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Keng should have known the night was doomed when he walked into the living room and found all six of his children draped over Namping like decorative throw blankets.
Not sitting near him.
Not even sitting with him.
On him.
Namping was in the middle of the sofa in his soft house clothes, hair falling into his eyes, halfway through reading a picture book aloud, and there was not a single visible patch of husband left unclaimed.
Por had somehow arranged himself along Namping's left side, cheek pressed to his shoulder like he was conserving body heat. Save was under Namping's right arm, curled into his ribs with both hands fisted in his shirt.
Pung had claimed a lap. Otto was stretched across the cushions with his head pillowed directly on Namping's thigh like this was a completely reasonable use of furniture. Fifa was sitting at Namping's feet, hugging one of his calves.
And Oh-Ae — smallest, most manipulative, and fully aware of both facts — was tucked into Namping's chest, held in the crook of one arm like a baby despite being long past the age where he could pretend he was one.
Keng stood in the doorway with one hand still on the frame and stared. Namping looked up first. And smiled. Soft. Warm. A little tired around the edges.
The exact smile Keng had been thinking about all day. The exact smile he'd been planning to kiss off his husband's mouth the second the children went to bed.
"Hi, Papa," Namping said.
Keng's heart did that stupid thing it still did after all these years — tightened, softened, gave up any pretense of dignity.
Then Por looked up too and said, with immediate suspicion, "Why are you standing there like that?"
Keng narrowed his eyes.
"Like what."
"Like you're going to steal Papi."
There was a beat.
Then Save, who had not even opened his eyes, tightened his grip on Namping's shirt and mumbled, "You always steal Papi."
Keng looked at the ceiling. This was what his life had become. "I do not always steal Papi," he said.
"Yes, you do," Pung said cheerfully from Namping's lap. "At night." Namping choked on a laugh. Keng felt every parental instinct in his body briefly leave him.
Otto, who had inherited Namping's sweet face and none of his caution, rolled over enough to look at Keng and asked, "Is that why you always make us sleep in our own beds?"
"Yes," Fifa said before Keng could answer, with the smug authority of someone making up facts in real time. "Because Papa wants Papi to himself."
Oh-Ae lifted his head from Namping's chest, blinked sleepily at Keng, and delivered the final blow. "Selfish."
Namping lost the fight with his composure entirely and bent forward laughing, which only made the children cling harder, because apparently if Papi moved even slightly there was a risk he might disappear.
Keng looked at his husband — flushed, laughing, beautiful, buried alive in offspring — and thought, not for the first time, that love was humiliating.
"I worked all day," Keng said, because he had and because someone in this house should care. "I came home to see my husband."
"You can see him," Por said generously. "From there." Keng stared at him.
Namping, still trying to recover, reached out one hand toward him over the pile of children. There it was. His husband.
Offering him exactly one hand because the rest of him was trapped under six small tyrants. Keng crossed the room immediately. Of course he did.
He took Namping's hand and squeezed it, thumb brushing over the ring there, and Namping's face softened at once. "Long day?" Namping asked quietly.
Keng looked at him. Looked at the children. Looked back at him. "It was improving," he said. Namping's mouth twitched. Save cracked one eye open. "No kissing."
Keng blinked. "I didn't do anything."
"You were thinking about it," Save said, then closed his eye again as if this settled the matter. Keng turned slowly to look at Namping.
Namping had the decency to look slightly guilty. "...They've been like this since dinner," he admitted.
"Why."
Pung answered before Namping could. "Because Papi is comfy."
"Because Papi smells nice," Fifa added.
"Because Papi reads better than you," Otto said.
Keng looked insulted on principle. "I read fine."
"No," Por said. "You read like instructions."
That one hurt because it was true. Namping squeezed his hand again, silently apologizing for the fact that their children were disloyal.
Keng looked down at all six of them in a tangle around the man he loved most in the world and tried — honestly tried — to be reasonable.
"Okay," he said. "Bedtime."
The room went still. Six faces turned to look at him with synchronized betrayal. Then all at once: "No."
Keng closed his eyes. He had faced championship matches with less resistance.
The thing was, Keng had not been unreasonable in his hopes for the evening.
He hadn't come home expecting miracles.
He was a father of six. He understood reality. He understood that romance in a house full of children had to be planned with military precision and the flexibility of a hostage negotiator.
He had aimed low. Dinner. Baths. Pajamas. Stories. Bed.
Then, after the house was finally quiet, he had planned to take Namping to their room, pull him into bed, and spend one soft, peaceful night with his husband.
Maybe kisses. Maybe cuddling. Maybe the kind of long, lazy talking they used to do before children turned every silence into a suspicious event.
He had been practical. He had been mature. He had, crucially, underestimated the extent to which all six of his children had decided tonight was a "Papi only" emergency.
Getting them off the sofa required strategy. First, Namping had to finish the story. This took ten more minutes because every child apparently had opinions.
