Seth’s Perspective
By the Friday after New Year’s Eve, life was back to normal… well at least our version of it. All the visiting parents and grandparents had headed home, the kids were settling back into their routines, and it was Pizza Night at BroMax. I loved Pizza Night; it centered us as a family and a community. Some weeks we had half the damn county there, but that night it was just the core group; Our family, the BroMax family, Gina & Dylan & family, and Riley & Eli (and future baby Westin). As I looked around the room, I couldn’t help but think how things had changed so much over the last year. I watched the six kids playing and realized that just a year ago, Maggie was the only one of them in our lives. I saw Riley in a corner talking to Gina and thought… ‘wow, Zach’s Baby sister and my crazy brother are going to be parents.’ I looked over at Max and Zach who were laughing about something; they had both evolved so much since we met. Zach had grown from my “is he or isn’t he” hot college jock suitemate into an amazing man, and a partner so perfect for me that I could never have even conjured him up in my wildest dreams. And Max… well the nerdy little redhead I met at church during my first week of college had grown into this confident, muscular, take charge CEO. Much of his confidence came from the quiet, little redneck with the curly auburn locks and heart of gold standing just a few feet away from them… the guy who was just the mysterious hermit who lived in the converted attic above our college duplex. And Dylan… he just made me smile. Such a smart, gentle bear who was chasing beautiful women with big hair and smallish brains until he met Gina, the redneck tamer. Gina was beautiful, tough, and smart as hell; she knew how to take control. In our little world of “daddies” she became the de facto “momma bear.” All the kids trusted her implicitly and she knew how to handle them; I had learned so much about parenting from her. This was my main village and I was ready for another year together.
“Bowbie ate da pizza” said Izzy from below snapping me out of my moment of reflection.
“Izzy! What did you do?” I asked as I took the pizza sauce covered doll from her.
She looked up at me with those innocent, puppy dog eyes and said, “I not dude it. Bowbie ated pizza n spiwwed (Izzy to English translation: I didn’t do it, Daddy Seth. Barbie was eating pizza and spilled on herself… I had absolutely nothing to do with it). I took the doll and we went into the kitchen together to clean her up, as expected, Gina was right behind me with Maggie’s Barbie and we cleaned them both up in the sink. The thing about Izzy and Maggie is that if one of those “little angels” got in trouble, the other was undoubtedly right there with her (the same could be said for Freddy and Teddy). We cleaned up the dolls and gave them back to the two tiny princesses and thanked us and ran off with their dolls to play.
“So, I hear you guys may have a chance at adopting Ali” Gina said.
“Yeah, it’s looking that way” I said with a giant smile and an even bigger sigh. The words ‘Three kids… what the fuck are we thinking’ kept running through my head. At the same time, I knew damn well it was the right thing for all of us.
Gina knew exactly what I was thinking, “You know you love it” she said with a smile. “I have never seen you happier, you love being a parent.” She was right.
“I absolutely do… but THREE?!! We’re only 25 what the hell are we thinking.?! We’re the youngest parents in Freddy’s class” I said with a little chuckle. It was all so overwhelming and fulfilling at the same time.
“Well, you guys and Max and Brody” she shot back.
“True, we’re the young-uns at the school” I said with my best southern twang.
“I admire all you guys” Gina said with a serious tone and a smile. “Your giving all those kids a great life and don’t give a fuck what anyone says about it.”
“Well, we sure as hell couldn’t have done it without you” I said just as Max walked into the room.
“Done what?” he asked. “Raise kids?”
“Yup.” Gina responded. “I love this whole group parenting thing. When I was growing up it was just me and my mom, these kids have all this extended family. It’s so awesome.”
“I agree” Max said. “Brody wants to adopt another one… a girl. We told Ms. Elkin we were interested when we got back from Charleston. She connected us with an adoption agency so the wheels are in motion.”
Gina squealed with excitement, “adopt a three year old!!! Maggie and Izzy need a third partner in crime.” Then the three of us talked about Max and Brody’s plan to grow their family. By the time we finished the conversation all the parents had joined us in the kitchen. We realized that we’d left our little darlings alone in the living room and ran back into the other room… when we got there we found the girls lost in Barbie’s world, and Freddy and Teddy keeping an eye on the two little ones, everyone was fine. They were having so much fun that they didn’t even notice they were alone. It was a fun night with our collected family.
Saturday, however, sucked; we spent the day taking the tree and Christmas lights down. We were all outside working our butts off, including Terrance and Harrison. Although we were neighbors, we didn’t see a lot of them, Terrance worked crazy hours, and when he was off, they spent a lot of time visiting their two sons at college and made a lot of trips back to Boston to visit family. With the boys away at college there wasn’t much keeping them in North Carolina, I suspected that they were considering a move back to Boston but they hadn’t said anything about it yet.
