Cracks in the Crystal

Three

Sunlight peeks through the curtains, washing through the room causing Stephanie's eyes to flutter open lazily. Her mind is hazy as she rolls over, reaching an arm out to hug Paul beside her. Except her hand hits empty space, falling to the cold sheets of the space next to her where her husband ought to be.

Her eyes widen in alarm before her brain finally catches up with her and she remembers that Paul hadn't come home last night. In fact, this was the second morning in a row she'd woken up without her husband beside her and it caused her heart to clench. Obviously she had no one else to blame but herself and it made her just want to curl up and cry. This whole situation was her doing and she wanted desperately to fix it but how could she when Paul couldn't even stand to be in the same house as her?

Stephanie lay there in their bed, wallowing in self-pity for several long moments. She knew she should get up and get started with the day but her heart just didn't want too. It wasn't until she heard the familiar lisp of her four year old talking excitedly that she was prompted to pull her self up and out of bed. The wrestling executive dragged herself out of bed, pulling on her robe and heading towards the sound of her daughter.

Getting downstairs and into the kitchen she frowned when she saw all three of her girls sitting at the table, breakfast in front of them. She wondered how they'd managed to serve themselves; she had slept a little later than usual and now she was very, very confused as to what was going on. Until she heard the deep voice of her husband, causing her eyes to widen as her head shot up to look over into the kitchen at the breakfast bar.

"Paul?" she said without thinking, catching the attention of her youngest in the process.

"Mommy!" Vaughn exclaimed excitedly, "Daddy made breakfast," she continued, grinning at her mother as she bounced slightly in her seat.

It took Stephanie a moment before she grinned at her child, stepping fully into the room. "I can see that. What did he make?" she asked, though the question was more aimed at her husband.

He glanced up at her stonily, face hard as he looked at her before turning back to what he had been doing. Stephanie deflated, even as Murphy replied happily about how yummy the pancakes their father had made were. She nodded, slipping in to the seat beside her eldest, pouring herself a glass of the juice in the middle of the table.

"Daddy is you going to give mommy her pancakes?" Vaughn asked through a mouthful of the fluffy breakfast food.

"Course baby girl," Paul replied a little gruffly, grabbing a plate and placing a few pancakes on it. He made his way over to Stephanie, placing them on the table in front of her silently, doing his best not to touch her or catch her eye in any way. Stephanie felt the tears well up in her eyes at the cold treatment but repressed them quickly, not wanting to start crying in the middle of breakfast and especially not with her girls around.

The family of five ate awkwardly, only broken up by the random chattering of the two youngest children. Stephanie watched a little concerned as Aurora ate her breakfast quietly before retreating to her room to get ready for the day with barely a word. It was obvious that something was wrong with her firstborn and Stephanie just hoped it had nothing to do with what was going on between she and Paul.

Paul finished washing up all the dirty dishes and Stephanie ushered the girls out of the kitchen and upstairs to get dressed for the day. They stood awkwardly for a moment; Paul tense and guarded as Stephanie crossed her arms over her chest self-consciously.

"We need to talk-…" she started before getting cut off by the older man.

"I better get Rora and Murph to ballet," he said over her words, glancing at her for only a second before walking out of the kitchen.

"Paul please," Stephanie called tiredly to the blonde man as he walked away from her. She watched as he stopped in his tracks and she could see his shoulders move as he obviously took a deep breath. She followed in his footsteps, moving to stand in front of him so he had to look at her. "We need to talk," she insisted softly, pushing a strand of hair behind her ear nervously.

The wrestler shook his head, "Not now Stephanie," he told her tiredly. "I can barely look at you. I'll spend the day with the girls but once they're asleep I'm going back to the hotel. I never thought it'd be this way Steph…but it hurts just being near you right now and I'm still angry. So just…not now. I can't talk to you because I am so close to just saying fuck it and filing for a divorce. Do you understand?" he sighed; voice gruff and she could tell immediately he'd had barely any sleep the night before. "I wanna be here sleeping beside you but this is your fault. You did this to us," he continued a little angrily.

He released a puff of air as he shook his head, trying not to get too emotional or upset at the moment. Today was about being here and spending time with his daughters, not the clusterfuck of a marriage he and Stephanie had fallen into. It hurt him to be so cold towards her and to speak as harshly as he was but he knew if he didn't he'd break down and cry and at the moment, that was one thing he did not want to do in front of her. She had broken his trust, broken their vows and destroyed their faithfulness in each other and it was going to take a lot of time and work to rebuild; if they even could.

AN: So yes, this is quite a lot shorter than the last chapter but I just felt like that was a good place to end. Plus, I didn't really have much else to add onto this. It's definitely a filler chapter but with some important information within it I guess.

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