I head toward the kitchen to get ice cream and see my luggage. Remembering I had packed all my clothes to move, and that we are now responsible-type father figures, I throw open the suitcase and pull out a couple of pairs of pajama bottoms so we will have appropriate clothes in the morning.

I grab a couple bowls and scoop some ice cream in them. Grabbing the canister of sprinkles from the cupboard, I spy the box of Trix and pull that out as well. I dust the ice cream with the colorful cereal as well as the candy sprinkles hoping Zach will be amused. I head upstairs armed with pajamas and ice cream, ready to tackle some logistics now that we have a few minutes to breathe after today's intensity.

Zach is reclined in the bed, his jeans and t-shirt on the floor. I set down the PJs and my ice cream on the nightstand, then hand him a bowl and he laughs and rolls his eyes at the rainbow-colored cereal, and takes a bite.

"Trix are for kids, you know," he jokes, and I am happy to see the cozy banter we'd had before hasn't left us even after talking about a lot of heavy things.

"I don't think our kid will begrudge you just a few," I wink, pulling off my clothes till I am down to my boxers as well. I crawl into bed and marvel at how this feels so cozy and normal and right again so quickly. "Speaking of our boy, I, uh, grabbed some PJ bottoms so we will be ready and appropriately attired for when he wakes up," I explain as I grab my own ice cream and dig in.

"Smart idea," Zach praises, enjoying another spoonful of ice cream. "I uh, think we should probably take it easy tonight on physical stuff too," he states after swallowing. "I worry he'll wake up sometime in the middle of the night stressed out over today and I don't wanna make that worse if we're getting busy."

"That makes sense babe. I mean, I had some pretty exceptional car sex earlier, so if we just cuddle tonight, that works for me," I offer with a grin. He looks relieved and I wonder if he was worried that I would be upset. "We can figure out how we will be around him going forward over the next few days, I think. As we do that, I am game to play it as we have when we had him other nights, no worries."

"Cody is right y'know. You really do rock Shaun," Zach smiles, polishing off his ice cream.

"As for what we should discuss tonight, let's chat about immediate needs," I begin, as I nestle my now-empty bowl inside of his. "I have most of my stuff here packed up, obviously. I was gonna make a few trips to take over some furniture I wanted. But now that we'll be packing up your place too, renting a moving truck might be wise," I consider, imagining myself as a butch trucker behind the wheel. Zach settles against me as I lay back and offer him my arm.

"Yeah, we have a couple more weeks till we gotta be out," Zach notes, his eyes looking upwards as he considers things. "I was gonna start looking for a smaller place for me and Codes, and Jeanne and Alan took a lot of stuff with them, so we'll need to inventory what we have, what we wanna bring, what can be tossed or whatever." He takes a breath and continues as his fingers wander over my torso. "I have my final shift at the diner tomorrow in the afternoon so we can at least start tomorrow morning and continue when I am finished. I think it shouldn't take too long since most of the better stuff we had is likely on its way to Oregon," he finishes, pragmatically. My inner drama queen wants to scream at Jeanne for leaving her brother and son with only the stuff she probably considered junk, but I can't say I am surprised. I don't want him feeling bad though.

"No prob. I also lost a lot of what I had to my ex, so I imagine we will need to do a lot of shopping for things." Zach winces so I reassure him. "This is actually a good thing! We can get things that work for us and for Codes. I saw the cutest Batman stuff! Maybe he'll want his own Bat Cave!" Zach suddenly falls toward me and kisses my neck intensely. "Uh, everything okay?"

"You are so thoughtful and sweet, thinking of Codes all the time. It's uh, a really sexy trait of yours, you know?" My boyfriend replies into my chest as he starts doodling what feels like hearts all across my torso.

"It's easy to be thoughtful about him. I want him to have everything we can provide. We can spoil him a little bit, don'tcha think?" Zach sighs and gives a slight nod. "Good," I continue, moving forward with discussing possible plans for our next couple days. "So we will go through your stuff in San Pedro and pack up what we wanna take with us tomorrow and maybe the next day. And start a shopping list of new stuff we will wanna pick up." I kiss the top of Zach's head before continuing. "And, uh, we have money to get whatever we need really," I confess. "You know how I said Larry gave me some money?" I continue. Zach looks up from his doodling and I see a bit of a frown starting to form across his face. "I mean, babe, it was so sweet. We will be fine for a long time. We can get everything we need for our place. You don't have to work at all while in school and if we wanna do any spoiling of Codes, we can." He continues his frown.

"I don't wanna be with you because of money," he sullenly states. A laugh erupts from me at the thought of it. "Already felt shitty asking you to help when I was trying to figure out how to juggle school and work and having Cody full time."

"Babe, you're not with me because of money. I know that. Larry's gift doesn't change it, you know. He was helping me start my life with you when he sent it." I stroke his shoulder as I continue, knowing I want to be forthright about finances but also not wanting to scare him. "He uh, sent us a couple hundred thousand dollars." My sweet Zach, who probably hasn't had more than a thousand in his bank account at one time bolts up on his knees.

"Dude, shut the fuck up!" He barks out, before throwing his hands over his mouth and looking toward the open door. I imagine he is afraid his outburst woke Cody and I start giggling. Zach holds his one hand out to me as if to tell me to stop, and holds a finger up to his mouth to shush as he listens.

After it's apparent that he didn't wake the sleeping boy down the hall. He jumps off the bed and grabs a set of pajama bottoms, throwing the other pair at my head. Before I can even pull them away from my face, he is in the pair he kept. Back in my clothes! I decide to humor him and slide down in bed a bit more to maneuver the PJ pants on. Zach crawls back into bed and lies on his side toward me.

"Tell me you're joking," he implores, eyes wide. I turn toward him onto my side till our knees are touching. I bite my lip, look upward, and smile, shaking my head in the negative. "Holy shit," he whispers.

"Yeah, since, uh, gay marriage isn't like, legal, Larry said he couldn't gift it at a wedding so he wanted us to have it. And this is on top of my college fund I never touched, which was fifty thousand, so we're sitting on a quarter of a million right now. I imagine there will have to be taxes and whatnot taken out at some point, but you don't have to worry about us figuring out how we are paying for rent or food or clothes or art supplies or anything like that while you're focused on school," I whisper back.

"Fuuuck me, man" Zach utters. The shock on his face is priceless — or perhaps worth 250,000 dollars, my inner drama queen speculates.

"Um, babe, no. We agreed to behave tonight!" I declare, clutching my imaginary pearls and shaking my head as he rolls his eyes and we both begin laughing at the absurdity of it all.

"You are a nut, Shaun," Zach sighs, throwing his arm over my hip. I smile back at his beautiful face. "I'm glad we can afford lots of therapy to get you the help you clearly need!" I grab his elbow and lean forward to kiss him.

"So now that you know and we have a semblance of plans for tomorrow at least, let's get some shut-eye now and figure out the rest tomorrow then," I point out in my most reasonable, un-nutty voice.

"Sleep well, sweetheart," he agrees, yawning as he pulls up the duvet over us both, still facing each other knee-to-knee. The perfect peace I feel surrounds me.

"Sleep well."