4 YEARS LATER
“Andrés Brady! Si quieres vivir, then you better get your little butt back in here and clear the dang table!” Jay’s English and Spanish mixed together, the way they usually did, as he chased his six-year-old son out onto Eli’s back patio.
When he caught him, he executed a brutal, relentless tickle torture that had the little black-haired boy gasping with hysterical laughter and tapping one hand over and over on the wood of the deck. “Okay, Papá. Okay!”
Mari grinned from where she sat with her feet propped up in the living room as her son trumped past, his cheeks still rosy from the laughter. His father came through just a second later and flopped onto the couch next to her.
“You’re such a tough guy,” she told Jay, bringing him in for a kiss.
“Somebody has to lay down the law on that kid,” Jay said, smacking the back of one hand down onto the palm of the other. Andrés, hearing the comment as he walked past, stuck out his tongue and shook his booty, his hands full of plates and glasses.
Both parents winced as one of those glasses wobbled precariously, but they didn’t say anything. Live and learn. That was their parenting style. Jay watched their son disappear through the swinging door of Eli’s kitchen, into the crowd of people in there, and he absently rubbed a hand over his wife’s quickly ballooning belly.
“I talked to him again today,” Jay said quietly. “About the baby.”
Mari nodded. “I did too. I think he’s starting to get it more. But I don’t think we’ll really know how he’s taking it until the baby is here. And real.”
Jay dropped his lips to her belly. “Shit, I still can’t believe this baby is real.”
After many long conversations, Mari and Jay had decided that adopting was the best option for them. Andrés had come into their lives at age three, and they couldn’t love him more. They’d both felt their family was complete. And then Mari had realized that she was pregnant. And then it had become very clear how much further their hearts were capable of expanding. All a little worried about how Andrés would handle having a sibling, the entire group was working little by little to make sure he was comfortable. It didn’t hurt that he already had a little cousin who he loved to distraction.
Just then a little black-haired, blue-eyed girl squealed as she raced out the swinging kitchen door, just barely avoiding Andrés’s wiggling fingers. He’d been tortured by the tickle, and now he was looking for a victim of his own.
“Hey!” Marcus barked as he followed them out of the kitchen. The intensity of his voice had both kids freezing. “Take it out back, you hooligans.” He reached down and grabbed Lily, his three-year-old daughter by the back of her long blue dress. “There’s a loaded supersoaker over by the swing set,” he whispered in her ear before puckering his lips up for a kiss. She carefully planted a little peck on his lips and then turned and ran like the hunted out into the backyard, Andrés hot on her heals.
“Hey!” Marcus barked again in the exact same tone as he rose up and saw Tia carrying a tray of after-dinner coffee out of the kitchen. “Gimme that! You know you shouldn’t be doing that.”
“You don’t scare me,” she glowered at Marcus, but handed the tray over to him as she waddled over to the couch to sit beside Mari. It was only the second trimester but her back was sure killing her.
Marcus set the tray down on the coffee table, peeked out the back window to check on the kids, and slipped back into the kitchen. Eli was just coming through and barely avoided the swinging door.
He stopped still when he saw Tia, feet propped up and head laid back, she’d begun to show and it thrilled him. Seeing her grow bigger was better than the Superbowl. “Twins,” he muttered, shaking his head from side to side as he came to sit at her feet.
“Yes, twins,” Tia groaned as she shifted to get comfortable. “How many times are you gonna say that?”
“As many times as it takes to get used to it, I guess,” Eli said, tipping his head back on her knees so that he could see her.
“When are you gonna make an honest woman out of her, dude?” Jay asked, slipping an arm around his wife.
Eli and Tia still hadn’t tied the knot. They’d been together the longest out of all of them and engaged for years. But both of them got such a kick out of being boyfriend and girlfriend. It was such a high school thing to be, and they hadn’t gotten to do it in high school.
Tia shrugged. “Now we’re thinking that we’ll want the twins to be in the ceremony, so maybe in a couple years, when they can walk.”
Iris groaned as she came out of the kitchen with a plate of cookies in her hand. “Are you kidding? You’re gonna make me wait even longer? I’ve had this damn speech prepared for years!”
Her blonde hair was long and down her back again, she had a nice tan from the six weeks she and Marcus and Lily had just spent at the beach house.
“What speech?” Marcus asked, pretending he wasn’t hovering at Ryan’s side as the older man crutched his way out into the living room. He’d tripped over a curb in the grocery store parking lot a few weeks ago and broken his ankle.
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Ryan grumbled, but he didn’t bat away Marcus’s hand on his elbow. If there was one thing Ryan had learned throughout his life, it was that sometimes, you just had to let family take care of you. He plunked down in an armchair that he knew would be big enough for Kat to sit with him.
“The speech I so desperately wanna give at their wedding,” Iris explained, jabbing a thumb toward Tia and Eli as Marcus yanked her down onto his lap. It didn’t matter how much seating was available, Marcus always insisted that she sit in his lap. They both liked it best that way.
Last but not least, Kat and Owen came out of the kitchen. She’d taken him under her wing ever since that day in the Bahamas. The last four years hadn’t been easy for Owen, the scarring was worse than ever. But he had family. For the first time in his life, his family involved more than one person. Owen tried not to sigh as he looked around at all the happy couples. Kat plunked down in the seat next to Ryan and Owen stretched out on the floor, his good side facing the group. He didn’t know if he’d ever forgive himself for what he’d done. But something was changing inside of him. Something that had once been hardened and bitter was softening. He was terrified that it was his heart. He was terrified that he was starting to yearn for what all the people around him had. Not that love was necessarily terrifying, but the thought of looking for it was. Because who could ever love a man who looked like him? He rubbed an absent hand over his scarring at the same moment that Kat picked up the thread of the conversation.
“Well, Iris, if you’re so desperate to give that speech, you could just change the names and give it at our wedding,” Kat said, slipping an arm around Ryan’s shoulders. His mouth was dropped open. They’d said they’d tell the kids today, but he hadn’t thought it would be like this.
“What!?” Three men jumped to their feet in unison, jostling their three women as they raced toward Kat and Ryan.
Kat and Ryan grinned as Eli, Jay and Marcus’s arms wrapped around them, and then one another. Eli wiped tears from his eyes as Marcus heartily kissed Kat, then Mari, and then passionately kissed Iris.
Jay hugged the heck out of his mother, and then his adoptive father.
“Hey, you two!” Tia called out the back door to the soaking wet kids. “Come on in here, Grandma and Grandpa have some news for you.” They hesitated. “And there’s cookies.”
The kids bolted toward the house.
And then her eyes went to Eli and Marcus and Jay. So did Mari’s eyes. And so did Iris’s. The three men laughed and slapped one another on the back and hugged. The marriage of their parents was a symbol to them. A formal union of a family that had always existed.
Marcus looked up just as his daughter bolted into his wife’s arms, the two of them snuggled together. He couldn’t believe that this was what happiness felt like. He couldn’t believe how much family he had.
~~~