Page 205 of As The Shifter World Turns

Toby was soaring in soccer. This season’s try-outs had him moving from the general group for his age group to a travel team. At the time it sounded like an amazing opportunity, one he only had thanks to the year Neil taught him.

But now?

Now I wasn’t so sure. Travel had sounded fun. It. Was. Not.

Every couple of weeks we were staying in a shitty hotel with all of the parents from other teams. Some of the teams were fine, but there were enough that had parents who not only let the kids do what they wanted, but they left them unsupervised because they wanted to socialize, and that meant getting drunk and hitting on the single moms and dads. It was pretty shittastic.

And this weekend it was a larger tournament which meant… the odds were great that one of the many teams staying with us was going to be a pain in the ass.

“Dad!” Toby called from his room. “Can you come here?”

I went to find him with things strewn all over his bed, his duffle bag empty.

“Not sure what to pack?” I asked, trying to decipher the situation.

“No. I know what I need. It’s just the zipper’s stuck on a pair of my underwear and I can’t get it unstuck.” He plopped on his bed. “Maybe this means we shouldn’t go.”

And that was something I hadn’t heard from him before. He was always super excited about the games and being in new cities. This was about more than a broken zipper.

I grabbed the duffle and joined him on the bed. “What’s up? Do you not like soccer anymore?” It was intense, and I wouldn’t blame him if he wanted to put on the brakes for a bit.

“Nothing like that, Dad. I love soccer, especially when Neil shows me new tricks.” Which just so happened to be one of my favorite things to watch.

Neil came alive when he was working with Toby on his soccer skills. I wanted to see him like that all the time. It was almost as if all the things that bogged him down were lifted from his shoulders for that short time.

“Then what has you wanting to stay home?”

“I didn’t say I wanted to stay home. I don’t.” He leaned into me. “Not exactly. It’s… we haven’t seen Neil all week and I thought maybe we could do fun things with him instead.”

“Did you ask him about this? He might have plans.” He’d been doing a lot lately, which is why Toby hadn’t seen him. Heck, aside from video chat, I hadn’t seen him either. My schedule hadn’t helped much, with an extra project on my plate at work.

“I didn’t. He’ll just tell me the team is counting on me. I wish he could just come with us.”

I did too. But then again why couldn’t he? He might not want to or maybe it was too much outside his comfort level, but we could ask him, right? Then at the very least he would know he was wanted and Toby would feel listened to. It was a win-win.

“We could ask him.”

Toby nearly knocked me over, hugging me so hard. “Really? Do you think he would come? He could tell me what I need to do better and get pizza with us and maybe watch that movie about the pirates we’ve been talking about.”

“Slow down with all the plans. Let’s go ask him.” I left the duffle, the zipper could be worked on when we got back, or worst case scenario, we could share a suitcase.

We walked to the manor and to Neil’s door with only a quick text to let him know we were on our way. He preferred the notice and I no longer took it personally. It wasn’tmehe didn’t want showing up unannounced, it was everyone.

He was standing there with the door open when we arrived and Toby immediately jumped in with his request.

“I have a game and it’s away and it’s more than a game, it’s a tournament and I want you to come. There will be a hotel and we can get pizza and watch movies and you can tell me how to improve my game and it will be fun. Dad says you might have plans, but for the record I can’t think of anything more fun than hanging out in a hotel room with a box of pizza and pirates. I really can’t.” He spoke so quickly I wasn’t sure he took a breath through all of that.

Neil just stood there staring.

“No hurt feelings if you can’t. Toby just… there were second guesses on if hewanted to go and it was because he missed you this week.” Gah. And now it sounded like I was trying to guilt the poor guy. “Forget I said all that.”

“It’s true, Dad. You don’t forget the truth.”

“And you also don’t need to over share,” I reminded him. “Either answer is fine, Neil. We just wanted to ask.”

“We?” Neil looked to Toby and then to me.

“Yes. We have both missed you this week and would love your company.” He smiled at my words.

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