Chapter Text
There were bruises on Kevin's throat, harsh against his tan skin.
It was hardly the worst of the injuries among the foxes, but it was the only one that had left someone curled into a corner of a hotel room crying while the others stood in shock and horror, assuming Kevin, in his deal for protection, was somehow safe from Andrew. It set a new, terrifying precedent, that when it came to Neil, nobody was truly safe from him.
Aaron had never had much violence in him, and though his tongue was sharp and his temper short, he didn't throw punches, but he'd recall that night as the closest he'd ever gotten. He didn’t know how to react to everything Kevin said about Neil, or Nathaniel, so he didn’t. He set his anger aside and kneeled next to Kevin. He knew that Kevin could tell them apart because he did not pull away when Aaron put a hand on his shaking shoulder.
Kevin was heaving, trying to breathe, and failing, but Aaron kept a firm hand on him as he tried to help him through it. The upperclassmen didn’t have it in them to be any more shocked than they already were. It wasn’t uncommon for Aaron to try to hold Kevin together through the worst of his panic attacks, but it wasn’t exactly common knowledge. Not that one of them cared, usually they handed his panic attacks with a lack of empathy that was odd considering their pasts. It made his blood boil most days, but today they all seemed too shocked by the events and angry with Andrew to be concerned.
Still, they stayed back, off-put by the protective set of Aaron’s shoulders. Coach and Matt had dragged Andrew off of Kevin, who was still spiting and snarling with more rage than Aaron had seen in him since Tilda had beaten him bloody in Aaron’s stead, and he’d killed her only months later.
As the others got distracted by Andrew, Aaron shut him out, he shut out all of them and focused on Kevin. He slowly pushed Kevin’s head between his knees, and began counting quietly to guide him, low enough for only them to hear, until Kevin wasn’t hyperventilating anymore. He stayed like that until Kevin's quiet sobbing stopped his head lifted from between his knees.
He was coherent, and he could stand, but his hands continued to shake for the rest of the night. Considering there’d been no bottle of vodka to drown his problems with, he was more functioning than anyone expected. Even so, Aaron did not move from his position by Kevin that whole night, even as they made it to the hotel to retrieve Neil, by which time Andrew had needed to be cuffed to coach so that he didn’t try to kill the FBI agents (one attempted murder was enough for the night) and Kevin had mostly composed himself.
He watched in mild horror as his brother knelt in front of Neil, he didn’t know what to make of it, it made his head spin, especially with how little they all really knew about Neil. His lies had stacked up that night as they learned more truths than they’d wanted. Aaron did not fight the others when they demanded to keep Neil, even if he thought it was stupid and could lead to trouble. He’d learned that Neil was trouble, even more so than he’d already thought, the risk was high. Still, he knew they would keep him, so he kept quiet next to Kevin.
By morning, Aaron was dizzy and exhausted. There had been several too many realizations from the night before, including one about his brother that Aaron did not want to unpack. He simply chose to ignore it, ignore Josten, ignore Allison’s triumphant waving of the money she’d made and Nicky’s constant hovering, he ignored everything but Kevin, who he kept a worried eye on. He could be angry at his brother later, for now, he’d do what Andrew was incapable of, caring about anyone, except for Josten, so it seems.
~
No one talked about it.
Kevin tried not to think about it either, but he felt the phantom pain of hands on his throat long after his bruises faded. But days faded and he couldn’t stop, he couldn’t pretend like it hadn’t happened. It was a week before their Raven’s game, he had bigger worries, but he couldn’t keep his mind clear long enough to worry about much else.
So he brought it up only once to Renee, who was the only person close to Andrew who wouldn’t immediately shut him out. He didn’t know what he wanted, to be comforted maybe, but he didn’t get it.
“Why would he do that, I’d have told him either way, I was telling him. I thought, fuck I thought he was supposed to-” his voice cracked, and he hated himself for the way his eyes burned. He turned away from her, blinking away tears as she politely pretended like she didn’t know he was crying, “We had a deal.”
“He protects you, Kevin, that was his deal to you, but he loves Neil, and that’s… that’s different”
Her words stuck with him, and though she was just telling it as she understood it, he couldn’t help feeling hallow with the truth of it.
The truth was that after over a year, Kevin didn’t know where he stood with Andrew. He’d thought that maybe there was more than just a deal between them, a level of trust, of care. Maybe he hadn’t always, or ever, shown it, but he did care for Andrew. It wasn’t the first time he’d overestimated just how much he’d meant to someone, and he hated it. Andrew had been volatile and manic when they’d met, but he had been safe, and he trusted Kevin with his meds when Kevin trusted him with his life. He hated Neil a little bit because he’d never felt so unsure before he showed up, but he quickly felt just as bad over that. It wasn’t Neil’s fault that Andrew’s protection had a hierarchy he didn’t know about.
He felt himself spiraling in the way his hands seemed to numb, he dropped his keys twice unlocking the dorm, too deep in his own head to care. The dorm was empty, with Nicky at some party the upperclassmen invited him to and Neil and Andrew off doing whatever they did on the roof. For a moment he thought the silence would be good, but it wasn’t. His brain swarmed with thoughts of how Andrew only kept him alive because he made a promise, how Jean had suffered so much for him and hated him now, Wymack must hate having a son who is so fragile, who can’t handle this after all he’s been through, weak, coward, pathetic, drunk, his teammate's words rang in his ears, he was shaking now, probably hyperventilating, his arms felt numb.
Aaron, was his one coherent thought as he stumbled out of his own room and knocked on Matt and Aaron’s door. Kevin didn’t know if he was there, and for a moment he felt sick with the idea of him being out with Kaitlyn, but he opened the door, face set in a scowl until he locked eyes with Kevin.
Suddenly, things aren’t wrong and weird, and he doesn’t feel like he doesn’t know how to interact with everyone around him. It’s just him and Aaron. Aaron is angry, but not at Kevin, and Kevin is crying and it has nothing to do with Aaron, so they sit together on Matt’s couch while Kevin shakes and works on calming his breathing while Aaron counts to guide him and keeps one hand on his shoulder to ground him but not overwhelm him. It’s not easy, and Kevin still feels like his chest is going to collapse, but it’s familiar, and that in and of itself helps. He knows where he stands with Aaron. They fight during practice and ignore each other in the dorms, but when Kevin needs him, he’s stable, and when Aaron needs to yell and scream and blow off steam, Kevin listens. This hasn’t changed, even if Aaron moved down the hall, he’s still here.
He hadn’t realized how much Aaron moving down the hall had bothered him until now.
It didn’t matter, because he was here now. One hand on Kevin’s shoulder as Kevin let his head loll back onto the back of the couch, he was exhausted, and probably dehydrated, but he didn’t move, not when Aaron’s breathing was helping him remember how to make his own lungs work. He could focus on that.
Kevin doesn’t know when he fell asleep, but he woke up laying across the couch with a blanket over him and water on the table. It could’ve been Renee or maybe even Dan, but he was pretty sure he knew who left it. Yeah, maybe everything with Andrew was tense and complicated, but Aaron wasn’t, and that could be enough for now.