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rsadellePart 1 - Story on AO3
Tyler gets traded to Boston on a Wednesday morning when Amanda's four. They already have his bag packed, so he gets a few minutes to say goodbye to the guys, and then he's no longer a Flyer. He doesn't have to be in Boston until the morning and Amanda's at preschool, so he goes home and sits down with Christine.
"You don't have to move," he says, "if you don't want to, but I need you to come with us at least until Amanda gets settled in and I can hire a new nanny."
Christine's traveled with them before, so she's okay with that part of it. "Are we leaving today?"
"I am." Part of Tyler is already thinking about what he needs to pack and everything else he needs to do. "I'll pick Amanda up today and tell her about it. I want to let her finish out the week at school, and you two can come up this weekend." He rubs his hand over his face. "I don't even know what our schedule is, if I'm even going to be there."
Christine gives him the kind of unimpressed look that makes her a great nanny. "So go find out." She looks past him at the clock on the cable box. "You have an hour before you have to leave to pick up Amanda."
He adds the Bruins schedule to his phone - they're at home this weekend, so that's fine - and then he dials Segs while he pulls things out of his closet.
"I got traded to you," he says as soon as Segs picks up.
Segs lets out a whoop loud enough that Tyler cringes to have it in his ear. "Dude, this is awesome."
"Yeah," Tyler says, "awesome. Can we stay with you? Just for a while, until-"
"Of course you're staying with me," Segs says. "It'll be awesome, and Amanda already has her own room here." She does, because Segs bought a ridiculously large townhouse and made one of the rooms into a guest room just for Amanda even though Tyler, Amanda, and Christine only ever came through Boston a couple of times a year.
That's at least one of Tyler's worries taken care of, and they talk for a little longer while Tyler packs everything he thinks he's going to need for a while, until he can get someone in to move everything from the old house to Segs' place, or wherever they end up staying long-term in Boston. He gets mostly packed before he has to go get Amanda.
It's always gratifying to pick Amanda up from preschool. She positively beams at him and says, "Daddy, look what I made," and tries to simultaneously show him her picture and hold her arms up to be picked up.
He signs her out, admires her picture, and straps her into her car seat for the drive home. He waits until they're home and sitting at the table with lunch to tell her about the trade. She takes it better than he expected, even if it's not without a few tears.
There are more tears when he has to say goodbye, from both of them, and Tyler finally hugs Amanda tight, says, "You be good for Christine, and I'll see you on Saturday," and has to physically hand her to Christine.
*
It's really only been long enough to be like a long road trip when Amanda and Christine get into town and come to the rink on Saturday, but that's more than long enough that Tyler's really glad to get great big hugs from his little girl. He takes her on a tour of the rink, Christine trailing behind them while Amanda holds his hand and asks about everything they see. He ends the tour at the players' lounge, since that's where Segs is most likely to be.
Sure enough, they're barely through the door when Amanda is tearing herself away from him and flinging herself at Segs. "Uncle Tyler!"
"Ladybug!" Segs barely has time to set his Gatorade down before Amanda crashes into him and he lifts her easily into his arms.
Amanda flings her arms around his neck and holds on so tight Tyler starts to worry about Segs' ability to breathe. "We went on a airplane."
"You did," Segs says. "Was that fun?"
"I had a coloring book," Amanda says. Then her lip trembles. "I left all my friends." And then she bursts into tears.
Segs cups her head and lets her cry into his shoulder. "I know, baby."
Tyler can tell which of the guys have kids and which ones don't; the ones without kids look way more freaked out. One of the rookies looks like his eyes are about to bug out of his head.
Segs just lets her cry, until she's down to hiccupping out the last sobs, and then he takes the Kleenex Christine holds out to him and gets Amanda to blow her nose.
"Moving is always a little scary, huh?" Segs says, and Amanda nods a little against his shoulder. "You get to stay with me, though. You always like that."
Amanda nods again, and she's completely stopped crying.
"Did you see Marshall before you came to the rink?"
That gets a smile out of her. "He licked my face!"
"He licked your face?" Segs leans close, like he's telling her a secret. "He does that to me too. Those are doggy kisses."
Amanda giggles, and then her eyes go wide. "I get to see Marshall every day."
Segs grins at her. "Yes, you do. Every single day."
Amanda flings herself forward, practically strangling Segs again. "Every day!"
Segs's grin is almost as big as hers. "That's right, baby." He looks around the room, where the guys who aren't staring at him are starting to filter out. "Daddy and I have to go get ready for practice now, but we're going to see you right after."
"I want to skate!"
"Not on a game day, Ladybug. Next day off, we'll go skating, okay?"
Amanda pouts, but she also nods. "Okay."
"Good. Now, big kisses, and then you have to go with Christine." Segs turns his cheek to get a sloppy kiss from Amanda and kisses both her cheeks, her forehead, and the top of her head before he hands her to Christine.
"I'm a big girl," Amanda says, squirming until Christine puts her down. "I can walk."
Tyler crouches down to hug her. "Be good for Christine."
Amanda hugs him back and says, "Be good for Coach."
There's a muffled ripple of laughter from the guys still hanging around that turns into outright laughter when Christine and Amanda leave.
"Jesse owes me a hundred bucks," Segs says as they make their way down to the locker room.
Tyler asks, "Why's that?" even though he knows from the smirk on Segs' face that he might not want to know the answer.
"He bet you'd cry about the trade before she did."
Tyler shoves a laughing Segs into the wall, and keeps walking, but braces himself so he doesn't get knocked down when Segs jogs to catch up with him and leaps onto his back.
*
They're all used to living together during the summer, and that means getting used to living together during the season is easy enough. Tyler spends a lot of time with Amanda when he's home, and Segs settles right into joining in whatever they're doing. Having a third adult in the house means Christine gets more time off, which she seems to like, and she agrees to stay with them in Boston.
Amanda spends hours playing with an unbelievably patient Marshall, demands to be taken skating at least twice a week, and makes friends at her new preschool.
Tyler's a little tense for the first couple of weeks, but he relaxes as Amanda does, and he figures this trade might actually work out well for them.
*
Of course, Amanda's calm could only last so long, and the morning it breaks is a morning Tyler and Segs have to leave for a road trip.
"No." Amanda crosses her arms over her chest. "I don't want you to go."
"I have to, baby." Tyler crouches down next to her chair. "We'll be back in a few days, and Christine is going to take care of you while we're gone."
"No!" Amanda turns away from him. "I don't want Christine to take care of me."
They've been on so many road trips, and Tyler really thought they were past the days of Amanda's temper tantrums about it.
Tyler puts his hand on Amanda's shoulder and leaves it there even when she tries to shrug it off. "Can I get hugs and kisses before I go?"
"No." Amanda's starting to sound more teary than mad. "I don't want you to go!"
"I know, baby." Tyler puts his arms around her and kisses the top of her head. "I love you. We'll be back in a few days. Be good for Christine."
He switches places with Segs, who puts his arms around Amanda and says, "I want lots of ladybug hugs when we get home." He kisses the top of her head too. "Love you, Ladybug."
It's hell walking out of the house with Amanda's sniffles behind them, but Tyler makes himself put one foot in front of the other and follow Segs out to the car.
When they get to the rink, Krejci throws one arm around each of their shoulders and says, "What's up with you two?" It draws more attention than Tyler really wants.
"I know that look," Marchy says. "You're only as happy as your least happy child, right?"
Segs leans around Krejci to give Tyler a look he's too stressed out to be able to figure out right now.
Tyler ducks out of Krejci's hold and goes over to talk to Marchy without having everyone listen in. "Amanda freaked out about us leaving this morning. We go on roadtrips all the time."
"Kids." Marchy shrugs. "It happens. All three of mine all freak out about it sometimes." And his oldest is pretty old, for a kid, and also a stepkid.
"What do you do about it?"
"Play hockey," Marchy says. "Call home, tell them I love them." Marchy claps him on the shoulder. "It'll be better next time."
Tyler can't do anything but trust him, and Marchy has three kids' worth of experience to draw on, so he takes his usual seat on the bus to the airport and does his best not to let it take him too far away from the experience of traveling with his team.
It slams into him when they get to the hotel, and on the way in, Segs nudges him in the side and says, "I gave the rookies my key to fight over. I'm sharing with you."
It's probably good; he wasn't going to stop thinking about it once they were quiet and settled anyway, and this way at least he won't be totally stuck in his head. Segs doesn't really look any happier than he does though, but they're close enough that they can be in bad moods at each other and come out okay on the other side.
Segs also doesn't bug him when he takes a nap instead of hanging out, even if he does bug him about going out for dinner.
"You can't just sit here and sulk," Segs says. His mouth tightens into a thin line. "I'm not, and I'm not going to let you either."
Tyler wasn't the only one Amanda wouldn't hug goodbye, so he lets Segs drag him out for dinner with a bunch of the other guys.
His phone buzzes with Amanda's bedtime reminder while they're still ordering drinks. He takes it outside; there's a bench halfway down the block that he heads for while he dials.
Christine picks up and says, "She calmed down later."
Tyler lets out a breath. "Good. How's she doing now?"
"Just fine. We were getting ready for bed." She raises her voice a little. "Amanda, do you want to say goodnight to Daddy?"
Tyler can hear Amanda's enthusiastic agreement in the background before she takes the phone and says, "Hi, Daddy."
"Hi, sweetheart. How was your day?"
"Okay."
"Yeah? What did you do?"
Instead of answering his question, Amanda says, "Daddy, I miss you."
"I miss you too. I'll be back in a week." Tyler looks up at the footsteps coming his way and scoots down the bench a little so there's room for Segs to sit next to him.
"That's forever."
Tyler smiles at the way she drags out the syllables. "I know it feels like that."
Segs nudges him in the shoulder and makes a gesture for the phone.
It feels a little like ducking out of the conversation, but Tyler says, "Do you want to talk to Uncle Tyler?"
"Yes!"
Tyler passes the phone over, and listens to Segs' side of the conversation as he somehow gets Amanda to tell him about her day.
"It's almost bedtime for you," Segs finally says. "I'm going to give the phone back to Daddy so you can say goodnight to him." He smiles at whatever Amanda says. "I love you too, Ladybug. Goodnight."
Segs doesn't leave, just leans his shoulder against Tyler's while Amanda says, "Daddy, I drawed you a picture today."
"Did you?"
"Yes!"
"You can have Christine take a picture for me before you go to bed."
"Yeah," Amanda says. "I want you to tuck me in."
"I can't tonight," Tyler says. "But I'll have Christine give you extra hugs and kisses for me, okay?"
Amanda's agreeing, "Okay," is only a little sulky.
"I love you."
"I love you too."
"Goodnight, baby. Give the phone to Christine."
"Night, Daddy."
Christine says, "Go pick out a story," to Amanda before she says, "She's okay," to Tyler.
