“He uses that word too loosely,” Elliot interrupts. “This man just invaded my space one day and I can’t get rid of him.”
Luke pulls Elliot in a little closer and pats his head. “Nah, he secretly loves me. Keeps me around to show off. Likes my muscles. Told me so himself.”
Elliot sighs and looks to the sky mumbling something under his breath, but makes no move to extricate himself from Luke’s arm.
“Alright, this is fucking awkward, but then again, with this family, why am I surprised?” Magnus mutters and then announces, “Alright everyone, listen up. For expediency, this is August, my best friend. And today August and Emery have officially become boyfriends.”
“Why, yes, we have. And we are also stepbrothers. It’s all very scandalous,” Emery adds and then links his arm with mine. “But yeah, he’s all fucking mine. And he is fabulous at sex. I mean, look at him. Mr. Rogers. Who knew? Mind blown.”
“Em,” I mutter, but he’s not listening. He’s bumping Sem’s fist and then Luke’s.
“It’s always the quiet ones, huh?” Luke says, eyeing Elliot.
“Oh yeah, totally. Like, it’s the best kind of surprise,” Emery says and then smiles at me. Fuck, he glows when he looks at me. I should have made him my boyfriend months ago.
Magnus interrupts by clearing his throat. “Okay, enough of this. Let’s go inside and get food because then we have a reservation for laser tag at two and Luke eats forfucking ever. The kitchen needs time to accommodate his order.”
“That’s right. I’m a growing boy,” Luke says and tugs a reluctant Elliot up the stairs to the diner.
“For real? Laser tag? Fuck yes.” Emery bounces and looks over at me. “I am going to be so good at it. Never tried it, but I’ve seen videos and it looks so damn fun.”
My heart aches at that smile he’s wearing, and I can’t help but press my lips to his temple. Magnus watches it all, still perched in Sem’s arms and waggles his eyebrows at me. I just narrow my eyes at him.
“Later,” Magnus mouths and then points to the stairs and Sem carries the two of them inside.
“Better go in, yeah?” Emery asks and then I grab onto his hand, threading my fingers through his and he stares down at them. He pulls our hands up to his lips and presses my fingers to his mouth.
“This is the best fucking day of my life. Well, one of them. Probably any day with you is the best, really.”
When we finally sit down, Emery presses himself into me and leans his head onto my shoulder.
“Don’t ask me to share my food. I can get very territorial,” Emery says softly. “But can I have a bite of yours?”
“You can have as much as you want.”
He bobs his head and then turns toward Luke and asks, “You got any weird tattoos you want to show me?”
This leads to an interesting conversation about eagles and mermaids that I only half pay attention to because Em’s hand is on my thigh and his fingers are playing with the button of my jeans. It’s driving me a little crazy.
And when our food comes, Emery continues chattering while picking off everyone’s plate.
“You going to eat that?” he asks Elliot who just scoots his plate toward Emery and Emery snatches the dill pickle right up and takes a large bite.
“God, people throw these away, but I’m all about them. I like to pretend it’s a tiny dick in my mouth.”
He crunches down on it again and Elliot stares at him half-appalled, half-intrigued. Yeah, I get it. I’m still reeling from it all.
“You’ll get used to it,” I say to Elliot and swirl a french fry in ketchup, popping it into my mouth. I dip another and then feed it to Emery, who snaps it right out of my fingers like this is totally fucking normal.
I’m coming to realize that there is nothing normal about this, and I think I’m okay with that.
“Hey, Eli,” Luke says, opening his mouth like he wants to be fed, but Elliot just scowls at him.
“I am not feeding you. You are not my boyfriend.”
Luke smirks at him and then leans over and rips into the sandwich that Elliot is holding in his hands.
A large bite mark appears on one end of the sandwich and Elliot lets out a deep sigh.