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In seconds, Colby and I have the box open, and my jaw drops when I see that Andreas has carefully packaged the action figures in beautiful sparkly black tissue paper.
“It looks like space,” Colby says softly, running his fingers over the tissue.
Andreas grins. “That’s what I thought,” he says warmly.
Whelp.He makes me feel like I’ve won a gold star, even when he’s not talking to me. I can see by the way Colby blushes that he likes it as well. Who the hell is this guy? Where did he come from? The North Pole directly from Santa?
Carefully, we begin fishing through the tissue paper and pulling out the toys. My heart is pounding in my chest with each one we uncover. But then I get to Jesse, the triceratops, and I pause, looking him over carefully.
“I thought his tail was broken?” I say uncertainly. The eBay listing Andreas made was totally upfront about the fact that these figures were very much preowned and well loved. I didn’t mind that they were battered, but as I look at all those we’ve revealed so far, I swear they look shinier.
Andreas clears his throat and rubs the back of his neck. “I decided to do a few repairs and touch-ups. I hope that’s okay?”
I blink at him and look back at the orange dinosaur in my hand. “It’s perfect. He looks brand new! You did an amazing job.”
“I’m a graphic designer,” Andreas admits. “I enjoy arts and crafts. It was my pleasure to fix him and the rest of them up for you guys.”
He holds my gaze until I feel my pulse quickening again. I laugh and look away, shaking my head incredulously. “This is amazing.You’reamazing.”
“Seriously, thank you,” Colby says.
He’s cradling Buckets to his chest. That’s his favorite character, the guy the fandom pretty much unanimously agrees is dating his sassy robot best friend. As Spark is voiced by a male actor, that makes it a queer relationship, which is pretty awesome considering when the show was made. Obviously, nothing happens to confirm this in the canon, but Colby’s written enough fanfics about those two to more than make up for it.
Soon enough, we have all the figurines out of the box standing proudly on our coffee table. I feel a little emotional. I was so sad when I lost the bidding war, but it worked out even better this way. I love the idea of sharing the collection with my best friend in the whole world. We never would have connected if it hadn’t been for these characters in front of us.
“Oh,” I say to Colby, a thought suddenly occurring to me. “I should pay you half of what you spent on eBay. It’s a present for both of us, after all.”
Before Colby can reply, Andreas is shaking his head and reaching into the back pocket of his jeans. “I forgot. Colby, this is for you.”
He hands over an envelope. Colby takes it and looks inside, his eyebrows rising. “Is that…?”
“A hundred dollars,” Andreas confirms with a nod. “You paid ninety-five dollars plus a couple of quid for postage, so I rounded up.”
“But…?” Colby says with a frown. Andreas is already waving his hands, though.
“I don’t want a penny for them,” he insists. “I just wanted them to go to a good home. Seeing the way you guys fought to give them to each other showed me that’s exactly where they’ll be.”
Colby bites his lip and glances at me. “That seems greedy,” he says quietly.
Awww, my baby. He’s so damned sweet, always thinking of others. He never thinks he deserves nice things, because his awful family made him believe that for so long. I move over so I can wrap my arm around him.
“No one couldeveraccuse you of being greedy, sweetie,” I tell him.
“Honestly, it’s my pleasure,” Andreas says sincerely.
Colby looks between me, him, and the toys on the table. “Okay,” he says softly. “But only because it’s Christmas.”
That makes us all laugh.
The moment stretches out. Andreas is looking thoughtfully at us both snuggled on the armchair. “I, uh, guess I should go,” he says, but he doesn’t sound convinced.
I don’t blame him. We’ve barely known him for fifteen minutes, but the thought of him disappearing already makes me panicky.
“No!” I yell, then blush in embarrassment. “I mean…if you already have plans, of course you should go. It is Friday night, after all.”
“I don’t need to be anywhere,” he says, his eyes sparkling as they meet mine. “In fact, I’m off work until the new year. I’ve been catching up on life admin.” He gestures to the table, and I wonder if he’s put more things on eBay that he doesn’t want anymore.
“You could stay for dinner?” Colby suggests.
