Troy was putting his and Taylor's 7-year-old daughter, Isabella, into bed like usual. He was about to give her a goodnight kiss when she turned away from him.
"Honey, don't you want your goodnight kiss?" he asked rubbing her arm.
"No"
"Well I want mine, so come on, lay one on me" he said with a smile.
"No only my dad gets a goodnight kiss" she pulled the covers over her head and he could hear how she was silently crying and saw how she was shaking trying to hold back her crying.
"Honey I am your dad" he said still shocked over hearing her say he wasn't her dad.
"No you're not, you're just some man my mom married!" she cried.
"Who told you that?"
"My real dad" Troy froze, that bastard that left Taylor when she discovered that she was pregnant with Isabella was now screwing up all of their lives, for a reason he did not yet know.
-----
"Taylor, we have a problem!" Troy almost yelled when he walked into their bedroom to find Taylor breastfeeding their 5 months old son, Alexander, in their bed.
"What kind of problem? We're out of diapers aren't we, well just run down to the store and buy some" she said before returning her attention to Alex.
"Our daughter knows that she's not really mine"
"What?!"
"Chris told her that he's her biological father, she won't let me near her anymore. My little girl is rejecting me because that bastard thinks that it's his place to tell her. You know I think it's that bitch that he married that thought that she should know, just because she can't have kids of her own she's trying to take my little girl from me!" Troy said as he paced their bedroom floor.
"Troy calm down' Taylor said in a low voice as she tried to comfort the tired and crying Alex 'let me go talk to her' he was about to protest 'I'll go talk to her while you put Alex to bed" she handed him Alex and both father and son seemed to calm down considerably, before leaving the room to talk to her only daughter.
"Looks like it's just you and me buddy" he said smiling down on his second born son.
-----
"Bella? You still awake?" Taylor asked opening the door and peering into the dimly lit room.
"Mama" came a tear filled cry from the bed. Taylor rushed over to her and embraced her in a tight hug.
"Its okay sweetie, mama's here' she rubbed the little girls back and let her cry into her chest. When she had calmed down a little Taylor decided that it was time to talk about it 'you wanna talk about what happened with your dad"
"He's not my dad' she cried 'uncle Chris told me that he was my real dad when we went to the zoo today. We saw this bear family, a mama and her two baby's Uncle Chris said that he wished he could have a baby to but he was happy with just having me. I didn't understand what he meant so he told me that he was my real dad and that dad was some man you had married because you had me" she cried and held on to Taylor for dear life.
"Sweetie your dad loves you"
"No he doesn't, he loves Troy and Alex not me!" she yelled waking up Troy junior in the next room.
"Sweetie he loves you just as much as he loves Troy and Alex, if he didn't love you he wouldn't come to your school plays or sit and watch you at dance practise but he does love you so he sits there and watches you with a big smile on his face the whole time since you're there doing something that makes you happy and if you're happy he's happy' she couldn't ignore Troy's cries anymore and let go of Isabella who looked as though she was in deep thought 'I'll be right back I just have to make sure your brother is alright" she said and left the room.
-----
Troy was sitting on their bed with his head in his hands with his elbows on his knees not noticing the small figure slowly approaching him.
"Dad?" he quickly looked up and saw Isabella's tear stricken face in front of him. He just looked at her since he didn't know what else to do, he was scared that if he tried to hug her she'd run away. He saw her tears running down her face faster and didn't hesitate in pulling her in to a hug, his little girl was hurting and he couldn't just sit back and watch.
"Do you love me?" she asked after a few minutes when her tears had subsided, Troy wiped away the remains of her tears with his thumb and looked her in the eyes.
"Of course I do honey, why would you think anything else?"
"Uncle Chris said that he's my real dad and only real parents love their kid's"
"Well Uncle Chris is a dumbass. I've loved you since the day you were born and I held you for the first time in my arms. I'll never stop loving you you're my little girl and nothing will ever change that"
"Do I have to call uncle Chris dad now?"
"Not if you don't want to and you don't have to call me dad either if you don't want to, you can call me Troy"
"But that's Troy's name?!" she said looking confused as she pointed out the door.
"Well you see, we named him after me"
"Why?" Isabella asked looking perplexed.
"We couldn't come up with a name, that's why" he said as he started to tickle her and she giggled.
"Bella?!" they heard Taylor's voice yell from down the hall.
"She's in here!" Troy yelled to her, Taylor came rushing in with Troy junior in her arms and looked at the two with curious eyes.
"Everything okay in here?" she asked sitting down next to Troy who now had Isabella in his lap.
"Yeah, everything's fine" Troy said scooting up in the bed to lay down with Bella still in his arms.
"Troy?"
"Yeah Bella?"
"Can I still call you dad?" she asked unsure of herself.
"It would be an honour for me if you would call me dad" Troy said kissing her forehead as Taylor lay down with junior and pulled the covers over all four of them.
As soon as the kids had fallen asleep Troy looked at Taylor who was stroking junior's hair.
"I'm guessing that we're gonna have to have a talk with Chris tomorrow"
"You bet your ass we will' Taylor answered as she entwined her fingers with his 'he's gonna wish he had never opened his big mouth"
-----
The next day they had invited Chris over to talk about what he had told their daughter, right now the kids were out playing in the backyard with coach Bolton who loved to play around with his two oldest grandkids as Mrs. Bolton sat in the hammock with little Alex.
"Care to explain to us why you told our daughter that you're her biological father?!" Taylor almost yelled as she fixed her eyes on her ex-boyfriend.
"She has the right to know that I'm her father!" he yelled back.
"We know that but we wanted to tell her when she was older and more mature so that she could process this better. And you also agreed that you would let us tell her and that you would just go on pretending you were her uncle and not tell her, what happened with that promise?"
"Tay calm down" Troy whispered in her ear as he entwined their fingers and squeezed her hand.
"I can't calm down that bastard left us and then when it suits him he comes back and claims he wants to be part of her life and agrees to all of our terms to then go and stab us in the back. I won't calm down!"
"Taylor I know what I did wasn't fair but she deserved to know"
"She deserved to cry all night because you were selfish?! Her whole world was turned upside down yesterday"
"I'm her dad she has the right to know that"
"Sure she does but you don't have the right to decide when the time is right for her to know!"
"Taylor can I say something?" Chris wife, Amber, asked looking between the two bickering adults.
"Go ahead"
"I agree that it was up to you to tell her but I also have to agree with Chris she deserved to know' Taylor as about to disagree but Amber went on 'the longer you would have waited the harder it would have been for her to accept it, she would probably have hated you if you decided to tell her when she is a teenager"
"As much as I hate to admit it you're right but that doesn't mean that I agree with what you did and if you wanna be a part of her life I suggest that you show some interest in her other then to take her to the zoo every other week"
"Like what?"
"Come to her school plays and dance recitals, take her to the park show some real interest in her and don't cancel you're plans with her just because you two need some alone time!" she said pointing between Chris and Amber before she walked out of the room and walked out to the kids.
"Okay, well, we'll call you" Chris said as he grabbed Ambers hand and dragged her out to their car.