Chapter Text
It was the perfect hiding spot; tucked away under the jungle gym at the edge of the park, only two ways in or out blowing up Andrew's chances of escaping, and none of the adults could see him. And at only five, he was able to scare away any kid who came near it- it was his spot and he couldn't be happier. Andrew's new foster family seemed nice so far, a mom and a dad with happy smiles in a nice house that didn't smell or have bugs and little furry things running around trying to take the little bit of food that existed, but he knew it was only a matter of time before those smiles turned into frowns and warm hands turned into heavy ones. So he found a really good hiding spot that was his and his alone.
Which was why, when Andrew crawled into his hiding spot and found another small boy with really pretty red hair and really bright blue eyes hiding in the tunnel with his knees pulled up to his chest, he was really annoyed. Andrew was sure that was what the funny feeling in his belly was because he was annoyed at the kid for being in his space. Andrew didn't like the feeling, therefore he didn't like the kid.
"Get out." Andrew ordered, crawling into the space so he could push the boy out. It was his space.
The boy looked at Andrew, his bright blue eyes widened and the fuzzy feeling in Andrew's belly only got worse. Andrew had to get rid of him. "This is a public space." He said. He wrapped his arms around his knees, pushing them towards him more.
"This is my space." Andrew argued. He moved closer to the boy, doing his best to ignore the fuzzy feeling in his belly. He was an iron wall that didn't feel emotions. Although, he had never seen an iron wall so he wasn’t sure if emotions got through them.
"You don't own this place." The boy argued back. He stuck his tongue out. He didn't look like he'd move.
Andrew sat close to the boy, glaring at him like he did all the other kids. He didn't budge. It was a staring contest, and Andrew wasn't going to lose to some random boy. The boy didn't back down and the more Andrew looked into those shiny blue eyes the more that fuzzy feeling got stronger, and Andrew didn't like it at all. Andrew moved forward, closer to him to push him out but that made the boy flinch badly, held his arms in front of his face and squeezed his eyes shut. Andrew knew that pose very well- he knew the way his body went hard because he did it too when he was waiting for an adult to hit him.
"You get hit too?" Andrew asked. He sat down carefully next to the boy, finally noticing the faint bruise poking out of his sleeve. Andrew knew bruises like that. He wore long sleeves even when it got hot and icky to hide them.
The boy lowered his arms slowly, his blue eyes looking at Andrew like he didn't trust him. "Do you?" He asked.
Andrew nodded. He pulled his knees up to his chest, copying the boy's pose. He pushed up his sleeve to show the purple bruise that was there. His last foster mom had grabbed him and pulled him up from the floor after she saw him looking for food because he was so hungry that his belly hurt for days. She had been slapping him really hard while holding onto him as his social worker came to do her monthly check in. She was supposed to come every week but she didn't. Andrew made sure to count the days between her visits, because he remembered when she was supposed to come and he remembered when she actually came unlike the adults. She had at least gotten Andrew out of that house and took him to the doctors who told her he was 'malnourished'. He didn't know what that word meant but he knew it wasn't good when his social worker got really scared. He got to eat so much that night he wanted to puke. Now he was in his new house but he didn't believe the pretty lights or happy smiles of the adults, all the other adults lied to him so why would these two be any different?
The boy looked at the bruise. He slowly pushed his sleeve up the rest of the way with a shaky hand and let Andrew see the bruise. It was the shape of a hand, Andrew could see the shape of fingers in the boy's skin.
"What’s your name?" Andrew asked.
The boy crossed his arms over his knees and tried to hide his face. "I don’t know." He muttered.
"How can you not know?" Andrew asked. Even he knew his name and he was an orphan. Even orphans have names, so did the kids who lived on the streets who were always nice to Andrew.
"Because I don't know!" The boy snapped, showing his teeth like a really angry dog. "My dad called me Nathaniel, but my mom calls me Abram- I don't know which one is right!"
Andrew thought for a moment, thinking of a solution for this problem. The boy didn't look like a Nathaniel, but Abram wasn't right either. "Then why don't you make one for yourself?" He suggested. That was the easiest thing to do, make a new one that he was sure was right.
The boy blinked, the anger gone from his face with only confusion left behind. "I can do that?" He asked.
Andrew nodded. "Of course you can." He remembered meeting a girl who said she used to be a boy when they were rummaging a dumpster for food. She told him that a name was a gift that anyone could reject- for her, she gave herself a brand-new name because she was a girl and girls didn't have boy names. She even told Andrew that he could change his last name, that he didn't have to be a Doe forever. Andrew liked her. She wasn't an adult, and she was nice to him. She even gave him the only piece of bread that wasn't moldy. "Names are gifts and we don't have to accept them."
