Page 44 of Please Open Me
Lucian didn’t get home until almost eight, and once he did, the two of us tag-teamed bedtime with the twins. He made a few offhand comments about how weird it was that Mason hadn’t already bathed them or gotten them into pajamas, and I reminded him—politely, for once—that he made those hellions, so he could help raise them.
He didn’t argue.
I took bath duty. He got them into pajamas. Then we each crawled into one of the twin beds while I read the night’s story.
Part of me wanted to ask why he never volunteered to read aloud, but I already knew the answer. Lucian was dyslexic. And while children’s books weren’t exactlyMoby Dick, our father had used that difference as a weapon from the beginning. He mocked Lucian for it, punished him, carved shame into him until he couldn’t look at a page without flinching. And now he didn’t go near books unless he absolutely had to.
The irony wasn’t lost on me. Two of his three partners were obsessive readers. Mason had a library in her basement that looked like it belonged in an indiebookstore, and Cameron read dystopian paperbacks like they held the key to the universe.
I sat cross-legged on Jasper’s bed, his warm little body curled into my side. His head rested on my thigh, arms locked around my waist like I might disappear. My free hand moved up and down his back, keeping time with the rhythm of the story.
I was halfway throughThe Incredibly Sleepy Dragon Who Couldn’t Find His Cave—a literary masterpiece, if you asked Jasper—when I looked across the room and caught a moment I hadn’t expected.
Lucian lay on Juniper’s bed, gently running his fingertip down the bridge of her nose. He was humming under his breath, a quiet sound so soft it barely reached me. Juniper’s eyes were already closed, her breathing deep and steady. She was out.
And suddenly, I saw it. The resemblance.
Not just in the shape of their faces or the slope of their brows, but something in the way they breathed was eerily similar. A deep-seated yearning filled my chest as I realized that while I may love the children in this house as if they were mine, I would never be able to make one for myself. Not with Dale around.
I glanced down at Jasper and felt it again. That weird, unwelcome ache in my chest. I wasn’t technically their dad, not biologically. I wasn’t even technically their stepdad. But I was here. And for the past year, I’d been here every day. Bath time. Sick days. School pick-ups. Bedtime.
What did that make me?
I didn’t have time to answer that question before Jasper let out a tiny sigh and drooled on my leg. The last page of the book closed with a whisper of paper as the dragon finally curled up in the clouds with his new friends.
Across the room, Lucian’s humming stopped. He didn’t move, didn’t speak. Just stayed there, watching his daughter breathe. We both stayed like that, frozen by love and logistics, wondering how the hell we were going to get up without waking the kids.
I leaned back against the headboard and closed my eyes. Maybe Jasper would roll off on his own. If he did, I’d sneak downstairs, grab my Switch, and play Persona until my eyes went numb. It wasn’t an ambitious plan, but it was mine.
Only… I didn’t make it that far.
I must’ve fallen asleep. I didn’t realize it until two firm taps landed on my cheek.
I startled awake with a gasp, my hand flying to Jasper’s small body, my chest clenching with that automatic, irrational panic you get when you fall asleep with a kid on you. But Jasper was fine. Still drooling. Still latched to my leg like a baby octopus.
Lucian stood a few inches away, hair damp, freshly showered, arms crossed like he’d been waiting all night for this exact moment.
“You gonna get up,” he asked flatly, “or are you gonna be a weirdo who sleeps with my kids?”
I bit back a yawn as I carefully shifted Jasper’s grip. I reached up to the stuffed animal net above the bed and pulled out a plush alligator, slipping it gently into his arms like a thief swapping a precious jewel for a bag of sand. He whimpered a little, and I rubbed his back, murmuring something incoherent until he settled again.
It was automatic. Instinct.
Which made it more confusing.
I turned to find Lucian still watching me from the doorway. Without a word, I draped my arm over his shoulders and herded him out into the hall. It was maybe a little over-the-top, but I liked the reminder it gave: sure, he was the older brother, but I was bigger now. He couldn’t shove me around anymore.
Once the bedroom door clicked shut, I said it before I could second-guess myself.
“I’m not a weirdo, by the way. They’re my kids too.”
It wasn’t a question, and it wasn’t a joke. It just felt true.
Cameron was their dad. Mason was their other mom. Rosie was their sister. And me? I was somewhere in the middle. Not quite dad. Not quite uncle, not anymore at least. Just always… there.
Lucian raised an eyebrow, the ink on his chest shifting with the movement. “Uh, no they're not.”
“I do all the dad stuff. I’m dating two of their four parents. What the fuck am I, then?”
