If she didn’t get out of this shower soon she was going to end up looking like a wrinkled prune, it wasn’t helping her thought process anyway, she was still no clearer in deciding how she needed to proceed to sort this problem out. She quickly shut off the shower and grabbed the towel wrapping it around her middle while she got another and wrapped her long sopping locks in it before she climbed out and into the main part of the bathroom. She quickly towelled herself dry and threw on the pair of sweats and tank top, knowing that when Nick was back all he would want to do was crash on the bed for a few hours so there was no use wrinkling up what she was going to wear tonight.

She sprayed on some deodorant and then hung up the towel before she made her way out into the bedroom, frowning slightly when she spotted Nick who looked so deep in thought he hadn’t even heard her come in.

He jumped when she asked “What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” he replied far to quickly placing the handful of pills back into the bottle. He looked to guilty to be doing anything above board and that’s when she realised what the tablets in his hand were. All his pain meds had been in boxes, the only thing she knew were in a bottle like that were her contraceptive pill, so why the hell did he have them out?

“Your pain meds are over there,” she pointed out his gaze following her finger to the nightstand next to his side of the bed.

“Oh yeah,” he said placing the bottle back in her bag before he walked over and popped two off the pills quickly, but if he thought she was going to let this go he was so wrong, she was intrigued at his behaviour now.

“So why did you…” as soon as his back stiffened she realised what she had caught him doing and she threw the towel she had been roughly drying her hair with on the bed. “I can’t fucking believe you!”

“What?” He fired back turning to her.

“You were counting them weren’t you?!” She accused shaking her head in disgust at him.

“No I wasn’t. Why would I do that?” He lied unsuccessfully, he could never met her eye when he lied and it was just convenient the way he turned away from her when he uttered the words.

“Oh at least have the decency to own up to what you were doing, I caught you fucking red handed!” She yelled.

“Fine okay I was,” he said standing up and holding his arms up in defeat.

“Why?” She asked softly, her brow wrinkling in confusion but he just kept quiet. “Do you not trust me?” Again he kept quiet and diverted his gaze down to the floor. He was so child like when it came to stuff like this, especially when he was in the wrong, he would try and avoid the situation which made her ever madder. “Have I ever given you a reason to not trust me?”

“No,” he mumbled.

“Then why did you feel the need to check that I was still taking my pill?” She almost yelled again her confusion turning into agitation.

“Because after what we were talking about it would be damn easy for you to spring a pregnancy on me,” he said ducking when she threw a remote at him. “Well that’s mature!”

“Don’t you dare say that to me! MATURE! YOU’RE FUCKING MATURE ARE YOU?!!” She yelled. “You know what? I have put up with the rest of your shit Nick but I won’t stand for this. How dare you go behind my back like that? This just go to show how much you don’t want to be with me, how uncommitted you are to this relationship.”

“Here we go again,” he said rolling his eyes.

“Excuse me? Here we go again? What the hell is that supposed to mean?” She asked angrily crossing her arms.

“Every argument we have it always comes back to me and my lack of commitment to you. Commitment doesn’t equal marriage and babies Adie I’ve done a lot to show I love you, to show that I want to be with you. You’re just pissed off that you’re not getting your own way,” he accused.

“Not getting my own way? Well then you’re pissed off that I’m not bowing down to your every wish like you’ve been so used to in the past, that I’m not just going to roll over and let you walk all over me!”

“That’s where your wrong because that’s what I love about you,” he admitted.

She rolled her eyes and shook her head at him before replying, “Yeah you’re so in love with me.”

“Well tell me how you define love? What I can do to show that I love you because I’m obviously not doing a good enough job at the moment am I?”

“You already know,” She told him as she sat down on the bed and began rough drying her hair again.

“And we’re back to the marriage thing again,” he sighed. She didn’t reply, just kept on drying her hair but he could tell she was crying, even if he couldn’t see her face or hear her he knew and he hated that he was the cause of that. He gently sat down on the bed and reached out to rub her arm but she pulled away quickly, moving over to the chair in the corner of the room. “I am committed to you,” he told her when she just stared at him with her red rimmed eyes. “I moved halfway across the country for you, accepted that we were going to have time apart, I quit partying for you.”

“Yeah but we all know there was another reason for that though don’t we?” She said raising her eyebrows challengingly to him, wrapping her arms around herself.

“I knew you were going to throw that in my face,” he spat back standing up from the bed. “It was three years ago, it was over before it started, I’ve changed Adie.”

“Still cheated though didn’t you?” She challenged.

“Yeah. Is that what you want to hear? You want me to admit it again? Okay I will, she gave me head, I was drunk, pissed off at you and I made a mistake. If I hurt you that badly why did you take me back?” He asked.

“I’m beginning to ask myself the same question,” she replied not missing how hurt he looked when she admitted that but she was too pissed off to apologise and so she just looked away, staring out the window.

“I don’t understand you. You’re obviously not happy with me and the life we have at the moment so I don’t know why you’re in such a rush to run down the isle when it quite clearly wouldn’t last.”