"Yeah, I guess." Tyler rubs his forehead. "I told her you'd give her extra hugs and kisses for me, and send me a picture of what she drew."
"Will do."
Tyler does have absolute faith in Christine's abilities, so that helps, a little. He turns his phone off and leans back against the bench. Segs shifts with him, so they're pressed together shoulder to shoulder.
"Do you remember," Segs asks, "when she was a baby and we'd just watch her sleep?"
Tyler closes his eyes. "Yeah. We could do that for hours. Hard to believe that was four years ago." He can feel Segs' eyes on him even though Segs doesn't say anything. "What?"
"Do you ever want more kids?"
Tyler opens his eyes and looks at Segs, who shrugs at him.
"You never said. When you had Amanda, you just said you wanted to be a dad."
"I am a dad now," Tyler says. "I don't really think about it. Amanda's my baby. I don't need another one."
Segs looks at him for a little longer, and then elbows him in the side and stands up. "Come on. It's cold out here and those assholes probably ordered without us."
*
They go out for drinks after dinner, since they're out of town. Tyler stopped drinking much when Amanda was born, and his tolerance is for shit now, so he sticks to just two beers and the shot Segs insists he take.
Segs drinks to just below the level where he's likely to do something embarrassing, which is still enough that Tyler hooks his shoulder under Segs' arm to help him back to their room. He shoves Segs into the bathroom first to brush his teeth and drink a bunch of water, and then they switch places, and Tyler comes out of the bathroom to find Segs in the bed that's supposed to be his.
"Stealing my bed is not cool."
"Not stealing." Segs holds up the covers. "Sharing."
Tyler rolls his eyes and goes to the other bed.
"Dude," Segs says, "don't make me get up and get in bed with you over there. I'll do it," he adds when Tyler hesitates.
"You're a real pain in my ass." Tyler gets into bed, turns off the light, and lets Segs maneuver them around so Segs is spooning him. "Really?"
"Shhh," Segs says. "You had a bad day."
"I'm not a four-year-old you can cuddle into feeling better. And it didn't work on the four-year-old this morning either."
Segs' sigh is a gust of breath on the back of his neck. "Stop worrying. She loves you, and she knows you love her."
Tyler thinks about the way she turned away from him before they left. "She was so mad."
"She's four," Segs says. "She'll get over it." He snuggles into Tyler the same way Tyler's seen him pull Amanda closer. "Anyone who talks to you for five minutes knows how much you love her. She knows."
Despite Tyler hassling Segs about it, being held is weirdly comforting, and he holds on to Segs' certainty that Amanda knows how much he loves her and lets that and Segs' warmth lull him into sleep.
*
Tyler texts Christine when they land at Logan so she knows when to expect them back. Amanda still sounded sad about them being gone, but she dealt with it better as the week went on. That doesn't mean Tyler's any less excited to see her. It has him smiling when they get off the bus at the rink. A short car ride and they'll be home.
"Daddy!"
Tyler looks up from his attempt to fish the car keys out of his bag as he walks, and gives it up so he can catch Amanda when she runs into him.
"Hi, baby." Tyler scoops her up and holds her as tightly as he can without hurting her.
Amanda buries her face in his neck. "Daddy, Daddy, I missed you."
"Oh, baby, I missed you too."
Amanda pulls back to place a sloppy kiss on his cheek. "You're home!"
Tyler's face hurts with how hard he's smiling. "Yep. Let's go home."
"What about me?" Segs asks. "Don't I get ladybug hugs too?"
Amanda says, "Yes," and holds her arms out to him. Tyler lets Segs take her and finds the keys while they walk to where Christine is waiting for them.
"We took a cab," she says, "so we can ride back with you."
Tyler and Segs dump their bags into the back of the car, and Segs says, "Give me the keys. I'll drive, and you can sit in the back with the ladybug."
They make the exchange, keys for Amanda, and Tyler says, "Thanks."
Segs squeezes his shoulder. "Four years," he says, "and you're still all starry-eyed."
*
Amanda scrunches up her face on the verge of a tantrum when Tyler says, "Bedtime." Tyler doesn't give in to it and starts calmly putting the toy cars he's been racing with her into their box. "We'll still be here tomorrow. It's time to clean up."
His calm, or his praying for her to stay calm, works, and she dumps toys into the toybox and goes with him for her bath and to brush her teeth. Tyler lets her pick out a book, and Segs comes in to sit on the floor next to her bed while Tyler reads and Amanda points out the pictures.
"Another one," Amanda demands when they get to the end of the book.
"What do you say?"
"Please?"
Tyler kisses the top of her head. "Okay, but only one more, and then it's time to sleep." He doesn't let her get out of bed and run across the room for it herself, but Segs goes over to her bookshelf and holds up books until she says, "That one!"
She falls asleep before Tyler even gets halfway through the book. He carefully shifts her off his lap onto the bed and puts both books on the shelf while Segs leans his head against the edge of the bed and watches her sleep.
Tyler holds out a hand to pull Segs up, and they quietly leave the room and close the door most of the way behind them.
"You could have let me watch her sleep," Segs says.
"I didn't want you falling asleep on her floor." Tyler yawns, and chuckles a little when it makes Segs yawn too. "I think it's bedtime for us too."
"Glamorous life of a hockey player."
Tyler checks in with Christine to let her know they're going to bed, and then he takes a quick shower to wash off the lingering feel of travel. Sometimes he thinks it never quite goes away, but a night in his own bed with his baby girl just down the hall helps make everything feel normal again.
What's not normal is Segs in his bed.
"Do I even want to know what you're doing here?" Tyler pulls on his pajama pants and a t-shirt and sets an alarm on his phone before he gets into bed.
Segs turns over and moves around until his back is against Tyler's chest. "You're not the only one who gets lonely and sad about traveling all the time."
Tyler knows Segs' penchant for cuddling well enough that he doesn't even bother trying to kick him out. He just puts his arm over Segs and makes himself comfortable.
He thinks Segs is falling asleep - he is - so it's something of a surprise when Segs says, "Remember that time in Plymouth?"
There are a lot of times he could be referring to, but pressed together in the dark, Tyler knows which one he means. He means the time Tyler's billets were out and Segs came over and they made out on Tyler's bed for a couple of hours.
"Yes."
Segs is quiet for long enough that Tyler thinks that's it, but then Segs' hand finds his arm in the dark, and his fingers are hot against Tyler's skin. "We never did that again."
They didn't. Segs went home to his own billets before curfew, they didn't talk about it, and it didn't happen again, even though Tyler had thought about it sometimes. A couple of weeks later, though, he'd started hanging out with a girl who worked concessions at the rink, and Tyler didn't really think about that time he made out with Segs anymore.
"No."
Segs sighs a little and Tyler's not sure what he's supposed to be getting out of this conversation.
Segs holds tight to his arm. "Whatever," he says, not like he's dismissing it, but like he's letting them out of the conversation. "Go to sleep."
Tyler lies awake and listens to Segs' breathing in the dark until sometime after Segs falls asleep.
*
Tyler's alarm goes off too early, and he stumbles out of bed and into the shower so he can be at least a little awake to get Amanda up. She crinkles up her face when he goes in to wake her up, but then she opens her eyes and smiles at him.
"Daddy."
"Good morning, sweetheart." Tyler kisses her cheek. "Ready to get up and have breakfast?"
Amanda puts her arms around his neck, and he carries her out to the kitchen where he slices half a banana into a bowl of Cheerios and sits across from her and lets her talk to him about her friends at preschool in between bites.
He wipes her face with a napkin and supervises while she washes her hands and picks out clothes for the day. It means an interesting combination of purple pants and a bright yellow Bruins shirt, but Tyler's trying to let her learn to make her own decisions, and he's seen worse things at her preschool and amongst her friends.
It's only when he's buckling her into her carseat that she asks, "Where's Christine?"
"I'm home today," Tyler tells her, "so she's taking the day off. I'll come pick you up too." He closes the door and goes around the car to get into the driver's seat.
"And Uncle Tyler too?"
Tyler smiles at her hopeful face in the rearview mirror. "I don't know. I'll tell him you want him to come, and maybe he will."
That satisfies her, and then she asks for the playlist Segs made for her, so they listen to mostly kid appropriate dance music all the way to her school.
Amanda holds his hand and stays with him all the way into the school where he signs her in and bends down to hug her.
"I love you, Daddy."
"I love you too. Go have fun, and I'll see you in a couple of hours." Tyler kisses her cheek and watches her run off to join some of the other kids before he leaves.
The house is mostly quiet when he gets home, but he can hear a shower going somewhere, so he makes enough breakfast for two. He guessed right, and it's Segs who comes into the kitchen and leans on the counter while Tyler finishes making breakfast.
"Amanda wants you to come with to pick her up from school," Tyler tells him.
Segs nods. "Cool. We getting her after skate?"
"Yeah. I was thinking we could take her out for lunch. Christine's off today."
"Sounds good to me. Then we can all have naptime." Segs punctuates this with a yawn.
They eat at the table and move around each other easily to rinse the dishes and put them in the dishwasher.
"Did you want to do it again?" Tyler asks before Segs can wander off somewhere else.
Segs isn't his best in the morning, so Tyler has to wait for him to catch up. "Oh," Segs says. "Yeah. I mean, it was the hottest thing that had ever happened to me, and then it just didn't ever happen again."
Happened to him. Tyler remembers Segs being just as active a participant as Tyler was. Segs has always been hot, and it was one of the hottest things Tyler had ever done too. Even if this turns out to be a bad idea, he and Segs are always going to be solid, so he crosses the kitchen and kisses Segs.
Segs makes a surprised noise into his mouth, and then he kisses back, and it's good. He's gotten better at this over the years, and he walks them back a little until Tyler's back is against the fridge, magnets pressing into him and Amanda's drawings crinkling under them.
Tyler gets his hands up the back of Segs' shirt, and Segs makes hungry little noises into his mouth. It's not tame. It's messy and wet and they're both hard, but it doesn't go any farther than that.
Tyler puts his hands on Segs' chest after a while and looks at the clock over Segs' shoulder. "We have skate in forty-five minutes. And Christine is here somewhere."
Segs rest his head on Tyler's shoulder for a few seconds before he pushes himself off. "Leave in fifteen?"
"Yeah." That'll give them enough time to get to the rink and suit up and still make it onto the ice on time. And it's probably going to take that long for his erection to go down. If he doesn't jerk off first.
*
They go straight from the rink to Amanda's school, and Segs gets out of the car to come in with Tyler. Tyler stops to check in with one of the teachers while he signs Amanda out. Amanda notices them while he's doing that and runs over with a piece of paper in one hand.
"Uncle Tyler, look what I drawed for you!"
Segs crouches down and holds the other side of Amanda's drawing.
"That's you and me and Daddy and Christine and Marshall."
"It's beautiful. I love it. Thank you, Ladybug." Segs takes it from her. "Can you go get your coat?"
