All About Us

It was two in the morning and while things had certainly slowed down, the party was still going and was probably going to continue going until the sun started to rise. From where he was sitting, Mike could faintly hear the music that was playing that mixed in with the chatter and the drunken laughter of the people who were still there. He leaned back in his seat, staring up at the night sky, all the noise disappearing into the background. It was kind of nice to be able to escape all the craziness of the party and have a few moments to himself.

He didn’t know how long he had been sitting there for, just staring up at the inky black night sky, before he heard the sound of approaching footsteps and something cold was being pressed against his cheek. He raised a hand to take whatever was pressed against his cheek – a bottle of beer – tilting his head back to see whom the intruder was. “Hey Carts,” he greeted as he tilted his head forward so that he could take a sip of the beer.

“So this is where you disappeared to,” Jeff murmured, plopping himself down in the chair next to Mike’s. “El was looking all over for you.”

“Sorry,” Mike mumbled. “I just needed to get some fresh air.”

“Can’t really blame you. Now that all the responsible adults are gone, it has gotten crazy in there. Toff and Pears were trying to get me to do body shots with them. Something about bringing some good luck to the “that 70’s line”. Honestly, I really wasn’t paying attention to what they were saying.”

Mike chuckled softly, shaking his head. “I’m guessing since you’re out here, you didn’t do body shots with them. Which poor sap did they end up getting to do body shots with them instead?”

“I think it was Joner, but I got the hell out of there as fast I could so I’m not really sure.”

Mike smiled lightly as he took another sip of his beer. “Can you believe that we were that young once?”

“You calling us old?” Jeff asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“No, that’s not what I’m saying,” Mike stated with a shake of his head. “I just feel like we’ve grown up a lot since we were that age. I couldn’t imagine doing stuff that I did at 21 now.”

Jeff hummed softly. “I understand. A lot of things have changed for us since we were that young.”

“Too true.”

Jeff took a sip of his own beer, leaning back in his chair. “Wouldn’t change anything though, y’know?”

Instead of replying, Mike closed his eyes, letting a silence fall over them. It really wasn’t something he wanted to talk about and he knew that Jeff would understand that. It was what Mike liked most about his relationship with Jeff: the other male knew when to just drop things. He never pushed Mike to talk about his feelings. They could just sit here and not speak for the rest of the night and be just fine.

Of course, that wasn’t going to happen. Mike didn’t know how long it was before he heard Jeff shifting around in his chair, clearing his throat before the other male was speaking.

“The ceremony today was really nice, right?”

Mike grunted softly, nodding his head.

“I can’t believe they’ve been married for ten years. They still act like a couple of teenagers in love.”

Mike hummed, slowly opening his eyes. It was true. Justin and Kelly may have been married for ten years, but they still acted like two teenagers that couldn’t keep their hands off of each other. And while Mike was happy for them, he couldn’t help but be a little jealous as well.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen Justin look as happy as he did today and Kelly looked beautiful in her dress.”

“I’m totally telling El that you said another woman looked beautiful.”

Jeff rolled his eyes as he reached a hand out to smack Mike on the arm. “Shut up, fuck face.”

Mike chuckled softly, letting it trail off as he bit down on his bottom lip. “She would look beautiful in a wedding dress,” he commented, voice barely above a whisper.

“Who? El?” Jeff asked in confusion.

“No, you’re mom,” Mike stated sarcastically, rolling his eyes. “Yes El, you dipshit.”

Jeff raised an eyebrow, an odd look on his face. “Okay…”

“Don’t give me that look,” Mike snapped. “You know that it’s true.”

“I wasn’t denying it. I just think it’s a little weird that you brought it up.”

“You’re the one who brought up dresses.”

“I was just making a comment,” Jeff stated softly, running his fingers through his hair. “You know, making small talk. It was a perfectly innocent statement. You’re the one that is making it more than it needs to be.”

“Fuck off.”

“No, I think there are some things that we should be talking about.”

“And you really think now is the time to have this talk? When our teammates and friends aren’t even 50 feet away from us?”

“When else would we talk about it then, huh? Because I know you. I know that if we don’t talk about it now, we’re never going to talk about it. You’re going to pretend that everything is fine when it really isn’t.”

Mike ground his teeth together, trying not to get too upset. He finished his beer in two swallows, setting it down on the ground. “There isn’t anything to talk about and everything is fine,” he stated, wishing that Jeff hadn’t come out to look for him.”

