Raj, Mel, and Noah's living room usually gets loud when we're all hanging out. Tonight, though - we’re sitting in complete silence. Nikita is snuggled up in Noah’s arms, watching the TV with rapt attention, her wide eyes filled with wonder. Aiden, Ripley, Noah, Raj, and I - we’re all doing pretty much the same thing.

“I’m obsessed with this,” Ripley finally says, his eyes glued to the TV.

“Told you, dude,” Raj answers.

Noah clicks his tongue. “And you fuckers all laughed at us.”

No one answers, because we’re all still watching intently.

On the TV, a series of animated strawberries with bright, smiling faces bounce happily around from one edge of the screen to another. That’s literally all that’s going on. The background is simply black, nothing happening except for the little cartoon fruits doing their synchronized dance. Jazzy music with a gentle, catchy drumbeat plays over the video.

A smiling banana joins the strawberries in their dance, and we all lean forward a little.

None of us can break our eyes away. Ripley and I have a pile of Nikita’s tiny socks between us, fresh from the dryer. We stopped sorting them when we started watching, and we’re each still holding a sock. Aiden hasn’t even touched the cup of tea in his hands. I’m pretty sure it’s gone cold.

We’re all mesmerized, enraptured.

Nobody notices that Melanie has stepped into the room until she says something.

“Um.” She looks at the TV, then at us. “Are you guys just sitting here watching the baby sensory videos we got for Nik?”

“Yeah, ‘cause it’s the best thing ever,” Noah answers, without tearing his gaze away. “Oh - yo, yo, yo - we got blueberries! Scope this shit!”

We all let out a collective sound of delight as a row of smiling, joyful blueberries bounce their way onto the screen to join the strawberries and banana.

“Why is this so good?” I sigh happily, my chin propped on my palm.

“Wait for the pineapple, bro,” Raj says, very seriously. “Your fuckin’ mind is gonna be blown. Shit’s off the hook.”

Mel is clearly trying not to laugh at us. “Did you all forget that you’re not babies, or?”

“We know that we’re grown, alright?” Noah says, watching the blueberries bounce in a circle around the strawberries. “This is - grown business.”

“This?” Melanie points to the adorable animated banana on the screen. “This is grown business?”

“How’s it feel, Mel?” Ripley laughs. “These are your baby’s two dads.”

“I’m not sure how many dads my baby has, actually.” Mel pulls her phone out of her pocket and holds it up. “Two might be a conservative estimate.”

Noah blinks his eyes over to her. “What? What’s that mean?”

Mel nods at the TV. “Can I pause this?”

“We just started watching,” Raj complains, as Melanie picks up the remote.

She stops the video, and we all stare at the timestamp, which informs us that we’ve actually been watching for about forty-five minutes.

“Oh,” Raj says sheepishly, as Melanie arches an eyebrow. “Um - what did you want to show us, angel?”

Mel uses her phone to cast something to the TV. It’s a video of Nikita, asleep in her bedroom upstairs. I recognize the camera angle, because I’ve seen it on Raj and Noah’s phones before. It’s from the baby monitor, which records video that automatically gets deleted after a few days. Melanie must have downloaded some of the footage. I’d guess that it’s from earlier tonight, because Nik is wearing the same onesie that she is right now.

Mel presses play, and we all watch.

The video shows Nik waking up from a nap. She stirs in the crib and starts babbling, triggering the baby monitor.

A moment passes, and then Raj steps into the room, yawning. He flips on the lights, then heads for the crib. Noah comes in right after him, followed by Aiden, then me, then Ripley. We all gather around the crib and bend over the sides to say hi to Nik.

“Looks like my baby has more than two dads,” Melanie giggles. “You can’t even see her, she’s so surrounded.”

“Jesus,” Raj says, staring at the video. “Aiden makes the rest of us look so short.”

“Got a real Snow White and the Seven Dwarves thing going on,” Ripley snickers, watching as Aiden leads us all back out of the room, Nik cuddled up in his muscled arms.

“Call me Snow White again, Ripples.” Aiden levels his blue gaze on him, unblinking. “See what happens.”

“No, thank you.”

“We're all perfectly reasonable heights, okay?” I protest. “It’s just that Aiden is a big, huge, giant-” I break off as Aiden turns to glare at me. “Giant - um - sweetheart?”

“Alright,” Aiden groans. “There aren’t even seven dads in that video. Five, tops.”

“That still seems like a lot of dads for one baby,” Ripley observes.

“Got any thoughts on this, Niki?” Noah gently turns her around to face him. “How many dads are you looking for, ideally?”

Nikita babbles loudly at him. We all turn to look at her, each of us letting out an excited noise.

Raj explained that we should all react positively when Nik seems like she’s trying to answer a question or say something, that it’s good for her developing communication skills. We might be taking his directions a little too far. She’s been getting an extremely enthusiastic response every time.

