Mary

There had been no greeting when he came home (she so enjoyed the fact that she could use the word home and have it apply to the both of them). That was the first thing that tipped her off to the fact that something (well, there were a lot of things that were wrong, but other than the usual world tumbling down around their ears situation) was wrong. He always kissed her first thing when he got back - whether they were in her apartment or down in the bar or even ran into each other out on the street. There was something about finally being out in the open that caused the two of them to relish the ability to express their affection without looking over their shoulders to check who might be watching whenever they saw each other - it was almost like being giddy.

There had been no kiss when he arrived today. There had not even been a hello, a smile, or an acknowledgement that she was even present. She studied his profile from across the room as he went through the motions of removing his jacket and hanging it on the back of a chair. She could not tell what to make of his mood. It was possible that his parents had given him a hard time. He always spent a lot of time fretting about what his dad thought about him. She hoped that Johnston Green hadn't tried to give him some sort of a lecture.

"Hey," she said drawing his attention to the fact that she was waiting on him to say something. He did not respond. He was standing still with his hands balanced over the top of his jacket against the back of the chair as he stared ahead of himself clearly not seeing anything in front of him. She wondered what it was that he was seeing. She wondered what it was that he would be telling her when he finally broke out of it. She wasn't going to stand there and start guessing - it would be silly when she was going to find out soon enough. Besides, whatever it was might be tragic or another complication for them to face or anything along those lines - it wouldn't matter. They would deal with it. She was sure that they could. They were together now - together in the openly together sense of the word. Everyone knew that they were a them, and there was no more hiding or waiting or watching from the background. And now that they were together, there was nothing that the two of them couldn't tackle as a team.

"Hey," he replied blinking in her direction as if he had just broken free of his internal monologue and noticed that she was, in fact, standing only a few feet away.

"What's wrong?" She asked moving closer and leaning up to give him a quick kiss before he answered. He got too broody sometimes; he needed to remember that she was here to help shoulder whatever it was.

He didn't speak for a few minutes. He sighed and ran a hand through his hair before returning it to the back of the chair. He sort of sank against the bracing of his hands as if they were the only thing keeping him from giving in and letting his legs crumple under him. She ran a soothing hand up and down his back while she waited for him to find whatever words he was trying to find. He didn't look sad she decided - it was more as though something had rattled him.

"April's pregnant," he blurted out just when she thought he might actually be drifting to sleep standing in front of her.

"Oh," she replied. That was not what she expected. She understood that that wouldn't be news that Eric expected to hear, but was it really cause for him to look quite as thrown by the news as he did? After all, it would be a little hypocritical of him to be angry if April had gone looking for someone that made her happy. He had done the same. Really, after he got over the initial surprise of the unexpectedness of it (Mary had had no idea of such a thing herself, but April's activities hadn't been at the top of her list of things to pay attention to), he would see that this was a good thing.

He had found happiness with her; April had found happiness with someone else. His parents might still be a little miffed at the sort of under the table way that it had all come about (Mary couldn't really blame them for that; they were, after all, correct that there were better ways for them all to have gone about the whole thing), but they couldn't act like Eric was some . . . well, they couldn't justify acting toward Eric the way that they seemed to be.

None of which really explained how off Eric looked. He hadn't spoken again during any of the time that she had spent thinking things through, and he didn't look as if his tension level had ratcheted down any. There was obviously something else, but she sure didn't have any idea what it might be.

"Eric?" She asked carefully wondering if there was something other than April that he still needed to say.

"She didn't even tell me herself," he said in a tone that she couldn't quite place. If this were turning into some sort of male ego thing, she was going to . . .

"Dad was the one who told me," he added. "She said that she didn't want it to factor into my decision." He shook his head while Mary tried to make his words make sense within the context of the situation that she was still operating inside. "That's finally something that the two of us are on the same page about," he muttered. "A child doesn't fix anything. It's most definitely not a reason to stay together."

Mary's stomach dropped out, and her hand dropped from where it had still been resting between Eric's shoulder blades. She took a step back as she tried to wrap her head around the implications of his words.

"Wait," she told him still hoping that there was something, anything that she had missed in those sentences that was making her think something that was not what he really had been saying (couldn't possibly be what he was really saying). "Are you saying that April is pregnant with your baby?" She asked (her voice cracking a little under the strain as she mentally begged him to look at her like she was insane while he cleared up her misconception).

"Of course it's my baby," he was turning around and looking at her like she had said something insane, but he wasn't calling her out on a misconception. "Who else would it belong to?"

The crack echoed in the sudden stillness of the room before Eric began yelling.

"What was that?" He hollered at her (the words loud despite the muffling of his hands clutching at his face and the blood running through his fingers).

Her fist dropped back to her side - the sting in her knuckles barely registering over the sudden rage that was welling up in her directed at the man standing there looking at her like he was the injured party in this scenario.

"What was that?" She echoed. "What was that?" She demanded. "That was me punching you in the face, you cheating, lying . . .," she trailed off as the words she was using actually registered. Her voice gave way to a pained laugh that she was having difficulty trying to control. This might be what it was like to be hysterical was a thought that flashed across her head, but the unnatural laughter continued on unabated.

"You're a cheater," she repeated managing the words through the laughter. "You're a cheater, and I'm stupid." She continued as the laughter cut itself off just as quickly as it had originally started. "Why should I be anything special?" She asked more to herself than to him even though the words were spoken out loud.

"How many times, Eric?" She demanded in a voice that was deadly calm. "How many times did you spin me the story about how you and April were married in name only? How many times did you tell me that the two of you lived completely separate lives - that you barely saw each other? How many times did you actually go from my bed back to hers and vice versa? Or do you not even have a count because it wasn't anything out of the norm for you?"

He just stood there looking at her with shocked eyes as the blood continued to drip between the fingers clutching at his nose. She couldn't detect a trace of guilt or concern or any emotion of the type in his eyes. There was nothing there but shock that she had hit him and an obvious expression that told her that he had no idea why she was upset or what her ranting spiel was even about.

"Get out of my home," she declared lifting a shaking hand to point at the door. "And don't come back."