Page 18 of A Game Of Love

Raiden’s eyes widen. “No.”

“Go.” Bennett points towards the playground, and the twins take off. “Kids,” he mutters as he starts to walk in their direction.

“He’s like a tiny adult sometimes,” Toby sighs heavily. “How did he go from the little boy who would follow us around to a teenager who has such an attitude.”

“Life,” I say sadly. “We all grow up. Change.”

“Yeah,” Toby murmurs, his eyes flash a bit of guilt.

Bishop pulls the wagon along as we search the pumpkins, me in the middle of the two men I love the most in the world. No one says anything, walking in silence. I hate it.

I want to grab each of their hands and hold them, to laugh and joke around like we used to. To be together.

“Is it always going to be like this?” I ask in a whisper, finally breaking the silence.

“No,” Toby admits. “I’m just not ready to forgive him yet.”

“Toby,” Bishop’s voice is filled with guilt.

“No. I don't want to hear it.”

“We need to talk, man,” Bishop insists. “You have to know I didn’t set out to hurt you. I’ve never tried to steal her away from you.”

“Stop!” Toby barks. “Just stop. Look... I love you, man, I do. But it fucking hurts. Too much, too fast. My mind is still a little messed up.” Toby scrubs at his face in frustration. “I’m taking my meds; I’m talking to my therapist. I’m doing everything I should be. But I can’t just make these feelings go away. My main focus is building Lilly’s trust back. To show her how much I love, need, and want her. Besides my mental stability, she’s the most important thing in my life. I can’t just put on a happy face, slap your back, and sayno problem, man. All’s good. Because it’s not. Maybe I’m overthinking things; maybe I’m making a bigger deal over this than it should be. But that doesn’t change the fact that that's how I feel. So, we’re going to take this day by day. I’m going to work through my own shit before we work through ours. We’re going to love Lilly, be there for her, and be civil to one another. I don’t hate you; you're still my best friend. But youtwo being together is going to take some time to process, to get used to.

“I’m not asking you to hide what you have. As much as I know it’s going to make me so fucking jealous to see you do everything I want with her, I’d never do that to Lilly. She deserves to be happy. She’s not some secret that needs to be hidden. I just ask you not to expect me to jump on this whole throuple thing. In my mind right now, I’m with Lilly. She’s with you. We’re not this happy little family.”

“Toby.” My eyes fill with tears. I hate how complicated this all is. It’s a mess. And I know better than to think that all of this will be okay overnight. It’s going to take time, work, and a lot of patience.

Toby cups my cheek with one hand, placing his thumb over my lips to silence me. “I love you, Flower. Now, go pick a pumpkin. We still have a whole day of family fun. This isn’t going to change how we are around one another. Because remember: we are best friends before anything else. Let me be your friend. Let me be there for you. The rest will click into place when it’s time.”

He presses a kiss to my forehead before stepping away to continue looking at the pumpkins.

I watch him for a moment before turning to a silent Bishop. He gives me a smile. “It’s gonna be hard, but everything will be okay.”

“I hope so,” I sigh heavily.

“It’s not going to be easy for him. His brain works differently. I’ll respect his feelings. We will make this work.”

When we get home, the boys take off into the house, leaving us to do all the heavy lifting.

Thankfully, my parents are back.

“Need some help?” Brody asks as he approaches the car, Jax trailing behind him.

“Yes, please.” I laugh, staring at the back seat of the van we took to the pumpkin patch.

“Holy shit.” Jax chuckles as he takes a look at the hoard of pumpkins. “Why so many?”

“The twins wanted to make sure everyone had one to carve.” I smile, shaking my head.

We were ready to leave, all the pumpkins paid for before Isaiah got upset because we didn’t get the parents any.

Toby and Bishop went back to the van to load what we had already while I took the boys to pick out something for our parents.

I grabbed the ones for our moms, the twins found ones for Jax, Chase, and Theo, while Bennett picked something out for Brody.

“The twins made us write names on them with a permanent marker,” Bennett grumbles. “Like it’s the end of the world if someone doesn’t have their assigned pumpkin.”

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