The boy tilted his head and Andrew couldn't stop staring. He really did have bright eyes. They were pretty, even if they made that fuzzy feeling stronger. "Okay." He said quietly, a nervous smile tugging on his face. "Then can I be Neil?"
"Why are you asking me?" Andrew asked. He found himself shuffling closer to him. "It’s your name."
"I know." Neil said, his small hands tugging on the end of his sleeves. He had small hands, even smaller than Andrew's. Andrew wondered if he was taller than Neil. "But I don't know if sounds stupid."
Andrew thought. He hadn't met many Neils, but he didn't think it was a stupid name. "There was a Neil who went to the moon." He told Neil. He read it in a book once. Two people had actually gone into space where all the stars lived, far far away from people. They got to walk on the moon and see the earth. Andrew wanted to do that.
Neil looked at Andrew with a big smile. He moved closer, their shoulders almost touched. "I want to go to the moon." He said. "It’s really far away."
"Me too." Andrew agreed. He held his hand out for Neil to take. "I'm Andrew."
Neil took Andrew's hand. It was warm. "I'm Neil."
The perfect hiding spot was dark and hidden away from the adult's eyes and all the other kids knew to stay away and for a while it was all Andrew's. But now, he didn't mind sharing it with Neil. It could be their hiding spot and they could be alone together.
-
"Andrew!"
"Neil!"
Andrew raced over to Neil, stopping just before he crashed into him. They had played together every day since they met, hiding away in their hideout or running around the park when there weren't as many kids around. And now, they were starting a new school year together. They even got to be in the same class so they wouldn't be alone.
Neil smiled really wide at Andrew. "Hi!" He yelled.
"Hi." Andrew said with a smile. He looked over and saw Neil's mom standing by the wall, looking at Andrew the same way someone looked at a bug- like she was disgusted by him and wanted to stomp on him. Andrew didn't like Neil's mom. She was jumpy, her eyes rarely stayed still, always looking at any noise she hears whether it really happened or not. Andrew heard a lot of things because he had to know where everyone in his foster homes were, but he didn't hear the things Neil's mom heard. She also hurt Neil which meant that Andrew hated her.
"Are you ready for school?" Neil asked. He was bouncing on his toes again, so he had to be excited to start school.
Andrew was too. He got to be out of the house and spend all day with Neil. His foster parents hadn't hurt him yet, but he knew it was only a matter of time and the less time with them the less they could hurt him. And this was something he had to do, his social worker explained it was the law that he had to go or there'd be trouble for him and he didn’t want to get in trouble. Then his foster parents really would hurt him. "Yeah, did you bring your lucky pen?"
Neil nodded really quickly and opened his yellow backpack. His mom frowned at him. He pulled out a black glitter pen and showed it to Andrew with a big smile. He said it was lucky because he had it when his mom took him and left his dad so it was definitely lucky. Andrew agreed with Neil’s logic. "See?" He waved it in Andrew's face.
"I see." Andrew nodded.
Neil lowered his pen and held out his free hand, a smile still on his face.
Andrew looked down at Neil's hand then back up at his face. "Why?" He asked.
"Hold my hand, yes or no?" Neil asked, shaking his hand. "It’s so we don't we taken away from each other."
Andrew didn’t want to be taken away from Neil. People were always taking him away from people, from places, even when he didn't want too. He didn't want to be taken away from Neil. "Okay yes." He agreed. He took Neil's hand into his own and squeezed tightly.
Neil smiled at him, then at his mom. His mom's frown only got worse and Andrew worried that she would be another adult who tried to take them away from each other. Andrew didn't want to be taken away from Neil. "Bye mum," Neil waved.
Neil's mom gave a tight smile, her eyes were still mean, and she still looked at Andrew like he was a problem, but she waved at Neil. "Have fun." She said in an accent Andrew had only ever heard on TV.
Neil nodded and turned to Andrew, hand tight in Andrew's, and his mom completely forgotten. "Come on, Drew," he said. "It’s time for school!"
Andrew nodded and happily got dragged along by Neil into the classroom, a smile on his face. It might not be as fun as Neil thought it would be but together it'd be just another adventure for them to complete together.
-
Andrew watched as Neil shakily wrote out random words into the dirt with a stick he found on the playground, belly on the cold ground and head propped in his hands. His shirt and arms would be dirty for the rest of the day but he didn't care because Neil was creating magic.
"And then you add this little dash, and it changes the way the letter sounds!" Neil explained. He created a little dash above the 'e' he wrote in the dirt and looked at Andrew with a smile. "Make sense?"
