Chapter 54

Reality

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Brice (POV)

10 years later

I grabbed my gym bag and backpack from the back of the old Jeep that used to be dad's, and made my way into the house. I found Aunt Lori in the kitchen, drumming her nails on the counter. She must have been waiting on the girls because I could hear their feet pattering upstairs in Soph's room.

"Hey Aunt Lori!" I greeted, tossing my stuff on the floor by the garage door. "Waiting on the girls?"

"Yes, they have to be at gymnastics in twenty minutes and they're taking their sweet time up there." She sighed.

"You should be used to this by now," I chuckled, grabbing a bottle of water from the fridge. "They've only been holding everyone up since they were five."

She glared at me before pacing over to the bottom of the stairs and yelling a five-minute warning up to the girls.

"Where is everyone anyway?" I asked.

"Your mom had a meeting than she was going to pick up your brothers from Uncle Josh's house, I guess they were having a play date with Henry. And your Dad is in his office doing some work," she informed me just before the girls came toddling down the stairs.

The three of them, Soph, Payton and Lily, were dressed identically with their hair up in buns, exercise pants, and matching grey sweatshirts with their gymnastics company logo on it.

"Have fun at gymnastics girls," I called as Aunt Lori marched them out the door and into the car.

I was about to head up to my room to get started on my homework when I heard something fall in dad's office.

"Dad?" I called as I poked my head into his office. "Oh my god, Dad, are you okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine, I just stumbled," he huffed as he tried to stand back up using the arm of a chair for support.

"Here," I said, linking my arms under his arms and around his torso to help him up into the chair.

"Thank you, Bri," he mumbled, catching his breath.

I sat down in the chair opposite of him and waited for him to say something.

"I just tripped on the leg of the desk," he finally said. "No big deal."

"Are you sure?" I asked, this wasn't the first time he had fallen.

"Yeah," he smiled. "How was school?"

I could tell he just wanted to change the subject. "School was fine. I had a test in calculus, which was easier than I thought it would be."

"That's always good, what about hockey practice?" he asked.

"Coach had us skate suicides because a couple of the guys were slacking off," he chuckled. "But that wasn't too bad."

When I was ten I joined my fist hockey team. Uncle Declan was more hurt by it than Dad was. Uncle Declan was set on me playing college basketball ever since I could dribble a ball. I have made it up to him though; I still play pick up games with him and enjoy watching with him too.

"Are you sure your coach isn't related to your uncle Foss?" he joked.

"You never know," I chuckled, "I have some home work to get started on. Are you sure you're okay, dad?"

"I'm fine, you don't have to worry about me," he assured as he stood up. I saw the slight flash of a wince in his eyes that he tried to mask.

"Okay," I shrugged it off as I got up and left the room.

I glanced over my shoulder as I strode away and saw him checking his hip. There was a rather large purple bruise forming already. Deep down I knew that there was something wrong with him, he was just too proud to admit it. I snatched my backpack and climbed the stairs two steps at a time before heading into my room.

I sat down at my desk and turned on some music before I pulled out my AP Biology textbook and began reading the assigned chapters. Within an hour and a half I had all my work done for the night and I could hear mom's car pull into the drive way. About a minute later she had made her way inside, followed by the twin tornados, Wyatt and Mason. As I strode down the stairs I could see that mom had an arm full of groceries.

"Here Mom," I said taking the bag from her, "Let me get that."

"Thank you, sweetie," she smiled in appreciation.

I took the paper bag into the kitchen where dad was already getting started on dinner.

"What are you cooking?" I asked.

"Pasta," he answered, breaking the noodles and tossing them into a boiling pot of water. "Did you finish your homework?"

"Yep, all done," I assured.

"Brice!" I could hear Mason shout from the bottom of the stairs.

"Yeah, buddy?" I called back.

"Come play with us!" Wyatt demanded.

"Alright, I'll coming," I said as I chased them up the stairs.

Kyle (POV)

I chuckled and shook my head as I listened to the boys charge up the stairs.

"I swear one day, they'll tear this house down," Amanda said as she began to fix a salad to go with the pasta.

"Boys will be boys," I teased, knowing how much she hated that expression. "How was your day?"

"Busy as always, Lori and I were able to close a deal with that new band Red Diamond though," she elaborated.

"Really? You guys have been trying to get them to sign a deal for the last month," I said. The band's manager was a difficult lady to please.

"The band actually fired their manager and decided that they would manage themselves," she said, chopping up the lettuce.

"Good for them," I commented as I stirred the sauce.

"How have you been today?" she asked.

"Fine, I went into work today and operated on an older man who had fallen and hit his head," I avoided what she was really asking me.

"I thought you weren't going into work this morning," she said as she tossed the salad.

"I'm an attending, I can't just not go to work." She felt that my job was putting too much of a strain on my body.

"I understand that, Kyle, but you don't seem to see the toll-"

"I'm a grown man, Amanda," I snapped, "I think I know what I can and can not handle."

