Page 92 of As The Shifter World Turns

92

IT SOUNDED LIKE A GOOD IDEA…

Martin

“Is it weird that we are showing up all together like this?” Neil asked.

And I could see his point. Most kids had two parents or possibly more with step-parents in the mix, but play groups tended to be a one parent kind of thing. At least from what I remembered back when Toby was little.

Not that I went to them often. My mate handled that part of things. The one time I went it was because he had a dentist appointment and I’d felt so over my head. Everyone knew the routine and each other and… I felt out of place.

And maybe that was why I felt like this was so important for all of us to go. Like if we were all there somehow none of us would feel that way. We’d be right where we belonged.

“No. It shows that Charlie is well loved and will be taken care of even in his loss.” Neil had stepped up in a way that awed me. He slid right into the role of Dad perfectly, while it was rough for me to wrap my head around all of this at first.

Having Charlie lose his father brought back so many memories of when Toby lost his dad. But Charlie only had one. He didn’t have his other parent there to hug him and tell him everything would be okay and it was them against the world.

But now he had us.

“You're right.”

He stepped into my waiting arms and I hugged him tightly.

Charlie was with Daire for the day in 3B. He was working on his reality project with Micah, and Neil and Nate were heavily involved. But Daire wanted to take on a bigger role with Charlie. In the past few weeks he’d already done so even if he didn’t see it.

We all had and Charlie let us know, his face blooming into a smile every time one of us walked into a room.

“We should head out to the minivan.” It was Daire’s, the one he’d had for ages but now it was for Charlie, his four parents, and Toby. Whomever had Charlie would use the van. Neil had seen one too many videos of carseat horrors and didn’t want us switching them from vehicle to vehicle and somehow using the set of wheels Daire already had seemed a better idea than buying multiple car seats.

And in the end we bought those too—just in case.

I grabbed the bag that had become a part of all of our outings now. It had a change of clothes for everyone, including the adults. They thought I was being silly until the first time Charlie puked on Nate’s shirt. It was not the best way to be proven right, but it worked.

“Toby wanted to stay home from school so he could come with us,” I said on our way out. “He really loves Charlie and having him around. But I told him no.”

“He’s such a great kid.” Neil squeezed my hand. “You’re an amazing father.”

“As are you.” I squeezed his back. “I see you with Charlie and… he’s so lucky.’

The others were already at the van, Nate buckling Charlie into his carseat.

“Who’s driving?” Daire asked.

“You?” Neil offered. He wanted to sit in the back with Charlie. The baby had only been upstairs for a few hours, but Neil had missed him something fierce. I knew that feeling, knew it well.

Toby’s first week of school I was a mess. I showed up a half hour early just to make sure I wasn’t late. I had big plans to get things done while he was gone. I even made a list. The only thing I managed to do was watch the clock. It had been rough.

Toby, on the other hand, had the time of his life.

“I can drive. Who is riding—never mind. You’re all going to be in the back. Someone needs to buy a hat for whoever's driving. One that says chauffeur,” Daire teased and we all climbed in.

The playdate slash play group was being held at the local community center. It was for any children under five and their parents. In theory it was going to be a ton of fun in a nurturing environment.

It was neither of those things.

We walked in and were greeted by a parent who wanted to know where our other babies were because they didn’t want strange adults in there planning to snatch their precious Morgan. They were less than thrilled when Neil pointed out that the very worst thing you can do when you think someone is about to steal your child is to arm them with said child’s name. It was pretty damn satisfying watching them storm off the way they did.

From there we had to fill out enough paperwork for a thousand children and then fill out more paperwork for each and every one of us. Apparently, Morgan’s parent was teaching all the adults in the group to fear us because they too were sure there was something nefarious about us all being there.

When we were finally allowed to go in to play, it was chaos. Kids were climbing on furniture that was not safe for climbing, a little girl was crying because she had a crayon stuck in her nose, a parent was yelling repeatedly at her kid to stop hitting others, and there was a child running around without his clothes.

Half the parents were in a coffee clutch and the director was outside on a smoke break.

“So this isn’t what I thought it would be.” Neil was holding Charlie close and unlike most times when there were things to explore, Charlie was not squirming to get down, instead holding onto Neil’s shirt like a lifeline.

“Is this normal?” Neil looked to me, the only one here with experience in such things.

“No. No it isn’t,” I answered immediately.

“Anyone else want to leave?” Daire asked.

“Ice cream?” Nate offered.

“Ice cream.” The three of us said in unison.

We were back to the minivan in record time and at the ice cream place when they opened.

“This was a much better idea.” Daire took a long sip of his float. “Much better.”

“Agreed.” Nate had a banana split, claiming the banana made it healthy. Not that anyone was going to judge.

Neil had an ice cream mixer with four kinds of candy. I was the closest thing to reasonable with my vanilla dish but the four scoops could hardly be described as reasonable. I argued with myself that it was because I was “sharing” with Charlie. That sharing ended up the equivalent of a tablespoon.

“We can have this be our play group,” I teased and Neil’s face suddenly got serious. “I was joking, m—Neil.” Mate almost slipped off my tongue. We still hadn’t quite worked through all that nonsense. But we loved each other and that was all that mattered.

“I know. But also… what if we made our own playgroup? Like, have a set time when we got together.” Neil put his ice cream down. “Not just us. That wouldn’t be any fun, but with our Sunshine Manor family.”

He had a point. Jasper wasn’t at the playing stage yet, but he would be soon and the others already were.

“It would have to be a set thing if we want to make it stick,” Nate said, chocolate sauce on his chin .

“You have a…” Daire leaned in and licked it off and then kissed his mate. It was sickeningly sweet and not just because of the sugar.

And I was more than a bit jealous. Not because they had each other or even because they were so affectionate. No, I was jealous because I never felt like I could be that way with Neil, not in public. Part of it was knowing all that Neil had been through, sure. But part of it was my own insecurities. I really needed to work on those.

“We can get together with the other fathers and see what works for them. And we need to think of a place. If it’s just at one of our places that’s fine, but it’s a lot to host each and every week.” Neil grabbed his ice cream again and shoved a spoonful in his mouth. “We could rotate.”

“We could refrigerate?” Nate asked. “Please tell me you did not just say we can refrigerate the kids, Neil.”

“I said,” he swallowed the last of his mouthful of ice cream. “I said we could rotate. Each week of the month is a different person’s place, like a schedule.”

“And if there are five weeks?” I pointed my spoon at Neil. “Then we can have that week here.”