“What do you mean by that?” She asked turning again to face him.

“A piece of paper and a ring are not going to change anything Adie, our problems are still going to be there and I don’t want to make that mistake with you,” he softly admitted bending down in front of her, his hands rubbing the tops of her thighs.

“I just want to know that I’m not wasting my time.”

“I love you,” he said taking her hand and kissing the top of it, “I’ve always loved you,” he said turning it over and kissing her palm, “ and I’m always going to love you,” he said reaching up to dry the few tears that had spilled before leaning in to kiss her. She leant into it at first but as soon as his hand began to creep towards her centre she pulled away knowing she couldn’t allow herself to go through with it, if she did that would mean he would have won.

“No,” she said trying to push him away but he was stronger and just trailed his kisses down her neck.

“Let me show you how much I love you,” he mumbled.

“NO!” She said pushing him more forcefully, making him fall to the floor in a heap before she climbed over him. “You don’t get to do that, you can’t just expect to sleep with me and make all this go away. I… think we need some time apart,” she said with a shaky breath.

“Time apart?” he sarcastically laughed. “I think that’s the cause of our problems, how the hell are we supposed to sort through them when we’re apart?”

“Well we’re not exactly sorting through them when we’re together are we?” She challenged.

He stood up and made his way to her slowly, “Look after tomorrow we’re going to be apart for another three weeks and then I’m home and we’re going to go to therapy and we’re going to sort through this, I promise.”

“I’ve been asked to go to Nepal,” she admitted not looking at him.

“Nepal? What’s in Nepal?” He asked confused.

“There’s a group that go every year, they perform cardiac surgery for free on kids out there who need it, they need ITU nurses with experience and I’ve been asked to go.”

“How long for?” He asked.

“Two months.”

“You don’t have any holiday left from work,” he pointed out.

“I can take unpaid leave.”

“So that means by the time you get back I’m going to be well into the American leg of the tour, so when are we ever going to sort through this? Why haven’t you told me Nepal was a possibility before now?” he asked.

“I didn’t know it was until today,” she admitted and instantly, with the way his facial features hardened, she knew he had pieced everything together.

“Mark asked you didn’t he?” he snidely asked shaking his head in distain. “After the way he treated you, you still think his shit doesn’t stink don’t you?”

“Oh don’t tell me your jealous, he’s married,” she retailed.

“Being with someone didn’t stop him from screwing around on you though did it?”

“Didn’t you fucking stop you either did it?” Adie threw back at him.

“Mine wasn’t for six months though, and I came to you and admitted what I had done, I didn’t let you catch me in bed with one of your best friends. I can’t believe you call him your friend, let alone still talk to him. You are not going to Nepal.”

“I’m not going? Really? And how are you going to stop me?” She laughed.

“I saw the way he was looking at you, he still loves you and don’t try and deny that you don’t have feelings for him.”

“Yeah there are still feelings there, he’s a friend Nick and that’s all. He’s married and even if he did try something on do you really think I would want to put another women through what I went through, that I would put you through that? I’m not as callous as you are, I don’t let my vagina rule my head. I know what it feels like to be cheated on and I wouldn’t want any other person to go through that humiliation,” she told him.

“One fucking time!”

“It should have been zero you should have loved me enough to say no!” She screamed back.

“Then you should love me enough to say no to Nepal,” he countered raising his eyebrows to her.

“If I asked you to quit this tour for me would you?” His silence was enough of an answer to her. “Yeah I didn’t think so!”

“This is different, this is my job,” he told her.

“Yeah well I would be going to Nepal to help sick kids Nick, not to screw Mark behind your back.”

“I just don’t think now is the time to do this, I think we need some time to try and sort through things, I don’t want us to fall apart,” He admitted his voice cracking slightly but by the time she looked to him he was facing away from her looking out the window.

“Then talk to me, tell me how you feel, open up to me,” she said walking over to him wrapping her arms around his waist from behind resting her forehead against his back.

“I can’t, not here, I’ve already told you that, we don’t have enough time anyway,” he mumbled as he rested his hands on top of hers and he moved back slightly before pulling her to rest in front of him. He pulled her arms up so they were wrapped around his neck as he leant down to kiss her again but she pulled away making him sigh.

“I said no.”

“It will de-stress you,” he tried.

“You mean it will for you, well there are plenty of groupies down stairs who I’m sure would jump at the chance.”

“Then maybe I’ll go down there and find one,” he retaliated knowing he had gone one step too far when she stared him down for a few seconds before grabbing her purse and shoes and stalked off in the direction of the door.

“You know what? You can fucking have them!” She said as she violently opened the door and almost crashed into Alex and her sister.

“Adie, I didn’t mean…just come back!” he yelled after her but it was no use and he watched as she rounded the corner.

“Go after her,” Rachel told Alex.

“You go after her she’s your sister, she’s not going to talk to me,” he replied.