“Bullshit,” Jeff snapped, narrowing his eyes. “You’ve been thinking about marriage again, haven’t you? I should have noticed something was off. You’ve been acting weird ever since Justin mentioned that he and Kelly were going to renew their vows for their tenth anniversary and wanted the whole team there.”

“Shut up! You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I know exactly what I’m talking about. You’re freaking out.”

Mike scoffed, shaking his head. “What the hell would I be freaking out about?”

“It could be a lot of things. The upcoming season. Having another bad year. The fact that we’re about to be parents. Take your pick.”

“Us being parents is a fucking joke.”

Jeff frowned. “What the fuck does that mean?”

“You make it sound so easy. That we’re going to have this baby and things are going to be just peachy. I don’t think you and El have really thought this through at all. Just think of what people are going to say.”

“I never said that us being parents was going to be easy,” Jeff argued. “And you’ve never cared about what people have said about us before. Why start caring now?”

“Because things are going to fucking change! We aren’t going to be able to put both of our names on the birth certificate. And what about family history, huh? What if this baby gets sick and they need to know what kind of medical history the parents have? You and El seem to think this is about playing house and it isn’t. You can pretend all you want that everything is going to be perfect and nothing will change, but it will. And you both act like not knowing who the father is doesn’t matter, but it does.”

“It doesn’t have to matter if we don’t let it matter.”

“Are you fucking dumb?!” Mike snapped. “Of course it fucking matters. You can honestly tell me that you’ll be okay if the baby comes out looking exactly like me?”

“Of course I’d be okay with that. And you want to know why?” Jeff asked, but didn’t wait for Mike to answer. “Because I love El and I love you and I love that baby. I’m not going to lie and say that I wouldn’t love if the baby were mine, but it ultimately doesn’t matter because the three of us are in this together.”

“You say that now, but you don’t know that. You may be okay with it now, but it isn’t always going to be that way. I’m betting that if this baby is mine, you won’t ever look at it the same way you would look at it if it were your own baby. It’s going to change everything and you can’t deny that,” Mike argued.

Jeff let out a frustrated noise, tugging at his hair. “You are honestly the most frustrating person ever.”

“Fuck you.”

Jeff let out a short laugh, shaking his head. “If that’s really the way you feel, than maybe you should leave. If you’re going to treat this child differently because he or she isn’t yours, fucking leave. Having a baby will change things, but not ruin them.”

Mike slowly blinked at Jeff, opening and closing his mouth a few times. “You want me to leave?”

“Of course I don’t!” Jeff exclaimed, throwing his hands up in the air as he got to his feet. “We need you. This relationship doesn’t work with just two of us and you know that. But if this is how you’re acting now, I don’t think it would be a good idea for you to be around when the baby is born.”

“So you’re kicking me out?”

Jeff clenched his jaw, curling his fingers into fists. “No, you dumb piece of shit. I’m telling you that you need to grow the fuck up. While we never really talked about this, we can’t change what’s happening. So either you can make things work and get over whatever stupid hang-ups you have about having a baby and we can be a happy family or you can leave.”

Before Mike could utter a response, the sound of laughter and music got louder and not a moment later Eloise came stumbling around the corner.

“There you two are!” she exclaimed, grinning widely. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you guys.”

Jeff forced a smile to his face, uncurling his fists as he walked over to Eloise. “Sorry baby. We just need to get some fresh air,” he stated softly as he leaned down to press a kiss against her cheek, hand going to rest on her stomach gently.

Mike’s eyes were glued to where Jeff’s hand rested, swallowing hard. Eloise was only three months pregnant and hadn’t started showing yet, but Mike knew that in a few months it would be hard to pretend that she wasn’t pregnant. Then, a few months after that, they were actually going to have a living, breathing baby to take care of.

“Mike!”

Mike jumped slightly, blinking his eyes rapidly. “Sorry. I kind of zoned out. What were you saying?”

Jeff frowned slightly. “We’re going to head out. Toff’s about to pass out and we’re in charge of making sure he gets home safely.”

“Right,” Mike mumbled as he stood up, running his fingers through his hair.

“Why don’t you go inside and make sure Tyler’s got all of his stuff, okay?” Jeff murmured as he turned his attention to Eloise, letting his hand fall away from her stomach.

“Kay!” she stated happily as she stood on her tiptoes to kiss Jeff on the cheek before heading back inside.

