It was the first day that Peter was working with me, it was the day when I would get judged for hiring my ex-husband as my new employee. This wasn't going to turn out well, but I guess it would be good in the long run, it would be better the further down the line we got, I had to go through the struggle now to get to the other side. Sadly, I had to put on my big girl panties and plow through the looks from my workers, the gossiping of their imagination and the whispered questions that they would have. I never usually cared about other people's thoughts, but I hadn't actually told Michelle yet and Nick was still not on board with the idea, I cared about their words, their thoughts, I cared about them.

I spent the night alone, yesterday just felt different, I cared about Nick, a lot but yesterday, he wasn't the man I knew, the one I fell for. It was expected though, he just went through a major event, he was still grieving, he was struggling, and I needed to be there, but I wasn't typically that person. My comforting could only go so far before it reached its limit, I couldn't pin everything that happened yesterday on his grief and move on, I wasn't able to do it no matter how hard I tried. When I got up this morning, there was some safety and warm energy around me, it felt good to be alone, even if it was for a bit, it was what I deserved.

Walking to the factory, I tried to ignore the moving of the curtain from number one, watching me from the front room. Instead, I kept my head held high and carried on walking, even when I heard the front door open, and footsteps join mine. I tried to keep my smile hidden, I was going to work early, which meant that he was looking at me even earlier and his footsteps quickened to join me.

"Morning Mrs. Connor."

"Morning, how are you then?"

"Good… really good actually, how are you and the breakfast…?"

"Breakfast?"

"You know the thing in your stomach…"

The thing in my stomach? The baby, really, that's how we were describing it now? Like a meal? Either way, it made me smile at the lengths he was going to keep it private and at the direction, his mind went to do that.

"I'm good, and the breakfast was good too, I just hope it doesn't come back up on me."

Ok, now I have to admit that it was a good analogy, it worked even when talking about morning sickness that never just stayed in the morning. We arrived at the factory in seconds, and I let him in before me, knowing that it was only a matter of time before the machinists started showing up. I led him straight into the office, at to the desk that was once his and would be his again.

"So, you know the desk, the office, the factory, nothing has really changed, oh, other than Alya, she sits over there and focuses on taking us to the future, basically putting on us online. She's really smart so I'm making sure that she's in my corner rather than against me."

He smiled at my sum up and sat in his chair looking through the drawers at the top of the desk, due to the amazingly quick turnaround, I hadn't had time to check that everything had been cleared out, I just assumed that Sally would have done that.

"Well, you know where everything is if you need anything, you know where to get it. That's it really. Oh, and all the contracts and stuff will be on your computer."

"Great."

That it? Well, what did I expect, it wasn't like I was giving him a prize, it was just a job, there wasn't much else to say so I dropped my own belongings on the floor, sitting at my own desk, waiting for the workforce to show up. It wasn't long before Alya made her way through the office door and made her way to her own desk, but I did notice the double look in Peter's direction, in confusion but maybe even in appreciation. Peter just smiled back at her, and we listened for the rest of the crew. The office door opened again, surprising me, it was Nick, his gaze firmly set on me as he walked over towards me with a coffee cup in his hand.

"Here, from Roy's."

Then his hand from behind his back pulled out a brown bag that was obviously food from Roy's to go along with the coffee.

"And a back buttie from Roy's as I know you probably haven't eaten this morning."

He was right but I couldn't help but feel weird at the display in front of Peter, but I didn't want to add any more friction between me and Nick, so I tried my best to drop my feelings and smile.

"Thank you."

I got up to take the items from him as he placed them on the desk instead and pulled me into a hug and a quick kiss, ok, it was definitely a display for Peter. If that is what he needed to help him accept this new working relationship then that was ok by me, because at the end of the day, I needed him to tolerate Peter enough to tell him that he was my baby's father.

"Have you got time for lunch today?"

"I don't know yet, can I let you know later? I need to talk to the staff right now."

"Oh, I can wait."

I didn't understand what he was waiting for, but I signalled for the people in the office to follow me out onto the factory floor. The machinists were still chatting to each other, getting ready to start their work, they looked up when they saw me, and predictably I could see their minds wandering and spinning when they saw Peter. Before I could start my speech, Sally came strutting in and spoke directly to me as though she wasn't just interrupting me.

