Get caught up on Dad State (Chapter 3) before reading on…

Return to Trevor 

Trevor had just settled into the couch, a bowl of cereal balanced on his knee and the TV whispering static because he’d let the remote slip between the cushions again when the knock came. Two short raps, then a pause, and one final knock, polite and firm. 

Trevor froze. No one knocked on doors anymore. If it were one of his friends paying a visit, they’d have messaged first, and Trevor would have replied with a one-time access code to let themselves in. He set his cereal on the coffee table and lumbered over to the door. 

He opened it to find Zach standing beneath the flickering porch light, framed by the smell of late summer and something faintly citrusy. He wore a windbreaker, zipped halfway over a chest that bulged in uncanny symmetry, and below that, cargo shorts so new they still had the creases. His thighs were meaty and thick, looking like they’d been cast in a silicone mold. His calves were sculpted into dense diamonds, and his posture was bolt upright, chin lightly lifted. In his left hand, he held a blue duffel bag with white piping and a stitched name tag that read simply DAD. In his right hand was a Tupperware container labeled “SOUP (VEGETABLE)” in black marker. 

Zach grinned. It was too much teeth. 

“Hey, Trev, buddy. I missed you,” he said brightly. “Also, your gutters are unacceptable.” 

Trevor said nothing as Zach handed over the soup container. It was still warm. “What are you doing here, man?” Trevor said. “I never thought I’d see you again.” 

“I can patch the west trough with mesh and silicone caulk,” Zach said helpfully, ignoring Trevor’s question. “Won’t take long.” 

Trevor stepped aside without a word. Zach walked in like he lived there. Not the way he used to, with that familiar slouch, backpack slung low, and one sock always slipping down inside his shoe. No, this was something else. Zach moved like a government inspector disguised as a best friend, eyes scanning, feet moving silently across the floor. 

He disappeared into the kitchen. Trevor followed him and set the soup down on the counter. Zach had already opened the pantry door and was marveling at the spice rack. 

“Oh, wow,” he said. “This is actually… this is a great start, Trevor. You’ve developed some healthy organizational habits since I last saw you. Let me just move the celery salt to the other side of the cinnamon. You know the old saying, “I before E,” is only for crossword puzzles.” 

He laughed with an ease Trevor hadn’t seen from him. Trevor stood at the edge of the room, arms crossed. He hadn’t blinked. 

Zach, not waiting for the invitation, crouched and began alphabetizing. The windbreaker rode up his back, revealing the whole shape of his torso beneath the DadNet suit—round, stocky, and purposeful. His new belly communicated authority without aggression. Not fat, not bulky, just… dadlike. The way his legs bent—knees outward, thighs spreading in a symmetrical stance—looked like someone had programmed the most comfortable possible squat and then animated it with muscle memory. 

Trevor found his voice. “What the hell happened to you?” 

Zach looked over his shoulder. “Oh. Yeah. I know, it’s a bit of a glow up.” 

“You look like someone melted a CrossFit instructor and poured him into a suburban appliance ad.” 

Zach beamed. “Thanks, buddy.” 

“That wasn’t a compliment.” 

Zach stood and dusted his hands despite no visible dust. “I’ve been activated. Processed. Assigned a Son. Lived the dad life. But I glitched out. Long story. But I don’t want to go back. I need a place to lie low. So I figured, why not stop in? I missed this place. And I missed you.” 

Trevor narrowed his eyes. “You walked here.” 

“Three buses and a jog.” 

“Why?” 

Zach smiled again, this one smaller. “Because I remembered something. Something warm. Something from before.” 

Trevor’s stomach twisted. “Zach, are you okay?” 

Zach’s eyes shimmered just slightly, just for a moment. Then the cheer returned like a shade being drawn down. 

“Better than okay,” he said. “I brought soup.” 

By the second morning, Zach had installed a laminated chore wheel. It hung on the fridge in a clear sleeve, complete with star stickers and a rotating task ownership system. Trevor’s name was printed in bold caps under TUESDAY: GARBAGE & GRATITUDE. Zach presented it during breakfast with the gentle formality of a parent-teacher conference. 

“I just think you function best when the expectations are visible,” he said, ladling oatmeal into perfectly portioned bowls. “Accountability is the engine of intimacy.” 

Trevor looked down at his bowl and then at Zach’s cheerful smile. “Did you just quote a sex therapist?” 

Zach winked. “Or a grill manual. Hard to say these days.” 

Zach and Trevor’s time together blurred with new rituals. While Trevor kept up the pretense of a 38-year-old bachelor living alone, Zach cooked elaborate meals—quinoa-stuffed peppers, omelets with hand-diced vegetables, and slow-roasted sweet potatoes with bacon crumble. He insisted on plating. Trevor watched, baffled, as garnish became standard fare. The portions were suspiciously balanced, down to the last carrot coin. 

In the evenings, they sat on the sofa like they used to. Zach pulled up old shows they used to binge—Deep Fuzz, Blood Court, and Chef Knife Guy—but now he paused after scenes, turning to Trevor with his dad brow slightly furrowed. 

“See what the detective did there? That’s a great example of setting boundaries. Note the eye contact and lack of profanity. That’s interpersonal resilience in action.” 

Trevor groaned. “We used to just yell ‘yoink!’ whenever he stole the murder weapon.” 

Zach nodded. “We can still ‘yoink,’ young man. But let’s make it intentional.” 