“I-“ Mike started, but was quickly cut off by Jeff speaking.

“Did you know that El was scared to tell us that she was pregnant?”

Mike licked his lips, shaking his head slowly. “No.”

“She was worried about how we might react to the news. She even though that we were going to leave her because we have never seriously talked about having a baby and that we wouldn’t be happy.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Well now you do. I understand that having a baby is going to be scary and we’re all a little scared. But don’t fuck things up by being a dick about it,” Jeff warned before he was heading inside.



Mike took a few minutes to get his emotions under control before he was going inside. He wanted to forget about the fight that had just happened. He knew that if he didn’t, he would just go and find Jeff to continue where they had left off. Which was something that he didn’t want to happen because he didn’t want to worry Eloise.

So once he was sure that he would be okay, he was walking into the building where the party was being held. He instantly noticed Eloise talking to Justin and Kelly, but as he looked around, he didn’t see Jeff anywhere.

“Mike!” Eloise called out, waving him over.

Mike plastered a smile on his face as he made his way over to the trio. “Hey,” he greeted, slipping an arm around Eloise’s waist.

“Jeff went to get the car. He said you could handle getting Tyler out to the car on your own,” Eloise told him.

“Yeah, I think I can manage that.”

“Awesome!” Eloise stated with a grin before looking over at Justin and Kelly. “Thank you both for inviting us. The ceremony was lovely.”

“We’re just happy that you all could come. Mike mentioned that you guys might have been staying in Sea City a little bit longer then planned,” Justin stated.

Mike tried not to wince, tightening his arm around Eloise’s waist. He had forgotten he had even said that. Of course it had been a lie, but as the day had gotten closer and closer the less he wanted to go. Something that he hadn’t mentioned to either Jeff or Eloise.

Eloise glanced up at Mike for a moment before smiling lightly. “We were, but I managed to convince these two we needed to come. They know that I love weddings or anything that has to do with weddings.”

“And we just can’t say no to her,” Mike added, grinning slightly, glad that Eloise hadn’t called him out on his lies. Though, he knew he would probably hear about it later once they were at home.

Kelly laughed softly. “You three are just so cute. You are really lucky to have each other.”

“I think so too,” Eloise murmured, smiling up at Mike.

Mike leaned down to press a quick kiss against Eloise’s lips. “We should probably get going. Wouldn’t want to keep Jeff waiting.”

“Right,” Eloise agreed as she stepped away from Mike so that she could hug both Kelly and Justin. “It was great seeing you guys. And congratulations on ten years.”

“Thank you. It was great seeing the three of you as well,” Kelly stated with a grin.”

Mike watched the two women chat for a moment before turning to Justin, patting him on the shoulder. “Congratulations. Ten years is a long time. I can’t imagine being with someone that long.”

“No, you’ve just been with the same two people for almost 12 years,” Justin said, smirking.

Mike wanted to argue that wasn’t even close to being the same thing. What the three of them were doing was different than being married, but he really didn’t want to cause a scene. Plus, deep down, Mike knew that Justin had a point. The three of them had been together longer than some of the married couples on the team. They really did have something unique and special. “Yeah, best 12 years of my life.”

Justin smiled lightly, placing a hand on Mike’s shoulder. “Don’t fuck things up then,” he stated softly, giving Mike’s shoulder a squeeze before he was pulling his hand away to rest it on the small of his wives back. “Come on babe, their playing our song.”

Mike frowned as he watched the couple walk away. Did Justin somehow know about the fight he and Jeff had had? Or was it just an off-handed comment based on things that had happened in the past. Either way, it left Mike feeling a little uneasy, flinching when he felt a hand on his arm.

“Are you okay?” Eloise asked softly.

Mike gave a quick nod of his head. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just ready to go home and get some sleep.”

“Alright, if you’re sure.”

“I am. I’m going to get Tyler. Why don’t you go see if Jeff’s got the car pulled up yet, yeah?” Mike suggested.

“Okay, see you out front,” Eloise murmured, giving his arm a gentle squeeze before she was heading for the exit.

Mike let out a soft sigh, rubbing a hand over his face before he was heading over to where Tyler was slumped over in a chair, head on the table. “Alright bud, time to go.”

“Fuck off,” Tyler grumbled, flapping a hand in Mike’s general direction.

Mike chuckled softly as he grabbed Tyler’s wrist, slowly helping him to his feet. “Trust me, there are better things I could be doing than dragging your drunk ass home.”