“Jesus Christ,” Melanie giggles. “She’s gonna grow up to expect a standing ovation for every word she says.”

“As she should,” Raj says approvingly.

He leans his head on Noah’s shoulder, so he can smile down at Nik.

She’s started trying to reach for things she finds interesting - fingers, beams of light, her rattler, and, apparently, people’s noses. She tried to get mine earlier, and Ripley’s. Now she makes a swipe for Raj’s, then frowns deeply when she misses.

“Really?” he laughs. “What are you gonna do if you get it, baby?”

She bats her hand in the general direction of it again, and Raj lets out an affectionate chuckle.

“S’all good, Niki,” Noah says warmly. “You’ll get it down.”

She smiles up at him, then reaches for his face with both of her tiny hands.

Something in Noah’s expression collapses. He lets out a soft, broken sound.

“I can’t even handle you, kid,” he groans. “Enough, already.”

He bends to pepper a bunch of fast little kisses on her stomach, then startles when she lets out a loud shriek of laughter. He looks up at Raj, then at Mel, his eyes wide.

“Oh, my god.” Mel presses her fingers over her smile. “That was one hell of a laugh.”

“My girl is learning to express herself,” Raj says, beaming.

Noah watches as Nik yawns deeply, his eyes swimming with love.

“Tu es fatiguée, Niki?” he murmurs.

“I’ll take her upstairs.” Mel pads over to the couch, tossing her braid over her shoulder. “It’s naptime, anyways.”

“You sure?” Noah looks reluctant to let Nik go. “I can do it, I don’t mind.”

“It’s alright.” Melanie gathers Nikita into her arms, then bends down to brush a kiss onto Noah’s mouth. “I’ve got her.”

Mel stops to give Raj a kiss, too, then heads for the stairs, her long red dress fluttering behind her. Raj and Noah watch her go, twin expressions of immense adoration on their faces.

Noah clears his throat, scoops his hair up into a bun. He picks up the Xbox controller and loads up the game we’ve been playing. Two knights in bloody armor appear on the screen, staring each other down.

“Where were we in the campaign, again?” I ask, reaching for the other controller.

“I played a tiny bit without you, bro,” Noah says, all casual. “Just had one thing I wanted to do.”

I twist to look at him, narrowing my eyes.

“Noah. Did you spend all of our gold on a phoenix scroll? After we agreed that it was a bad idea?”

Noah bites his pierced lip, keeping his gaze on the TV. “Ah… no?”

I hold up the controller and stab a finger at it. “Noah, if you bought that scroll, I swear to god, I’m gonna break your shit.”

“Not my controller, man. You’d be breaking Raj’s shit.”

“Does that mean you did it?”

Noah presses his lips together, and I let out a long, loud groan.

“For fuck’s sake, Noah! Oh, I’m gonna rip my goddamn hair out - we’re so low on troops, and you go spend all of our gold on one scroll? I’m gonna kill you!”

Noah looks over at me, suppressing a laugh. “Very intimidating, dude.”

“I can be intimidating, okay?” I answer heatedly. “You know what a group of tough guys would say, if they saw me coming?”

Noah considers his answer. “Prolly say, like - who is this lost lil’ kitten, and how do we get him back to his owner?"

“You can return him to me,” Aiden says, holding up an index finger. “You’ve all got my address, right?”

“Okay!” I groan, shoving the controller at Raj. “I’m getting more pizza. Raj, you can deal with the aftermath of Noah’s video game decision-making.”

“Always a chilling prospect,” Ripley laughs, and dodges a swat from Noah.

I head into the kitchen, set down my plate. Turn around to realize that Aiden followed me.

Before I can say a word, he takes me by the back of my neck and places a long, thorough kiss on my lips. A sharp breath escapes me. I automatically put my hands to Aiden's jaw, melting into him.

My heartbeat is thundering by the time he pulls back. I look up at him with hazy eyes, wondering what I did to deserve this. Aiden leans down and tells me, punctuating each word with another kiss.

“So. Cute. When. You’re. Mad.”

I let out an indignant laugh, my cheeks burning. I put my hand flat on Aiden’s face and push him away, his beard tickling my palm. He huffs out a laugh, too, stretching his arms over his head. I fall silent, watching his biceps roll gently beneath his bronze skin. Glad I set the plate down, or I probably would have dropped it.

I force myself to tear my eyes away before Aiden notices me staring. I glance out at the living room, instead.

Raj and Noah are still curled up together on the couch. They’re having an argument about which troops they can buy with our measly remaining gold, but neither of them moves away from the other. Raj actually starts playing with a strand of Noah’s long onyx hair as he tells him what a complete fucking idiot he is, and Noah looks at him with shimmering magnesium eyes.

But - Ripley isn’t there.

I look at the kitchen door, just in time to see him slip silently into the room.

“Hey, Ripples.” Aiden nods at him, flipping open the pizza box. “Want another slice?”

