A Beautiful Mess

Nine

It had been three weeks since Paul had left and Stephanie was not coping well at all. The first two days had been relatively fine and then the girls had started getting restless. They wanted their father and they had started acting up like they did the first night he'd gone back to Raw.

Feeding them and putting them to bed was a struggle, which only seemed to get better when they saw their father. Four times in three weeks was not enough to appease them however and tantrums were in abundance lately. She'd not been taking them to school either, having to get three of them ready by herself in the mornings as well as look after Nathan was just too much.

She sighed in frustration as she heard her two eldest children arguing. She lightly bounced Nathan in her arms as she walked inside their playroom, shaking her head at the two of them. It was the middle of the day on a Thursday, all three of her daughters should've been at school and day care but she just hadn't had the energy this morning to take them.

"Rora! Murph! Stop arguing right now. Can't you two just play nicely?!" She told them, raising her voice a little in exasperation.

The two little girls ignored her however, continuing to fight over whatever toy they were playing with. Stephanie had had enough, she was at the end of her rope already and her nerves were just not having it. She placed Nathan down on his play mat before moving over to the two girls and pulling the toy from their hands.

"That's enough!" She yelled sternly, tossing the toy behind her. "You are both on timeouts for not listening do you understand? Move it. Go!" She continued, pointing towards their time out spots. "Five minutes the both of you."

She watched as they both looked up at her in shock before running towards their timeouts. Stephanie felt bad for a moment, neither she nor Paul ever really yelled at the girls. But she'd had enough and she did not want to hear them arguing.

She moved back over to Nathan, picking him up off the play mat, settling onto the couch. She shook her head then, when she noticed her youngest daughter toddle over to pick up whatever it was her older sisters had been fighting over. She couldn't help but sigh a little as she realised she couldn't deal with them all day everyday.

They needed to start going back to day care and Stephanie made a promise to herself that tomorrow she would wake up and get them all to day care. It'd just be her and Nathan for the day and she knew it'd be much more manageable then having all four children all day. She had to start getting things under control, she and Paul had been living separately for three weeks now and she wasn't sure how long it'd continue for so she needed to pull herself together.

Paul walked tiredly through the front door, ready to talk to Stephanie. It had been hard being away for the last few weeks and he hated that he wasn't spending nearly enough time, as he should have been with Nathan and the girls. He was starting to think that his decision had been a dumb one and he was going to talk to Stephanie about coming home. His thoughts however were interrupted when he heard the sound of his son crying from upstairs.

He quickly made his way up to Nathan's room, frowning as he realized he hadn't seen Stephanie at all since he'd walked through the door. Her car was here yet Nathan was crying in distress and she was nowhere to be found. Reaching the bassinet he picked his son up, uneasiness settling in his gut at the boys distressed cries and Stephanie's apparent absence.

After nearly ten minutes he calmed the baby down, his concern deepening, as he had still seen no sign of his wife. He could sense that there was something very, very wrong going on and he had no idea what it was. He held his son in his arms, looking down at him with a frown as he spoke.

"Where's your mom Nate?" he asked softly as he began to walk out of the bedroom. He assumed she was still in the house, her car was here and he didn't think she'd just go walking anyway. The more he thought about it, the angrier at her got; he'd been home for at least 20 minutes and their son had been bawling his eyes out by the time he'd gotten there.

Why hadn't she been up there trying to comfort him or check on him? He was barely 5 months old and she hadn't even bothered to check on her own baby. Paul was getting pissed off now, he had been home for 20 minutes and she couldn't have known that, so why hadn't she checked on their son? It was downright irresponsible of her to just ignore her child like that, couldn't she hear him crying?

Walking through the 2nd level of their house with Nathan contently in his arms, Paul realized she wasn't up there. He quickly decided to put Nathan back in their room as he searched the rest of the house for her, knowing they'd probably end up having it out with each other. Once the baby was back in his bassinet Paul stormed out and down the stairs, calling out for Stephanie harshly.

"Steph? Stephanie where the hell are you?" he yelled as softly as he could, so as not to disturb their son.

He checked everywhere before finally heading to their home gym, opening the door roughly. Stepping inside he quickly spotted his wife on the far side, back against the wall, hands over her ears and face buried in her pulled up knees. The wrestler frowned at the sight as he made his way over to his wife, some of the anger he'd had before slowly dissipating.

He knelt slowly in front of her, not sure if she could sense him there or not. "Steph, babe," he says, reaching out a hand to her. "What's going on?" he asks as he slowly pulls her hands away from the sides of her face. His frown deepened as she slowly looks up, eyes frightened and tears streaming down her face.

"I'm sorry," she whispers instantly, shaking her head as she realizes she's been caught. "I just…I just couldn't get him to calm down. He just wouldn't stop crying…" she rambles a little frantically, "I just want him to be quiet! I wanted to…" she stops herself then, shaking her head harder at the words she almost let out.

Paul felt the knot in his stomach tighten at her words. His wife was a mess; never before had he seen her so distraught and over something like this, well it was downright bizarre. He wanted to comfort her but in this moment he really wasn't sure how he could do it.

"Stephanie, what is going on? How long was Nathan crying for?" he asked, just wanting to get to the bottom of whatever it was that was happening right now.

Stephanie glanced away from him for a moment, trying to gather her thoughts. She turned back to face him, shifting to stand up as quickly as she could. She shook her head, "It's fine Paul. I was just…I was overwhelmed. He wasn't crying for that long I promise…I just needed a moment. I thought he'd settle himself," she told him, lying as best she could.

Paul knew immediately that she was lying; he'd always been able to tell when she wasn't being completely truthful with him. A perk of being married for so long he supposed. Usually he let it slide, knowing she never left it too long to tell him things but something told him this time was different.

As she moved to walk passed him Paul straightened up, grabbing her arm to stop her in her tracks. It wasn't rough in any way yet he couldn't help but notice the way Stephanie flinched at his touch. Now he definitely knew something was wrong; in the 12 years they'd been together never once had she flinched or shied away from his touch like she just had.

"Stephanie," he said sternly, turning her to face him, "Don't lie to me. What's going on?" he asked, looking her in the eye.

Stephanie felt her walls go up as anger, as irrational as it was, bubbled up inside her. She pulled her arm roughly from his grasp as she spoke, "Nothing is wrong. Everything is fine Paul," she insisted tightly.

Paul would have believed her if it hadn't been for the tears he could see glistening in her eyes as she tried not to cry.

AN: I've had most of this chapter written for months so I figured why not just go ahead and finish it and post it. Everything has been planned from the beginning and I'm thinking this story will start coming to a close soon. We're pretty much halfway at this point and I really do hope you're all enjoying this story.

I hope you enjoyed. Please review. :) LT.