Amanda runs off and comes back with her coat. They have to wait for her to get it zipped up, and then Tyler waves goodbye to the teachers and follows Segs and Amanda out to the car. Segs takes the keys, and Tyler buckles Amanda into her car seat.
"We're taking you out to lunch," Tyler tells Amanda. "Do you want a sandwich or do you want dumplings?"
They wait for her to consider her options. "Can I have french fries?"
Tyler says, "With your sandwich," and Segs starts the car. There's a place they like that's not too far away, and the waitress smiles at them and brings crayons and paper for Amanda to draw on.
Before Amanda can get too involved in her coloring, Tyler asks her, "What kind of jam do you want on your sandwich?" He sometimes orders her the grilled cheese, but peanut butter and jelly seems healthier if he's also letting her have fries.
"Ra-berry."
Tyler glances at the menu to make sure raspberry is an option. "Raspberry it is." The kids' sandwiches come with carrot slices, which he wants her to eat, so instead of substituting, he orders a side of fries for the three of them to share.
Tyler and Segs talk about practice and tomorrow's game while Amanda amuses herself with the crayons and asks a question about their lines that has Segs drawing her a diagram on the back of her paper.
When their food comes, Tyler puts a handful of fries and some ketchup on Amanda's plate and moves the plate of fries out of her reach.
Amanda gets peanut butter and jelly and ketchup all over her face and hands - Tyler is still baffled by how much of a mess she can make just in the process of eating, even though his parents say he was the same way - and Tyler does his best to clean her up with napkins before their waitress brings over a couple of wet wipes in tiny foil packets. Tyler vetoes dessert and makes sure Segs leaves a really good tip when he gets to the check before Tyler does.
Amanda's almost asleep by the time they get home. She fusses for a minute when Tyler takes her to her room, but she falls asleep almost the moment he puts her to bed.
Tyler goes to his own room for a nap. He's not quite sure what he's going to find, but his bed is empty and Segs' door is closed.
*
Their evening is normal. Segs makes dinner and Tyler builds Lego structures with Amanda. They watch an episode of Wild Animal Baby Explorers, which sends Amanda to her room to drag out a small stack of books of animal pictures that they turn slowly while she points out things about the animals and Tyler and Segs take turns reading her their names and the facts about them that go with the pictures.
Amanda goes to bed easily, but it takes them reading through four books before she falls asleep clutching at the edge of Tyler's shirt where he sits on the edge of her bed. He carefully gets himself free without waking her, and Segs keeps his amusement to a silent grin.
Tyler and Segs watch a couple of episodes of grown-up TV off the DVR and go to bed early. Or Tyler means to go to bed early. He brushes his teeth and changes into pajamas, and then gets pushed into his bed by Segs.
"You have your own room."
"You're not in it." Segs climbs in with him, and instead of tucking himself into Tyler in whatever way he wants to cuddle, he kisses him. They're both lying on their sides, and they're not cuddled together, just kissing with one of Segs' arms thrown over his shoulders.
It's tame, not that there isn't tongue, because there so is, but it's not like this morning. At least it's not until Segs rolls him over and climbs on top of him. Then it's a lot more like this morning, and Tyler gets his hands under Segs' shirt because fuck if he's not going to get to touch all of that if they're doing this.
Segs has to agree with him, because he gets shirt off without moving away from Tyler hardly at all, and he groans into Tyler's mouth when Tyler gets his hands all over him.
Segs doesn't leave him hanging, either. He grinds down into Tyler, and they're both hard, and fuck, there are no billets they have to listen out for, just Amanda, and she's asleep.
"You locked the door, right?" Tyler asks.
"Yes." Segs bites Tyler's lip. "Are you seriously thinking about that right now?"
Tyler puts his hands on Segs' ass and pulls down. "I don't want to stop, and we'll have to if Amanda wakes up."
Segs groans and grips Tyler's shoulders. "Oh my God, that's not going to happen. Shut up and just." He stops talking and rubs against Tyler while he kisses him. It's even hotter than it was the time in Plymouth.
Tyler turns them over after a while, because he's just as into this as Segs is, and there's no reason Segs should get the monopoly on grinding down into him. Segs takes advantage of it and tugs Tyler's shirt off, and fuck, why didn't he think of that earlier? With both their shirts off, there's a lot more skin on skin. Segs is still making noise into his mouth, and every time Tyler pulls back at all, he can see that he's leaving beard burn all over Segs' face. It's so hot he works on kissing Segs' neck to spread it over more of his skin.
"Can we?" Segs asks, and he pulls Tyler's pajama pants and boxer briefs down off his hips.
Tyler hisses at how much closer his cock is to Segs' this way, and he lets Segs turn them over again. They get in each other's way when they both try to get at Segs' pajama pants at the same time, but it only takes a frantic moment before they're out of the way and Segs is rubbing his cock against Tyler with nothing between them.
Segs groans, and Tyler puts a hand over his mouth.
"Shhh. You have to be quiet." There's Amanda, and Christine wasn't home when they went to bed, but she might be now.
Segs bites him, lightly, but Tyler still takes his hand away.
"I don't know if I can be," Segs says. "This is so fucking hot."
"I know." Tyler kisses him, and gets his hands on Segs' ass, which is even better without anything covering it. "But try. Fuck." He mouths at Segs' jaw where it's red from the rub of Tyler's stubble.
"Fuck," Segs echoes, and he tilts his head up so Tyler can get at his neck.
Tyler scrapes his cheek over the thin skin of Segs' neck, and mouths at it. Segs would probably let him leave a hickey, but he doesn't suck that hard. He does dig his fingers into Segs' ass a little harder, and it takes a second, but he gets Segs to move so they're lined up better.
Segs gets loud, and he kisses Tyler before Tyler even moves a hand away from his ass to make him be quiet. It's not really quiet, but it's quieter with Segs making noise into his mouth.
Tyler opens his mouth to Segs, takes in the sound, and rubs up against him. He doesn't know how long they do that. It could be minutes, could be hours. It all just collapses into now, into making out so much his mouth feels swollen, into Segs' hands touching him, into their cocks hard between them.
Tyler's surprised when he comes. He shouldn't be - they're naked and hard and rubbing up against each other - but he is. Because they didn't go this far before, probably.
His brain fuzzes out into just pleasure, and he bites Segs' lip when he's trying not to be too loud about it.
"Come on," Segs is saying when there's more than just emptiness in Tyler's head. "Come on, just, please."
It's too much to have Segs grinding on his softening dick, but Tyler only pushes him away far enough to get his hand on Segs' cock, and he jerks him off with fast, sharp strokes.
"Yeah," Segs mutters, "yeah," and Tyler kisses him to keep him quiet. It's a good thing too, because even then his yell when he comes is pretty loud.
Tyler keeps jerking him off until Segs pushes his hand away, and then Segs pretty much collapses on him and they keep kissing for long enough that it's pretty gross when Segs rolls off him.
Tyler makes a face at the mess and grabs at the Kleenex on the nightstand. It doesn't do a whole lot to make it better, but it's enough that he can pull his clothes on and be comfortable enough to sleep.
Segs has his own handful of tissue, and he doesn't put his shirt back on, just his pants. He looks at Tyler for a minute, and then says, "Roll over. I'll be the big spoon."
Tyler rolls his eyes but lets Segs do what he wants. "I'm not so freaked out I need to be cuddled into submission."
"Submission," Segs snickers. "Kinky."
"Asshole. Shut up and go to sleep." He thinks for a minute that it's going to work, but he should know better; it doesn't work any better on Segs than it does on Amanda when she doesn't want to go to bed, and it probably wouldn't even if he were as nice about it as he is with Amanda.
"No, but really," Segs says, and Tyler can tell from his tone that it's a real question, "we're cool?"
"Yes, Tyler." Tyler reaches his hand back and pats some part of Segs he doesn't bother trying to identify. "We're good. That was good."
"Good," Segs says. He apparently takes that as license to get even more handsy, because instead of just throwing his arm around Tyler, he gets his hand up under Tyler's shirt, and he kisses the back of Tyler's neck and then stays so close Tyler can feel it every time he breathes.
Tyler doesn't stop him. It doesn't bother him, is nice, even, and there's pretty much nothing of him left that Segs hasn't already touched.
*
Tyler wakes up early, and it doesn't seem weird at all to have Segs in bed with him. He'd consider morning sex, but Segs is still out cold, and doesn't wake up when Tyler nudges him a little. Segs moves when Tyler gets out of bed, but only to roll over a little and smash his face into Tyler's pillow.
Tyler leaves him to it and jerks off in the shower.
Christine already has Amanda up when Tyler leaves his room, and they're in the kitchen where Christine is making Amanda's breakfast while Amanda leans on the table with both elbows and watches her.
"Good morning, baby." Tyler kisses the top of Amanda's head and goes to the fridge for some juice.
"Good morning, Daddy." Amanda turns to watch him but still seems a little sleepy.
Tyler says, "Morning," to Christine too, and pours two glasses of juice. He puts the smaller, plastic one in front of Amanda. She wraps both hands around it and drinks carefully, then puts it down and pushes it out of the way when Christine gives her a bowl of cereal.
"Skate and a game today?" Christine asks.
"Yep." Tyler sits down next to Amanda and watches her eat. "Skate's late enough that I can take Amanda to school."
"Can I watch your game?" Amanda asks through a mouthful of cereal.
"Don't talk with your mouth full," Tyler reminds her. "You can watch the beginning, but you still have to go to bed on time."
Amanda very obviously finishes swallowing her next bite of cereal before she says, "Kay."
Tyler finishes his juice while Amanda eats, and he gets her dressed and ready for school. She's not very chatty on the way there, but she hugs Tyler tight and then runs off to her friends after he signs her in, so it's probably just a quiet morning.
Segs is in the kitchen when Tyler gets home, bleary-eyed and shirtless, with his hair everywhere and eggs on the stove.
Tyler nudges him out of the way. "You're going to burn something." He takes over the eggs and lets Segs make their protein shakes.
"Christine went back to bed," Segs mumbles, so Tyler only gets down two plates.
He throws some bread in the toaster, divvies it and the eggs onto the plates, and carries them to the table. Segs brings the protein shakes, and Tyler gets forks. If Segs is having a morning when he doesn't want to wake up, it's probably better not to let him go rummaging through a drawer full of sharp objects.
They don't talk while they eat, but Segs seems more awake by the time they're done. Awake enough that Tyler makes him put his own dishes away. And then awake enough to corner Tyler against the counter and kiss him.
Tyler lets it go on for a minute before he pushes Segs away. "Gross, dude. Go brush your teeth."
Segs makes a face at him. "You said we were good."
"We're good when you're not making me taste your morning breath. Go brush your teeth."
Instead of doing that, Segs leans his forehead on Tyler's shoulder. He says, "Game day," and Tyler knows what he means; game day means they have routines to observe and things to do, and making out isn't on the list.
