Carla and Peter both stayed still, still and silent in each other's arms for a good few minutes. They both pulled away at the same time and there was a lingering moment where they both thought the other one might kiss them.

"We should probably…" Peter said knowing getting that close to Carla was not a good idea. She quickly backed away from him and gave him a quick nod, as if to say "Well done" Peter nodded back at her rather foolishly causing her to smile even though in actual fact there was absolutely nothing for them to smile about.

"D'ya... fancy a brew?" Carla asked Peter nodded even though a cup of tea was the last thing he wanted to drink right now.

It was silent between them once more as Carla pottered about the kitchen made the drinks but it wasn't the excruciating kind of silence that they had once endured in the car last night, it was more of a comforting silence, one that they both could handle with ease.

The kind of silence that you could only have with someone you were incredibly close with. Peter watched her as she put a splash of milk in a mug which she had left the tea bag in, She then added two sugars to it absent-mindedly... This was exactly how Peter liked his tea and he was rather astonished to see that Carla had remembered just how he liked it.

Carla knew exactly what Peter was thinking as she handed him the mug with his tea in, She gave him half a smile and then they both went and sat down at the Barlow's dining room table, Peter one end, Carla on the other.

Peter took a sip of tea but Carla didn't drink hers just yet, She just sat and watched him, unable to take her eyes off the man who had come crashing back into her life so unexpectedly. Although she couldn't bare to look at him for too long because it was evident just how much pain he was feeling over the loss of Deirdre.

"Where's me Dad and Tracy?" Peter eventually asked

"They've gone to get Amy from school, I offered but I think they wanted to be the ones to get her" Carla said "I guess they're gonna bring her back her and then..."

"Oh right" Peter said solemnly. Carla shuffled in her seat uncomfortably for a moment and then said

"I'm glad you're here Peter... " She then paused and clear her throat "I don't mean here as in here I mean here in Weatherfield, Your family are gonna need you and... If I'm honest..." Peter, who had been looking down at his fingernails looked back up at Carla attentively.

"What?" He whispered watching her closely.

"I'm... I'm gonna need you too. She sniffed and it was her turn to look down this time.

"Really?" Peter asked and Carla nodded coyly still not looking up at him. "Well... I guess we both need each other then don't we?" There was another small silence before Peter spoke again "I still can't believe she's gone." He said with a sad sniff, Tears spurted out of his brown eyes and began to fall down his cheek freely.

Carla swallowed and as she looked up at him she couldn't stop her own tears matching his.

"I know" She said "it's so weird to think that she won't be back in that kitchen cooking one of her famous meals." Peter chucked bitter sweetly

"Yeah, I'd give anything for another one of those." he said nodding softly and sadly.

"I were just thinking that earlier." Carla said softly, she was running a finger around her cup absent-mindedly as she spoke, They both reminisced about some of their favourite Deirdre moments for a while and Carla was in the middle of telling Peter her version of the trifle incident when Peter started to cry again, She stopped talking as he quickly wiped his eyes and tried to compose himself, "Peter... Darlin what is it?"

"I just.. wish I had of made more of an effort y'know, I mean there were a few texts here n there but you know what Deirdre was like with her phone... I should have called her more, should ave visited." Peter sobbed

"Peter..." Carla said sincerely, almost reaching forward to take his hand but somehow she stopped herself before their fingers met. "Deirdre really loved you, she loved you like you were her own, you didn't know this would happen did ya? Although... I get it n I wish I had made more of an effort too... I mean at least you were miles away, I were right ere, I should ave come round a bit more." Carla said sadly now.

"I'm gonna ave to tell Simon aren't I?" Peter said wondering how on earth he was going to break the news to his son.

"Maybe you should get him to come over ere and maybe you could all tell Amy and Simon together?" Carla suggested, thinking it might ease the pain if they did this as a family unit. Peter seemed to think this idea was a pretty decent one and nodded at Carla gratefully.

"That sounds..." And then he nodded again. He didn't want to say it sounded good because nothing about this situation sounded good. Carla understood what he meant though. He got his phone out and called Simon as he would definitely be out of school by now and should be able to answer his phone.