“Like having sex?” Tyler asked, leaning heavily against Mike’s side.

Mike rolled his eyes, draping Tyler’s arm over his shoulders, wrapping an arm around Tyler’s waist. “Sure. Like having sex,” he replied as he guided the other male to the exit.

“You’re a lucky guy, Mikey. You get to have sex with two people all the time. That’s the dream! Though, ‘s a little weird that one of those people is Carts, but whatever. If he makes you happy, good for you.”

Mike held in a groan, shaking his head. Next time he was going to have Jeff deal with a drunk teammate. “Let’s talk about something else, huh?”

“Can I join you guys one time?”

“No!”

“But why not?” Tyler asked with a pout.

“Because it would be weird!”

“No it wouldn’t!”

“Would you really want to have sex with Jeff and I?”

Tyler stayed silent for a moment before he was slowly shaking his head. “Probably not.”

“Then it’s a definite no to you ever joining us.”

Tyler frowned. “Than could I watch?”

“Just wait for the sex tape to come out just like everyone else.”

“You guys made a sex tape!?” Tyler exclaimed, eyes widening.

Mike didn’t bother responding as they finally got outside, leading Tyler over to where Jeff was parked, the back door already open. “Alright bud. You’re going to have to step up to get into the car. Can you do that for me?”

“I can’t believe you actually made a sex tape. That’s kind of hot. Is it weird that I think that’s hot? It probably is weird,” Tyler mumbled to himself as he stated to climb into the car.

“I’m going to hold this moment over you for the rest of your life,” Mike stated softly, resting one hand on Tyler’s back and the other on the back of his head so the younger male didn’t end up hitting it while he climbed into the car.

“You!” Tyler exclaimed once he was safely inside, pointing a finger at Jeff. “Have been holding out on me!”

“Ignore him,” Mike stated as he climbed into the backseat, closing the door.

Jeff raised an eyebrow as he turned around slightly so that he could look at Tyler. “…Sorry?”

“You should be,” Tyler pouted, crossing his arms over his chest. “And to make up for it, I should be the first person to see your sex tape.”

Jeff raised his eyebrow even more as he turned his attention to Mike. ‘Sex tape?’ he mouthed.

“He’s drunk and crazy,” Mike explained as he reached over to place a hand on Tyler’s mouth to keep him from speaking any more. “Let’s just get him home.”

“We decided that he can just crash in the guest room at our place,” Jeff explained as he turned around, starting the car.

“We thought it would be the safest thing to do. That way, one of us can check on him throughout the night to make sure he doesn’t choke on his own vomit,” Eloise added.

“Sounds good,” Mike murmured, removing his hand from Tyler’s mouth, letting the younger male rest his head against Mike’s shoulder, staring out the window as Jeff drove them back to their place.



By the time that they got to their house, Tyler was completely passed out. It took both Mike and Jeff to carry the younger male into the house, Eloise hurrying ahead of them to get Tyler a glass of water and some Advil. They carefully carried him into the house, gently placing him down onto the bed in the guest room, Mike bending down to take his shoes off.

Eloise walked into the room, holding two bottles of water in one hand and a bottle of Advil in the other. “Can one of you help him sit up? He should drink some water.”

Jeff nodded as he moved over to the bed, sitting down on the edge. “Come on kid. Time to drink some water,” he stated softly, helping Tyler to sit up.

Mike threw the shoes onto the floor, watching as Eloise walked over to the bed. “If you two have this covered, I’m going to let the dogs out.”

“Okay,” Eloise murmured, smiling over at him before she was kneeling down on the bed next to Jeff.

Mike backtracked out of the room, gently shutting the door behind him. He walked down to the kitchen, shrugging off his suit jacket as we went. He draped it over the back of a chair, whistling for the dogs. He grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge, smiling when he heard the sound of nails clicking against hardwood floors as the dogs ran into the kitchen. “Hey guys,” he murmured as he reached down to scratch Arnold behind the ears before doing the same to Eloise’s dog, Teddy. “Let’s go outside.”

He moved over to the sliding glass door that led to the deck, pulling it open. He chuckled softly as he watched the dogs bound out of the house and down the stairs into the backyard. He left the door open as he moved outside, sighing softly as he sat down.

It was like a sense of déjà vu when he heard footsteps from behind him, eyes falling shut. “I don’t want to fight with you.”

“I don’t want to fight with you either,” Jeff stated as he stepped outside, closing the door behind him. “But we need to talk.”