Tyler cups the back of Segs' head for a moment. He'd rather make out too. "Next time brush your teeth first."
Segs makes that same face at him again. "You've become really boring."
Tyler laughs and shoves him away. "I get enough gross in my life with a preschooler and hockey. I don't need it from you too."
Segs wanders off. To his own room, Tyler finds when he goes to get ready for practice and his room is empty. That's fine; they have game day routines to take care of. They go to skate, have lunch at home with Amanda, take naps, and head back to the rink.
They win, and Tyler tries to get out of going out with the other guys after the game, but Segs wraps an arm around his shoulder and gets Marchy to hem him in on the other side.
"The ladybug's asleep anyway," Segs says. "And Christine's there. And you never come out with us. You're coming."
There are times, Tyler has learned, that it's better to just give in, and this is one of those times.
He doesn't drink much, but Segs does, enough to hang all over Tyler on the way home, and enough that Tyler has to remind him to be quiet so they don't wake Amanda and Christine up.
Tyler tries to drop Segs in a bed, but he insists on clinging to Tyler while he looks in on Amanda. At least he doesn't wake her up, even if he does bury his face in Tyler's shoulder and say, muffled enough that Tyler can barely hear him, "I can't believe how big she is."
Tyler backs them out of the doorway, closes the door as quietly as possible, and pats Segs' shoulder. "All right, dude, you're wasted. Time for bed."
"Your bed," Segs insists, so Tyler takes Segs with him into his room and makes him hang up his suit before he crawls into bed.
Tyler turns around from taking off his own suit to find that Segs has been watching him.
"I'm not too drunk to get it up," Segs says, and as if to prove it, he's rubbing himself through his boxer briefs. "Come here. I'll blow you."
"You don't need to get it up to blow me," Tyler says. He locks the door, though, and lets Segs manhandle him down onto the bed in the position most comfortable for Segs. Segs' idea of a blowjob, or at least what he can manage while drunk, is messy and sloppy and very, very wet. It's also louder than Tyler would have guessed Segs could be with his mouth mostly full of cock. Still, a blowjob is a blowjob, and it's hot even beyond that, and Segs swallows when Tyler comes, which is almost as hot as the rest of it.
Segs kisses him after, which isn't as gross as it could be, although Segs is still pretty sloppy.
"You should blow me now," Segs says, and Tyler would be willing to, but if Segs couldn't stay quiet while he was sucking Tyler off, he doesn't have a lot of faith in his ability to be quiet while on the other side of things.
Tyler kisses him and gets his cock out, and Segs whines into his mouth and goes with it.
That only lasts so long before Segs pushes him away and says, "No, wait. I wanted you to blow me."
Tyler considers it for a second, and then he puts his hand over Segs' mouth and twists so he can keep it there while he gets his mouth on Segs' cock. It's almost not enough, and he has to resort to sticking his fingers in Segs' mouth to keep him quiet when he comes.
Segs moans a little when Tyler takes his mouth off of his cock and his hand away from his mouth, and he grabs at Tyler before Tyler can even think about getting cleaned up or putting on pajamas.
"No, no," Segs says. "You have to come here. Fuck, that was so good." He wraps himself around Tyler like an octopus, and Tyler has to resort to a little creative movement to get them under the blankets.
"So good," Segs mutters into his neck.
"So drunk," Tyler says, and Segs barks out a laugh.
"Both," he says, and it's not like Tyler disagrees with that.
*
Tyler doesn't expect much from Segs in the morning, and he doesn't get it. Segs isn't even up when he gets back from taking Amanda to school. Christine is still hanging around, so Tyler eats breakfast with her and then decides that second game day in a row or not, he's going back to bed.
Segs barely moves when Tyler gets into bed with him, but he's annoying as fuck when he manages to kick Tyler trying to get up when his alarm goes off later.
"You're a disaster," Tyler mutters at him. "You deserve every bit of your hangover."
Segs groans, and Tyler looks up to watch him stretch. "No," Segs says, "I feel good." Tyler flips him off, and Segs laughs. "Win, drinks with the boys, blowjob." Segs crawls back into bed and presses a long but close-mouthed kiss to Tyler's lips. "We should do that again today."
Tyler puts one arm around Segs as he sits up, so he doesn't knock him all the way off the bed. "All right, cowboy, go get ready for practice."
"Cowboy?" Segs laughs. "Really?"
"You kicked me awake," Tyler says.
"Poor baby. Want me to kiss it better?" Segs makes a kissy face at him, and this time Tyler does shove him off the bed. Segs is enough of an athlete to keep himself from falling totally on his ass, and he leaves the room still laughing.
*
They lose, which means they don't go out after the game and they're both in bad moods when they get home. Tyler has to catch the front door to keep it from slamming when Segs pushes at it too hard. Segs makes a face at him that's what passes for apology when he's in that kind of mood. Tyler just pushes him farther into the house.
He checks in on Amanda and isn't surprised when his room is empty and Segs' door is closed.
*
Tyler's not expecting much the next morning either, but when he gets Amanda up, Segs is already in the kitchen making breakfast. He gives Amanda a small plate of eggs and a single slice of bacon and makes up larger plates for himself, Tyler, and Christine.
"We can pick up Amanda from school after practice," Segs tells Christine. "We don't have to be back at the rink until five."
Tyler keeps an eye on Amanda, but she's too involved with the relative novelty of eggs for breakfast to have noticed that they're talking about a travel day instead of a game day.
Christine takes Amanda to get dressed after breakfast, and Segs and Tyler clear the table and put dishes in the dishwasher.
Tyler pushes Segs up against the counter when his hands are empty. Segs smiles at him, not his usual bright grin, but something smaller, something more like an invitation. Tyler spends a minute kissing it off his face before he steps away.
Segs says, "We could let Christine take the ladybug to school," but he doesn't try to keep Tyler from moving away.
Tyler squeezes Segs' hip. "Amanda will take a nap after lunch. You can jerk off and take your own car to the rink if you can't wait."
"I was ready to wait until you said that."
Tyler grins at him unrepentantly and isn't surprised to find that Segs is ready to leave when he and Amanda are.
*
Segs barely waits for Amanda to fall asleep for her nap before he's dragging Tyler into his room.
"Someday," Segs says while he's kissing Tyler and trying to get their clothes off, "we're going to do this when they aren't home and we can make all the noise we want."
Tyler pushes him away and strips, because it's not happening while they make out. "You're such a screamer you'd have to get rid of the whole block."
Segs pushes him down onto the bed. "I don't care if the neighbors hear me."
Tyler laughs and grabs his ass. "You get much louder and Christine's going to figure it out."
Segs groans and rolls his hips against Tyler's. "Stop talking about the nanny while I'm hard."
Tyler bites Segs' lip instead of talking, and Segs keeps himself quiet by kissing Tyler while they get off.
Tyler dozes with Segs still lying mostly on him, which makes for an uncomfortable couple of minutes when they separate and get up later.
"You know she's probably already figured it out," Segs says when they're cleaning up in the bathroom. "Christine. She lives with us."
"Yeah," Tyler admits, because Christine isn't stupid and they haven't been very careful about what they've been doing.
"Chill, dude." Segs bumps their shoulders together. "Christine's cool."
Tyler hopes so and, he thinks later, knowing they're hooking up is probably less of an issue in her life than having to deal with Amanda's unhappiness about their road trip.
*
They don't hook up on the road. Segs doesn't even worm his way into Tyler's room at any point, although he does show up when Tyler calls Amanda to take his turn talking to her. She's calmer this time around, and mostly happy to chatter away at them and laugh at Segs' preschooler-appropriate stories about the other guys.
It's only a two-game road trip anyway, and they get home to a quiet and dark house late after the second. Segs follows Tyler when he goes to check in on Amanda, and after Tyler closes the door to her room softly, he takes Segs' hand and pulls him into his room.
"Miss me?" Segs laughs when Tyler locks the door and pushes him toward the bed.
"Yes," Tyler says. He detours to the closet so they can get rid of their coats, and then he pushes Segs down onto the bed, follows him down, and kisses him.
Segs goes with it so easily. He wraps his arms around Tyler, doesn't try to move them at all, except to change the angle of the kiss.
They make out for a long time without doing anything else, until Segs twists his head to the side and yawns.
"Sorry, dude. Too much traveling."
Tyler rolls off of Segs. It's not like he's any less tired.
Segs wriggles out of his clothes, and Tyler's cock, which is already half-hard, twitches with interest, but he doesn't do anything about it, just watches Segs scoot up the bed and then under Tyler's covers.
"At least take your pants off and get in here," Segs says. "You're going to get cold."
"You just want to cuddle," Tyler accuses without heat.
Segs doesn't deny it, and he cuddles close when Tyler kicks his pants off, lets his shirt drop to the floor, and gets under the covers with him.
*
They got in late enough that they sleep through Christine taking Amanda to school and don't wake up until midmorning. Tyler's sticking to his no making out until after they've brushed their teeth rule, but he nuzzles at Segs' neck when he starts making waking up noises.
"Mmm," Segs says. He tilts his head, and Tyler follows the movement, biting at his neck as it becomes open to him. "Afternoon practice?"
"Yes." Tyler runs a hand down Segs' chest. "Plenty of time."
"Good." Segs stretches under Tyler's hand and then rolls onto his side and opens his eyes. "Hey."
Tyler smiles at him, just short of a laugh. "Hey."
Segs tilts his head. "Go back to what you were doing. That was good."
Tyler does laugh then, softly, and he strokes Segs' chest while he nuzzles at his neck and jaw.
He slides his hand lower after a while, under the waistband of Segs' boxer briefs, and he takes Segs' cock in a loose grip. It's just as lazy and unhurried as last night, and after a little while Segs gets his hand on Tyler's cock and they jerk each other off in a slow, easy rhythm. Segs isn't even loud when he comes, just sighs and flexes his hand around Tyler.
Tyler bites into Segs' neck when he comes a couple of minutes later.
Segs stretches again, only a little more awake than earlier. "That's a way better way to wake up than an alarm."
"Not always practical." Tyler reaches for his phone to see just what time it is, and then remembers that it's still in the pocket of his pants on the floor and he has to get out of bed to get to it.
It's not too late - he turns the phone so Segs can see when he demands it - so Tyler leaves Segs in bed and gets in the shower.
Segs is still there when he gets out.
"Lazy ass," Tyler says.
Segs doesn't bother to deny it, and he wolf whistles when Tyler tosses his towel on the foot of the bed and turns around to get clean clothes out of the closet.
"Are you getting up?"
Segs crosses his arms behind his head. "I'm enjoying the show."
Tyler raises his eyebrows. "I'm getting less naked by the second."
Segs' frank appraisal makes Tyler's cock twitch even though it's too soon for him to get it up again. "You're hotter than you think you are."