"You're so stubborn, you can't even put your pride aside, to listen to your family for once," her tone was sharper, "Foss, Jessi, Nate, your parents, we've all been telling you that you need to slow down and let your body heal."

I didn't say anything; I just took the noodles off of the stove and drained the water into the sink.

"In the last year alone, you've traveled to Germany to help with the army medical center, you've been to Africa to do surgery," she paused, "you've done a lot Kyle."

Again I didn't say anything, I just stood at the sink with my back to her. She was right, and I knew she was. But that didn't mean that I could just stop helping people. It was my job to help people; it's my purpose to help people. Before she had a chance to say anything further, Sophia came home from gymnastics and the boys came down and joined us for dinner.

Amanda and I tried our best to put our argument aside and have a nice meal with our kids. I could tell that Brice had picked up on the slight tension between Amanda and I, but none of the younger kids had. Once dinner was over I cleaned up the kitchen and Amanda helped Sophia with her homework.

By the time I was finished cleaning up I snagged Wyatt and Mason from their game of superhero vs. pirate, to get them ready for bed.

"Dad?" Mason called me from my thoughts as I plucked him from the tub and wrapped him in a towel.

"What's up, buddy?" I asked, as I pulled Wyatt from the tub.

"Were you listening to my story?" He asked, rubbing his nose with his towel.

"Yeah, you were saying something about Brice," I tried my best to recall what he had been saying.

"No…" his face fell.

"I'm sorry buddy, I've just had a lot on my mind, will you tell me again and I promise pay close attention," I said, as I reached for their tooth brushes and began helping them brush their teeth.

"You promise you'll listen this time?" he asked.

"Yes, I promise," I smiled.

"Okay," he grinned and started into his story for the second time. This time I listened and it turned out that when he was at Josh's house today, Josh had made him laugh so hard milk came out his nose.

"Milk came out your nose?" I tried my best to match his enthusiasm.

"Uh huh, it went everywhere," he giggled.

"Then aunt Andy made uncle Josh clean it up!" Wyatt added to Mason's story.

"Well uncle Josh shouldn't have made you laugh so hard," I teased.

I led them into their bedroom that they shared and got them into their pajamas. Then they climbed into their bunk bed, and dove right under the covers. Wyatt was on the bottom bunk and Mason had the top bunk. I craned my neck to see Mason in the top buck so that I could say goodnight to him, then bent down to the bottom bunk to say goodnight to Wyatt.

I hesitated in the doorway for a moment and watched them give into sleep. They were my twin boys, my buddies. I watched Wyatt, the shyer one of the two; he had Amanda's blond hair, and my blue eyes. Than there was Mason, the troublemaker, he had thick dark hair like mine and my eyes as well. I remembered back five years ago when Amanda had told me she was pregnant. I had just gotten back from a trip with a team of doctors to South America. I didn't think I could have been more overjoyed; until we found out they were twins.

I left the door cracked slightly before I poked my head into Sophia's room. She was curled up in bed reading a book.

"Goodnight, Soph," I smiled.

"Night, dad," she said.

Then I crossed the hall to Brice's room. He was at his desk going over his playbook for hockey.

"Don't stay up too late, Bri," I warned.

"I won't, night dad," he said.

"Night," I said softly as I left his room.

As I walked down stairs I thought of my children. They were all growing up too fast. Brice was 16 and would be starting his junior year in the fall. Sophia was 10 and the best gymnast I had ever seen. The twins were four and already in preschool. Amanda was right, I did take on too much, and it was taking a toll on my body. I wasn't healing as fast as I used to, I was constantly tired, and I was growing weaker.

I found Amanda out on the back porch. She was sitting on one of the benches with a glass of wine.

"I'm sorry," I said, drawing her attention to me.

"For what?" she countered.

"I'm running myself into a far earlier grave than expected," I admitted, sitting down beside her, "I'm a fool to think that my body can handle this stress,"

"Kyle, after you had that seizure last spring," she paused, "you promised me that you would slow down,"

"I know," I whispered. "It's a lot easier said than done, though,"

"Its not that I want you to quit you job: you love your job," she sighed. "It's just that I don't want you traveling or working as many hours as you have been,"

"I'll try my best to cut back," I said.

"I don't want what happened to Adam to happen to you," she said, reaching out and pulling my face to look at her.

"I know," I whispered.

Not long after, we made our way up stairs and she changed into her pajamas and climbed right into bed. I decided to take a shower, it had been a long day and I just needed to relax. After about twenty minutes I got out and dried off. I stopped in front of the mirror and caught a glimpse of the deep purple and blue bruise that had grown much larger on my hip. I gently ran my fingers across it and winced. I knew after I fell that it would leave a mark, however I hadn't anticipated it to be this severe.

AN: Hello everyone! Here is a new chapter. I don't have much to say, other than this story will be coming to a close shortly. I want Fatherhood to have a proper ending and its been something that I have been planning and writing toward for a while. However, I do anticipate a few more chapters before I am ready to say goodbye Fatherhood, so you will all be able to enjoy that! Please feel free to comment and let me know what your thoughts are! Thank you for reading!