"No, read that page again."
"Papi, do the bunny voice."
"He skipped the frog."
"There was no frog."
"There was emotionally a frog."
Keng sat in the armchair opposite them like a man in mourning and watched the scene unfold.
Every so often Namping glanced up at him over the heads of their children, and every single glance said the same thing: sorry.
Every single one made Keng want to walk over, scoop his husband and all attached offspring into his arms, and carry the entire situation to bed.
He couldn't. He had limits. Mostly weight-related ones.
By the time the story was over, Pung was fully asleep on Namping's lap and Oh-Ae was drifting. Keng saw opportunity. "Good," he said immediately. "Now bedtime."
Por sat up. "I need water."
"Me too," Fifa said.
"I need to pee," Otto announced.
Save, who had not moved in twenty minutes, whispered, "I'm too tired to walk."
Namping looked at Keng with helpless amusement. Keng looked back and understood, in one terrible flash, that this was now a team operation.
For the next half hour, their home became a battlefield. Keng carried Pung to the bathroom when Pung woke up disoriented and demanded Papi specifically.
Namping gave Otto water while Oh-Ae clung to his leg like a limpet. Save refused to brush his teeth unless Namping stood there and watched, because apparently oral hygiene now required emotional support.
Por needed a different blanket because the blue one "felt wrong." Fifa wanted a goodnight kiss on both cheeks because "one is unlucky."
At one point Keng found himself standing in the hallway holding two stuffed animals, a cup of water, and what remained of his patience while Namping, glowing with impossible sweetness, soothed three different children in three different directions at once.
It was absurd. It was chaotic. Keng was in love with him so badly it was becoming a medical issue.
By the time the last child had theoretically been settled, it was nearly an hour later. Keng stood outside the bedroom door with Namping tucked against his side and let out a slow breath.
The hallway was quiet. The house was quiet. Namping leaned into him, tired and warm, and Keng dropped his forehead against his husband's temple.
"Finally," he murmured. Namping laughed softly. "Poor Papa."
"Don't mock me."
"I'm not mocking you." Namping tilted his face up, eyes bright with tired amusement. "Maybe a little."
Keng slid one hand around his waist and pulled him closer. There. This. This was what he had wanted all day.
Namping in his arms. The house quiet. No small voices yelling for Papi from another room.
He bent and kissed him. Just once at first. Soft. Slow. The kind of kiss that started as hello and immediately became something else.
Namping sighed into it and melted in the way he always did, hands coming up to rest against Keng's chest, body going warm and pliant against his.
Keng deepened the kiss just slightly, thumb pressing into Namping's waist, and thought, with immense satisfaction: mine.
Then— "Papi?"
They froze. Keng did not move. Did not breathe. Did not release his husband. Maybe if they stayed still enough, the problem would go away.
"Papi!" This time louder. Closer.
Namping pulled back first, already smiling in that infuriatingly fond way he had whenever one of their children interrupted them. Keng kept his eyes closed for one more second.
"I hate this house," he said quietly.
"No you don't."
"No," Keng admitted. "I really don't."
The bedroom door opened.
Oh-Ae stood there in dinosaur pajamas, hair sticking up on one side, stuffed rabbit tucked under one arm. "I had a dream," he announced.
Without hesitation, Namping knelt down and opened his arms. Oh-Ae went straight into them. Of course he did.
Keng watched his son fold himself into Namping's embrace and knew instantly that the night was not recovering from this. "What kind of dream?" Namping asked softly.
"There was a fish." Keng waited. That was apparently the entire report. Namping, saint that he was, nodded solemnly. "A scary fish?" Oh-Ae considered. "Rude fish."
"That's serious," Namping said. Oh-Ae nodded against his shoulder. Keng looked at the ceiling again. Within two minutes, Oh-Ae was in their bed "just until he gets sleepy again."
Keng was already predicting disaster when there was a second knock. Then a third. Then the door opened without waiting.
Por came in first, clutching his blanket. "Save says his room feels weird." Behind him, Save appeared, looking deeply aggrieved. "It does."
"What does that mean?" Keng asked. Save shrugged. "It feels weird." Pung arrived next because he "didn't want to be lonely." Otto came because "everyone else is here." Fifa came last, already carrying his own pillow like a professional.
And just like that, Keng's bedroom — his sanctuary, his final hope, the place where he had planned to hold his husband and maybe kiss him until morning — became a refugee camp for children emotionally incapable of sleeping more than ten feet away from Namping.
He stood at the foot of the bed and watched the invasion in real time.
Namping, because he was Namping, made room. Always made room. Por went to his left. Save attached to his right. Pung curled near his knees. Otto claimed one arm. Fifa claimed the other. Oh-Ae stayed in the center like he'd orchestrated this.
There was one narrow strip of mattress left. Keng stared at it. Namping looked up at him from the middle of the nest of children and smiled — sleepy, apologetic, unbearably beautiful.
