Undercover

Andy woke up on the couch the next morning, covered in a blanket that he hadn't wrapped around himself. He smiled to himself when he realised Austin had put it there and he sat up only to see him making breakfast.

"You always that cute?"

"Nope." Austin winked and handed him coffee when he stood.

"So what's on the agenda today?"

"We're getting the horses tomorrow, so we've gotta go see a guy I got in contact with a while ago about supplies and equipment. It's not gonna be cheap but I need the stuff so.." Andy nodded.

"It'll be good to get away for the day." Austin snorted slightly in disagreement.

"You really hate leaving, don't you?"

"Nope, just hate people." He stood up from the table to get more coffee.

"Can you tell me what happened with Barry Harver?" Austin's shoulders tensed up and Andy hated it, himself for asking, for having to ask, hating the situation, how sad it all was. Most of all he hated that Austin had to really search his eyes when he turned round for motive for asking.

"I can...doesn't mean I will. Why do you wanna know?"

"Because I feel like...I feel like it's this huge thing between us. It's the elephant in the room, it causes tension, it's...I believe that you didn't do it for no reason. I believe that there must have been some terrible situation that led you to that...but I can't know it for sure until you tell me." Austin looked at him calculatingly for a long while before nodding.

"Ok, I'll tell you." Andy waited as he thought about how to piece together the story.

"First-" He stood and bent down to kiss Andy hard, a kiss that had them both staring at one another in arousal afterwards.

"Just in case you won't do that again afterwards." He winked and smiled but Andy could tell he was afraid.

"You know that Tessler's an old acquaintance..well he got me into drugs when I was sixteen. I had a bad upbringing I guess I always needed to feel....that..belonging. I never had it at home.." Andy's gut clenched in sadness as Austin told him in an almost monotone way, he'd clearly thought this through and psychoanalysed himself so many times that it seemed routine now.

"And it moved from taking drugs to selling, to trafficking, then weapons, then the bank robbery...and he always praised me, I got into the main circle and they manipulated me into thinking that we were brothers, family. Well, after I went to prison for him - I covered for him in that robbery. After that..I told him I wanted out. You can imagine he was not happy to have his most valued puppet start cutting the strings..." Andy was pained by the bitterness in his words and voice.

"Anyways, I'd met Tessler's boss a few times, not directly but I'd been there as muscle when they did meet. Barry Harver. He was round at Lee's house sometimes when I arrived and he used to leave and there was always an atmosphere and I never knew why. Now..what I never told you, don't know if you know, is that Tessler's got a baby sister. Molly, her name is." Andy shook his head, apprehensive of where the story was about to lead them. Austin rubbed his face wearily and lit up a cigarette.

"Molly is....twelve years younger than Lee. Seven years younger than myself. So when all that was going down I was twenty-one and she was...fourteen. She was the only good thing about my past. She was the kindest, most forgiving person I've ever met. To this day I think she's some kind of angel. She was such a sweet girl, pretty too. But she never has looked her age, always been young for her age...." Austin drifted off in thought, brow furrowed with worry, sadness or anger, Andy couldn't tell. But he just waited for him to resume the story.

"Anyway, so one day me and the boys are at Tessler's place, Molly's in her room doing math homework. Then outta nowhere Harver storms in with his boys and gets all up in Tessler's face screaming and waving his gun around cause he screwed up some drug deal I didn't know about. Let me tell you...I thought Tessler was scary when he got mad...Barry Harver is the scariest man I've ever met. Anyway...so this day he's..so angry. And I really thought he was gonna kill Lee, but instead he just storms off down the hall, and his boys disappear back to the car and I'm thinking what's he doing and then he's banging on a door. And I'm just so confused..." He was getting agitated by the memories now and Andy wanted to hold his hand but he knew he had to let him do it alone.

"...and he storms back into the room and has Lee right up in the air by his throat telling him that if...'if you don't open that door I'm gonna kill everyone here including her instead.' And I'm just starting to connect the dots when Tessler screams he'll 'sort it out.' And so he let's him go and Lee goes running down the hall and I can hear him yelling. At Molly. And she's crying and screaming back and then Lee must've kicked down the door because she's screaming and- and then Harver goes racing in there and then Tessler comes out slowly lookin' like shit. And I finally got it." Andy looked at him, feeling slightly afraid.

"All those times I'd seen him and he'd been in their house. All those times there was a creepy ass atmosphere. Tessler had literally given Harver his baby sister to go at when he got angry. And it had been happening for years. Since she was a little girl. And it made me sick. So I ran in there and I saw him smack her cause she was trying to fight him off and he was trying to rip her clothes off...the cunt already had his dick out. So I shot him. And he died just like that. And I didn't regret it then...and I don't regret it now...and that's when I took Molly and I left, and that's the last time I ever saw Lee. That's when...it was...all...over." He took one last, long draw on his cigarette and stubbed it out, the agitation ebbing away from him. Andy was shocked. Too shocked to speak.

"So now you know. I bet you're gonna say something like I should've called the police or got child services involved-" Andy cut him off by hugging him tightly. So tightly it almost hurt, almost.

Austin felt like he could finally breathe when Andy hugged him. It was like a huge weight has been lifted just because he'd forgiven him for his crimes.

"I...I am so sorry." He was surprised that Andy was almost in tears.

"Don't be."

"I had no idea. I...she..Molly, is she ok now?" He asked, sitting back down.

"If I could've taken care of her I'd've done it. But I could barely sort myself out so I got her adopted. One of my old teachers and her husband had never been able to have kids and they took Molly in just like that. They were good people so I knew they'd sort her out and keep her safe. She's in college now, studying psychology. She wants to be a therapist, I think."

"Wow...she'd've never got there if you hadn't saved her." Austin nodded slowly. He clearly still harboured a lot of pain and guilt.

Austin was thinking so hard he missed Andy tearing up on the other side of the table. He was snapped out of his mind when the other man sniffed and wiped his eyes.

"Are you crying?"

"I'm sorry- I just...I'm sorry. I..."

"It's ok, you didn't know."

"No but I shouldn't have judged-"

"Let's face it, Andy, pretty much all murders are senseless acts of violence. Most people don't have the reason I did." Andy nodded slowly, and Austin could see that Andy also harboured so much guilt it was almost crippling. He slowly reached out with the hand not holding the fresh cigarette and Andy took it in surprise.

"Thank you for telling me." He just nodded reservedly.