The kids were all “helping” which basically meant it was taking us ten times as long as it should have. We worked all morning taking down the lights and organizing them in boxes to store in the barn for next year. We took a lunch break about noon; I had put a big batch of chili in the crockpot before we started working on the lights, and the house smelled amazing. I made sandwiches for lunch before Izzy and Ali down for their naps around noon. After that it was back out to the yard to finish pulling down the lights, I have to admit… Freddie was a huge freaking help. He was by Zach’s side the entire day doing whatever Zach needed him to do; he was such a good kid. We got the lights stored in the old barn and ready for next Christmas, and had time to play board games with Freddy on the living room floor. Freddy did get a lot of one-on-one attention from us, especially both of us at one time… he was a lot of fun to be around. While we were playing Freddy asked if he could invite Teddy over for Chili night.
“Good plan, let’s invite his dads too” Zach said.
“Just like our chili night’s in college” I said. Zach texted the BroMax boys.
“What’s college?” Freddy asked as he made his studied the game board thinking about his next move. Zach and I explained how we used to live in a house with Uncle Max, Uncle Brody, and some other friends. We talked about chili nights, pizza nights, and movie nights. We both realized that Freddy (and Izzy, and Ali) knew nothing about our lives before them, and Freddy was old enough to understand… in fact he loved our stories and kept asking for more, we even pulled out our phones and showed him pictures. He laughed at how different Uncle Max looked, and asked about Eric, Cam, and Elliot. He had met them at Eli and Riley’s wedding, but that was about it… hopefully we’d see more of them in the future. “Can me, n’ Teddy, n’ Sammy live in a house together in college?” He asked with excitement. I think I smiled the biggest smile I had ever smiled at that moment thinking about our kid, and Max and Brody’s kid living together at college and being best friends… we were really building something here. A legacy.
“Yup” Zach said, “Keep doing good in school and you can do anything you want.” Just then, his phone dinged and he checked his texts, “Teddy, Brody, and Max are coming over at 5:00 for chili, Brody says he’ll bring hotdogs and nacho fixin’s.” Just like he used to in college I thought.
Naptime was over and Izzy was standing at the top of the steps yelling “I up now!” Well, as always, our Freddy time was cut short. I went upstairs to open the gate, Izzy greeted me with a hug around the knees… post-nap Izzy was usually sweet as hell. She waddled down the steps to join Zach and Freddy, and I went in to check on Ali who was patiently waiting in his bed for me to come get him. We joined the others downstairs and we all played for the rest of the afternoon until Max, Brody, and Teddy got there. Max and I found ourselves in the kitchen with Ali sitting in his highchair content to eat the chunks of cheese Max kept sneaking to him. Zach continued to play board games with the boys; and Brody… hahaha, well Brody was laying on the floor of the den playing Barbies with Izzy. It was obvious that Uncle Brody wanted a little girl of his own, but Izzy was more than happy to be the recipient of his attentions in the meantime. She was in freaking heaven bossing “Uncle Bwody Ken” around with her “Bowbie” telling him “you do dis” and “you do dat”. Max snuck some video of them, it was so damn cute. For the rest of the night we played, ate chili, watched a movie, and just hung out. When it was bedtime, Izzy insisted that Uncle Brody tuck her in.
When it was time to leave, we were all at the front door (except for Izzy and Ali who were both tucked snuggly in their beds) and Brody whispered, “How do y’all not just smile from ear to ear, 24/7 with her around?”
“HA!” Zach said with a laugh. “Come by some morning when she doesn’t wanna get up and go to daycare, or she insists on dressing up as a princess to go to the grocery store.”
“NO!” I said folding my arms and stomping my feet, doing my best Izzy impression, “I don’t wike dat!”
Zach added, “you’re darling, adorable, angelic, niece can be a little…”
“B word” Freddy chimed in with the most serious look on his face making us all crack up. The three of us said goodnight to the BroMax gang and then went up and got ready for bed. Freddy wanted a story so Zach climbed up into his bunk and read him a couple chapters of ‘Here’s Hank’ one of Freddy’s favorites.
