A couple of days, and a couple of calls to Phil, we were in East Sussex. Jayne was still tense, but as we drove on she appeared to relax the closer we got to her house. By the time we got there I could see the sparkle back in her eyes, for the first time since the miscarriage. It was late when we arrived so Jayne went to put the kids to bed whilst I endured an awkward sort of handover from Phil.

"Kieron has football practice tomorrow, Jess has decided she doesn't like grapes anymore and she's developed a fear of 'monsters under the bed' so you'll have to check them before she'll go to sleep."

I sighed.

"Oh, I'm sorry am I boring you?"
"They're Jayne's kids too you know, I'm sure she knows all of this."
"Well, she hasn't seen them properly for a while, and where on earth were the two of you a couple of weeks ago? I couldn't get hold of either of you for days?"

I didn't know what to say. It wasn't exactly my place to tell Phil about the miscarriage and I didn't exactly think that he would relish the idea that Jayne had managed to get pregnant again by me, after all those years that they had tried.

"We were just busy preparing for the final."
"Too busy as usual."
"That's not fair."

He rooted around in his bag for a moment, eventually finding an envelope and handing it to me.
"This is for Jayne, from my solicitors. It's the start of our divorce proceedings, I'm not going to demand full custody or anything, I want this to be as amicable as possible."
"So do we."
He nodded.
"Good"
He picked up his bags.
"See you in a few days, tell Jayne I said bye."
"Okay."

As he left I could still hear Jayne upstairs reading to Jess so I wandered around the house that I hadn't been in for about 6 months. I'd been here a thousand times, yet, as I walked through the rooms everything felt alien. The once familiarity of the house had gone, the family pictures of Jayne, Phil, and the children now seemed to mock me, as if saying 'you don't belong here.' Not as Jayne's romantic partner I didn't. This was their family home. The one that they were so excited about buying, the one they made 'theirs' over the years. It was the house they brought Kieron into as a baby when they adopted him, Jess too. I'd always felt that we'd slotted perfectly into each other's family lives, but now I felt like I was invading on something that I shouldn't be.

It was like invading Phil's territory. Like I hadn't done that enough. I started to feel very uncomfortable, fleeting thoughts invading my mind. Where were we supposed to sleep? There was no way I could sleep in the same bed she'd shared with Phil. Everywhere I seemed to look I could see Phil's influence. I suddenly felt hot, and like I couldn't breathe properly. The room started to spin slightly, and I realised I was on the verge of a panic attack, one of my first in years. I ran outside to the patio area and tried to take some deep breaths, the breeze cooling my flushed skin, and helped to make me feel slightly calmer. Still, I was unable to control my breathing, or stop the landscape from tilting around me. I sank down into one of the chairs, putting my head down, trying to regain control.

As I sat there, attempting to clear my mind I heard Jayne's footsteps in the kitchen.
"Chris?"
I heard her footsteps getting closer but I couldn't lift my head up just yet. I could tell when she saw me, because I could hear the concern in her voice as she called my name, and then quick footsteps.
"Chris?" she said gently. I think she had kneeled down, as her voice sounded level to my ears. She isn't that small.
"Chris what's wrong?" I shook my head, to try to convey 'nothing'. She took hold of my hands, her touch making me feel calmer more than fresh air ever could.

She is my fresh air.

After a few minutes I felt in control enough to lift my head up, praying that the landscape had stopped revolving.
"Did you have a panic attack?"
I nodded.
"What do you…what do you need me to do?"
"Nothing" I managed to say.
"I'll get you some water" she said, before dashing back into the kitchen and returning, pressing a cool glass into my hands. I drank it slowly, feeling much more in control.
"Do you want to tell me what that was about?" she said, her hand on my leg.
"It's your house. It hates me."
"What?" she said, frowning. "If this is your idea of a joke then it's not funny."
"Jayne I'm not joking" I said, gulping down some more water. She studied my expression. "You're being serious, aren't you?"
"Yes. But it's not the house, more the items and the occupancy of the house."
"Because it's Phil's house too?"

"Not just that." I rubbed my temples, sighing. "I don't see the same things anymore. It's like I'm seeing everything from a different perspective. Everything….everything's just different"
Jayne looked concerned.
"Chris I don't, I don't really understand"
"It's not 'your' house anymore. It's not the house that you were e-mailing me about non-stop until the sale went through, it's not the house that, before you moved in you sent me pictures of all the empty rooms, then sent me pictures of how you'd decorated it."

Jayne smiled.
"I'm glad you told me to get rid of the floral wallpaper."
"You would have liked it for a couple of weeks then wanted rid of it."
"True"
"It's not about that. I mean, how can you not think about where you and Phil were when you got the call to say that you'd been successful in your adoption process? Or when you brought Kieron home for the first time and you all walked through the door and the house suddenly changed from a house into your family home, with the children that you and Phil were so desperate for. Through there" I gestured inside. "That's where Kieron and Jess took their first steps. Everywhere in this house is where you and Phil made memories, made a family, made a life. And I've never felt this here before, and now I see you and Phil everywhere I look and I feel like there isn't a place for me."

