Page 80 of Good Time Boyfriend
Nobody was fighting, nobody was pushing or arguing or threatening. They just looked happy, and as if this all made sense and they had done it countless times before.
Heath and I stood in the back, wide-eyed, wondering what exactly was happening.
“Did you invite them all?” I asked, trying to speak low so my voice wouldn’t carry.
“I mentioned to my family that we should have family dinner, but I didn’t know that this was what they meant by family dinner.”
“It wasn’t me,” I said, and then another voice spoke up.
“And it also wasn’t me,” Addison said as she came to hide behind us.
“Wait, did I know you were here?” I asked, before I hugged her. “Why are you hiding? You know everybody here.”
“But there’s so many of them. I’m really outnumbered.”
Heath snorted beside me.
“You think you’re outnumbered. The Cassidys aren’t even close to being the dominant predators here.”
Addison and I both burst out laughing.
“Predators?”
“You heard me,” Heath mumbled, but then everyone seemed to turn towards us.
“You’re here!” my mom yelled, before Alice Womack Johnson came over and hugged me.
Before I could respond, she did the same to Heath while my stepfather hugged me, and then each one of my siblings came at me. Everyone continued to talk while the step-sibs hugged us, then the half-sibs moved in as one, as if they were a group of rabid wolves from the movieHotel Transylvania.
I’d always been worried that I hadn’t fit in. That I’d been the one kid without the same mom or the same dad and without the same name. But they had always loved me. They always counted me as their own.
When I was hurt, they dropped everything and came to me. They had organized childcare and made sure the spouses were all ready to do anything needed so our family was safe. And it was the same with the Cassidys.
It was the Johnsons, Cassidys, Womacks, and everyone we counted as family.
I had kept my name to honor my father, but perhaps part of me had also kept it to set myself apart, because I was so afraid they would leave, just like my dad had. Even though he hadn’t had a choice.
But you couldn’t stop the brain of a little girl who was so sad and afraid.
I loved my family. I loved their robustness, how loud they were.
And I loved how easily they took in the Cassidys as if they were their own.
My mother and stepfather already decided that Heath and his siblings were theirs. It didn’t matter that Heath and I weren’t married, that we were only dating. That he had been my fake and imaginary boyfriend before this.
No, my mother would mother them, and Heath and his family had no say in it.
“Why are you crying?” my mom asked as she wiped my tears.
Heath had been absorbed into the horde of siblings, and I knew I had to go save him. Eventually.
“I was just thinking how much I love you guys.”
My mother let out a soft gasp before she pulled me closer. “I love you so much, daughter of mine. And both of your dads do, too.”
William cleared his throat as he pulled us into his arms. “You’re my daughter. And I’ll be forever grateful that Hunter gave me you.”
“And there goes that,” I said, tears flowing down my face.