Andrew nodded. He grabbed the stick Neil got him and wrote out all the letters Neil had written down. Kids were yelling and screaming around them, not paying any attention to them as they laid in the dirt and created new words. "It looks like English," he said. "But it's not anything I know."
"That’s because it's French!" Neil explained. "It’s a different language that mum is teaching me to speak. She says I have to know a bunch of different languages."
Andrew thought about it and maybe Neil's mom was right. Maybe it was good to know many languages. They could talk to so many different people like that, and they would have to do that if they wanted to go to space. Aliens didn’t speak English- Andrew didn’t know what they spoke but they might speak French. "Can you teach me?" He asked.
Neil nodded really fast, getting really close to Andrew's face until their noses almost touched. "Of course Drew." He said. His eyes were really bright, and Andrew wondered if he'd ever get tired of looking at them. He didn't think he would.
"We should make our own language." Andrew said quietly. He was scared that if an adult heard them, they'd try to stop them. They were always ruining things for Andrew, putting him in homes without food or with people who hated him. He didn't want them to ruin this either. He was tired of them ruining things.
"Okay." Neil agreed. "It'll be fun!"
Andrew nodded. It would be fun. They would be making something for just them, that no one could take away from them. Andrew was finding that he couldn't forget things, and adults didn't have any powers to take away his power so he'd always remember their language. This would be theirs forever. "Did you want to go find the yellow and orange leaves?" He asked.
Neil nodded, his floppy hair hitting Andrew in the face but he didn't mind. "Yeah, come on," he hurried. "Before the idiot kids step on all of them."
"Okay." Andrew worried, for just a moment, that he would jump off a cliff with Neil. But he found out that it didn't bother him, as long as he was with Neil he'd do anything.
-
The flame flickered and crackled, little embers floating up into the sky before it disappeared. It was warm and Andrew could hear the wood that kept it alive breaking and cracking, but it hurt to look at. It was like looking at a smaller sun, which made sense because Andrew's books about space said that the sun was a burning ball of gas.
But that didn't seem to bother Neil. He was obsessed with the fire, had been the moment his mom had lit the match. He couldn't take his eyes off of the tiny fire, watching as it hit the pile of dry wood that the two had collected in the afternoon, watching as it grew bigger and bigger. Nothing his mom did could make him look away from the fire, so she gave up. Andrew had simply sat next to him and watched with him. It was pretty, but he didn't understand why Neil was so obsessed with it. But he still sat with Neil anyways, in a nice silence as the sky got darker and darker until Neil's mom fell asleep on the deck chair with a glass bottle full of the yucky liquid adults liked in her hands.
Neil scooted closer to the fire, close enough that the tips of his hair turned wavy, like the road did whatever it got too hot.
"Neil," Andrew called out quietly. He didn't want to wake Neil's mom up, she didn't like the name Neil gave himself and got mad when Andrew used it. "Neil."
Neil blinked like Andrew's voice broke the spell he was under. He turned to look at Andrew with a confused look on his face. "Andrew?"
Andrew shifted closer to Neil, holding out his hand for Neil to take. "It looked like you got put under a spell." He whispered. "Is the fire magic?"
Neil tilted his head and moved away from the fire, closer to Andrew. He put his hand in Andrew's and thought. "I don't know." He admitted. "I think it is. Is that weird? Magic doesn't exist."
"We don't know that." Andrew told him. If Neil said that the fire was magic, then the fire was magic. They were just kids, so who was to say that magic didn't exist anyways? Andrew trusted Neil. "If you say it's magic then it's magic." He said seriously.
"Really?"
"Yeah, I trust you."
Neil smiled, cheeks turning pink, but Andrew wasn't sure if it was because he was too hot from the flames or not. "I trust you." He promised.
"Okay." Andrew said, his belly getting fuzzy and warm again. He still didn't know what it meant but he knew Neil caused it, so maybe Neil was magic. Andrew could see that. He liked the idea of Neil being magic, it made him feel safe. Like Neil and him could handle everything that happened to them. It felt nice.
-
Hand in hand, Andrew and Neil ran down the hallway of the school, laughing and giggling as they pushed past the adults who failed to stop them. Andrew had seen a scene similar to this, in the show his foster mother watched- a woman in a white dress running down a red aisle with a man in a suit, both of them laughing and smiling as they ran away together. That's what this felt like, and he understood why they were so happy. Andrew would happily run away with his best and only friend.
Neil laughed loudly as they passed by the mean gym teacher, making Andrew laugh along with him. It was impossible to not laugh when Neil laughed, like when someone yawned. Neil looked at Andrew, a really big smile on his face that Andrew couldn't look away from. Was this what Neil felt like when he looked at fire? Unable to look away even if he knew he should?