Carla watched as Peter spoke to Simon, tears ran down his cheeks as he asked Simon to come over to Number one as soon as he could. Carla couldn't hear what Simon was saying of course, but it seemed as if he was reluctant to come over at first, Peter sniffed hard and said

"Please Si' it's important... just do as you're told." Then Carla's own phone began buzzing in her pocket, She pulled it out and saw that she was receiving a phone call from Nick. She decided that she should probably speak to him as she had just left him standing on the curb outside their building earlier.

"Hi Nick" Carla breathed into the phone unenthusiastically.

"What on earth is going on with you?" Nick asked, he sounded anxious and also as if he was rather annoyed.

"What d'ya mean?" Carla asked a little ridiculously because even she knew her behaviour over the past twenty-four hours had been rather erratic.

"Well where do I start? I mean I thought everything would be okay after last night but you leave the flat in the early hours without even saying goodbye and then when I finally find you, you drive off like a maniac. Not to mention you've been spotted running around the street going in out of shops and the pub." Nick said

"What d'ya mean I was spotted?" Carla asked irritatedly as Peter hung up his phone, he watched her as she spoke into her own phone, "Ave you got people spying on me or summat?"

"Don't be ridiculous Carla. It's just at least three people came up to me and told me they saw you... They also said that you said you were looking for… him?" Nick said as if he couldn't bear to say Peter's name. Carla sighed again, she had an idea who those people going up to Nick probably were and she was willing to put money on Norris Cole being one of them.

"Him? Who exactly is this him?" Carla asked although she knew full well who Nick was talking about.

"Peter..." Nick sighed into the phone.

"So… I was looking for Peter, I was doing Ken a favour..." Carla said and then she paused, not wanting to tell Nick about Deirdre, She felt as if it wasn't really her place to start telling people yet and she also didn't want to say anything in case Nick might have got to Simon before he came home.

"Carla... I know how much you care for the Barlow's but you really need to realise that they are not your family anymore."

"What?" Carla said not believing what Nick had just said to her. She had been with Peter almost two and a half years and in that time she had gotten surprisingly close to his family. Closer then she'd got to any of her other husband's families with the exception of the Connors of course.

How could Nick think that she could just reject them like that?

"Well they aren't are they, I mean not really, it's not as if you've even spent that much time with them recently." Nick said, reminding Carla again that she hadn't been there as much as she wished. She glanced over at Peter who was trying his best not to make it obvious that he was listening to what she was saying. There were a lot of things that she wanted to say to Nick and with a lot of colourful language too but instead she just said

"Y'know what... I'm gonna hang up now Nick." And she did. Carla put her phone into her bag, so it was as far away from her as possible.

Carla didn't say anything, She was far to worked up to begin talking, So Peter left her in silence for a moment, He was curious to find out what had happened between her and Nick last night, although the thoughts that were going through his head made him feel sick, the idea of Carla and Nick was still so alien to him and the idea of them kissing or doing even more than kissing was enough to make Peter want to throw himself under a bus.

"I saw him earlier." Peter said eventually.

"Did ya?" Carla asked, intrigued to see what Nick had said. She imagined it probably wasn't pleasant "What did he have to say for himself then?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing?" Carla repeated,

"Yeah… he just gave me a quick look and then carried on walking." Peter said wondering why Carla was so surprised at how civil Nick had been towards him. "I mean I assume you didn't tell him about... What happened in the lift last night…"

"I... did actually." Carla cut in, a little taken aback that Nick had said nothing to Peter.

Peter had kissed the woman Nick supposedly loved and yet he had said absolutely nothing to him.

Nothing at all.

"You told him?" Peter said shocked, Carla nodded

"Yeah... I did as soon as I got in last night."

"And what did he do?" Peter asked out of curiosity.

"Nothing." Carla said quietly

"Nothing? Well he must ave said something?" Peter thought about he would feel if Carla had of come home to him and told him that she had kissed an old flame. He knew he would have hit the roof.

It was all Peter could do not to go berserk at Nick for being with Carla in the first place, so he really couldn't seem to understand how Nick had remained so calm upon hearing about this kiss.

"He said... that he understood and that he wasn't going to let if affect us" Carla said

"Wow…" Peter said and he thought some more for a moment, Carla watched him

"What?" she said knowing that Peter's mind was going a mile a minute.