Part 3
Tyler gets traded to Boston on a Wednesday morning when Amanda's four. They already have his bag packed, so he gets a few minutes to say goodbye to the guys, and then he's no longer a Flyer. He doesn't have to be in Boston until the morning and Amanda's at preschool, so he goes home and sits down with Christine.
"You don't have to move," he says, "if you don't want to, but I need you to come with us at least until Amanda gets settled in and I can hire a new nanny."
Christine's traveled with them before, so she's okay with that part of it. "Are we leaving today?"
"I am." Part of Tyler is already thinking about what he needs to pack and everything else he needs to do. "I'll pick Amanda up today and tell her about it. I want to let her finish out the week at school, and you two can come up this weekend." He rubs his hand over his face. "I don't even know what our schedule is, if I'm even going to be there."
Christine gives him the kind of unimpressed look that makes her a great nanny. "So go find out." She looks past him at the clock on the cable box. "You have an hour before you have to leave to pick up Amanda."
He adds the Bruins schedule to his phone - they're at home this weekend, so that's fine - and then he dials Segs while he pulls things out of his closet.
"I got traded to you," he says as soon as Segs picks up.
Segs lets out a whoop loud enough that Tyler cringes to have it in his ear. "Dude, this is awesome."
"Yeah," Tyler says, "awesome. Can we stay with you? Just for a while, until-"
"Of course you're staying with me," Segs says. "It'll be awesome, and Amanda already has her own room here." She does, because Segs bought a ridiculously large townhouse and made one of the rooms into a guest room just for Amanda even though Tyler, Amanda, and Christine only ever came through Boston a couple of times a year.
That's at least one of Tyler's worries taken care of, and they talk for a little longer while Tyler packs everything he thinks he's going to need for a while, until he can get someone in to move everything from the old house to Segs' place, or wherever they end up staying long-term in Boston. He gets mostly packed before he has to go get Amanda.
It's always gratifying to pick Amanda up from preschool. She positively beams at him and says, "Daddy, look what I made," and tries to simultaneously show him her picture and hold her arms up to be picked up.
He signs her out, admires her picture, and straps her into her car seat for the drive home. He waits until they're home and sitting at the table with lunch to tell her about the trade. She takes it better than he expected, even if it's not without a few tears.
There are more tears when he has to say goodbye, from both of them, and Tyler finally hugs Amanda tight, says, "You be good for Christine, and I'll see you on Saturday," and has to physically hand her to Christine.
*
It's really only been long enough to be like a long road trip when Amanda and Christine get into town and come to the rink on Saturday, but that's more than long enough that Tyler's really glad to get great big hugs from his little girl. He takes her on a tour of the rink, Christine trailing behind them while Amanda holds his hand and asks about everything they see. He ends the tour at the players' lounge, since that's where Segs is most likely to be.
Sure enough, they're barely through the door when Amanda is tearing herself away from him and flinging herself at Segs. "Uncle Tyler!"
"Ladybug!" Segs barely has time to set his Gatorade down before Amanda crashes into him and he lifts her easily into his arms.
Amanda flings her arms around his neck and holds on so tight Tyler starts to worry about Segs' ability to breathe. "We went on a airplane."
"You did," Segs says. "Was that fun?"
"I had a coloring book," Amanda says. Then her lip trembles. "I left all my friends." And then she bursts into tears.
Segs cups her head and lets her cry into his shoulder. "I know, baby."
Tyler can tell which of the guys have kids and which ones don't; the ones without kids look way more freaked out. One of the rookies looks like his eyes are about to bug out of his head.
Segs just lets her cry, until she's down to hiccupping out the last sobs, and then he takes the Kleenex Christine holds out to him and gets Amanda to blow her nose.
"Moving is always a little scary, huh?" Segs says, and Amanda nods a little against his shoulder. "You get to stay with me, though. You always like that."
Amanda nods again, and she's completely stopped crying.
"Did you see Marshall before you came to the rink?"
That gets a smile out of her. "He licked my face!"
"He licked your face?" Segs leans close, like he's telling her a secret. "He does that to me too. Those are doggy kisses."
Amanda giggles, and then her eyes go wide. "I get to see Marshall every day."
Segs grins at her. "Yes, you do. Every single day."
Amanda flings herself forward, practically strangling Segs again. "Every day!"
Segs's grin is almost as big as hers. "That's right, baby." He looks around the room, where the guys who aren't staring at him are starting to filter out. "Daddy and I have to go get ready for practice now, but we're going to see you right after."
"I want to skate!"
"Not on a game day, Ladybug. Next day off, we'll go skating, okay?"
Amanda pouts, but she also nods. "Okay."
"Good. Now, big kisses, and then you have to go with Christine." Segs turns his cheek to get a sloppy kiss from Amanda and kisses both her cheeks, her forehead, and the top of her head before he hands her to Christine.
"I'm a big girl," Amanda says, squirming until Christine puts her down. "I can walk."
Tyler crouches down to hug her. "Be good for Christine."
Amanda hugs him back and says, "Be good for Coach."
There's a muffled ripple of laughter from the guys still hanging around that turns into outright laughter when Christine and Amanda leave.
"Jesse owes me a hundred bucks," Segs says as they make their way down to the locker room.
Tyler asks, "Why's that?" even though he knows from the smirk on Segs' face that he might not want to know the answer.
"He bet you'd cry about the trade before she did."
Tyler shoves a laughing Segs into the wall, and keeps walking, but braces himself so he doesn't get knocked down when Segs jogs to catch up with him and leaps onto his back.
*
They're all used to living together during the summer, and that means getting used to living together during the season is easy enough. Tyler spends a lot of time with Amanda when he's home, and Segs settles right into joining in whatever they're doing. Having a third adult in the house means Christine gets more time off, which she seems to like, and she agrees to stay with them in Boston.
Amanda spends hours playing with an unbelievably patient Marshall, demands to be taken skating at least twice a week, and makes friends at her new preschool.
Tyler's a little tense for the first couple of weeks, but he relaxes as Amanda does, and he figures this trade might actually work out well for them.
*
Of course, Amanda's calm could only last so long, and the morning it breaks is a morning Tyler and Segs have to leave for a road trip.
"No." Amanda crosses her arms over her chest. "I don't want you to go."
"I have to, baby." Tyler crouches down next to her chair. "We'll be back in a few days, and Christine is going to take care of you while we're gone."
"No!" Amanda turns away from him. "I don't want Christine to take care of me."
They've been on so many road trips, and Tyler really thought they were past the days of Amanda's temper tantrums about it.
Tyler puts his hand on Amanda's shoulder and leaves it there even when she tries to shrug it off. "Can I get hugs and kisses before I go?"
"No." Amanda's starting to sound more teary than mad. "I don't want you to go!"
"I know, baby." Tyler puts his arms around her and kisses the top of her head. "I love you. We'll be back in a few days. Be good for Christine."
He switches places with Segs, who puts his arms around Amanda and says, "I want lots of ladybug hugs when we get home." He kisses the top of her head too. "Love you, Ladybug."
It's hell walking out of the house with Amanda's sniffles behind them, but Tyler makes himself put one foot in front of the other and follow Segs out to the car.
When they get to the rink, Krejci throws one arm around each of their shoulders and says, "What's up with you two?" It draws more attention than Tyler really wants.
"I know that look," Marchy says. "You're only as happy as your least happy child, right?"
Segs leans around Krejci to give Tyler a look he's too stressed out to be able to figure out right now.
Tyler ducks out of Krejci's hold and goes over to talk to Marchy without having everyone listen in. "Amanda freaked out about us leaving this morning. We go on roadtrips all the time."
"Kids." Marchy shrugs. "It happens. All three of mine all freak out about it sometimes." And his oldest is pretty old, for a kid, and also a stepkid.
"What do you do about it?"
"Play hockey," Marchy says. "Call home, tell them I love them." Marchy claps him on the shoulder. "It'll be better next time."
Tyler can't do anything but trust him, and Marchy has three kids' worth of experience to draw on, so he takes his usual seat on the bus to the airport and does his best not to let it take him too far away from the experience of traveling with his team.
It slams into him when they get to the hotel, and on the way in, Segs nudges him in the side and says, "I gave the rookies my key to fight over. I'm sharing with you."
It's probably good; he wasn't going to stop thinking about it once they were quiet and settled anyway, and this way at least he won't be totally stuck in his head. Segs doesn't really look any happier than he does though, but they're close enough that they can be in bad moods at each other and come out okay on the other side.
Segs also doesn't bug him when he takes a nap instead of hanging out, even if he does bug him about going out for dinner.
"You can't just sit here and sulk," Segs says. His mouth tightens into a thin line. "I'm not, and I'm not going to let you either."
Tyler wasn't the only one Amanda wouldn't hug goodbye, so he lets Segs drag him out for dinner with a bunch of the other guys.
His phone buzzes with Amanda's bedtime reminder while they're still ordering drinks. He takes it outside; there's a bench halfway down the block that he heads for while he dials.
Christine picks up and says, "She calmed down later."
Tyler lets out a breath. "Good. How's she doing now?"
"Just fine. We were getting ready for bed." She raises her voice a little. "Amanda, do you want to say goodnight to Daddy?"
Tyler can hear Amanda's enthusiastic agreement in the background before she takes the phone and says, "Hi, Daddy."
"Hi, sweetheart. How was your day?"
"Okay."
"Yeah? What did you do?"
Instead of answering his question, Amanda says, "Daddy, I miss you."
"I miss you too. I'll be back in a week." Tyler looks up at the footsteps coming his way and scoots down the bench a little so there's room for Segs to sit next to him.
"That's forever."
Tyler smiles at the way she drags out the syllables. "I know it feels like that."
Segs nudges him in the shoulder and makes a gesture for the phone.
It feels a little like ducking out of the conversation, but Tyler says, "Do you want to talk to Uncle Tyler?"
"Yes!"
Tyler passes the phone over, and listens to Segs' side of the conversation as he somehow gets Amanda to tell him about her day.
"It's almost bedtime for you," Segs finally says. "I'm going to give the phone back to Daddy so you can say goodnight to him." He smiles at whatever Amanda says. "I love you too, Ladybug. Goodnight."
Segs doesn't leave, just leans his shoulder against Tyler's while Amanda says, "Daddy, I drawed you a picture today."
"Did you?"
"Yes!"
"You can have Christine take a picture for me before you go to bed."
"Yeah," Amanda says. "I want you to tuck me in."
"I can't tonight," Tyler says. "But I'll have Christine give you extra hugs and kisses for me, okay?"
Amanda's agreeing, "Okay," is only a little sulky.
"I love you."
"I love you too."
"Goodnight, baby. Give the phone to Christine."
"Night, Daddy."
Christine says, "Go pick out a story," to Amanda before she says, "She's okay," to Tyler.
