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Chapter Twenty-Five

"What did you and Sasha fight about?" asks Ethan, stroking my hair as I snuggle onto his shoulder.

"I don't want to keep talking about it." I roll away. He'd been asleep last night when I snuck into his room, but this morning I told him I had a fight with Sasha and now all he wants to do is talk, which is not properly distracting me from all of the emotions swirling around inside my head.

"You wouldn't have come in here if you didn't want to talk." Ethan rolls me back toward him and tugs me until I'm sprawled out on his chest. "You would have gone to Lionel or Helix, who would have fucked you into forgetting what happened."

"I'd thought Sasha was my friend, and I'd confided in her that I'm, you know, seeing all of you," I tell Ethan's chest. "I didn't know if she was going to be supportive or judgmental. And at first I thought she was cool with it. But then she called me a bad writer."

I've never thought of myself as the perfect writer.

There's always room for improvement, which is why I'm part of a critique group.

But I've been working hard and following all of their advice.

Doing as much research as my body can possibly take.

Surely a truly bad writer wouldn't work so hard to improve.

"And she hit on the guys in the kitchen while I was still downstairs." I can't believe she thought I would let her fuck them for inspiration. Refusing to play along with that scheme is hardly gatekeeping. They're mine .

"Are those two things equal in your eyes?" Ethan lifts my chin up off his chest to look into my eyes.

How do I answer? Both things hit my feelings like a personal attack. Insulting my writing is basically her slicing up the core of my being, my deepest identity. But I also feel more and more that these men belong to me, and being their girlfriend is also becoming a large part of my identity.

"No," I whisper. "I don't think so?" I glance up. "This is all so confusing."

"It's not supposed to be." He leans forward to brush a soft kiss against my lips. "But I'm glad you at least told someone about us."

"Yeah, I'm not sure I'm doing that again." I roll off of him to stare up at his ceiling. "Look how well it went."

Ethan's phone pings, and he checks it, swiping and tapping at the screen. Probably work then. They all work so hard, and don't get much downtime. I should do something nice for them soon so we can have quality time together. Maybe a weekly date night with no phones and no work.

"I hope you change your mind on that." He plants another kiss on my forehead before rolling out of bed. "And quick too."

"Why do you say that?" I sit up, letting the blanket pool at my waist to bare my breasts, which makes him pause at the door.

"Because we just announced that we have a girlfriend to all of our followers." He disappears into the hallway, leaving me alone in his bed.

"What?" I call after him. "You didn't want to talk to me about that first?"

When Ethan doesn't answer, I crawl out of bed and move over to my own room and my computer. I don't know where I left my phone. Probably in the basement, but I don't want to go looking for it. I'm not ready to run into all of my boyfriends yet after the embarrassing situation that was last night.

I'm not sure where they posted the information that they have a girlfriend.

Or how much information they've given. I do a basic search with their names and girlfriend.

A few older articles come up, saying they aren't dating anyone, but a few chat forums show up as links with other gamers either freaking out that these guys have a girlfriend or posting they don't care and it shouldn't matter.

These comments include the link to their streaming site, and when I click over there, I see it. In their "About" section, it simply says, "In a relationship". No other information is provided.

I'm not sure how I should feel about this.

They've clearly stated that they're in a relationship and they're not interested in either hitting on or being hit on by any of their subscribers.

However, they also haven't named me, which is nice for my privacy but also makes me wonder.

If they were involved with someone famous or successful, would they tell everyone my name and be proud to claim me as theirs?

I pull up the web version of the subscribers' chat. My subscription was about up the other day, so I renewed for another month. It's not that much money and I like knowing what they're up to.

Their subscribers are freaking out there too. Apparently, because my boyfriends never share anything from their personal lives, the fact that they've shared this is sending everyone into a tizzy.

Miles's pinned post floats at the top of the chat, no matter if I scroll backward or forward. "Yes, we have a girlfriend. No, we will not be divulging additional information about her at this time."

I really wish they'd talked to me about this first. I mean, we'd talked about it briefly the other night when Quintin and Lionel walked me home from critique group.