"It's just... I find it hard to believe that Nick reacted that way, I mean all I had to do was look at Leanne back then and it would send him into a jealous rage and now…"

"Well that were a long time ago, maybe he's changed." Carla said defensively, although she had been starting to think the same way as Peter for a while now.

"Maybe..." Peter said watching Carla closely, he could tell she wasn't comfortable with this conversation but he still continued "or maybe it's just because it was Leanne."

"What you trying to say?" Carla said although she knew what Peter was getting at, She knew how jealous Nick was of Peter and Leanne in the past and how even the two of them having a conversation about Simon, could make Nick insanely jealous.

"Nothing... It's just if I were your boyfriend and I heard that you had kissed an ex... Well I would ave hit the roof and there's no way I could ave just walked past the guy n ave ignored him that's all, I mean I would ave probably punched him to be honest." Carla sighed knowing that Peter was right, in fact he was spot on and she had been thinking the exact same way as he had whilst trying to work at the factory earlier on.

"So are you saying that Nick doesn't care about me as much as he did Leanne?" she asked feeling a little foolish. Peter shook his head, his brown eyes were totally fixated on Carla as she sat opposite him.

"I'm not saying that at all, I'm just saying that there's always that one person in our lives, one person that we will never ever get over... no matter how long, no matter what happens... If I'm honest I think Leanne is that person for Nick."

"Do ya really?" Carla asked dryly Peter nodded at her.

"Yes, I do and I reckon that she probably feels the same way about him. I mean she always ends up back with him at some point doesn't she?" He said not meaning to make Carla feel as inadequate as she now felt.

"And let me guess… you reckon that you're that person for me, that one person I'll never ever get over, no matter what?" Carla asked him, watching him with her head on one side, trying to ignore the truth telling tears that were begging to escape from her eye lids. Peter looked at her fondly said

"Look all I know is that you're definitely that person for me." Carla didn't have to say anything to Peter, he could see by the look on her face that he was definitely that person for her.

The one she would never truly get over.

Carla swallowed hard, trying so desperately hard not to cry again, She feared if she cried that she would never stop, that Peter would hug her and hold her close and that she would let him in… again.

Their relationship had ended so abruptly and even though Carla knew breaking up with Peter was the most sensible thing to have done, a small part of her always wondered if it was the right thing to have done. She still wondered if she should have given him another chance. She wondered how she'd feel about Peter right now if they had of had some sort of proper closure on their relationship, a proper goodbye rather than an awkward meeting in The Rover's back room.

The front door suddenly opened, Carla turned to see Amy and Simon appear with Ken and Tracy behind them. They all walked down the hallway, silently and in single file as they entered the back room.

Simon looked at Carla and then at his Dad. He may only be twelve but he knew enough to know that Carla and his Dad would never just be sat there having a casual cup of tea like that, something must have happened, something must have brought the pair together.

"What's going on?" Simon asked as Ken flew straight past him, over to Peter and threw his arms around him.

"I'm so sorry Dad." Peter sobbed into Ken's arms. Ken nodded, he didn't care what Peter had to say, he was just so relieved to see that he was back home and he was sober.

The room was quiet. Tracy was already in tears and Peter was still crying from the reunion with his Dad.

"Will someone just say something." Simon begged. Ken let go of Peter and bit his lip.

"Sit down Si and you too Amy." He said nervously, Tracy sat down on the sofa next to where Amy had sat and sniffed.

"Granddad what's happened?" Amy asked anxiously, she could be a little madame at times but she knew when to be serious, and this looked serious. Her Mum, Uncle and Granddad all looked inconsolable. "Mum?" Amy said her delicate little voice breaking as she looked up at her Mum. Carla got up out of the chair to leave them all to it but then Peter suddenly clung onto one of her hands... finally.

"Please Carla… don't go." he begged, his eyes glassy, his expression desperate. She looked at Ken and Tracy who both nodded at her pleadingly. Simon gulped as he watched Carla sit down into the chair next to Peter, her hand still entwined with his.

There was another deafening silence, no one knew just how to start this impossible conversation.

How do you know how to tell two children that they had just lost their Grandmother?