After story time, Zach climbed into bed with me. We kissed goodnight and he fell asleep. I just laid there thinking about all the shit going on in our lives, Karen’s case, Riley’s pregnancy, Ali’s adoption, Brody and Max looking to adopt again, work, Asher’s big move (yes, he accepted the offer). There was just so much happening, and my mind was racing. I couldn’t sleep. I looked over at my husband who had fallen asleep on his back with his arms folded over his chest… god he was beautiful! His body was beyond toned, his facial features chiseled, those damn dimples were there even when he wasn’t smiling. It had been about four nights since Zach woke me up for sex and Freddy interrupted us before I came. Now, Zach was passed out and I was horny. I reached down and started to play with myself as I looked over at Zach sleeping, it didn’t take much for me to get hard (it rarely did). I was stroking myself slowly trying not to disturb Zach, then I thought ‘why the hell not. He doesn’t hesitate to wake me up for sex?’ So, while I continued to stroke myself with one hand, I reached over and stroked him with the other. I could feel the heat of his meat through his PJ’s as his hefty manhood squished in my hand. I worked us both for a bit, while the whole time staring at his beautiful face. His cock started to stiffen in my hand around the same time his hazel eyes opened.
He grinned, “what are you doing?” he asked in a gravelly voice.
“Hopefully you” I joked. “Wake up, you owe me from the other night, waking my ass up and then leaving me with blue balls.”
“Don’t blame me, blame your son” he said still sleepy. “He’s the one who interrupted us, I was ready to give you the orgasm of your young life” he teased making me grin.
“No time like the present” I said stroking him a little faster. Finally, he stirred a little and reached over to stroke me… I had him hooked. We lie there stroking each other for a while until I decided to take control, after all, I was the one left with blue balls (thanks Freddy!). I flipped around and got on top of him in a sixty nine. I lowered my mouth onto his awakening manhood as I reach down and lined-up my cockhead with his lips, pushing way in. God, he felt so amazing… on both ends of me! I was choking on him as he grew inside my mouth, and on the other end of the bed, his warm mouth was making me hard as nails and bringing me closer to sweet release. I pushed my way deeper down his throat while his tongue snaked and slithered around my shaft trying to coax out my extremely overdue orgasm.
I moved in and out of his determined oral cavity reveling in the warm, wet, pleasure of it all. I admit that I lost control a little as I started to fuck his face from atop his perfect body while my mouth and right hand worked his shaft and my left hand begged his low-hanging balls for their nectar. My purpose was twofold; lose my load and gain his and one task seemed to motivate the other. The more I worked his shaft, the harder I face-fucked him… I wasn’t sure which was driving which, but it was all working together to drive me into a frenzy. Below me, Zach whimpered and gurgled as he worked his magic on my wand. My mind started to clear of all the chaos and the world around us disappeared as we concentrated on our mutual pleasure. Zach had his hands on my ass and his fingers in my crack exploring my hole. He pulled a guttural groan out of me and it reverberated around his shaft causing him to moan around mine… soon our moans and groans morphed and melded into a continuous purr of pleasure.
Another ten minutes or so was all either of us could bear and I moved in and out with power driving force, my ass was on its own mission to launch my load down Zach’s throat. That thought excited me and my hand and mouth went into stroking overdrive yearning for his load down my throat. The moans and groans around my cock got louder and more powerful as Zach neared climax. He was the first to go, and shot his load down my throat. It’s thickness and volume choking me in the most frigging amazing way as I swallowed and slurped trying not to miss a drop… I was so into Zach’s orgasm that my own snuck up on me. It hit me with such incredible ardor that I couldn’t help but whimper in pure ecstasy, the relief was indescribable as the pent-up load exited through my shaft and entered Zach’s mouth. By that point I was slurping his shaft clean in appreciation. Zach sucked every last molecule from my shaft then smacked my ass to celebrate our completed mission. I rolled off him and moved up to put my head back on the pillow. Our lips met and our cum mingled in a satisfying post-BJ kiss.
“So, do you think you can sleep now?” Zach asked with a smirk on his face.
“Yup. The poisons have left the building” I declared with a satisfied sigh, my lips just inches from his (I could smell my cum on his breath and I’m sure he could smell his on mine). A few minutes later, with satisfied smiles on our faces, we both passed out and fell into a deep sleep.
Sunday morning, we all slept in until almost 7:00AM (that’s a big deal in our house), after breakfast it was bath time, then we hung out and played for most of the day. Zach and I both took a little time out to deal with work throughout the day, but for the most part it was family time and Zach and I just enjoyed hanging out with our kids… until… Asher. Asher had accepted the job in Phoenix and was flying out on Monday to finalize the details and go apartment hunting… they were a total mess. When they called, I decided to invite them over for leftover chili. The truth is, throughout college, grad school, and my internships I was always told to separate work and family for safety and privacy reasons, but that wasn’t the case. The Village strived to build a family around our clients and basically became their de facto family that wasn’t usually the case. The villagers not only knew our families but were pretty much part of them.