But when I'd called them out on not telling people about me and our relationship, I'd thought they would tell their friends and family first. Not their millions of fans and followers.

I climb into a scalding shower to wash off the bad vibes from last night and organize my mind about what I'll say to my boyfriends when I confront them. And hope they don't bring up Sasha's comment about gatekeeping again.

I could tell them to ignore her because she's just jealous that I have five boyfriends and she has none. But if I wait too long, my boyfriends will be shut up in their computer den and I won't be able to talk to them for hours.

"We need to talk," I say as soon as I step into the kitchen, but immediately freeze at the sight before me.

The table is set with real plates, stacks of pancakes, and bowls of both fruit and eggs.

I've never once seen any of my boyfriends eat anything more substantial than a bowl of cereal for breakfast. Usually they grab a protein bar if they're feeling healthy, but pair it with an energy drink.

This is the most startling thing I've seen since moving in, and they've bought me multiple sex toys.

"What do we need to talk about?" Miles hands me a cup of piping hot coffee.

Of course it's in my favorite mug, the one with the little birds singing all around it. Don't they know this thoughtful little display of theirs is throwing me off my game when I'm ready to be mad? How do I tell them I'm upset when they're doing something so sweet?

"What's with all this?" I point accusingly at the loaded table, then sip my coffee. It's delicious.

"Breakfast," answers Miles.

"Sit down," says Helix. "Eggs go cold surprisingly fast."

"I can tell it's breakfast," I say as Quintin practically ushers me into a seat. "Why did you all make breakfast?"

"So, we did a thing," says Miles sitting down as well.

"I already told her," says Ethan, casually helping himself to a couple pancakes.

"You told her?" asks Lionel. "Ender, you've left us overextended!"

Ethan shrugs. "She was with me when we decided and posted."

"And you didn't ping us?" asks Helix. "Or tell us while we were cooking all of this?"

"I thought we were making breakfast to make Clarissa feel better about her friend hitting on you last night," says Ethan, his brows drawing together in confusion.

"No, we did it because we wanted to break the news to her about our subscribers," says Miles.

"Wait, I thought we were doing it because we crashed her critique group thing," says Quintin.

"I thought it was because we hadn't told her we were going on vacation." Lionel casually pours syrup over his scrambled eggs.

Miles pinches the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "Fine, it can be for all of those reasons."

"Oh no, this can only be for one of those things," I say, accepting the syrup from Lionel and dousing my pancakes. "This is a nice breakfast, but it's not nice enough to cover everything ."

"Then it's for my reason, since I was the one who suggested the breakfast thing," says Miles. "And we'll have a strategy session later to deal with the other things."

"Fuck, that's going to be a long session," grumbles Quintin.

"Can we order takeout for it at least?" asks Helix.

"Sure," says Ethan, scooping a line of egg down the middle of a pancake and rolling it to eat like a taco.

"Are you going to get to the apology part of this meal?

" I'm annoyed about them not involving me in this announcement, but I also feel guilty about needing to apologize myself for using them without their knowledge as research for my book.

The better I get to know these guys, the worse I feel about keeping this a secret.

Maybe I'll plan an elaborate apology blow job for each of them.

"This is the apology," says Miles, surprised.

"You need to say the words too." I don't have a lot of dating experience, but I'm pretty sure all apologies have to include the words I'm sorry at some point. Although that'll be hard with my mouth full of cock, so maybe a blow job and something else.

"I'm not sure that's true." Miles looks around the table to his teammates for guidance.

"I'll wait for as long as you need." I sip my coffee. "But you should take down the notice that you have a girlfriend until you apologize."

"Yeah, that's not going to happen," says Miles, setting down his fork and crossing his arms.

"So you're afraid of looking bad in front of your followers, but not afraid of what I'll do, or not do, until you apologize?" I set down my own silverware and mirror Miles's posture.

"Woah, woah." Helix throws up his hands. "Let's not poke at each other."

"Yeah, let's not jump to anything drastic," says Lionel. "We can sort this out."

"Sure, and while this is a nice gesture," I wave to the breakfast spread, "I need the words too."

"Okay, yeah, we can do that," says Lionel, nodding. "Go ahead, Arrow."