The two of then crashed into someone, falling to the ground but still holding onto each other's hands.
"Ouchie." Neil whined.
Andrew looked up and saw the principal looking down at them with a mean look on his face. He never liked Andrew, or any of the kids. Andrew didn't know why he worked at a school if he didn't like kids. Adults were confusing.
But the principal wasn't alone, there was an older woman with soft brown hair and a really gentle smile looking at them. She was wearing a soft looking sweater and waved at Andrew.
Andrew didn’t know why but he waved back at her.
Neil didn't like the principal, he didn't like any men really, and once they were back on their feet he hid slightly behind Andrew, trusting Andrew to protect him. And of course Andrew would.
"As I was saying Dr. Dobson," the principal said, looking and sounding more kind to the woman than he ever had to Andrew. "These two are two of our problem children. If you could do something about them, we'd really appreciate it."
Andrew frowned, holding on tight to Neil's hand. They weren't problems, they were kids just trying to live in a place that didn't like them.
"Go fuck yourself." Neil said from behind Andrew. Even when he was scared, he couldn’t help but speak his mind. Andrew really liked that about him.
The woman chuckled as the principal made mean faces at them. "See?" He said, gesturing towards Neil and Andrew.
"Now now, Mr. Harold." The woman said. "They're just kids."
"They're a bunch of troublemakers."
The woman sighed, shaking her head slightly. She looked down at Andrew and Neil and gave them a very kind smile that Andrew wanted to believe. Even though he knew they never lasted. The woman knelt down so she was eye level with them and suddenly she wasn't as scary as before. She wasn't towering over them like all the other adults. "Hi," she said with a warm voice. "My name is Besty, but you can call me Bee."
Neil and Andrew looked at each other, unsure what to do. They didn't trust adults. They hurt them, left them with bruises that hurt for days or weeks. Teenagers were okay, they were nice to them, at least the ones Andrew knew. But adults? They were mean and couldn't be trusted. But maybe this one was different?
"Bee is a funny name." Andrew said, looking back at Bee.
Bee chuckled and nodded. "It is." She agreed. "But I think it suits me."
"Did you pick it out yourself?" Neil asked, peaking out from behind Andrew in a way that reminded Andrew of a shy kitten.
Bee nodded. "I did, with the help of my best friend." She said.
Neil looked at Andrew with big eyes. It was just like them. Neil picked his name out with Andrew's help. It proved Andrew's point that they could pick their own names! "Just like us, Drew." He whispered.
Andrew nodded in agreement. He hadn’t met another adult who had decided their own name yet, but here she was- an adult like them!
"I'm going to be a counselor here," Bee told them. "I'll have my own office right by the nurse's office."
"What’s a ‘counselor’?" Andrew asked. He knew he heard the word before in movies and TV shows but he didn't know what it meant. And based on Neil's confused look he didn't either.
"It’s someone who listens." Bee said. "You can tell me anything you want, and I'll listen. I can help you solve a problem you have with someone or help you understand something about yourself. And everything you tell me will be between us."
That sounded too good to be true, and whenever something sounded too good to be true it usually wasn't true. Adults lied, all the time. They made promises that they had no intention of keeping, they needed the threat of punishment to not do something and even then they still did it.
"You know how adults have to follow the law?" Bee asked, smiling brightly when both Andrew and Neil nodded. "Well, if I tell someone what you said to me in my office, as long as I don't think you're in danger, I will be breaking the law. I'll lose my license and may go to jail."
Andrew and Neil looked at each other. This seemed to be the only adult who knew that her actions would have consequences, that wanted to follow the rules instead of breaking them.
Neil nodded and that was all Andrew needed.
"Okay Bee." Andrew said to Bee. "Can we come together?"
Bee's smile got bigger as she nodded. "Of course you can!" She assured them. "Would you like to race to my office?"
Neil nodded rapidly, stepping out from behind Andrew. He always liked to race people because he was so fast and could outrun all the other kids. "First one there gets to hug Drew!" He announced.
"Hey!" Andrew protested. "What if I win?"
"Then you can hug me!" Neil compromised.
Andrew thought about this and decided that that was a great prize. "Okay, let's go!" He took off running, not giving Neil or Bee the chance to set off themselves.
Neil yelled after him, giggling as he quickly caught up to Andrew. Andrew couldn't help but laugh as they turned the corner, passing by everyone else they didn't care about. He didn't even mind when Neil passed him, or when he gave Andrew a big, long hug as his prize. If it was anyone else he would've, but it was Neil and anything Neil did was okay. Andrew was really lucky to have a friend like Neil. He hoped they stayed together forever.