Jayne looked down, having seated herself on the floor by my legs and I could tell that I had upset her.
"You don't feel that there's a place for you here?"
"No. Yes. Well….oh shit Jayne, I'm not making much sense here."
"No, I think." She paused. "I think I know what you mean, but I don't agree with it. That's not what I see. I mean, yes, of course I see the memories, and yes, of course I've had a life here with Phil. But I've had more of a life with you than I ever have with Phil, just in different ways. This is the place I loved so much that I had to constantly send you pictures and e-mails about it because I value your opinion so much. And it's also the place, where I was sat on the phone to you when you told me that Jill was pregnant, and then, nine months later, at 2 o clock in the morning you phoned to tell me that you were a dad to Jack. This was the place I couldn't wait for you to come back from America to see. And it was right here, in this garden where we sat in the summer, just before Jess's arrival with the three boys toddling around."

I smiled at the memory and Jayne saw.

"See, your place is just as a big part of this house as Phil's is. Whereas you see Phil and me, just as equally I see it as you and me. Nothings ever going to change that."
I nodded.
"I'm sorry, you're right. I'm just not seeing it from the right viewpoint."
Jayne rested her head by my legs and I reached out to pull out her hair tie.
"Oi" she said. "I've only just tied it up."
"It looks better down."
"It's too messy."
"Well, I like it."
I ran my hands through her hair, tugging at the slight knots in it.
"Are you feeling better?" she asked.
"Yeah. I guess…..I guess I just needed a little bit of reinforcement. Silly I suppose."
"No, not really. I imagine I'd feel the same way if I was to now go to the house that you and Jill shared."
"No you wouldn't, you're much more level headed than me."
"Sometimes." She paused for a moment. "You know, there's probably more pictures of you and me hanging up then there are of Phil and I."
"I bet he loves that now."
"Hmmm"
"As long as he doesn't cut all my heads out of the pictures" I said, trying to make Jayne laugh but it didn't seem to work.

"Do you think I should move?" she said, more to herself than to me. "I mean, what's the etiquette here? Do I let him stay? Do I leave? Because technically I left him."
"I don't know Jayne."
Then I remembered the envelope, and handed it to her.
"Don't get upset, Phil told me to give this to you. It might help."
"What is it?"
"It's from his solicitors, the start of your divorce proceedings."
She handed it back to me.
"You read it."
"Why?"
"You've done this twice!"
"So I'm a divorce expert all of a sudden?"
"Well you've done it twice more than I have, so yeah. Plus, if there's anything bad in there I'd rather hear it from you."
"He said it would be amicable."
"I know, but….just in case."

I took the envelope back off Jayne and opened it, scanning the text, looking for anything abnormal or anything that would be detrimental to Jayne.
"Well?" she said, anxiously.
"Hang on."
I finished reading it, feeling slightly relieved.
"It's fine, joint custody, but…he thinks as you work away so much, it would be better for him to remain in the house, where the children are settled."
She nodded.
"Fair enough."

She started tracing patterns onto my leg, her eyes looking into the distance.
"So I guess I'm moving."
"You don't have to do anything until after the tour."
"Yeah. Maybe it's for the best, considering what's just happened."

She stared out into the distance, her face unreadable.
"Get a house with me." I said, suddenly. "We practically live together as it is when we're filming, especially now. We could have a house together here, no bad memories, or either of us feeling out of place. A new start, for both of us. It can be down here so that you're close to Kieron and Jess and.."
Jayne stopped me.
"It's a great idea, but do you remember the last time we lived together? I mean properly lived together, the whole thing was a disaster and we wanted to kill each other by the end of it!"
"We were different back then."
"Really? So you're not going to get all moody because there's dishes to be washed, or that the laundry's not in the hamper, or that I've paired up your socks incorrectly?"
"You don't pair socks."
"You know exactly what I mean though, I see the way you look at me when I get out of the shower and I leave the towel on the floor instead of putting it straight on the radiator."
"The only reason I look at you that way is because when you get out of the shower you're naked. You could leave a hundred towels on the floor, as long as you're naked I wouldn't care."
"Oh really"

She raised her eyebrows and moved off the patio where she was sitting, onto my lap, kissing me.
"So….if I walked around the kitchen naked, purposefully leaving the dishes on the side, you wouldn't mind the mess?"
"No" I said, feeling arousal creep through me.
"And…..this would work for every room in the house?" she said, turning on her seductive purr of a voice that she knew drove me crazy.
"Um…probably."
"Well, that would certainly come in handy when we're in our new house."
"Uh-huh….or, we could try out my theory here, y'know, just to practice."

She leaned in again, moving her hips against my erection, making me feel breathless for the second time in an hour.
"You've got yourself a deal Mr Dean."