"Yeah, I guess." Tyler rubs his forehead. "I told her you'd give her extra hugs and kisses for me, and send me a picture of what she drew."
"Will do."
Tyler does have absolute faith in Christine's abilities, so that helps, a little. He turns his phone off and leans back against the bench. Segs shifts with him, so they're pressed together shoulder to shoulder.
"Do you remember," Segs asks, "when she was a baby and we'd just watch her sleep?"
Tyler closes his eyes. "Yeah. We could do that for hours. Hard to believe that was four years ago." He can feel Segs' eyes on him even though Segs doesn't say anything. "What?"
"Do you ever want more kids?"
Tyler opens his eyes and looks at Segs, who shrugs at him.
"You never said. When you had Amanda, you just said you wanted to be a dad."
"I am a dad now," Tyler says. "I don't really think about it. Amanda's my baby. I don't need another one."
Segs looks at him for a little longer, and then elbows him in the side and stands up. "Come on. It's cold out here and those assholes probably ordered without us."
*
They go out for drinks after dinner, since they're out of town. Tyler stopped drinking much when Amanda was born, and his tolerance is for shit now, so he sticks to just two beers and the shot Segs insists he take.
Segs drinks to just below the level where he's likely to do something embarrassing, which is still enough that Tyler hooks his shoulder under Segs' arm to help him back to their room. He shoves Segs into the bathroom first to brush his teeth and drink a bunch of water, and then they switch places, and Tyler comes out of the bathroom to find Segs in the bed that's supposed to be his.
"Stealing my bed is not cool."
"Not stealing." Segs holds up the covers. "Sharing."
Tyler rolls his eyes and goes to the other bed.
"Dude," Segs says, "don't make me get up and get in bed with you over there. I'll do it," he adds when Tyler hesitates.
"You're a real pain in my ass." Tyler gets into bed, turns off the light, and lets Segs maneuver them around so Segs is spooning him. "Really?"
"Shhh," Segs says. "You had a bad day."
"I'm not a four-year-old you can cuddle into feeling better. And it didn't work on the four-year-old this morning either."
Segs' sigh is a gust of breath on the back of his neck. "Stop worrying. She loves you, and she knows you love her."
Tyler thinks about the way she turned away from him before they left. "She was so mad."
"She's four," Segs says. "She'll get over it." He snuggles into Tyler the same way Tyler's seen him pull Amanda closer. "Anyone who talks to you for five minutes knows how much you love her. She knows."
Despite Tyler hassling Segs about it, being held is weirdly comforting, and he holds on to Segs' certainty that Amanda knows how much he loves her and lets that and Segs' warmth lull him into sleep.
*
Tyler texts Christine when they land at Logan so she knows when to expect them back. Amanda still sounded sad about them being gone, but she dealt with it better as the week went on. That doesn't mean Tyler's any less excited to see her. It has him smiling when they get off the bus at the rink. A short car ride and they'll be home.
"Daddy!"
Tyler looks up from his attempt to fish the car keys out of his bag as he walks, and gives it up so he can catch Amanda when she runs into him.
"Hi, baby." Tyler scoops her up and holds her as tightly as he can without hurting her.
Amanda buries her face in his neck. "Daddy, Daddy, I missed you."
"Oh, baby, I missed you too."
Amanda pulls back to place a sloppy kiss on his cheek. "You're home!"
Tyler's face hurts with how hard he's smiling. "Yep. Let's go home."
"What about me?" Segs asks. "Don't I get ladybug hugs too?"
Amanda says, "Yes," and holds her arms out to him. Tyler lets Segs take her and finds the keys while they walk to where Christine is waiting for them.
"We took a cab," she says, "so we can ride back with you."
Tyler and Segs dump their bags into the back of the car, and Segs says, "Give me the keys. I'll drive, and you can sit in the back with the ladybug."
They make the exchange, keys for Amanda, and Tyler says, "Thanks."
Segs squeezes his shoulder. "Four years," he says, "and you're still all starry-eyed."
*
Amanda scrunches up her face on the verge of a tantrum when Tyler says, "Bedtime." Tyler doesn't give in to it and starts calmly putting the toy cars he's been racing with her into their box. "We'll still be here tomorrow. It's time to clean up."
His calm, or his praying for her to stay calm, works, and she dumps toys into the toybox and goes with him for her bath and to brush her teeth. Tyler lets her pick out a book, and Segs comes in to sit on the floor next to her bed while Tyler reads and Amanda points out the pictures.
"Another one," Amanda demands when they get to the end of the book.
"What do you say?"
"Please?"
Tyler kisses the top of her head. "Okay, but only one more, and then it's time to sleep." He doesn't let her get out of bed and run across the room for it herself, but Segs goes over to her bookshelf and holds up books until she says, "That one!"
She falls asleep before Tyler even gets halfway through the book. He carefully shifts her off his lap onto the bed and puts both books on the shelf while Segs leans his head against the edge of the bed and watches her sleep.
Tyler holds out a hand to pull Segs up, and they quietly leave the room and close the door most of the way behind them.
"You could have let me watch her sleep," Segs says.
"I didn't want you falling asleep on her floor." Tyler yawns, and chuckles a little when it makes Segs yawn too. "I think it's bedtime for us too."
"Glamorous life of a hockey player."
Tyler checks in with Christine to let her know they're going to bed, and then he takes a quick shower to wash off the lingering feel of travel. Sometimes he thinks it never quite goes away, but a night in his own bed with his baby girl just down the hall helps make everything feel normal again.
What's not normal is Segs in his bed.
"Do I even want to know what you're doing here?" Tyler pulls on his pajama pants and a t-shirt and sets an alarm on his phone before he gets into bed.
Segs turns over and moves around until his back is against Tyler's chest. "You're not the only one who gets lonely and sad about traveling all the time."
Tyler knows Segs' penchant for cuddling well enough that he doesn't even bother trying to kick him out. He just puts his arm over Segs and makes himself comfortable.
He thinks Segs is falling asleep - he is - so it's something of a surprise when Segs says, "Remember that time in Plymouth?"
There are a lot of times he could be referring to, but pressed together in the dark, Tyler knows which one he means. He means the time Tyler's billets were out and Segs came over and they made out on Tyler's bed for a couple of hours.
"Yes."
Segs is quiet for long enough that Tyler thinks that's it, but then Segs' hand finds his arm in the dark, and his fingers are hot against Tyler's skin. "We never did that again."
They didn't. Segs went home to his own billets before curfew, they didn't talk about it, and it didn't happen again, even though Tyler had thought about it sometimes. A couple of weeks later, though, he'd started hanging out with a girl who worked concessions at the rink, and Tyler didn't really think about that time he made out with Segs anymore.
"No."
Segs sighs a little and Tyler's not sure what he's supposed to be getting out of this conversation.
Segs holds tight to his arm. "Whatever," he says, not like he's dismissing it, but like he's letting them out of the conversation. "Go to sleep."
Tyler lies awake and listens to Segs' breathing in the dark until sometime after Segs falls asleep.
*
Tyler's alarm goes off too early, and he stumbles out of bed and into the shower so he can be at least a little awake to get Amanda up. She crinkles up her face when he goes in to wake her up, but then she opens her eyes and smiles at him.
"Daddy."
"Good morning, sweetheart." Tyler kisses her cheek. "Ready to get up and have breakfast?"
Amanda puts her arms around his neck, and he carries her out to the kitchen where he slices half a banana into a bowl of Cheerios and sits across from her and lets her talk to him about her friends at preschool in between bites.
He wipes her face with a napkin and supervises while she washes her hands and picks out clothes for the day. It means an interesting combination of purple pants and a bright yellow Bruins shirt, but Tyler's trying to let her learn to make her own decisions, and he's seen worse things at her preschool and amongst her friends.
It's only when he's buckling her into her carseat that she asks, "Where's Christine?"
"I'm home today," Tyler tells her, "so she's taking the day off. I'll come pick you up too." He closes the door and goes around the car to get into the driver's seat.
"And Uncle Tyler too?"
Tyler smiles at her hopeful face in the rearview mirror. "I don't know. I'll tell him you want him to come, and maybe he will."
That satisfies her, and then she asks for the playlist Segs made for her, so they listen to mostly kid appropriate dance music all the way to her school.
Amanda holds his hand and stays with him all the way into the school where he signs her in and bends down to hug her.
"I love you, Daddy."
"I love you too. Go have fun, and I'll see you in a couple of hours." Tyler kisses her cheek and watches her run off to join some of the other kids before he leaves.
The house is mostly quiet when he gets home, but he can hear a shower going somewhere, so he makes enough breakfast for two. He guessed right, and it's Segs who comes into the kitchen and leans on the counter while Tyler finishes making breakfast.
"Amanda wants you to come with to pick her up from school," Tyler tells him.
Segs nods. "Cool. We getting her after skate?"
"Yeah. I was thinking we could take her out for lunch. Christine's off today."
"Sounds good to me. Then we can all have naptime." Segs punctuates this with a yawn.
They eat at the table and move around each other easily to rinse the dishes and put them in the dishwasher.
"Did you want to do it again?" Tyler asks before Segs can wander off somewhere else.
Segs isn't his best in the morning, so Tyler has to wait for him to catch up. "Oh," Segs says. "Yeah. I mean, it was the hottest thing that had ever happened to me, and then it just didn't ever happen again."
Happened to him. Tyler remembers Segs being just as active a participant as Tyler was. Segs has always been hot, and it was one of the hottest things Tyler had ever done too. Even if this turns out to be a bad idea, he and Segs are always going to be solid, so he crosses the kitchen and kisses Segs.
Segs makes a surprised noise into his mouth, and then he kisses back, and it's good. He's gotten better at this over the years, and he walks them back a little until Tyler's back is against the fridge, magnets pressing into him and Amanda's drawings crinkling under them.
Tyler gets his hands up the back of Segs' shirt, and Segs makes hungry little noises into his mouth. It's not tame. It's messy and wet and they're both hard, but it doesn't go any farther than that.
Tyler puts his hands on Segs' chest after a while and looks at the clock over Segs' shoulder. "We have skate in forty-five minutes. And Christine is here somewhere."
Segs rest his head on Tyler's shoulder for a few seconds before he pushes himself off. "Leave in fifteen?"
"Yeah." That'll give them enough time to get to the rink and suit up and still make it onto the ice on time. And it's probably going to take that long for his erection to go down. If he doesn't jerk off first.
*
They go straight from the rink to Amanda's school, and Segs gets out of the car to come in with Tyler. Tyler stops to check in with one of the teachers while he signs Amanda out. Amanda notices them while he's doing that and runs over with a piece of paper in one hand.
"Uncle Tyler, look what I drawed for you!"
Segs crouches down and holds the other side of Amanda's drawing.
"That's you and me and Daddy and Christine and Marshall."
"It's beautiful. I love it. Thank you, Ladybug." Segs takes it from her. "Can you go get your coat?"