"Mrs. Connor, I feel horrible about leaving you without any support, I thought I could stay until – "

"Actually Sally, I need to make an announcement so that will answer you too."

She was slightly offended that I didn't single her out to talk but moved to the side not wanting to miss what I had to say.

"Right, you lot, listen up. Some of you would have worked here when Peter was running half of the business, he was good at his job. Now, with Sally moving on to bigger and better things, and with Peter needing a job, I have decided to hire him as a new supervisor."

Just again, as I had predicted, murmuring started, the disbelief that I would hire him after our history, and I was actually glad Nick was here so that people knew I was still romantically tied to him and not Peter. Not missing a beat, Peter stepped forward to introduce himself in his new role and try to establish the hierarchy.

"Hi, I know you're all surprised that I am the new supervisor, but I was a good boss before, and I hope I will be again. I am excited to work with you all again."

"And with that warm welcome, let's all get to work and get a move on, the order has to be out by end of play tomorrow."

Not waiting for a response from anyone and I guess to prove that I was the top boss, I walked straight back into my office and sat straight down onto my chair, knowing that my orders were being followed. Nick was the first to follow me in and sat at the edge of the desk, passing me the food he brought to me.

"Eat. Let me know about lunch."

"If I do have time, I will have to see Chelle first, she's going to kill me if I don't talk to her."

Peter and Alya were now in the office, finishing their small conversation with smiles on their faces, and returned silently to their own desks. Nick watched them out of the corner of his eye and even waited for them to be seated before he replied to me.

"Well, now you've got management, you have more time to meet for lunch unless you micromanage. I'll even meet you in the Rovers with Chelle, it's been a while since I had a catch-up with her too."

Ok, so it wasn't a secret that Michelle liked Nick, they had a friendship, and it was nice seeing as they were both important to me, but it was also no secret that she hated Peter. Nick had to know that it sounded like a dig at Peter, as well as the remark about having more management. Sure, I can be a controlling boss, wanting things to go my way and be demanding while doing it but micromanage? He knew that wasn't my style, but he was backing me in a corner, if I didn't have lunch with his now, Peter would accuse me of not trusting him, even though I kind of did, it was still his first day back. Nick was being petty and although I couldn't blame him, even though he worked with his ex-wife, it wasn't an attractive side of the man. I also didn't want to call him out on his behaviour, especially with this audience so I sucked it up and dug into my breakfast.

"As I said, I'll let you know, we are just working at some tight deadlines, you should probably be getting to work before your staff come hunting."

"Ok, text me, love you."

A quick kiss on the cheek and he was gone, with no reply from me yet again, not wanting to make it noticeable, I stared at my screen getting straight to work. It only occurred to me half an hour in, sandwich and coffee destroyed that Sally must have left with her tail between her legs and was probably spreading the gossip as we speak. I should text Michelle, and raid the biscuit tin, I was feeling really hungry.

"Right, I'm going to make a coffee, one time offer, do either of you two want anything?"

"No, I'm ok thank you, Mrs. Connor."

Alya always denied, she had some weird attitude about accepting these things from me, but I just lived with it. Peter was too into the computer that he hadn't even noticed I had said anything, so I left without repeating it with my phone in my hand.

The text was the hardest thing I had done in a while and when you consider everything that had been going on in my life recently it was almost humorous that it was this hard to text my best friend. Every text I wrote was deleted and I could feel eyes on me as the kettle boiled and I distractedly made a cup of tea, realising that I needed to cut down on coffee. My text wasn't even a masterpiece or anything, it was just the best I could come up with.

'Hey, I'll pop by the pub for lunch, I need to tell you something to tell you, nothing bad, so don't worry.'

'You're telling me, you know I'll be there.'

She already knew, damn it. With her quick reply, I knew her phone was in her hand, she was waiting for me to text, or worse, she was just about to text me and send me a lecture. Mentally shuddering at the thought, I grabbed a handful of biscuits and balanced my tea in my hand with them and my other carried my phone. When I got back to the office before I could enter, I was greeted by the sound of laughing, well more like giggling from Alya and it was weird. Walking through the door, I could see that Peter was the cause as he was directly looking at her and when I returned, he straightened up and turned back to his computer looking guilty for something I didn't know.