“No.” Ripley looks into the living room, checking to see if Raj and Noah are paying attention. They aren’t. “I actually wanted to talk to you two about something.”

Aiden and I exchange a quick glance. It’s immediately apparent that neither of us knows what this is about.

Aiden shrugs his broad shoulders. “What’s up, man?”

Ripley leans back against the kitchen counter, pushing his green curls out of his eyes.

“So - you guys are big supporters of my art,” he says slowly, paint-stained fingers fidgeting with the stud in his ear.

“I mean.” Aiden points to his backwards snapback, the one with Ripley’s paintwork forming the bi pride flag. “Obviously.”

“No, um…” Ripley lowers his volume, gives us a meaningful look. “My other art.”

I suddenly understand why Ripley wants to talk to us about this, not Noah and Raj. They don’t know that he’s the one who vandalized the construction site by the school and did a stealth-takeover of the billboard by Floyd’s stretch of the highway.

Ripley can tell by our expressions that we’ve caught on to what he’s talking about.

“Yeah,” I tell him. “We are big supporters. Why, though?”

“Because,” he says, choosing his words carefully. “I’ve got a new, um. Art project planned. And I could use some help, for this one.”

Aiden and I stare at him, startled.

“Ripples - what?” I drop my voice to a whisper. “We’re not gonna help you do that! Are you kidding me?”

Ripley raises an eyebrow. “Mkay, well, I’ve heard your stories from high school, so I happen to know that you guys don’t care about doing illegal shit.”

“It’s not about that, man,” Aiden explains. “It’s about how Gabby is gonna skin us alive if she finds out.”

“Alright, no problem.” Ripley shrugs, unbothered. “I’ll do it myself.”

I blink at Ripley, confused. “I thought you said you need help?”

“I don’t need help,” Ripley clarifies. “It’ll just be riskier on my own. That’s fine, though.”

“But-” I stop, chewing my lip, and look to Aiden.

“We really shouldn’t be helping you get into trouble, dude,” he tells Ripley.

“You’d be helping me stay out of trouble, because I’m gonna do it whether or not you help me. So.”

“You’re eighteen, you know,” Aiden rumbles. “You’re not a minor. If you get caught, you could be in serious…”

He trails off, clearly realizing that Ripley must have already thought about this. Because he’s done it two times already, and that's just what we know of.

“What are the chances we can talk you out of doing this?” I ask.

“Mmm… zero?” Ripley pretends to do some math in his head, counting on his fingers. “Yeah, zero.”

I shouldn't have even asked. No one can stop Ripley once he's set his mind to something.

Again, I look at Aiden. He’s thinking silently, running a hand over his beard. I have a feeling that we’re thinking along the same lines. If we go with Ripley, we can help him avoid getting into trouble. Aiden is a Guardian. That’s basically his whole job.

Aiden catches my eye, and I tip my head to the side. A moment passes in silent communication, and then Aiden makes an exasperated sound.

“This fuckin’ guy, I swear,” he says to me, pointing at Ripley.

Ripley cracks a grin. “Is that a yes?”

“What do we have to do?” I ask, and Ripley’s devious smile grows wider.

“Don’t worry,” he says. “I’ve got a plan.”

Raj and Noah are still arguing when we all return from the kitchen.

“Man, I love you and respect you,” Raj is telling Noah, “But your brain ain’t right.”

“I’m telling you, dude, one phoenix scroll is better than an entire horde of archers. Can you just trust me on that?”

“I trust you on literally everything except that. We’re selling the scroll, okay? We’re gonna buy some archers before this fight, or some - Noah!” Raj gasps as Noah sends his character rushing forward towards the fight startpoint. “Don’t trigger the - no, dude!”

He tries to snatch the controller from Noah, who flings himself backwards. Raj dives after him, and they both go crashing down from the couch onto the rug. The controller goes flying, and the TV switches back to the animated strawberries, who continue their happy dance as Raj and Noah brawl on the floor.

Ripley snags the escaped controller. Raj and Noah both sit up, panting.

“Did he start the fight?” Raj gasps, trying to get his breath back.

Ripley switches the TV back to the game. Raj breathes out a sigh of relief when he sees that the battle didn’t start.

“Oh, thank god.”

“Aw, c’mon,” Noah groans, pouting. “Can we at least try-?”

He stops in surprise as Ripley uses the controller to run Noah’s knight the rest of the way to the waiting enemy.

“Ripples, what the fuck!” Raj sputters, as the TV switches to the battle loading screen.

“Yes, Ripples, that’s my fuckin’ boy!” Noah springs to his feet, grinning widely. He slaps Ripley’s back, messes up his green curls with a tattooed hand. “This man’s got the boldness!”

Ripley laughs, and I sit down next to the pile of Nik’s socks. I start sorting them again, going over the plan in my head.

Thinking to myself that Noah has no idea just how right he is.