Life doesn’t get more perfect than this, Dylan thought, looking out across the clear water of the Elizabeth River. The sun was a welcome presence, warming his shoulders and breaking the waves into sparkling ripples of white.
Ryan stood at the helm of his boat, the Bloody Mary. The soft rush of warm breeze and the lapping of waves hid the meaning of his words from Dylan as he spoke, but it wasn’t to Dylan that he was speaking. Hunter was at his side, nodding with every word. And in Ryan’s arms was their newest son, Gunner, sleeping as the bobbing waves rocked him.
Gunner was born only a few weeks after their wedding, deciding in the middle of the night that he was ready to meet the world. He was a little early, even for a shapeshifter baby, but Dylan was already prepared for just such an occasion. Hell, he’d been prepared for almost two months before because he didn’t want to be caught unaware like he had with Hunter.
A sharp stab of pain had woken him at 11 p.m., a few hours after he had gone to bed after feeling unusually tired all day. Dylan had sat up, panting, clutching his sides as his stomach shivered and heaved of its own accord. The spasm of pain continued on and on and he was aware of the mattress beneath him getting wetter as his water broke. When the contraction finally passed, he stood gingerly and went down the hallway to the living room. Ryan had been staying over for the night but hadn’t gone to bed yet, poring over some papers by the light of the TV.
“Hey, baby,” Ryan murmured.
“If you don’t get me to the hospital, you’ll be saying hi to the real baby,” Dylan said drily. In his mind, it was a hilarious joke.
In reality, it sent Ryan into a panicked frenzy of activity. They arrived at a shapeshifter-friendly hospital in no time, but it certainly wasn’t a smooth drive. Ryan was all over the place, and Hunter was fussing at having been woken from his sleep, and there were periodic spasms attacking Dylan from the inside. They hurt pretty damn bad but he knew that the worst was yet to come.
Gunner was born several hours later, emerging shrieking into the sunrise. Dylan collapsed as his brand-new son emerged, the horrific pressure inside him finally abating just when it had reached its peak and he thought he could take no more. He couldn’t really remember the pain of giving birth to Hunter, and he was already starting to forget this pain too, but he thought that the first time might have been worse.
Weakness dragged at his limbs as he reached for his newborn son, accepting the squalling baby from the beaming nurse. He wrapped his arms around the red-faced newborn, cradling him in close until his cries waned to a low murmur of discontent. Dylan remembered seeing his firstborn for the first time and realizing just how much he looked like Ryan; this time, it was the opposite. He was looking at himself, right down to the shape of that snub nose and the fine arching eyebrows. The baby had a tuft of golden brown hair, darkened by fluids, and his eyes were a brilliant turquoise that Dylan suspected would eventually mellow out into sea-blue.
“Hi, baby,” he whispered to the infant. He touched one of the delicate little waving fists and felt tiny fingers wrap around one of his. “Welcome to the world.”
After both he and the baby were cleaned up, Ryan and Hunter were allowed to enter the room. They had very different approaches for doing so. Hunter bounced in, practically skipping, while Ryan staggered, tripping all over himself in his hurry.
Ryan threw his arms around Dylan, cradling him and kissing all over his face. Dylan smiled wearily and accepted this outpouring of love, returning only the kisses that landed on his lips because he didn’t have the strength to do anything else.
“He’s perfect,” Ryan kept whispering. “He’s absolutely perfect.”
Hunter was significantly less impressed by his new baby brother and remained unimpressed up to this very day where they were all riding the boat together. “He needs batteries,” Hunter often said, disappointment and disapproval edging every word.
Dylan laughed each time, which always made Hunter get mad at him. He couldn’t explain why this was so funny except that he knew in a couple of years, Hunter would be regretting his desire for his brother to be mobile. Dylan was envisioning a lot of arguing, whining, and complaints that Gunner wouldn’t leave Hunter alone.
Then again, maybe not. Though they moved in with Ryan after the baby was born, since Dylan needed help in these trying times, he couldn’t quite get over the fact yet. He still felt like he was dreaming, like at any moment he would wake up to discover that none of this was real and he was still just a teenager in high school pining after his best friend.
But he didn’t wake up. It was real. They were living with Ryan in his beautiful house, with all that room inside and out. Maybe with all that space, there would be no arguing over who was in constant proximity to whom.
A parent could hope, anyway.
Of course, they couldn’t live with Ryan forever just yet. There was his own apartment to be taken care of, and so many other things which needed to come first. This adventure of theirs on the water was only a prequel, not the full story.
And he was looking forward to every step of the way.
Suddenly, he realized that he was being watched. Ryan was looking at him and smiling, practically beaming brighter than the sun ever would. Gunner had woken and spit-up on his chest, but he didn’t seem to have noticed yet.
Dylan smiled back, looking into the eyes of the man he had loved all along. It no longer mattered to him that he hadn’t been able to fully see Ryan when he looked in the wishing well. He thought he had that whole well business figured out anyway. Not the mechanics of it, but the purpose of it.
He thought that everything was predetermined. That everyone had their destiny and that things would always wind up exactly where they needed to be. But he also thought there were many routes that all wound up in that same place. The well was just one path, one choice.
And it was one he would never regret taking.
Arden was still in jail, still awaiting trial. Dylan had hated her for some time after her crimes came to light, but now he only pitied her for the road she had traveled. She had chosen bitterness instead of love, and now she might never know what it was really like. Of course, it had been his idea to become mates to satisfy both their needs, but Arden hadn’t suddenly become bitter. It had been a process that started long before he appealed to her, one which had been reversible until she decided to try and get rid of Hunter.
Dylan didn’t think that experience would ever leave him, that it would ever truly fade for any of them. Even when he was 80, he might still awaken, fearful that his son was in harm’s way. But, he hoped that the echoes would fade in time until they were only whispers on the wind, insubstantial and easily dismissed.
He stood up and went to take Gunner from Ryan so that his husband could clean up, when he heard it.
“Papa,” Hunter said.
Dylan stopped in his tracks. Ryan had always just been Ryan to Hunter, until just now.
“Papa, you’ve got something on your shirt.”
“Yeah,” Ryan said, and his voice was full of wonder at this new development. It wasn’t the baby puke, which was unfortunately all too common, but the fact that Hunter had finally accepted him in the way he wanted all along. The way he had never dared dream would actually happen. “Yeah, I guess I do.”
At long last, they were a family.
The End