattress to keep anything from dripping out onto his sheets. He’s struck by the memories of the countless times he’s eaten Neil out to clean him up and how he’s been unable to do so for too long. It’s a stupid thing to miss, but he does anyway.
He leaves the toy on his nightstand for future Andrew to deal with and drags his laptop closer so Neil doesn’t have to deal with Andrew’s cock in his face for the rest of the call.
(Of course, Andrew knows that Neil would be more than happy to stare at his cock all day, but they have to have some sense of decency.)
“When the hell did you get your nipples pierced?”
Neil smirks. “About a week ago, maybe. Matt stopped by after his game in Raleigh and wanted to get something done but he chickened out. I thought, why the fuck not?, and did it.” He shrugs, half hidden amongst the nest he’s buried in. “I like them.”
All Andrew can do is shake his head. He likes them too, but he’ll wait to share that until he has Neil in his arms again and can show him properly.
“Where’s Sir?” Neil asks.
“Hiding, probably,” Andrew dutifully answers.
Their cat is easily spooked, taking up residence under the guest room bed at the smallest change happening around her, even something as small as a brand new cardboard box in the kitchen. Andrew is unsurprised that she’s been missing since he came home.
Neil pouts, a cute little thing Andrew wants to rip right off his face. He shouldn’t be allowed to look like that without Andrew right by his side.
Frankly, he shouldn’t be allowed to exist without Andrew there, taunting and irresistible when he’s so far away.
“Take me to her?”
“She’s under one of the beds.”
Neil just rolls his eyes. “Take me anyway. She’s our daughter, Andrew. We should be showing her that we support her interests, even if that’s being a little demon under the bed.”
Andrew calls him an idiot but it’s too fond for either of them to pretend that it’s as insulting as it once was. Maybe it’s time for them to stop pretending. Andrew’s therapist certainly thinks so.
“Three weeks,” Andrew says, a reminder of the couple of days he gets off around Thanksgiving. He’ll be flying down to Palmetto for those two nights, spending them at Abby’s while they play at being a family with Kevin and Coach. They’re close enough to the real thing anyway. “I’ll be there in three weeks.”
“Three weeks,” Neil echoes. His smile is wistful and longing, a mirror of everything Andrew’s been feeling since he first accepted the Wolves’ contract and mapped out the distance. Andrew drinks it all in even if he doesn’t like how the emotions sit on his boyfriend’s face. “Now, take me to see my special little girl.”
One day. Three weeks. It doesn’t matter how long, it’s all the same.
But there is an imminent future where they won’t be so far apart. Andrew cannot wait for it.