Alya was blushing and looked back at her own screen, I saw her eyes continually flicker towards Peter though and it had me wondering what I had missed. So, he could talk and chat with Alya, but he couldn't even answer me on whether he wanted a coffee? Instead of calling him out on what as probably obvious flirting, I carried on pretending that I was working, pretending like I wasn't watching them out of the corner of my eye, and ate my biscuits, trying to figure out what was going on.

"Car, about this contract with Madeley, I just, I don't know can you have a look?"

"Yeah sure."

I got up and walked round to his side of the desk and saw Alya mouthing the word Car unfamiliarly as if trying to process that he wasn't calling me Mrs. Connor like everyone else. To be fair to her though, he didn't even call me Carla, he called me Car and I guess it was weird for her to hear. I helped explain what he was confused about and even explained the new element of the contracts that were causing him the confusion. Glancing at the time on his monitor before leaving, I noticed that time had gotten away from me, and I needed to let everyone go for lunch soon and check the order progress. Tackling two birds with one stone, I decided to send everyone to lunch.

"Alya, do you want to get off for an early lunch and tell them lot out there too."

"Yes sure."

With no need to beat Sally anymore, the girl rushed off and I could hear the commotion of the machinists also gathering their stuff and rushing out of the door before I changed my mind. I carried on typing random things onto a blank page before I looked up at Peter and addressed him, being a little petty.

"Oh, sorry Peter, I forgot about you, you can get off too, I'm just gonna check the order and get off myself too."

He muttered something under his breath as a reply and I stood, ready to make quick work of this so that I could try and get my lecture over and done with as I really didn't want it to drag on.

"What was that?"

"Nothing… I'll come with you to check the order. Si is meeting me for lunch so I would be too early in any way."

"Ok, fine"

We made the pass around most of the office in silence as we both counted and wrote down everything to keep on track. We almost made it with no talking, but Peter was like a bottle of fizzy pop, he had been shaken too many times and now he was exploding.

"You know, if you need breakfast, I can get you it."

"What?"

"If you don't have time for breakfast, I can get you something, you don't need Nick."

"Peter, it was just breakfast, he's, my boyfriend."

"Yeah, and I'm your baby's dad, I can make sure you eat enough as well."

That was it then, he felt threatened, and I needed to figure out a way of tackling this issue gently, I honestly didn't think this would happen so early on in the pregnancy.

"I didn't ask him, he was probably just trying to help, as a boyfriend, not… I guess, a baby daddy?"

That remark made him crack a smile even if I could tell he was still annoyed at the situation. There was nothing else I could do but try to be more sensitive to him and Nick, even though I was the pregnant one, that's what happens when you have so many secrets.

"Right, I think that's enough counting, you go see your son, I'm going for my lecture, Mr. Barlow you have caused me a lot of grief."

"Why change the habit of a lifetime aye?"

By the time I reached the Rovers Michelle was waiting with a scowl on her face and I knew it was judgement time.

"So, you know, I can explain, and you love me."

"Yes, I know, I bet you can and I'm not sure I do."

I took my seat on the stool next to her and felt the eyes of some of my workforce on me as they knew what we were talking about.

"Simon came up to me begging to get his dad a job and I said I would if one came up and one did…"

"More."

"I felt bad about not keeping my promise, it's not a big deal, Nick is fine with it and I need someone to cover for me don't I?"

"Yeah, you do, apart from he will also be off when you are."

I was really hoping that she wouldn't figure that out as it was my best reasoning, I was backed into a corner, but she surprised me with her next remark.

"Fine, if you say you know what you are doing but I will tell you I told you so when it goes wrong."

"Ok, you have every right to, I did mean to tell you…"

"No, you didn't."

She was right, I knew I should of but deep down, I knew I forgot on purpose.

"What's it like then, working with Peter?"

"It's alright, Alya definitely likes having him there, if you know what I mean."

"Poor girl. Well, at least this means he will hopefully leave you alone."

That cheered her up a bit hearing about Peter's interest in Alya even if was me just guessing but her reaction hit me deeper than I realised, it felt weird to think of him with Alya. If I knew hiring him would be giving him a new girlfriend, I don't know if I would have done it and I don't know why.

Thank you for all the love, let me know what you think.