“Right now?”

“Yes.”

Mike sighed softly, running his fingers through his hair. “Fine. Talk.”

“Do you remember when we decided to try this whole relationship thing between the three of us?”

“Of course.”

“Do you remember how we said that for this to work, we needed to treat each other like equals? That it wasn’t just going to be me dating El and you dating El? We were all dating each other?”

“Yes.”

“When did that change for you?”

Mike frowned slightly. “What are you talking about?”

“It just seems like something’s changed for you. Like finding out about this baby is some end-all-be-all thing. Like whoever the father is gets Eloise and the other person gets kicked to the curb.”

“Things would be easier if that were true.”

“Of course they would, but what we have has never been easy. We went into this knowing that things wouldn’t be easy. That people wouldn’t understand, but it didn’t matter what other people thought.”

Mike slowly opened his eyes so that he could look at Jeff. “Haven’t you ever wished that things would be easy? That we could be normal?”

“I used to, yeah,” Jeff admitted with a small nod. “When we first started telling people about us and they just didn’t understand. I wanted nothing more than to be in a normal relationship. That I could be with one person and have that be okay.”

“What changed for you?”

“Realizing everything I would lose. While yes, it would be nice not having to explain to people that we aren’t just sharing one girl, but we’re all together, it wouldn’t really make me happy. Maybe things would be different if we had never met El or if the two of us had never met, but I can’t think about all those ‘what if’s’ or else I’d go crazy. I can’t imagine living any other way.”

Mike chewed on his bottom lip, turning to watch the dogs. “I just feel like something’s missing. I feel like I should be married and have 2.5 children. Sometimes I wonder when things are going to fall apart.”

“I think you should know by now that isn’t going to happen. We’re in this for the long run. This is our ‘to death do us part’. We don’t need rings or a piece of paper for that to be true.”

Mike smiled sadly. “I wish I had your confidence.”

“I think you do, but you’re just scared to show it because if you do things will change. And they will, but not the way you think they will. Neither El or I is going to decide we don’t want you around.”

“How do you know that for sure?”

Jeff was silent for a moment, staring out at the backyard before sighing softly. “I don’t really know that for sure. Anything could change. There are some days when I wonder if someone is going to get bored with this whole setup and decide to leave. I especially wonder if I’ll get bored and want to leave.”

“You do?” Mike asked quietly.

“I do,” Jeff answered with a nod. “I used to think about it all the time when we first started doing this whole thing. I figure that this wouldn’t last long. We were young and dumb and rushing into things.”

“But now?”

“Now I know that we can do anything. I’ve learned to trust that we love each other enough to not just let this fall apart because we’re scared. All those thoughts of getting bored and leaving are just thoughts. I know it will never happen. But it’s okay to be scared too.”

“I hate being scared,” Mike grumbled.

Jeff chuckled softly. “I know you do. I hate it too and I’m sure El does too. But we just have to remember that we have each other. Instead of bottling things up we have to talk to each other.”

“What if we have things to say that the other two won’t like or don’t want to hear?”

“I don’t like 90% of the stuff that comes out of your mouth already,” Jeff joked, smirking.

Mike narrowed his eyes, raising a hand so that he could flip Jeff off. “I’m being serious.”

“I know, I’m sorry,” Jeff murmured, the smirk quickly leaving his face. “We deal with it. As long as we’re being honest with each other, we’ll figure it out.”

Mike slowly nodded his head, taking a sip of his water. “I’m scared about having a baby.”

“I think we all are.”

“You really think so?”

“Yep and it’s okay. I think I almost shit my pants when El first told us.”

Mike let out a startled laugh. “I think I did too. I don’t know anything about raising a baby.”

“None of us really do, but we’re in this together, okay? We’ll figure it out one step at a time.”

“Okay,” Mike whispered, letting out a shaky breath.

“Good,” Jeff stated with a nod. “You done freaking out.”

“For right now.”

“That’s all I can ask for,” Jeff stated as he placed a hand on Mike’s shoulder. “Come inside?”

“Give me a few minutes and then I’ll come in.”

“Alright,” Jeff murmured as he leaned down to kiss Mike on the top of his head before going into the house.

Mike took a deep breath, slowly letting it out. He was scared as hell about things changing. Having a baby was such a big deal, but they could do this. They had been through much worse things in the past. Having a baby was going to be a walk in the park compared to everything else.