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Back The Long and Winding Road
Chapters (31)
  1. The Long and Winding Road
  2. Table of Contents
  3. Dedication
  4. Epigraph
  5. Prologue: Or, Where Bear Answers the Door
  6. PAST
  7. 1. Where Bear Makes the Wrong Assumption
  8. 2. Where Bear Finds Out
  9. 3. Where Bear Makes a Decision
  10. 4. Where Bear Learns the Art of Breathing
  11. 5. Where Bear Has Bro-Time with Creed
  12. PRESENT
  13. 6. Where Bear Attends the Most Awkward Homecoming Ever
  14. 7. Where Bear Tells Tyson Everything
  15. 8. Where Bear Makes a Promise
  16. 9. Where Bear Goes to Lamaze Class
  17. 10. Where Bear Gets Advice About His Sex Life
  18. 11. Where Bear and Otter Role-Play at a Hotel Bar
  19. 12. Where Bear Faces the Reality of Married Life
  20. 13. Where Bear Sees Everything Change
  21. FUTURE
  22. 14. The Long and Winding Road
  23. Epilogue: Or, Otter’s Perspective, As It Were
  24. Coda
  25. No. Absolutely not. No way.
  26. More from TJ Klune
  27. Readers love the Bear, Otter, and the Kid Chronicles by TJ Klune
  28. About the Author
  29. By TJ Klune
  30. Visit Dreamspinner Press
  31. Copyright
Document

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly, not wanting to speak with a mouthful of crazy.

Too bad things don’t work out that way.

“I want to get you so pregnant,” I blurted out.

His eyes bulged. “You want to what?”

And of course, I panicked. “Oh my Christ, that is not what I meant to say. Holy shit! I mean, aside from the obvious fact that I can’t get you pregnant, because of all your man parts, that’s not what I was going for. And that’s not to say that if we could that you wouldn’t be the one getting pregnant, because fuck gender roles, right? I mean, yeah, I’m smaller than you and tend to flail more, and you’re all big and grr and look at me, I just did six thousand squats for no reason whatsoever. And I know I told you to get me pregnant when we saw that stupid little kid in those stupid checkered Vans doing that stupid fucking dance, but why would it have to be me getting pregnant? I mean, fuck what society says about our roles, right? Fuck that. But then I got weird again, and I think I won’t ever stop being weird about it, and I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry that it’s taken me this long to get to this point. Because here you are, you’re forty, you are forty years old, and by the time we get this done, what happens when they graduate high school? You could be sixty years old, and we’ll be there, all proud and happy, with signs made of glitter that say things like I MADE YOU AND I AM PROUD OF YOU and YOU ARE SO COOL, and everyone will be happy and merry, and then some stupid little shit will look at you and say oh, that’s so nice that your grandpa was able to come to your graduation. And then I’ll get arrested for the murder of a recent high school graduate, because no one calls you a grandpa, even though you’d totally be the hottest grandpa ever. And then I’d have to go to jail for murder, and you’d be a single dad, even though they’d already be a high school graduate, and I don’t even know how conjugal visits work! Like, are those even a thing? You just get to come into the prison with a bottle of lube and bone me in some weird little room that stinks of semen from everyone else that used it? I don’t want to have sex in a room that smells like other people’s spunk, because there is no way in hell that could possibly be hygienic. I mean, what if someone shoots on the floor and I accidentally put my hand in it when I have to bend over, because you’ll be old and we’ll have to do it standing up because your hip could break? I don’t want to touch a semen-soaked floor in a jail where I’m at for murder because of your bad hip, Otter.”