The problem with teenagers is they get downright mortified if they’re reminded of exactly how they were made.

Well, maybe that’s not the perfect metaphor considering Charlie’s birth was via a surrogate mother and Leon’s adopted, or whatever it is if it’s not a metaphor — he’s sure Marc could tell him — but Dan can’t even kiss his husband in the comfort of his own home without a groaned ‘dad!’ from one of his kids now. It’s annoying.

It’s not like they’re making out like, well — he refuses to think about his teenagers making out, he knows it’s something that is probably going to happen if it’s not happening already, but even though Marc keeps saying it’s ‘healthy’ and ‘don’t stigmatise it’ and ‘if we want them to be open with us we need to be unilaterally supportive, stop making that face, Daniel’, all that totally reasonable stuff, he still refuses.

He can’t even get away with a hug or a peck to Marc’s hair in the morning without Charlie making a noise like he just ruined her breakfast, and even Leon, sweet, wonderful Leon, has started doing it too. They don’t let him hug them or peck their hair anymore either, with rare exceptions. He misses that.

“Ironic,” Marc says when Dan complains. “Considering you hate public displays of affection.”

“This isn’t public, it’s my house!” Dan says. “I should be able to kiss my husband in my own damn house.”

Marc gives him a condescending pat on the shoulder, but Dan knows it bugs him too.

Dan refuses to be bullied in his own house. He’s going to learn to tune out the ‘ugh’ noise the same way he learned to tune out tantrums and that particularly whiny ‘dad’ tone when Charlie wasn’t getting her way about something minor.

It works for awhile, but the kids change it up.

“Scoot,” Dan says, Marc blocking his path to the fridge while he’s trying to make dinner, and when Marc ignores him, makes it happen with a light hip check, finishing it off with a less light tap to his ass.

“Dad!” Charlie shrieks. It’s harder to tune out shrieking. Leon just ‘ugh’s, but he throws in a disappointed in Dan head shake, which is unfair.

“Ass slapping is a hockey thing!” Dan says. “You do it too!”

“With padding!” Charlie says.

“There’s padding,” Dan says. Plenty of padding. Ten years into retirement, and Marc’s thankfully still got a hell of a hockey ass.

Charlie groans and then says something about Dan being the most embarrassing father of all time into her hands. Marc smirks at him, probably just glad he isn’t being called the most embarrassing father of all time for once.

“Right?” Leon says to Charlie.

“You too, Lion?” Dan asks, hurt.

The Riley Lapointes are at it again, and by ‘it’, Joseph means he might have to go over in a few minutes and tell Riley to take Marc home before some idiot starts taking pictures. The hockey world is weirdly obsessed with them, and he’s sure it’d end up on a blog or ten. 

The Habs themselves are completely inured to it by this point, and to Riley’s presence after they play the Sens most of the time. Joseph assumes, by Marc’s absence after others, the Senators are used to Marc as well. Honestly, some of the Habs have loudly said they prefer Riley at this point, but if they were trying to rile Marc up, it backfired, because Marc just looked pleased.

“That’s so weird,” one of the latest call-ups says, and Joseph looks over sharply.

Logan looks embarrassed. “I didn’t mean it like that,” he says. “It’s just weird seeing Lapointe, like—”

He gestures at the table in the corner, where Marc looks precariously close to just crawling into Riley’s lap, smiling wider than he does any other time, with the possible exception of goal celebrations. Joseph’s gotten used to it over the years, but there is a noticeable disconnect between Marc Lapointe among teammates or media and Marc Lapointe when his husband’s around, like all his edges have gone soft. They’re even sharper the next day, though. Marc in practice after Riley’s left town or they’ve left Ottawa has pushed at least two rookies to the edge of tears.

Joseph gets it. Well, he doesn’t, because he doesn’t live in a different city than his wife, but he’s had enough of a taste from long road trips to know it sucks. He’s not surprised at all they have trouble being more than an inch away from each other at any moment when they're in the same city, but there’s a group of people who clearly recognise them — there was literal pointing — and Marc will be an absolute terror in practice if that leads to pictures.

It’s an Anglo table, so when he goes over he lets Marc know in French that he better take his husband home before they hit the internet again, though Marc undermines him entirely by translating it immediately.