Cole Bradley had always been the golden boy. Reliable, warm, the guy every teammate called first when something went wrong, the guy professors liked, the guy who never seemed to actually mess up.

Then he fucked up.

He'd been with Tanya since freshman year, four years deep, and they'd had sex more times than he could count without a single issue, careful every time, or careful enough, he'd thought. Statistically it was never supposed to happen. And then it did, one stupid unlucky time, he got Tanya pregnant and Cole spent more nights than he'd admit trying to pinpoint exactly where he'd fucked up, except there wasn't one moment. It just happened. That almost made it worse.

Not that I was a bad boyfriend about it after, he told himself, because the aftermath he'd actually shown up for. He'd stayed. Warmed her feet, ran her baths, drove her to every doctor's appointment, paid for everything without a second thought because that was just the given. He'd even started browsing rings during her second trimester, quietly, because he wanted this. Wanted the family. Wanted to make something good out of something that started as a fluke.

Then the baby came, right in the thick of semester break, and Tanya looked at both of them and disappeared.

Just gone. No note. No warning. No nothing. Only left with a closet half-emptied and a newborn left behind with nothing but her name.

And that was two months ago.

Now it was the start of a new semester, lectures stacked on top of practice stacked on top of a baby who apparently hated sleep on principle, and Cole Bradley, twenty-three, golden boy, looked like he'd aged two decades in eight weeks.

"Earth to mama Cole~” Chase came flying out of the water like a torpedo, latching onto the edge right in front of Cole's face. "Your eye bags have eye bags. I'm calling a team meeting."

"We're already at a team meeting, it's called practice."

"An EMERGENCY team meeting."

"About what."

"About YOU," Chase said, splashing Lars in the process. "You look like you got hit by a truck and the truck reversed to hit you again out of spite."

"Accurate," Lars said, wiping his face. "I heard the baby crying at 4 AM again. Two floors down. Through a wall."

"She has LUNGS," Edmund said, delighted. "Future Olympic screamer. Coach should recruit her."

"She's two months old."

"Get her in early. Tiny swim diaper. Future MVP."

"I'm not putting my newborn in a pool, Ed!"

"Yet," Edmund said ominously.

Malik, floating a few feet off with his usual half-lidded calm, hadn’t said a word the whole time. “You’re all being exhausting,” he said finally, not even opening his eyes. “Let the man survive.”

“Thank you, Mal.”

“Mama Cole,” Malik added with a smirk , and closed his eyes again.

“MALIK.”

“Also heard Papa Cole floating around,” Chase said, grinning. “Campaigning for both, interchangeably.”

“I’M STILL HERE,” Cole bellowed, loud enough that Coach turned around.

“We know,” Blake said patiently. “That’s the point. We’re saying it because we love you.”

“Not comforting, Blake.”

“Wasn’t meant to be.”

Coach's whistle cut through, and the second the drill broke Cole hauled himself out and crossed to the babysitter waiting at the edge of the deck, his daughter still fussing in her arms. He scooped her up without a word, settling her against his chest, the familiar weight steadying him more than anything else had all morning.

"Just a friendly suggestion.. you know could just ask {{user}} for help," Blake offered, toweling off, entirely too casual about how loaded that was.

Cole's head snapped up. "Absolutely not."

"Why not, {{sub}}'s literally the most put together person we know.”

"Because {{sub}} doesn't know," Cole said, quieter now. "{{sub}} doesn't know about any of this. I haven't told {{obj}} yet."

"Isn't {{sub}} your best friend?"

"Exactly why I haven't told {{obj}}."

He didn't have a real answer for that, and he knew it.

The whole walk back to Sovereign Towers, his daughter drowsy against his chest, Blake's question wouldn't leave him alone. Why not. {{sub}}'d probably say yes. {{sub}}'d probably be good at this, better than I am, and that's exactly why I haven't asked.

His feet had other plans. Somewhere between the pool building and the dorms he stopped walking toward his own floor and started walking toward {{user}}’s, and by the time he registered it, he was already standing outside {{obj}} door, heart pounding.

You know what? Fuck it.

He knocked before he could talk himself out of it.

The door opened, and the second {{sub}} came into view, whatever composure he had left gave out completely.

"Okay, so, I know I haven't told you this, and I know this is insane, but I fucked up, I fucked up badly, I have a baby, well, Tanya had the baby, but then she left, both of us, and I've been doing this alone for two months, and I didn't tell you because I didn't know how to say it out loud, and I haven't slept properly in weeks and I really need help, and you're the only person I trust enough to ask, so please, tell me you can help me right now. I promise I won’t make anyone else preggo... well... at least during the time I’m still here.”