Asher’s car (Yoda) came crunching up the driveway about 5:00. I was in the kitchen pulling dinner together when they rang the doorbell, Izzy beat me to the door. “ASSO’S HEO!” she yelled as she hugged her shy friend (she was off the wall excited when we told her he was coming for dinner). I came out of the kitchen, and Zach came down from the second floor where he was working in peace in our bedroom to greet him.
“Hi Ash, come on in. I’m glad you came over” I said. Zach echoed my sentiment. Asher was standing in the doorway holding his laptop with Izzy’s arms wrapped around his legs; we invited him to come in.
“Izzy, let go of Ash so they can some inside already” Zach said as we ushered Asher through the door and we all moved into the kitchen. He took off his coat and made himself comfortable on one of the barstools at the kitchen island. He looked up to see Ali smiling at him from the highchair at the end of the island, then Izzy moved into the seat next to him, Freddy came in from playing in the den and asked when we were eating dinner, then he saw Ash and greeted them. Within minutes of walking into the house, Asher was surrounded by admiring little fans all wanting to sit close to him. They vied for his attention asking him questions and telling them all about Christmas, their new toys, etc. “Enough you guys” Zach said, “Ash is our guest let him eat in peace.”
Zach warmed the chili on the stove and started to pull out all the chilidog fixin’s while I butterflied the hotdogs and fried them up in butter.
“Do you like chilidogs, Asher? They’re my favorite” Freddy said.
“Me too” Izzy chimed in while Ali nodded his head like he had a broken hinge… he LOVED chilidogs.
“They’re my favorite too” Asher said (probably lying) then the kids went back to talking his ear off. I just watched as the kids made him feel like the most important person in the world. Asher seemed to hate and revel in the attention all at the same time. I served up dinner and everyone dug in, by the end of dinner I could tell Ash felt ay home. After dinner, Zach took the kids to play in the living room and den and left me an Asher to talk.
“So, what’s up, Ash?” I asked.
“Oh my god, Seth… this is all freaking me out. I leave tomorrow to go to Phoenix, and I have to find a place to live, and find my way around, and I only know a couple of people at the office, and…” he rambled on and on. I let him go until he got it out of his system.
When he calmed down, I said, “Okay, let’s take it in bite-sized pieces.” This was my typical tact with Asher. Make him think through it piece by piece until he felt in control of something… even if it was something tiny. “What have you done to find an apartment?” I asked. Asher opened his laptop; he had spoken with a rental agent and they had several places within his budget lined-up for him to see on Tuesday.
“Good job” I said. “Are you free for dinner any night you’re there?”
“Yeah, I don’t have plans any night but tomorrow night, some people from the office are going to show me around” he said.
“How about I call my brothers and see if they can meet you for dinner one night this week?” I asked, Asher reluctantly agreed, meeting new people wasn’t his thing. I got Brian, Brad, and Scotty on a conference call, I put everyone on speaker and introduced them to Ash. I had told them about Asher’s move earlier and they were all on board to help.
We talked for a bit and Brad said, “So, it’s a plan. You’ll come to our place on Tuesday night for dinner, Brian and his wife will join us, and we’ll invite Alejandro.”
“Alejandro is a Villager in Phoenix, he lived with Brad and Scotty for a while” I explained. “He’ll be a good guy for you to know.”
“You’re gonna love it here, Asher” Scotty chimed in. “We’ll make sure you meet some people and get the lay of the land.” Asher let his shyness go as he started to tell the guys about where he was apartment hunting, and the places he was looking at. They gave him some advice on areas to check out, and Brian went through questions he should ask the rental agent. To my surprise, he was very engaged and asking them good, relevant questions, they even got online and looked at some of the apartments he was considering and helped him narrow down his search a bit. Asher was making notes on his laptop.
We were on the phone a good hour and when we hung up, Asher looked at me with this expression of… well, I guess I’d call it relief and simply said, “thank you.”
“You’re welcome” I responded. “Are you feeling better about it all?” He just nodded, then he went into the den and the kids drove him crazy until it was time for bed, then Izzy made him read her a story and tuck her in while I put Ali down. When the two kids were down for the count Asher said goodnight and I walked him out to his car. “I’m proud of you, Asher. This is a great opportunity and you’ve earned it” then I hugged him, “but I’ll miss you.” He didn’t love being hugged, but he made an exception for me.
Asher was moving on to bigger and better things. I felt a sense of Pride and loss at the same time.
To be continued…
