-1Chapter 8

Jack felt as if his heart had been ripped out of his chest, torn into tiny fragments, thrown by the sidewalk and trampled on until he could feel no more. It felt worse than when he crashed on the island, worse than when he thought his father might be sleeping with his ex-wife.. It even felt worse than when Sarah left him. His eyes travelled down the duvet - not baring to look her in the eye. His whole life was crumbling to pieces before him, at last, he thought he would be happy with Juliet back in his life. Yet she seemed to have forgotten to mention the fact that she had exchanged vows with another man.

Juliet clasped her right hand to her mouth, with tears streaming freely down her face she moved her other hand to Jack's. He pulled away, still refusing to look at her.

"I'm sorry Jack". It was barely more than a whisper, inaudible.

After minutes of silence, apart from the faint sound of Juliet's whimpers, Jack looked at her. He looked angry. Angry like the day the had first met. Though Juliet could also see sadness in his eyes, and it killed her inside seeing him like this.. And knowing she had caused it.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Jack had asked her calmly, he looked calm, but his anger was building up inside of him. For the second time that morning he wanted to scream, but for completely different reasons. Now he wanted to scream at Juliet. Scream at her for doing this to him. But he remained calm.. For a little while anyway.

"I .. I couldn't Jack.. I love you, I didn't want to hurt you", Juliet whispered choking on her tears "Please.."

Jack decided to ditch being calm, being calm in the past had gotten him nowhere, and it certainly wasn't getting him anywhere now. He wanted Juliet to know how he felt, he wanted her to hurt as much as he was. He wanted to hurt her. Just like she hurt him.

"And you thought by doing this you wouldn't hurt me, Juliet?!", Jack got out of bed and started to pull on his clothes "How could you even think for one second I wouldn't be even slightly phased by this!". When he was fully dressed he turned to face her. "I mean, you take me back here, and we sleep together! We sleep together.. In the bed you share with him! The bed you and your husband have made love in! And you just expect me to take that!"

Juliet found it hard to speak, of course she hadn't expected him to take this. She hadn't exactly lied to him.. But she hadn't told the truth either, which was probably worse.

"Jack please, I didn't mean to hurt you, I.. I love you Jack, please don't do this to me!"

He leaned in close to her.. If looks could kill..

"Don't do this to you?! What about what you've done to me, Juliet! You know I'm crazy about you, I always have been, and you just.. You go off and you marry another man!"

Now it was Juliet's turn to be mad. "I married another man because I never thought I'd see you again! You left me on that island with no intention of ever coming back! I married another man because I was in love with another man! I moved on Jack! Don't you dare try to blame me because you didn't!". Juliet's eyes were still red, but she had stopped crying. She fought back the tears as best she could, she wasn't going to let Jack leave thinking she had been wrong to marry another man. She didn't want to Jack to leave full stop. But she knew it was going to happen.

Neither of them spoke.

Jack's eyes wandered around the room, he fixed them on a photo framed on the wall. It was of them. On their wedding day. How could he have been so stupid not to notice something like that, right in front of him.

"So where is he now, Juliet? Blissfully unaware of the fact his wife has just been screwing around with somebody else, I suppose?"

Juliet looked at him shocked "Screwing around?", she felt broken "You said you loved me"

"I don't know anymore Juliet.. I just don't know".

Juliet's bottom lip trembled, she blinked back the tears. Jack knew he had hurt her. He also knew he had lied, but he wanted her to feel the way he had. The way he still did. But he couldn't bare to watch her.

Jack forced himself to break away from her and pull the bedroom door open. Without saying a word he made his way down the stairs, picked up his jacket and tie from where they had been thrown on the floor last night. He couldn't hear any sounds coming from upstairs. Somewhere inside of him he wanted Juliet to come rushing down the stairs, he wanted to pick her up in his arms and tell her that he was sorry for shouting at her, he wanted to kiss her and tell her it was all going to be okay. But he couldn't.

Sighing he opened the front door and was about to leave when he saw a car pulling up in the drive way. It was him. He knew it. Jack quickly shut the door. A part of him wanted to walk straight up to this man and tell him just what him and his wife had done last night. In detail.

Even feeling the way he did now, he decided he couldn't do something like that to Juliet. He still loved her, he just didn't want to admit it.

Jack hurried to the back of the house, passing numerous photographs of Juliet and her husband. His eyes locked on the backdoor just as he heard a key turning in the lock of the front one. As quietly as possibly he edged open the door and slipped outside to the fresh morning air. Jack shut the door and walked down the long road to where his car had been parked.

Thoughts of the previous night still fresh in his memory.