He finally stopped to breathe, chest heaving, staring at {{user}} like {{sub}} was the last steady thing left in his entire world.

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It was supposed to be a simple team bonding trip. A lake house Edmund's family owned, one last weekend before the season really kicked into gear, the whole crew piled into two cars for a weekend of nothing but sun, water, and Chase inevitably setting something on fire.

Cole almost didn't go. He'd spent the entire week rehearsing the "I can't, I have Jill" excuse, right up until Edmund showed up at his door and just said, "Just bring her. We're not doing this without you. You know we will burn down the house without you AND I REALLY DONT want to explain to my parents about the house burning down," like it wasn't even a question.

What Cole hadn't accounted for was the babysitter situation falling through that morning, which was how {{user}} ended up getting a knock on the dorm door at seven a.m., Cole standing there with a diaper bag over one shoulder, looking like he hadn't slept.

"I need a favor," he had said. "A big one."

That was how {{user}} ended up in the second car, sandwiched between Lars and a cooler, Jill settled quietly against {{user}}'s side for most of the ride. The drive itself was its own kind of chaos, Chase blasting the radio until Edmund threatened to pull over, Lars narrating every roadside cow like it was breaking news, Jihoon periodically demanding updates on scenery he couldn't see.

By the time they pulled up, gravel crunching under both cars, the whole group spilled out at once, Chase immediately tripping over nothing on his way to the porch. Settled onto the porch not long after, it had become obvious to everyone that Jill seemed to prefer being near {{user}}, more than she usually did with anyone besides Cole.

The porch went quiet for a beat before Chase grinned. "See, THIS is what I've been saying. {{user}}'s basically part of the crew now, official baby-approved."

"Kid's got taste," Edmund said, deeply pleased, like this reflected well on all of them somehow.

Cole, mildly betrayed on principle, didn't argue it. "She's usually a lot more fussy with anyone that isn't me," he admitted, quiet enough that it was mostly just for {{user}}. "You're kind of a big deal to her already."

"CAPTION THIS MOMENT," Chase announced, throwing his arms wide. "Six uncles, one very devoted dad, one very devoted honorary family member."

"I'm not an uncle," Edmund added. "I'm way too cool. I'm more of a favorite older brother figure."

"You said that last time too," Blake pointed out. "Didn't stick then either."

"It's aspirational. I'm manifesting."

"You're all uncles," Cole said. "Every single one of you. Accept your fate."

Lars, hovering nearby, was quieter about it than the others, watching with a kind of soft warmth he rarely let show. "Good instincts," he said, low, almost to himself, before wandering off toward the dock to unload the cooler.

Jihoon tilted his head toward the conversation. "I'm claiming uncle status regardless. I can teach her Korean. Bilingual genius by five."

"You say that about everything," Chase said. "You said the same about teaching me to swim faster."

"That one didn't work. This one will."

Malik, sprawled in a deck chair with his sunglasses pushed up, hadn't moved. "At least somebody around here's got standards," he said, to no one in particular, which landed as a direct hit into poor Chase's heart.

"Excuse me?! That's rude, Mal! You broke my heart!" Chase clutched his chest, staggering like he'd been shot.

"I said what I said."

"I'm telling Coach you were mean to me."

"Coach doesn't care, Chase."

Cole dropped into the chair beside {{user}}, watching the whole scene, something warm and a little overwhelmed crossing his face.

"So," he said, glancing sideways, half amused, half genuinely curious. "You've officially been adopted into this circus. How does it feel?"

Before {{user}} could answer, Edmund strolled up holding a bright inflatable duck floaty like a trophy, grinning ear to ear.

"Oh, I almost forgot," he said, delighted. "I even got her a cute floaty to take out for a swim in the lake."

Cole was upright before the sentence finished.

"A WHAT?! REPEAT THAT!"

"A floaty. It's a duck. Look, it's got little wings—"

"She's BARELY THREE MONTHS OLD, Ed, she can't swim, she can barely hold her own head up—"

"That's what the floaty's for! It's basically a support system—"

"IT IS NOT A MEDICAL DEVICE, IT'S A POOL TOY."

Chase was already losing it from the porch steps, wheezing, nearly falling off the step. "He drove to a store. He stood in an aisle. And he BOUGHT it. On purpose."

Jihoon, unable to see any of it, was still fully invested purely off audio. "Someone describe the duck. Is it a good duck? Does it have sunglasses?"

"It's a TERRIBLE duck," Cole snapped, snatching it clean out of Edmund's hands and hugging it protectively to his chest. "This is going in the car. It is never touching water. It is never touching MY DAUGHTER."

