Adriana found Jon passed out at the table. He had his arms on the table folded and had his head rested on them. Drool was slightly coming out of his mouth. She nudged him awake.

"Jonathan!"

Jon slowly opened his eyes. They were partially red. He slowly sat up and looked around sleepily.

"Where..." Jon started.

"You're at home. You need to shower," Adriana said.

Jon didn't argue with his wife. He simply got up and walked past Adriana to the bathroom.

The next few days were pure hell for Adriana.

As soon as she walked through the door, she automatically had to start dinner and cleaned the house. Jon sat in his recliner chair and watched t.v. all day while Adriana tried to keep some order in the house.

'Let him tell it he's just the man of the fucking house,' Adriana thought to herself angrily. 'Fucker needs to get up.'

"Hey, you know that you live here too right?" Adriana said.

Jon kept staring at the t.v.

"Shut up and get me another beer," was his response to her.

"I'm not getting you anything. You need to stop drinking anyway."

Jon tore his eyes away from the t.v. and looked up at his wife.

"Don't tell me what to do, Adriana. I pay the bills in this damn house. I take care of you. Don't tell me what I can or can't do in my house."

"News flash: this is my house too. And I pay the bills here as well. I'm telling you to stop drinking for your own sake."

Jon rubbed his temple.

"Just get me a beer and stop running your trap!"

"Jonathan, please. I really don't want to argue with you. Can you just be reasonable for once?"

Jon got up from his chair and went to the kitchen. He grabbed a beer then retreated to the bedroom.

Jon went into the room and closed the door. He placed the can of beer on his nightstand. He grabbed a picture off of his nightstand and sat down on his side of the bed.

He stared at the picture he took of Adriana at the park. She was pregnant with the twins. She wore a loose fitting pink dress that went down to her ankles. Her hair was in a ponytail, with strands of hair sticking out here and there on her head. Adriana was feeding bread crumbs to the ducks in the pond. Jon remembered that day perfectly.

"Damn," Jon said out loud to himself. "Adriana, please forgive me."

He placed the picture back down on the nightstand and grabbed the beer. Opening it, he chugged the entire thing down. Jon remembered that he had bought some Vodka just the other day. He reached under his bed and pulled out the bottle. Opening that, he began drinking it too.

He kept drinking until he got just about enough in his system and stopped. He closed the bottle and hid it back under his bed. Jon then laid down and drifted off to sleep.

Sex went from being amazing and full of bliss to a simple quickie or a thing of the past. Simply hanging out was out of the question too. No matter how much Adriana wanted to be intimate with her husband, he either was too tired, simply not in the mood, or wanted to get it over with to satisfy Adriana.

"Jon, what's the matter? Damn, don't you even love me anymore?" Adriana asked Jon.

"Adriana, I love you. Okay? Don't start."

"You sure as hell don't sound like you do."

"Can you just go to sleep please?"

Adriana turned back over onto her side and closed her eyes.

"Look, I'm sorry. Sorry for snapping," Jon said. "Night."

"Night."

The next day:

"Any particular reason as to why you drew a beer can, Jonathan?" Jill asked.

"I just...started drinking. Sometimes when I'm very depressed, I just drink. I really don't know when to stop sometimes," Jon said.

"I have a feeling work is stressful as well," Jill said.

"It is. Had a little gunfight with a criminal just yesterday. I just shot him in the leg. Had to file a report on that," Jon said.

"How's everything else?"

"Me and Adriana barely touch each other now. I've been coming home late from work since I have to work overtime for a while. Luckily Adriana only works a few hours at her shop. She has coworkers that take over for her so that she can go pick up the kids from school and take them home. But her work doesn't stop there. She cooks, cleans, helps the children with their homework and everything. Both of us are so drained and irritated that the smallest thing sets us off and we're arguing again."

"I think the problem is that you guys do not know how to communicate without yelling and screaming at each other."

"I know. And that is what bothers me."

"Which explains the picture you drew and left here. Of you and Adriana yelling at each other."

"Ever think about going to a marriage counselor?"

"No."

"If you want to, I'll give you the number to one."

"I'll talk to her one on one."

"Good. If you guys still can't get things under control, I'm here to help."

"How was Jon as a child?" Adriana asked Linda.

"Oh, he was very aggressive. Partially it was because of me. I do blame myself for taking Greg back. It was my fault. It crushed me to see Jon leave. Even though I honestly didn't know he was just going down the hallway to live with you, I just let him go. He was angry. Very angry. Him and his father used to fight all of the time. Jon would always keep a weapon near him in case Greg did anything to him," Linda said.

"He's been drinking a lot. And he's not taking his medication. He's been working late a lot too. Things have been pretty hectic for him for a little while. I think he'll go back to his regular shift in a few days. How do I fix things with him?" Adriana said.

"You two need to learn how to communicate without getting angry at each other. Learn to let go of the past. Just. Let it. Go," Linda said. "Both of you are great parents. Jon can be a hothead himself. He tries so had not to be like his father. But he's a great father. Sometimes Maddy cries when Jon leaves her with me."

"She does?"

"Yup. The kids really love their father. And they love you very much too. J.J. always wants to know when you're going to come pick him and the others up. Aiden misses you guys too but he's too busy picking up worms in the backyard."

"That's Aiden alright. Alright, I'll talk to Jon after he gets home."

"I'm going to keep the kids one more night so that you two can get things sorted out."

Adriana was nervously waiting for Jon to come home. When she heard the front door open, she quickly got up and ran to him. She hugged him as tight as she could. Jon hugged gave her a hug and rubbed her back.

