On a sweltering June morning, Robin shook me from a deep sleep. I blinked the sleep from my eyes and looked up at him to find the lights were already on, and he was fully dressed. It had to be close to four—our alarm wasn’t set to go off for another hour and a half, at least.

“Robin?” I asked, groggy.

“Get out of bed, Troy,” Master demanded. He spoke with total calmness and clarity. “The baby is coming, and you need to take me to the hospital.”

I snapped awake in an instant and threw back the covers. Master stood at the bedside, an overnight bag already slung over his shoulder. At nine months pregnant, he was big, but I found him more beautiful than ever. With glowing, radiant skin and effortless paternal instinct, every day he aspired toward divinity. And right now, the life he’d devoted himself to creating was ready to meet the world for the first time.

What was I supposed to do?

We’d come up with a plan, but all I could remember was the end goal: get Robin to the hospital. There were other steps, other things I needed to remember. What were we supposed to bring? What was the drop-off point? Who was I supposed to call?

“Troy.” Master cupped my face with both his hands, holding me still until I focused on him. We looked at each other eye to eye. His calming, dominant disposition put me at ease and helped clear my panic away. “Calm down. It’s okay. All you need to do is get me to the hospital—I’ve taken care of the rest.”

“Okay,” I whispered. I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to speak, but it seemed important that I make it known that I had understood.

“The car should be ready, right?” Master asked. “Do you want to drive, or do you want to be driven? You’ll need to call your driver if you want to be driven.”

“I’ll call him.” My phone was charging on my bedside table, and I reached for it. I was stripped down to my boxers, but the minute it would take me to throw on a shirt, pants, and shoes would be all it would take for the car to be brought out front. While I tended to that, Master went to stand by the door. He looked down the hall, then back at me. I thought I saw him wince.

“Are you okay?” I asked as I hopped on one foot, pulling on a sock.

Robin was back now, his expression flat and unimpressed. He raised an eyebrow. “Troy? I don’t know if you’ve been made aware, but I’m in labor and about to have a baby. Do you want to rethink that question?”

I finished putting on my socks and grabbed my shoes, hopping across the bedroom floor toward the door as I put them on. “I… yes. I’m just… it’s a lot to process.”

“It is.” All the while, Robin kept his voice level. I didn’t know how he could be so composed in the face of hours of physically taxing pain. “Now, let’s get going. If we can avoid it, I’d prefer not to have our baby in the back seat of the car.”

“Right.” Robin needed me, and I was going to be there for him. If that meant unscrambling my brains and putting my head on straight, I’d figure out a way to do it. “I’ve got this under control. I’m ready to go.”

“Um… Troy?” Robin pushed his lips to the side, holding back a smirk. “Your shoe.” He pointed at the shoe I was still holding—the one I’d already forgotten about. “You might want to put that on before we go.”

My face flooded with heat, and I bobbed my head in agreement. “I… I was going to get to that in a second.”

Robin chuckled and shook his head, but when he looked at me, his face was full of so much love that my heart sang. “You’re something else, Troy. I hope that even after we become fathers and grow old—or older—together, that we’ll still be like this.”

“We will,” I promised as I put on my shoe. “We might change, but as long as we’re together, I don’t think we have anything to worry about.”

“You sap.” He ran a hand over his low-hanging stomach, then looked my way and smiled. “You’re going to make a good dad, you know that?”

Shoe finally on, I put both feet on the floor. “I won’t be the only one.”

“Ugh. Now I’m diabetic and pregnant. Great.” Robin’s grin was all I needed to put my head back on straight. “I’ll meet you at the car.”

“No, I’ll go with you.” I stood and took his hand. He flashed me a smile that was worth more than all my millions of dollars in investments and the cash I kept in my accounts.

Whatever it took, and wherever the journey led us, I would be at his side. There was no alternative.

Six hours of labor later, a sweaty and exhausted Robin cried out through his teeth and pushed one final time. The thin sheet provided by the hospital lay crumpled on the floor, and Robin’s hospital gown was half ripped from his body. I watched, astounded and overwhelmed, as a dark head of hair crowned, and our obstetrician pulled our newborn free.

There was a frightening minute where there was no noise. The baby was a dark red color that I wasn’t sure was natural. Breath held, I took a step toward the doctor and my child and was about to ask what was wrong when the baby sucked in a breath and started to wail. Robin, who’d slumped back onto the hospital bed, folded an arm over his eyes and drew in a rattling breath almost in tandem.

“Congratulations,” our obstetrician said. He smiled at me as he handed our child off to the attending nurse. “It’s a boy.”

A boy. I grinned, then went to stand by Robin’s side and took his hand. He unfolded his arm from over his eyes and looked up at me. Although he was exhausted, I saw how proud he was of what he’d just done—of what we’d done together.

“A boy,” Robin said, astonished. “You know, statistically, I shouldn’t be surprised. You’re more likely to have a male child if you conceive with an older partner.”

“Is that a jab?” I asked.

Robin shrugged a single shoulder. He should have been too tired to joke, but he powered through regardless. “Depends on if you take getting old personally, old man.”

I held back a laugh and kissed the top of his sweat-soaked head.

“What’s his name?” the nurse asked as she brought the baby back. He’d been lightly cleaned, and while she carried him wrapped in a blanket, he wasn’t swaddled. When she placed him on Robin’s chest, they made skin-to-skin contact. In that moment, I saw Robin melt. A mellow adoration washed over him, and all of his exhaustion and worry melted away. He held our child, and as he did, I fell in love with them both. My family—my forever. My heart had never been so full.

“Spencer,” Robin said with finality. It was the name of his father—a man he sorely missed. “Spencer Sullivan. Happy birthday, little man. Your dads love you very much already.”

Spencer settled as he snuggled with Robin, and Robin settled, too. I sat at the bedside and held him loosely, my eyes closed and a perpetual smile on my face. There were moments in life that would drag me down and wear me out, but right now, with my new family, I felt like nothing would hit me quite as hard anymore. In them, I’d found purpose and inspiration. Even if it took every cent I had, I would cherish and protect them. I’d found love, and I would submit to it forever.