His brow arched nearly to his hairline and he pursed his lips. "That's too gay even for me, Q." Alisha snorted and giggled behind her hand while Maggie just shook her head, fighting the urge to grin at him.
"God, look at the three of us," Maggie said. "Alisha's got a hot boyfriend she's serious about, you and Adam are getting married, I'm makin' babies…Face it, we're growing up, kids." Her eyes welled for what felt like the hundredth time that day.
"Maggie, I swear to god," Russell interrupted, holding up his hand. "I love you, but the tears are freaking me out. Take your pregnancy hormones and Louwer them into submission."
Alisha laughed.
Maggie frowned and cried again.
Russell smirked and sipped his juice.
… … …
It had been a few days since Big found out that his best friend was going to be a father. Of course his girlfriend had let that cat out of the bag and he was supposed to pretend he didn't know anything at all about it. It hadn't been that hard to do. James had been working and they had only texted a couple times throughout the week.
So when his buddy called him up and invited him out for pizza and beer, he was pretty sure the news was gonna drop then.
They were sitting in their favorite pizza joint and James was acting shifty, which was his tell that something big was going on. Big had just taken a huge bite when James blurted "Maggie's pregnant." He was slightly thankful he already knew that bit of info, otherwise the choking he could have experienced would have fucking sucked. "Hey, man—congrats!" he mumbled with a mouthful.
James cocked his head to the side and regarded his friend. "Dude, Alisha told you, didn't she?"
Big nodded, swallowing his pizza. "Yep. In her defense, I thought I was the one having a kid and she told me before I had a goddamn heart attack." James chuckled and Big smirked, taking a swig of his beer. "How d'you feel about all this? Pretty heavy stuff, bro."
The taller man shrugged as a smile stole across his face. "I was shocked at first, but now that it's sunk in, I'm excited, man. A little freaked, but mostly just excited."
Big still couldn't believe that his best friend was reproducing and happy about it. But whatever. He could be happy for him. "S'weird. You're gonna be someone's dad." That word hung heavily in the air around them.
James took a pull from his beer and nodded slightly. "Yeah."
It dawned on him then that James would get a chance to be something neither of them had growing up. He knew then that James would kick ass and take names in fatherhood because he would never want his child to go through what either of them did. "Think of all the cool shit we can teach your kid, dude."
James laughed and the two knocked their beer bottles together. That was the best endorsement James could have imagined from his best friend. He hoped that Big would take his other piece of news as well as he had the baby, but he wasn't holding his breath. "I have some other news," James said slowly.
Big grabbed another slice and took a huge bite, lifting a questioning brow.
"Remember how I told you about the fight Maggie and I had about my job?"
He swallowed his food and tried to ignore the weird feeling he had in his gut he knew had nothing to do with the pizza. "Yeah…"
"I'm quitting the department," James told him, dropping his eyes to the label on the beer bottle.
"Fuck you, man, don't joke about that. It's not funny."
"It's not a joke, Big," James said seriously.
His brows pinched together and he glowered across the table at his idiot best friend. "So Maggie flips her shit about the job and you're quitting? You gonna chop off your balls and hand them over to her, too?" A baby was one thing, but James quitting a job he loves because of a woman was unacceptable to him. And yeah, he'd asked Alisha if she had a problem with his job, but that wasn't code for "if you do, I'll quit" thank you very much. Fuck that noise. He'd never quit something he loved for pussy. No way. No how.
"C'mon, dude, don't be like that," James sighed, running a hand over his jaw. "It's different now—we're having a baby."
"I fucking know that," Big said, pouting a little as he toyed with a coaster on the table.
"Besides, you were asking me the other day when Q and I got into that fight whether I loved her enough to choose her over the department. I told you yes. Why are you acting so surprised?"
He frowned, not appreciating that his previous advice was coming back to bite him in the ass. "Because it was all hypothetical or whatever that shit is. I didn't think she'd actually force you to choose. The hell's that about?" He pulled another frown when he lifted the bottle to his mouth and discovered it was empty.
James sighed again. "She didn't. This is my choice and it's a choice I made for my family." Big's brows shot up briefly before a scowl broke out on his face. "Maggie insisted that I didn't need to quit—"
"So don't!" Big bit out.
"But I get it now," James said quietly. "Our job is dangerous and I don't want something to happen leaving my kid to grow up without a dad. We both know what that's like."
Yes, they both knew what that was like and it fucking sucked. James had a point and Big couldn't deny it. That didn't mean he had to like it though. "So what're you gonna do? Isn't Q rich or some shit? You could be a kept man and—well, on second thought never having to work again sounds pretty fucking awesome." He was only half teasing.
"Shut up, asshole," James said laughingly. "I'm going to see about becoming an EMT. Got experience already and maybe