Amanda runs off and comes back with her coat. They have to wait for her to get it zipped up, and then Tyler waves goodbye to the teachers and follows Segs and Amanda out to the car. Segs takes the keys, and Tyler buckles Amanda into her car seat.
"We're taking you out to lunch," Tyler tells Amanda. "Do you want a sandwich or do you want dumplings?"
They wait for her to consider her options. "Can I have french fries?"
Tyler says, "With your sandwich," and Segs starts the car. There's a place they like that's not too far away, and the waitress smiles at them and brings crayons and paper for Amanda to draw on.
Before Amanda can get too involved in her coloring, Tyler asks her, "What kind of jam do you want on your sandwich?" He sometimes orders her the grilled cheese, but peanut butter and jelly seems healthier if he's also letting her have fries.
"Ra-berry."
Tyler glances at the menu to make sure raspberry is an option. "Raspberry it is." The kids' sandwiches come with carrot slices, which he wants her to eat, so instead of substituting, he orders a side of fries for the three of them to share.
Tyler and Segs talk about practice and tomorrow's game while Amanda amuses herself with the crayons and asks a question about their lines that has Segs drawing her a diagram on the back of her paper.
When their food comes, Tyler puts a handful of fries and some ketchup on Amanda's plate and moves the plate of fries out of her reach.
Amanda gets peanut butter and jelly and ketchup all over her face and hands - Tyler is still baffled by how much of a mess she can make just in the process of eating, even though his parents say he was the same way - and Tyler does his best to clean her up with napkins before their waitress brings over a couple of wet wipes in tiny foil packets. Tyler vetoes dessert and makes sure Segs leaves a really good tip when he gets to the check before Tyler does.
Amanda's almost asleep by the time they get home. She fusses for a minute when Tyler takes her to her room, but she falls asleep almost the moment he puts her to bed.
Tyler goes to his own room for a nap. He's not quite sure what he's going to find, but his bed is empty and Segs' door is closed.
*
Their evening is normal. Segs makes dinner and Tyler builds Lego structures with Amanda. They watch an episode of Wild Animal Baby Explorers, which sends Amanda to her room to drag out a small stack of books of animal pictures that they turn slowly while she points out things about the animals and Tyler and Segs take turns reading her their names and the facts about them that go with the pictures.
Amanda goes to bed easily, but it takes them reading through four books before she falls asleep clutching at the edge of Tyler's shirt where he sits on the edge of her bed. He carefully gets himself free without waking her, and Segs keeps his amusement to a silent grin.
Tyler and Segs watch a couple of episodes of grown-up TV off the DVR and go to bed early. Or Tyler means to go to bed early. He brushes his teeth and changes into pajamas, and then gets pushed into his bed by Segs.
"You have your own room."
"You're not in it." Segs climbs in with him, and instead of tucking himself into Tyler in whatever way he wants to cuddle, he kisses him. They're both lying on their sides, and they're not cuddled together, just kissing with one of Segs' arms thrown over his shoulders.
It's tame, not that there isn't tongue, because there so is, but it's not like this morning. At least it's not until Segs rolls him over and climbs on top of him. Then it's a lot more like this morning, and Tyler gets his hands under Segs' shirt because fuck if he's not going to get to touch all of that if they're doing this.
Segs has to agree with him, because he gets shirt off without moving away from Tyler hardly at all, and he groans into Tyler's mouth when Tyler gets his hands all over him.
Segs doesn't leave him hanging, either. He grinds down into Tyler, and they're both hard, and fuck, there are no billets they have to listen out for, just Amanda, and she's asleep.
"You locked the door, right?" Tyler asks.
"Yes." Segs bites Tyler's lip. "Are you seriously thinking about that right now?"
Tyler puts his hands on Segs' ass and pulls down. "I don't want to stop, and we'll have to if Amanda wakes up."
Segs groans and grips Tyler's shoulders. "Oh my God, that's not going to happen. Shut up and just." He stops talking and rubs against Tyler while he kisses him. It's even hotter than it was the time in Plymouth.
Tyler turns them over after a while, because he's just as into this as Segs is, and there's no reason Segs should get the monopoly on grinding down into him. Segs takes advantage of it and tugs Tyler's shirt off, and fuck, why didn't he think of that earlier? With both their shirts off, there's a lot more skin on skin. Segs is still making noise into his mouth, and every time Tyler pulls back at all, he can see that he's leaving beard burn all over Segs' face. It's so hot he works on kissing Segs' neck to spread it over more of his skin.
"Can we?" Segs asks, and he pulls Tyler's pajama pants and boxer briefs down off his hips.
Tyler hisses at how much closer his cock is to Segs' this way, and he lets Segs turn them over again. They get in each other's way when they both try to get at Segs' pajama pants at the same time, but it only takes a frantic moment before they're out of the way and Segs is rubbing his cock against Tyler with nothing between them.
Segs groans, and Tyler puts a hand over his mouth.
"Shhh. You have to be quiet." There's Amanda, and Christine wasn't home when they went to bed, but she might be now.
Segs bites him, lightly, but Tyler still takes his hand away.
"I don't know if I can be," Segs says. "This is so fucking hot."
"I know." Tyler kisses him, and gets his hands on Segs' ass, which is even better without anything covering it. "But try. Fuck." He mouths at Segs' jaw where it's red from the rub of Tyler's stubble.
"Fuck," Segs echoes, and he tilts his head up so Tyler can get at his neck.
Tyler scrapes his cheek over the thin skin of Segs' neck, and mouths at it. Segs would probably let him leave a hickey, but he doesn't suck that hard. He does dig his fingers into Segs' ass a little harder, and it takes a second, but he gets Segs to move so they're lined up better.
Segs gets loud, and he kisses Tyler before Tyler even moves a hand away from his ass to make him be quiet. It's not really quiet, but it's quieter with Segs making noise into his mouth.
Tyler opens his mouth to Segs, takes in the sound, and rubs up against him. He doesn't know how long they do that. It could be minutes, could be hours. It all just collapses into now, into making out so much his mouth feels swollen, into Segs' hands touching him, into their cocks hard between them.
Tyler's surprised when he comes. He shouldn't be - they're naked and hard and rubbing up against each other - but he is. Because they didn't go this far before, probably.
His brain fuzzes out into just pleasure, and he bites Segs' lip when he's trying not to be too loud about it.
"Come on," Segs is saying when there's more than just emptiness in Tyler's head. "Come on, just, please."
It's too much to have Segs grinding on his softening dick, but Tyler only pushes him away far enough to get his hand on Segs' cock, and he jerks him off with fast, sharp strokes.
"Yeah," Segs mutters, "yeah," and Tyler kisses him to keep him quiet. It's a good thing too, because even then his yell when he comes is pretty loud.
Tyler keeps jerking him off until Segs pushes his hand away, and then Segs pretty much collapses on him and they keep kissing for long enough that it's pretty gross when Segs rolls off him.
Tyler makes a face at the mess and grabs at the Kleenex on the nightstand. It doesn't do a whole lot to make it better, but it's enough that he can pull his clothes on and be comfortable enough to sleep.
Segs has his own handful of tissue, and he doesn't put his shirt back on, just his pants. He looks at Tyler for a minute, and then says, "Roll over. I'll be the big spoon."
Tyler rolls his eyes but lets Segs do what he wants. "I'm not so freaked out I need to be cuddled into submission."
"Submission," Segs snickers. "Kinky."
"Asshole. Shut up and go to sleep." He thinks for a minute that it's going to work, but he should know better; it doesn't work any better on Segs than it does on Amanda when she doesn't want to go to bed, and it probably wouldn't even if he were as nice about it as he is with Amanda.
"No, but really," Segs says, and Tyler can tell from his tone that it's a real question, "we're cool?"
"Yes, Tyler." Tyler reaches his hand back and pats some part of Segs he doesn't bother trying to identify. "We're good. That was good."
"Good," Segs says. He apparently takes that as license to get even more handsy, because instead of just throwing his arm around Tyler, he gets his hand up under Tyler's shirt, and he kisses the back of Tyler's neck and then stays so close Tyler can feel it every time he breathes.
Tyler doesn't stop him. It doesn't bother him, is nice, even, and there's pretty much nothing of him left that Segs hasn't already touched.
*
Tyler wakes up early, and it doesn't seem weird at all to have Segs in bed with him. He'd consider morning sex, but Segs is still out cold, and doesn't wake up when Tyler nudges him a little. Segs moves when Tyler gets out of bed, but only to roll over a little and smash his face into Tyler's pillow.
Tyler leaves him to it and jerks off in the shower.
Christine already has Amanda up when Tyler leaves his room, and they're in the kitchen where Christine is making Amanda's breakfast while Amanda leans on the table with both elbows and watches her.
"Good morning, baby." Tyler kisses the top of Amanda's head and goes to the fridge for some juice.
"Good morning, Daddy." Amanda turns to watch him but still seems a little sleepy.
Tyler says, "Morning," to Christine too, and pours two glasses of juice. He puts the smaller, plastic one in front of Amanda. She wraps both hands around it and drinks carefully, then puts it down and pushes it out of the way when Christine gives her a bowl of cereal.
"Skate and a game today?" Christine asks.
"Yep." Tyler sits down next to Amanda and watches her eat. "Skate's late enough that I can take Amanda to school."
"Can I watch your game?" Amanda asks through a mouthful of cereal.
"Don't talk with your mouth full," Tyler reminds her. "You can watch the beginning, but you still have to go to bed on time."
Amanda very obviously finishes swallowing her next bite of cereal before she says, "Kay."
Tyler finishes his juice while Amanda eats, and he gets her dressed and ready for school. She's not very chatty on the way there, but she hugs Tyler tight and then runs off to her friends after he signs her in, so it's probably just a quiet morning.
Segs is in the kitchen when Tyler gets home, bleary-eyed and shirtless, with his hair everywhere and eggs on the stove.
Tyler nudges him out of the way. "You're going to burn something." He takes over the eggs and lets Segs make their protein shakes.
"Christine went back to bed," Segs mumbles, so Tyler only gets down two plates.
He throws some bread in the toaster, divvies it and the eggs onto the plates, and carries them to the table. Segs brings the protein shakes, and Tyler gets forks. If Segs is having a morning when he doesn't want to wake up, it's probably better not to let him go rummaging through a drawer full of sharp objects.
They don't talk while they eat, but Segs seems more awake by the time they're done. Awake enough that Tyler makes him put his own dishes away. And then awake enough to corner Tyler against the counter and kiss him.
Tyler lets it go on for a minute before he pushes Segs away. "Gross, dude. Go brush your teeth."
Segs makes a face at him. "You said we were good."
"We're good when you're not making me taste your morning breath. Go brush your teeth."
Instead of doing that, Segs leans his forehead on Tyler's shoulder. He says, "Game day," and Tyler knows what he means; game day means they have routines to observe and things to do, and making out isn't on the list.