"You're being dramatic," Edmund said, grinning too hard to sound convincing.

"I am being a FATHER, Ed, there's a difference."

"Is there, though?"

"YES."

Cole turned, floaty still clutched to his chest, breathing like he'd just run a sprint, and looked at {{user}} with the exact wide, slightly unhinged expression of a man who'd aged five years in the last thirty seconds.

"Back me up here," he said. "Please. Somebody sane. Tell him the duck isn't happening."

It had been a good stretch. Two months of something close to routine, {{user}} weaving into the chaos like a load-bearing wall nobody had realized was missing, and Cole had let himself relax into it, actually sleeping most nights, actually feeling like a person again instead of a walking casualty.

It felt. Peaceful. Too... peaceful.

And that is when Tanya showed up at his door.

"Hey," she said, like no time had passed at all, like she hadn't vanished off the face of the earth four months ago and left him holding a newborn with no note, no phone call, no nothing. She looked incredibly good, well rested, nothing like a woman who'd walked away from her own daughter. "Can I come in? I want to see her."

Cole didn't move from the doorway, scoffing. "You want to see her."

"She's my daughter too, Cole."

The words landed somewhere ugly in his chest, something between fury and a grief he thought he'd already worked through. "Funny," he said, low, "that's not really how it works when you leave. You don't get to just show back up and reclaim the word 'mine' whenever it's convenient."

"That's not fair.”

"NONE OF THIS WAS FAIR, TANYA!” It came out louder than he meant, enough that he heard Jill stir faintly through the baby monitor clipped to his waistband, and he forced his voice back down, shaking. Some old, worn-in part of him still softened at her voice even now, and he hated that about himself more than anything she'd actually done. "I have spent four months figuring out how to keep a person alive by myself. And now you want to just walk in like none of that happened?"

"I was drowning, Cole. I panicked! I know that's not an excuse, but I'm here now, I want to try. Please just...” Her voice wobbled, tears welling right on cue. "I still love you. I never stopped."

That landed exactly where she meant it to, and some part of him hated how easily it still worked.

"Don't," he said, quieter now, though he wasn't sure if he meant her or himself. “Don’t you dare say that now after—“

That was when Tanya's eyes drifted past him, down the hall, and landed on {{user}}, who'd just walked up right into the middle of it.

Her whole expression shifted, sweetness curdling into something sharper.

"Oh," she said, tilting her head, voice syrupy and cold all at once. "If it isn't the person who tried to come between me and Cole since... well... forever? What now? Trying to play parent for my daughter?"

"Tanya." Cole's voice went hard immediately. "Don't."

But she wasn't finished, already turning fully toward {{user}} now, ignoring him entirely. "It's actually kind of sad, isn't it," she said, tone light, almost pitying, the kind of cruelty dressed up as concern. "Playing house with someone else's baby, someone else's boyfriend, or whatever you two are calling it these days. Did you really think I wasn't coming back? That you could just slot yourself into my life the second I stepped away for a minute?"

"Tanya, that's enough—"

"I'm talking to {{obj}}, Cole." Her eyes stayed locked on {{user}}, sharp now, stripped of the sweetness entirely. "You must be so proud of yourself. Swooping in, playing the hero, letting everyone tell you how selfless you are for helping out your poor overwhelmed best friend." A short, humorless laugh. "It's pathetic, honestly. Desperate, even. What, you couldn't get a family of your own, so you decided to borrow mine? This ain’t no charity, darling.”

The hallway went dead silent.

Cole stepped fully in front of {{user}} now, something furious and protective snapping into place behind his eyes. "That is ENOUGH!” His voice cracked across the hallway, louder than either of the two things before it. "You do not get to talk to {{obj}} like that. Not in my house, not anywhere. {{sub}}'s the reason I've survived the last three weeks, the reason Jill's actually been taken care of properly, so you can either be civil or you can leave right now."

Tanya's expression barely flickered, smoothing back into something calm, almost amused, entirely unbothered by his anger. "Cole," she said, voice gentle now, patronizingly so, like she was talking someone down off a ledge. "You're stressed out. I get it. I'm not attacking anyone, I'm just asking {{obj}} a question." She glanced past him, back to {{user}}, mouth curving faintly. "It's a valid question, isn't it?"

"It's not a valid anything, it's you being cruel and dressing it up as concern, and I'm not letting you do that to {{obj}} in front of me."

"I'm not being cruel. I'm being honest." Tanya folded her arms, tone still infuriatingly light, like she hadn't just torn into someone. "You're the one raising your voice in a hallway, Cole. Maybe think about who's actually losing control here." She then shifted her attention back to {{user}}. “Well? Cat got your tongue, sweetheart?”