Page 2 of Man Advantage

And now he wants our kids to be with him—withthem—all the time? Over my dead body.

Of course he could’ve brought this up at any time during the off season. Any time during the past few goddamned months. But no, he’d waited until I was almost walking out the door to training camp to drop this bomb on me.

Probably because he knew I wouldn’t be able to line someone up in time, so his petition for full custody would be a slam dunk.

Were you always this underhanded and conniving? What the hell?

The more pressing question, though, was what was I supposed to do? It had taken me until the twins were two to be comfortable leaving them with their grandparents overnight. They were six now, and I still didn’t like the idea of anyone other than a relative or close friend watching them. Now I was supposed to… what? Hire someone, then leave them alone with the boys for hours and hours while I went to training camp? And fordaysat a time while I was on road trips?

I rubbed my eyes. Then I snatched my phone off the counter. I was on a private group chat with several friends from back home who I trusted not to leak screencaps and whatnot. Even if they didn’t have a solution, they’d let me vent and bitch.

I don’t suppose any of you know someone who’s vetted and trustworthy that I can fly out here on a moment’s notice to be a live-in nanny or something, do you?

God, just reading that was depressing. How was this my life all of a sudden?

The responses started quickly.

Mike: Are you serious, or is your autocorrect fucking with all of us?

LOL Serious unfortunately. TL;DR, ex is being an ass.

Don: What else is new? He’s always been an ass.

Now you tell me.

Jake: You have always been a slow learner.

(middle finger emoji)

Don: So you need someone to watch the kids while you’re on the road or something?

If I want to keep joint custody, yeah.

Jake: No shit? He’s going to try for full custody over it? What a dick.

Mike: Ouch, that’s brutal.

Tell me about it.

Jake: Actually, I might know someone. Got a minute to FaceTime?

Absolutely. Thanks, man.

Seconds later, the FaceTime request came through, and I accepted the call. “Hey, what’ve you got?”

Jake cut right to the chase: “You remember Cameron Wright, don’t you?”

I blinked. That was a name I hadn’t heard in a while. “Of course I do. Why?”

“Because he’s in a bind right now, too, and you guys might be able to help each other out.”

“I’m listening.”

“Right, so he’ll have to tell you the whole story, but the short version is that he and his ex split, and the guy sabotaged his job, too. So he’s out of a place to live, out of a job, and—man, he’sreallyfucking desperate right now.”

“Oh, shit. I’ll, um… Yeah, I can reach out to him.” I paused and flipped to my contacts. Cam was still there, of course, butthere were no texts. No calls. Not since I’d upgraded my phone, and probably not since two or three phones before that. I was horrified and a bit embarrassed to realize just how long it had been since Cam and I had talked. “I, um… I don’t know if I have his current number.”

“He hasn’t changed it since before he moved to Portland, but hold on.” Jake furrowed his brow at his screen, probably perusing his own contacts. He read off the number he had for Cam, and it did indeed match the one I had.

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