Tyler cups the back of Segs' head for a moment. He'd rather make out too. "Next time brush your teeth first."
Segs makes that same face at him again. "You've become really boring."
Tyler laughs and shoves him away. "I get enough gross in my life with a preschooler and hockey. I don't need it from you too."
Segs wanders off. To his own room, Tyler finds when he goes to get ready for practice and his room is empty. That's fine; they have game day routines to take care of. They go to skate, have lunch at home with Amanda, take naps, and head back to the rink.
They win, and Tyler tries to get out of going out with the other guys after the game, but Segs wraps an arm around his shoulder and gets Marchy to hem him in on the other side.
"The ladybug's asleep anyway," Segs says. "And Christine's there. And you never come out with us. You're coming."
There are times, Tyler has learned, that it's better to just give in, and this is one of those times.
He doesn't drink much, but Segs does, enough to hang all over Tyler on the way home, and enough that Tyler has to remind him to be quiet so they don't wake Amanda and Christine up.
Tyler tries to drop Segs in a bed, but he insists on clinging to Tyler while he looks in on Amanda. At least he doesn't wake her up, even if he does bury his face in Tyler's shoulder and say, muffled enough that Tyler can barely hear him, "I can't believe how big she is."
Tyler backs them out of the doorway, closes the door as quietly as possible, and pats Segs' shoulder. "All right, dude, you're wasted. Time for bed."
"Your bed," Segs insists, so Tyler takes Segs with him into his room and makes him hang up his suit before he crawls into bed.
Tyler turns around from taking off his own suit to find that Segs has been watching him.
"I'm not too drunk to get it up," Segs says, and as if to prove it, he's rubbing himself through his boxer briefs. "Come here. I'll blow you."
"You don't need to get it up to blow me," Tyler says. He locks the door, though, and lets Segs manhandle him down onto the bed in the position most comfortable for Segs. Segs' idea of a blowjob, or at least what he can manage while drunk, is messy and sloppy and very, very wet. It's also louder than Tyler would have guessed Segs could be with his mouth mostly full of cock. Still, a blowjob is a blowjob, and it's hot even beyond that, and Segs swallows when Tyler comes, which is almost as hot as the rest of it.
Segs kisses him after, which isn't as gross as it could be, although Segs is still pretty sloppy.
"You should blow me now," Segs says, and Tyler would be willing to, but if Segs couldn't stay quiet while he was sucking Tyler off, he doesn't have a lot of faith in his ability to be quiet while on the other side of things.
Tyler kisses him and gets his cock out, and Segs whines into his mouth and goes with it.
That only lasts so long before Segs pushes him away and says, "No, wait. I wanted you to blow me."
Tyler considers it for a second, and then he puts his hand over Segs' mouth and twists so he can keep it there while he gets his mouth on Segs' cock. It's almost not enough, and he has to resort to sticking his fingers in Segs' mouth to keep him quiet when he comes.
Segs moans a little when Tyler takes his mouth off of his cock and his hand away from his mouth, and he grabs at Tyler before Tyler can even think about getting cleaned up or putting on pajamas.
"No, no," Segs says. "You have to come here. Fuck, that was so good." He wraps himself around Tyler like an octopus, and Tyler has to resort to a little creative movement to get them under the blankets.
"So good," Segs mutters into his neck.
"So drunk," Tyler says, and Segs barks out a laugh.
"Both," he says, and it's not like Tyler disagrees with that.
*
Tyler doesn't expect much from Segs in the morning, and he doesn't get it. Segs isn't even up when he gets back from taking Amanda to school. Christine is still hanging around, so Tyler eats breakfast with her and then decides that second game day in a row or not, he's going back to bed.
Segs barely moves when Tyler gets into bed with him, but he's annoying as fuck when he manages to kick Tyler trying to get up when his alarm goes off later.
"You're a disaster," Tyler mutters at him. "You deserve every bit of your hangover."
Segs groans, and Tyler looks up to watch him stretch. "No," Segs says, "I feel good." Tyler flips him off, and Segs laughs. "Win, drinks with the boys, blowjob." Segs crawls back into bed and presses a long but close-mouthed kiss to Tyler's lips. "We should do that again today."
Tyler puts one arm around Segs as he sits up, so he doesn't knock him all the way off the bed. "All right, cowboy, go get ready for practice."
"Cowboy?" Segs laughs. "Really?"
"You kicked me awake," Tyler says.
"Poor baby. Want me to kiss it better?" Segs makes a kissy face at him, and this time Tyler does shove him off the bed. Segs is enough of an athlete to keep himself from falling totally on his ass, and he leaves the room still laughing.
*
They lose, which means they don't go out after the game and they're both in bad moods when they get home. Tyler has to catch the front door to keep it from slamming when Segs pushes at it too hard. Segs makes a face at him that's what passes for apology when he's in that kind of mood. Tyler just pushes him farther into the house.
He checks in on Amanda and isn't surprised when his room is empty and Segs' door is closed.
*
Tyler's not expecting much the next morning either, but when he gets Amanda up, Segs is already in the kitchen making breakfast. He gives Amanda a small plate of eggs and a single slice of bacon and makes up larger plates for himself, Tyler, and Christine.
"We can pick up Amanda from school after practice," Segs tells Christine. "We don't have to be back at the rink until five."
Tyler keeps an eye on Amanda, but she's too involved with the relative novelty of eggs for breakfast to have noticed that they're talking about a travel day instead of a game day.
Christine takes Amanda to get dressed after breakfast, and Segs and Tyler clear the table and put dishes in the dishwasher.
Tyler pushes Segs up against the counter when his hands are empty. Segs smiles at him, not his usual bright grin, but something smaller, something more like an invitation. Tyler spends a minute kissing it off his face before he steps away.
Segs says, "We could let Christine take the ladybug to school," but he doesn't try to keep Tyler from moving away.
Tyler squeezes Segs' hip. "Amanda will take a nap after lunch. You can jerk off and take your own car to the rink if you can't wait."
"I was ready to wait until you said that."
Tyler grins at him unrepentantly and isn't surprised to find that Segs is ready to leave when he and Amanda are.
*
Segs barely waits for Amanda to fall asleep for her nap before he's dragging Tyler into his room.
"Someday," Segs says while he's kissing Tyler and trying to get their clothes off, "we're going to do this when they aren't home and we can make all the noise we want."
Tyler pushes him away and strips, because it's not happening while they make out. "You're such a screamer you'd have to get rid of the whole block."
Segs pushes him down onto the bed. "I don't care if the neighbors hear me."
Tyler laughs and grabs his ass. "You get much louder and Christine's going to figure it out."
Segs groans and rolls his hips against Tyler's. "Stop talking about the nanny while I'm hard."
Tyler bites Segs' lip instead of talking, and Segs keeps himself quiet by kissing Tyler while they get off.
Tyler dozes with Segs still lying mostly on him, which makes for an uncomfortable couple of minutes when they separate and get up later.
"You know she's probably already figured it out," Segs says when they're cleaning up in the bathroom. "Christine. She lives with us."
"Yeah," Tyler admits, because Christine isn't stupid and they haven't been very careful about what they've been doing.
"Chill, dude." Segs bumps their shoulders together. "Christine's cool."
Tyler hopes so and, he thinks later, knowing they're hooking up is probably less of an issue in her life than having to deal with Amanda's unhappiness about their road trip.
*
They don't hook up on the road. Segs doesn't even worm his way into Tyler's room at any point, although he does show up when Tyler calls Amanda to take his turn talking to her. She's calmer this time around, and mostly happy to chatter away at them and laugh at Segs' preschooler-appropriate stories about the other guys.
It's only a two-game road trip anyway, and they get home to a quiet and dark house late after the second. Segs follows Tyler when he goes to check in on Amanda, and after Tyler closes the door to her room softly, he takes Segs' hand and pulls him into his room.
"Miss me?" Segs laughs when Tyler locks the door and pushes him toward the bed.
"Yes," Tyler says. He detours to the closet so they can get rid of their coats, and then he pushes Segs down onto the bed, follows him down, and kisses him.
Segs goes with it so easily. He wraps his arms around Tyler, doesn't try to move them at all, except to change the angle of the kiss.
They make out for a long time without doing anything else, until Segs twists his head to the side and yawns.
"Sorry, dude. Too much traveling."
Tyler rolls off of Segs. It's not like he's any less tired.
Segs wriggles out of his clothes, and Tyler's cock, which is already half-hard, twitches with interest, but he doesn't do anything about it, just watches Segs scoot up the bed and then under Tyler's covers.
"At least take your pants off and get in here," Segs says. "You're going to get cold."
"You just want to cuddle," Tyler accuses without heat.
Segs doesn't deny it, and he cuddles close when Tyler kicks his pants off, lets his shirt drop to the floor, and gets under the covers with him.
*
They got in late enough that they sleep through Christine taking Amanda to school and don't wake up until midmorning. Tyler's sticking to his no making out until after they've brushed their teeth rule, but he nuzzles at Segs' neck when he starts making waking up noises.
"Mmm," Segs says. He tilts his head, and Tyler follows the movement, biting at his neck as it becomes open to him. "Afternoon practice?"
"Yes." Tyler runs a hand down Segs' chest. "Plenty of time."
"Good." Segs stretches under Tyler's hand and then rolls onto his side and opens his eyes. "Hey."
Tyler smiles at him, just short of a laugh. "Hey."
Segs tilts his head. "Go back to what you were doing. That was good."
Tyler does laugh then, softly, and he strokes Segs' chest while he nuzzles at his neck and jaw.
He slides his hand lower after a while, under the waistband of Segs' boxer briefs, and he takes Segs' cock in a loose grip. It's just as lazy and unhurried as last night, and after a little while Segs gets his hand on Tyler's cock and they jerk each other off in a slow, easy rhythm. Segs isn't even loud when he comes, just sighs and flexes his hand around Tyler.
Tyler bites into Segs' neck when he comes a couple of minutes later.
Segs stretches again, only a little more awake than earlier. "That's a way better way to wake up than an alarm."
"Not always practical." Tyler reaches for his phone to see just what time it is, and then remembers that it's still in the pocket of his pants on the floor and he has to get out of bed to get to it.
It's not too late - he turns the phone so Segs can see when he demands it - so Tyler leaves Segs in bed and gets in the shower.
Segs is still there when he gets out.
"Lazy ass," Tyler says.
Segs doesn't bother to deny it, and he wolf whistles when Tyler tosses his towel on the foot of the bed and turns around to get clean clothes out of the closet.
"Are you getting up?"
Segs crosses his arms behind his head. "I'm enjoying the show."
Tyler raises his eyebrows. "I'm getting less naked by the second."
Segs' frank appraisal makes Tyler's cock twitch even though it's too soon for him to get it up again. "You're hotter than you think you are."
Part 3