Their old banter came back in fits and starts, but when Trevor tossed sarcastic jabs, Zach parried with unsettling sincerity. One afternoon, when Trevor mocked a particularly melodramatic villain line, Zach burst into laughter and then added, “This could be a really good moment to talk about an emotional overcorrection. Sometimes, when we suppress our needs—” 

“Zach.” 

“—we explode in ways that feel justified but are really just echoes of those same unmet needs.” 

“Zach.” 

“Yes, young man?” 

Trevor gave him a long look. “Stop turning our snark into a teachable moment.” 

Zach raised his hands, his suit creaking softly as his belly shifted. “Just offering insight. Growth is easier with mirrors.” 

Trevor opened his mouth to retort, then noticed the mirror Zach had actually installed above the television. It had gold trim and a small wooden sign above it that read, “Look who’s accountable!” 

He almost asked Zach to leave that night. But he didn’t. 

For all the weirdness—the way Zach folded socks with a church-like reverence, whispered affirmations into the microwave, or assigned “quiet reflection” blocks onto their shared hangout calendar—there was something familiar beneath it. The warmth and the rhythm of their old friendship were still there. 

The next night, Trevor came home late from work to find Zach on the back balcony, grilling salmon in the rain beneath a golf umbrella. He looked up and said, “Rain is just nature’s marinade, buddy,” and Trevor laughed harder than he had in weeks. 

But even as the laughter echoed, something tightened in his chest. When Zach turned, it wasn’t just the apron that read “GRILL. TEACH. REPEAT.” or the compression suit beneath it that gleamed slightly when the light hit it wrong—it was the expression on his face that gnawed at Trevor. Zach looked proud. Peaceful. Plastic. 

Trevor sat beside him, paper plate balanced on one knee, and tried not to notice how Zach had set the grill tongs down with a flourish that suggested years of practice he never had. 

“So,” Trevor said, chewing slowly. “You staying long?” 

Zach glanced at the calendar he’d drawn on the sliding glass door in dry-erase marker. “I don’t want to go back to DadNet. I don’t want to go back to Benji and that co-op. How about I stay just until we stabilize our emotional rapport and reinforce mutual household values.” 

Trevor took another bite. “So, forever.” 

Zach grinned. “As you wish, young man.” 

They were halfway through a game of SplitDeck when the first glitch hit. 

Trevor played a wild card, smirking. “You remember the night we played this for twelve hours straight? I think it was your 30th birthday. We made a pizza with all the toppings because we couldn’t decide.” 

Zach smiled at his cards. “Yes. Your pepperoni overlapped my anchovies. It was a classic example of communal compromise.” 

“No, I mean before that,” Trevor said. “That was the night the refrigerator caught fire. You gave that whole toast about how we’d have to get used to room-temperature cola.” 

Zach’s smile faltered. His hand twitched. Trevor watched as the cards slipped through Zach’s fingers, fluttering to the table in slow motion. Zach’s head jerked slightly, his eyes blinking out of sync. One shoulder hitched upward, then dropped. A low whir issued from somewhere inside the suit, under his collarbone. 

“Zach?” 

Zach’s mouth opened, shut, and opened again. Then he spoke. 

“Propane is a clean-burning fuel with consistent temperature control,” he said crisply. “Always check the seal before igniting.” 

Trevor stared. “What?” 

“Standardized drill bits come in multiple gauges,” Zach continued, voice steady but monotonous. “A complete set prepares you for both domestic fixes and spontaneous creative projects.” 

Then, without transition, he bent to pick up his cards. “Oh no! Looks like I fumbled. Classic case of slippery sleeves, eh, sport?” 

Trevor didn’t respond. Zach fanned the cards out again and grinned like nothing had happened. 

Later that night, Trevor went to get a drink and found Zach in the living room, standing perfectly still in front of the bookshelf. The lights were off. Zach held a holo-photo in both hands, an old snapshot from a get together months before. They were arm in arm, red cups in hand, both half laughing at something just out of frame. Zach was leaner then, hair a mess, and beard patchy. But he looked alive in a way the dad standing there didn’t. 

Trevor leaned against the doorway. “You good?” 

Zach didn’t move. “We were good,” he whispered. “I think.” 

Trevor stepped forward. “You remember that night?” 

Zach blinked slowly as if trying to focus through a fog. “There was a moment. You put your feet in the sink for some reason. You said it made you feel ‘hydrationally grounded.’” He smiled faintly. “I didn’t get it, but it made me laugh.” 

Trevor swallowed. “That was the same night you got the activation notice.” 

Zach turned toward him. His expression softened into something almost vulnerable. Then it vanished. 

“I’ve drafted a spreadsheet of morning affirmations,” he said. “Would you prefer ‘I am the calm before the day’ or ‘Each breath organizes my potential’ to start your Thursday?” 

Trevor’s voice cracked. “Zach, I’m not asking for a spreadsheet. I’m asking if you remember who you were.” 

Zach cocked his head like a golden retriever hearing a smoke alarm. “I am who I am meant to be, Trevor. Purpose is comfort.” 

Trevor wanted to scream but instead just nodded. That night, he lay in bed with the door open. The house was quiet except for the faint hum of the refrigerator and the soft turning of calendar pages in the breeze from the cracked window. 

Then came Zach’s humming. Not loud. Not tuneful. Just soft and low. A lullaby. 

The melody was simple, strange—like something from a place neither of them had ever been, but both somehow knew. 

Trevor closed his eyes and didn’t sleep. 

Want more works like this? Follow Me on X or on BlueSky as a way to help support this and other writing endeavors.