Adriana didn't notice that she was crying. She sniffed and tried to hold back tears.

"Don't cry baby," Jon said. "Please, don't cry."

Adriana couldn't stop herself. Jon held onto his wife tight and let her cry on his shoulder.

"I'm sorry," Adriana said.

"I'm sorry too," Jon said.

"Dammit, I don't want to keep fighting like this!" Adriana said.

"Me neither. I'm so sorry for everything."

"I'm not going to drink or smoke anymore. That shit isn't me. Mom raised us better than that. If we keep this up, we're going to end up killing each other."

"I want the kids to be happy. I want you to be happy."

"I want you to be happy too."

Jon sighed.

"I really messed up," he said.

"No. You didn't. I still love you. No matter what."

"I love you more."

"Jon?"

"Hm?"

"We should talk while eating doughnuts."

"I'll take you to get some doughnuts then I'll take you to the park."

The cool breeze brushed past the both of them. Jon had eaten two grape jelly filled doughnuts. Adriana was eating a plain sugar doughnut. She laughed when Jon spilled jelly over his leather jacket.

"It's not funny," Jon said. He wiped the jelly off of his jacket and smeared the the jelly on the picnic table.

"It is too funny. And you have jelly on your chin."

"Would you stop pointing everything out?"

Adriana giggled and watched as Jon wiped his face with the back of his hand.

"Here's some hand santizer and Kleenex," Adriana said.

"Now you offer them to me."

"Oh, shut up and take it."

Jon wiped his mouth with the tissues and cleaned his hands with the sanitizer.

"Let's go over to the swings," Adriana said.

"Just one quick thing: remember when I told you that you were feeding the ducks at the pond over there while pregnant with Aiden and Madaline?" Jon said.

"Yes I do. That was one of the memories I actually did retain. It was a bright and sunny day. Eighty degrees outside. The babies were pushing against my bladder like nobodies business. But it was a fun day though. Isn't that the same day the ducks came out of the pond and started chasing you?" Adriana said.

"Nope," Jon quickly said.

"Yep! It was!" Adriana said.

"Hush!" Jon said.

"J.J. was even here and they were chasing him too! Oh my goodness, that was a classic!" Adriana said. "And you fell down too! The ducks were just all over you. J.J. got away but you? Nope."

"I'm leaving you," Jon said.

He got up and went to the swings. Adriana got up from the table and ran past him.

"I'll beat you there!" Adriana said.

"Like hell you will!" Jon responded.

Adriana managed to get to the swings before Jon. Somehow Jon tripped over his own foot and landed on the ground.

"Fuck!" he said.

Adriana cracked up laughing and went to help Jon up. Jon dusted himself off.

"Dammit," he said.

"Come over here," Adriana said. She grabbed Jon and led him towards the swings.

She sat down on one of them.

"Sit next to me," Adriana said.

"I'll push you," Jon said. "I've always liked doing that."

"Okay then. Whatever makes you happy."

"Seeing your gorgeous face everyday is what makes me happy."

Jon's words warmed Adriana's heart.

"Not too hard right?" Jon said.

"Not too hard," Adriana said, smiling.

Jon gently pushed Adriana on the swings. Watching her hair flow behind her instantly brought back memories of when they first came to the park as kids. Time sure does fly.

Whenever Jon and Adriana came to the park, a feeling of peace washed over the both of them. If only they could get the same feeling in there home. Adriana was thinking of moving back to Virginia. She was born there and wanted to start fresh again in Virginia. But she was only going to move unless both her and Jon could agree on it. Since the two of them have managed to calm down and actually be civilized with one another, Adriana felt this was a good time to tell Jon.

"Jonathan, I've been thinking," Adriana started.

"About?"

She paused for a second, the only sound coming from the squeaking of the swing. She needed to choose her words carefully so that Jon wouldn't go off the deep end. Adriana really wanted to keep this cotroversation under control.

"Moving."

"To where?"

Adriana closed her eyes and said: "Virginia."

All of a sudden, she felt Jon grab the swing and stop it. She looked and saw Jon looking at her. His expression was unreadable.

"Only if you're okay with it. I figured we needed a new start. You know?"

Jon shoved his hands in his jacket pockets.

"I don't know," he said.

"I'm not saying let's pack up and move tomorrow. And if you don't want to move, you honestly don't have to."

"What about mom and Bob?"

"I've already talked to them about it. And your mom and Steve too."

"You told everyone else first but me!?"

"Jon, calm down-"

"Don't you tell me to calm down!"

Adriana quickly got up. She was trying her hardest not to cry.

"Jonathan, I'm not talking to you if you're going to keep acting like this. I know you've been going through a lot, alright? I know why you've been acting up. You've been battling a lot of demons. I get it. I've been reading your journal a lot lately. I'm sorry about Samuel. He was a great guy. But I know for a fact he wouldn't want to see his best friend like this. It's okay to be angry about his death. I know it's taking time for you to go through withdrawal but that's okay. I am here for you. But I cannot talk to you if you're going to fuss and yell at me. I'm sorry but I can't do this anymore. We are not going to keep fighting like this. We just can't do this anymore. I can't do this even more, Jonathan. I love you but I can't do this anymore."

Adriana walked away. She wiped the tears from her eyes as she went back to the car. Jon followed her. He thought about what she said.

The fighting did have to stop.

He wasn't going to go back down the road of fighting, hurting, and turmoil. Not again.

Author's Note: Hmm. We will see what happens.