My Best Friends Brother

Chapter 168

These fortnightly fucking meetings with the social worker are becoming the bane of my fucking existence. Let's see if Chrissy actually fucking turns up this time shall we.

We are supposed to be reviewing her possibly having some kind of supervised contact with Liam today so a part of me just hopes she stays the fuck away. He doesn't fucking need her.

I glance down at my phone to see another news notification about Miles from the game yesterday. I knew he'd fucking smash that record.

He's been blowing up online for the last forty-eight hours, he sent me a text this morning to say they've even done a full two page spread on the new golden boy of Westbrooke in the paper this morning. Damn, it's nice to see the Thompson name in the press without it being about Heather's fucking overdose. Miles is trying to sound modest but we both know he's over the fucking moon that people are basically saying he's the new and improved Jayce.

They might be back to getting on again but they are both still competitive little fuckers.

Although it was seriously fucking nice too have a very different experience at this game than there was at the last.

Jayce and Al where sitting in the front row cheering him on, all the fear from the last time he was playing a game was completely gone now that his big brother has decided that he actually wants to be happy for Miles. He slammed his first basket less than ten minutes in so he didn't even give people a lot of time to adjust before he was in those record books, but Jayce didn't look anything other than fucking proud.

Although that pride slightly diminished by the time he was on his fourteenth basket that game. My man is a fucking machine.

Him running up and kissing me in front of everyone the moment the final whistle blew... Yeah, that I wasn't expecting.

We've spoken about how us being together could effect him getting into the pro's. It was hard to hear it when Jayce said it but it's true. I thought we'd kind of agreed to just float under the radar but of course he had another fucking plan... His opinion is if they don't want him for loving me, then he doesn't want to be there. You have to respect him for that, I know I fucking do.

But I did realise what it feels like to be Jayce and Aleah for the day. They still get people looking at them dodgy because of their 'potential fucking stepsibling' label, not all the parents there were particularly subtle about their opinions on someone like me being with someone like Miles but... they just don't fucking get it. They don't know him and they don't know me, they're just judging on some stupid fucking notion of what our relationship must be.

I'm trying not to think about it too much.

Watching him play again though... it was like freeing a captive bird from it's cage for the first time. He just looked so... whole.

He never complained about rehab or the time he had to take off, but once he had that ball back in his hands there was no fucking stopping him. Even the rest of the team played better just by having him on the court as captain again, although Eli practically crushed every bone in his body right after he scored that first basket with the giant bear hug that he gave him.

As for Luke and Eli... Let's just say that even if I had a Michelin star chefs fucking knife, I still couldn't have cut the tension between those two.

They are hiding it well from most people, but how Miles isn't able to see what's going on there is beyond me. They look about two minutes away from either killing each other, or ripping each others clothes off, every time they get too close.

I'm worried about Eli though, I remember how hard it was on Harley when I couldn't come out, and I didn't have half the hate for myself that Luke does. That kid is going to get his heart broken, I can already see it.

They definitely have a story to tell, maybe not here and maybe not now but somewhere... Somewhere there's a story for these two... I'm just not sure that it's going to have the happy ending that everybody wants.

Although I guess that's true of any story...

I'm a true believer that things always work out exactly the way that they are supposed to... It might not be the way that you originally envisioned.... but it's the way it's destined to be.

Just as I walk into the building and spot Stephanie sitting in the room waiting for me, I feel my phone buzz. A message that makes me instantly smile.

My Stars: 'Accidentally took Liam's sandwiches instead of mine this morning... don't think Eli is ever going to let me live down eating star shaped peanut butter and Jelly's... It's kind of crazy here today, me and Zoe are hiding in the back of the library so nobody can congratulate me again 😂 She says hi, wish me luck in gym... my body is killing me after last night...😉 I love you x⭐'

His body is killing... I'm lucky to be able to walk in here... Oh shit, I need to talk to Steve about fixing that headboard.

He's going to fucking laugh isn't he?

I smile, walking towards the room and re-reading the message again. For a guy who looks like he just stepped off the pages of a glossy magazine he's still not used to getting a crazy amount of attention.

I'm so fucking proud of him though.

And I bet he looked cute as fuck eating his little star sandwiches.

Stephanie smiles when I step into the office, opening up her folder and waving for me to take a seat. She quickly glances behind me but we are both aware there's a good chance that Chrissy won't show her revolting little face today.

The last time I saw her she was pretty adamant that she was going to get that kid back by any means necessary, of course that didn't fucking include something as simple as actually just turning up to the meeting so she could see the little boy.

"Okay Josh, we'll give her five more minutes and then we'll start." I nod, I'm used to this routine by now.

Charlie sent me over some new documents for me to take a look at earlier so I start quickly scanning through our next perspective client when suddenly the door swings open and in walks the devil herself.

"Oh Christine, I wasn't sure that you were going to make –"

I was hardly paying any attention to the bitch when suddenly something slams down on the table in front of us and forces my attention away from my phone. A sudden cold rush hitting my body as I look down at the open newspaper.

"A high school child Josh! This is who you're dating!" Stephanie looks down at the image of Miles on the court celebrating his new record, his smiling face that usually brings me so much joy feels like a stab to the fucking heart.

Shit.

"Josh, what is she talking about?" Chrissie's smile grows even wider when she realises that I haven't told Stephanie about me and Miles yet.

I wasn't keeping it from her, sort of... When I first spoke with her we weren't together yet and it's never really come up again since then. We know how we look so we figured we'd just tell her if we had too... Hopefully after he was in college.

I should've just fucking told her... This looks so much worse. It's not like we're hiding, I assumed at some point Liam would've said something and it could just come up naturally. She'd hear how much Liam loves him and it wouldn't matter about the age gap between us.

It doesn't affect my ability to take care of Liam anyway, it's nobody else's fucking business.

"Don't you see, he's sick! He's been with this boy for months, I've seen them together but..." Chrissy quickly changes her tone, realising there's a better way to play this and dropping her anger to replace it with false fucking concern. "I'm so sorry, I knew the boy he was sleeping with was young but I assumed he was in college... If I'd known he was praying on an innocent child I would have done something sooner."

Oh fuck off you fake cunt.

"Josh, is this true? When you completed in your profile you said that you were single and-"

"I was." I cut her off, she needs to understand that this isn't intentional. "When we did that interview me and Miles went together. I'm sorry that I didn't update you but honestly I didn't feel it was relevant." Chrissy scoffs loudly, she's been waiting for me to fuck up.

"That doesn't change the fact that he is a child Josh! A child who's still in school!" Chrissy is fucking loving this, she's practically clutching her fucking invisible pearls and holding a handkerchief to her brow with shock right now.

"He's not a child, he's nineteen." I know this doesn't look good but this isn't any normal situation, Miles shouldn't even be in that fucking school...

"Oh like that makes it so much better! What are you going to do about this? Liam can't be with some kind of pervert who's got a thing for little boys like Josh, you have to get him out of that house." Chrissy directs her question towards Stephanie but it's taking every fucking ounce of restraint I have not to launch across the table and rip her face straight off her fucking skull.

How fucking dare she... She knows what she's implying isn't even fucking close to the truth. They can't do shit about this, no matter the age gap we're both fucking adults.

Stephanie runs her hands through her hair, I can see the confliction in her. She knows me, she knows Liam, and she knows that he's better off with me than he is anywhere else.

"Is this boy a part of Liam's life Josh?"

Will you stop calling him a fucking boy.

"Of course he fucking is!" Chrissy shouts, her frustration getting the better of her and forcing her to let go of her 'will somebody please think of the children' facade. "They practically fucking live together!"

How the fuck would she know that?