"You can still come here," he whispered. The children all looked at him. Suspiciously. Like border guards.
Keng climbed into bed with the grim dignity of a man accepting defeat in public. He settled carefully into the only available space, which was approximately half his normal width and mostly occupied by Pung's feet.
For a moment, everyone shifted and resettled. Then silence. Then, slowly, Namping reached across the fortress of children and found Keng's hand under the blanket.
Threaded their fingers together. Keng looked at him in the dim light. Namping's face was half-buried in pillows and children, hair a mess, eyes soft and laughing.
"Hi," Namping whispered. Keng huffed a quiet breath through his nose.
"Hi."
"Still mad?"
"Yes."
Namping's thumb brushed over his knuckles.
"You'll survive."
"Maybe."
"You love them."
Keng looked at the pile of limbs and blankets and sleepy faces that had ruined his night.
Por, frowning even in sleep. Save, curled around Namping's arm. Pung, drooling slightly on the blanket. Otto with one hand flung over Namping's stomach. Fifa using Namping's shoulder as a pillow. Oh-Ae tucked under Namping's chin like he belonged there.
Then he looked at Namping. His husband. His beautiful husband. The center of gravity in this family. The one every child turned toward without thinking. The one Keng turned toward too, if he was being honest.
"Unfortunately," Keng said quietly, "I do." Namping smiled — that private smile, the one that only ever belonged to Keng. "Come closer, then."
Keng looked pointedly at the number of obstacles between them. "This is as close as your children have allowed me."
"Our children," Namping corrected automatically. Keng narrowed his eyes. "Tonight they are your children." That made Namping laugh, but softly, because the room was full of sleeping kids.
Then, with the kind of stealth that only years of shared parenting could produce, Namping shifted just enough to lean over Save's head and press a quick kiss to Keng's mouth.
Short. Soft. Barely there. Still enough to make Keng's entire ruined evening feel suddenly survivable. He caught Namping's hand tighter under the blanket.
"You think one kiss fixes this?" he whispered. Namping's eyes sparkled. "No," he whispered back. "But maybe it helps."
Keng was preparing a response — something low and pointed and appropriately husband-like — when Oh-Ae, eyes still fully closed, mumbled from the center of the bed: "No more kissing. Sleep."
There was a silence. Then Namping bit his lip so hard trying not to laugh that Keng nearly gave up on dignity altogether.
"Your son is threatening me in my own bed," he said. "Our son," Namping whispered. Keng sighed.
Around them, the room settled deeper into quiet. The children were warm, heavy with sleep, breathing softly in different rhythms. The house had finally gone still.
And under the blanket, Namping's hand was still in his. It was not the night Keng had planned.
There were no long kisses. No uninterrupted cuddling. No peaceful, private time with his husband.
Instead there were six children in his bed, all of them convinced that Namping was a public resource, and one tiny stolen kiss that had to last him until morning.
Objectively, it was a disaster.
Subjectively—Keng looked at the mess of his family in the dark and felt something in his chest soften despite himself.
Namping caught him looking and smiled again. Soft. Sleepy. Home. Keng lifted their joined hands and pressed a kiss to Namping's knuckles.
Namping's expression went even softer. "I'll make it up to you tomorrow," he whispered. Keng raised a brow. "Will you."
"Mhm."
"You promise."
Namping nodded once against the pillow. From somewhere near his shoulder, Fifa — again, clearly not fully awake — muttered, "No you won't. We have breakfast."
Keng stared into the darkness. Namping shook silently with laughter. And because he was outnumbered, because he was defeated, because apparently this was his life now, Keng did the only thing left available to him.
He settled deeper into the bed. Kept hold of his husband's hand. Closed his eyes. "Tomorrow night," he murmured. Namping squeezed his hand once. "Tomorrow night," he agreed.
Keng believed him for exactly three seconds.
Then Pung rolled over in his sleep and kicked him in the thigh, Por stole half the blanket, and Oh-Ae made a tiny content sound under Namping's chin like he'd personally won something.
Keng opened his eyes again and stared at the ceiling. This, he thought, was what fatherhood really was.
Not wisdom. Not sacrifice. Not even love, exactly. This. Losing your husband to six clingy children and still loving every single person in the bed enough that your chest hurt with it.
He turned his head.
Namping was already half-asleep, still holding Keng's hand, surrounded on all sides by children who adored him so much they apparently needed physical contact to survive the night.
Beautiful. Impossible. Entirely Keng's, even now. Keng looked at him for a long moment in the dim light.
Then he leaned as far as he could across the battlefield of blankets and sleeping limbs, and pressed one last soft kiss to Namping's forehead.
Namping smiled without opening his eyes. And Keng, defeated but not empty-handed, finally let himself sleep.
Tomorrow night, he thought.
Tomorrow night he was locking the door.