“Well I’m really going to be able to catch up to her aren’t I?” She said pointing to her large stomach.

“Fine,” he said as he took off down the hallway.

“You and I are going to have a little talk,” she told Nick as she pushed him back inside the room and closed the door watching as he fell face first into the bed. “Nick?…Nick do not try and smother yourself to try and get out of this conversation!” She joked making him move and look at her a small smirk on his face before he let a few tears fall. Those tears made Rachel frown in concern, god now he was showing his emotions in front of the wrong sister, people weren’t supposed to see him when he got like this, it showed he was weak, people would play on that, would use it against him.

“I’m loosing her Rach,” he whispered as he pushed himself into the sitting position on the bed, moving over so she would have enough room to sit next to him.

“Why do you say that?” She asked as she slowly lowered herself down on to the bed and when he tried to hide a giggle she shot him a look, “don’t even start I get enough of the fat jokes from Alex!”

“Well you are looking pretty big now, guess you shouldn’t have eaten half of my cake should you!”

“Whatever and stop trying to change the subject. What happened?” She asked.

He sighed and look towards the window, wondering whether Alex had managed to catch up with her, because she could be pretty fast when she wanted to get away. “We got in a fight,” he shrugged.

“Well that much was obvious!”

“She kinda…well she uh caught me counting her pill,” he mumbled quickly dropping his eyes to the comforter before him but he still saw the shake of Rachel’s head and heard her exasperated sigh.

“Nick…why?” She asked.

“I’m not ready for that yet.”

“But has she ever given you a reason to not trust her? Has she ever given you any indication that she would do that, that she would get purposely pregnant to try and trap you?” Rachel asked pulling his face so that he had to look at her.

“No,” he said softly his cheeks blushing scarlet. The more he thought about it the more childish and irrational he realised he had been, but this was an argument that had been brewing for months anyway so maybe it was better that this had happened.

“Then why do something like that?”

“I don’t know Rach? Maybe my fever is making me delusional? Maybe I know she isn’t happy? She wants us to be married and have a family so badly but…but I…” his voice was so close to breaking, he could feel the hot angry tears at the back of his eyes and he quickly turned from the women sat beside him, not wanting her to see him like he was.

“But you what? Come on Nick tell me or tell her,” she said placing a comforting hand on his shoulder.

“I want to… so badly Rachel, I really do but I’ve been hurt in the past, so many people have played on my emotions…”

“I know that and she knows that too but you can only keep saying that for so long…the longer you keep using that line the more pissed off she is going to get because your basically saying to her you don’t trust her. What you did today would have been a big slap in the face,” she told him firmly making him turn his head back to her to try and defend himself.

“I’m trying okay?” He said his voice rising slightly as he got up off the bed. “I asked her to come to therapy with me, I gave her a promise ring but I know that wasn’t enough, she thinks she hid the look on her face when I gave it too her, she thinks I don’t see her looking at it then to your wedding ring,” he angrily said pointing to the band on Rachel’s left hand.

“Okay…alright just calm down okay? Do you want me to talk to her? To try and explain?” She offered.

“No…she’ll just…it won’t change anything…we both want different things,” he said leaning his head against the window, straightening up slightly when he saw Alex walking across the road with Adie, at least he caught up with herhe thought to himself.

“What do you want Nick?” God she was the first person to ask him that in what seemed like forever and he truly didn’t know. Yes a loving family that he had helped to create would be great but there was just too much risk, he saw what happened when the idealistic picture disintegrated, saw what it did to the children and he would not be willing to put anyone through what he had been through himself.

“Her. I just want her Rach.”

Deep down he knew that that wasn’t enough for Adie and in his heart of hearts he knew that this was all going to come to end.

***

“ADIE!” Alex called for the third time as he caught up to her on the stairs, grabbing her arm. She tried to shrug him off but he held on firmly, pulling her into his embrace when she broke down and started sobbing.

“I can’t do this anymore Alex,” she hiccupped after a while.

“C’mon we’ll go and talk,” he said as he grabbed for her hand to try and take her back up to the sixteenth floor where they were all staying, but she resisted, pulling her hand out of his as she shook her head.

“I’m not going back up there. I need to get out of here,” she said swiping the tears from here eyes.

“You need to sort this out,” Alex tried.

“Not right now I don’t, if I go back up there this is just going to get worse, I’m so angry at him right now,” she said bitterly.

“Well then talk to me about it, we don’t have to go back upstairs we can go someplace else,” he added quickly when he saw the hesitation in her eyes.

She sighed and then nodded letting him lead her out of the hotel and across the road and ten minutes later she was sat in a secluded area of Hyde Park, Alex walking towards her with two coffees. He handed her one and she smiled a small thanks as she accepted and watched him sit down on the grass next to her. She was surprised when he didn’t ask her about the fight she had just had with Nick right away, instead choosing to look around his surroundings, taking in all the other people who were grabbing the opportunity to bask in the English sunshine while it lasted.

“I miss it here,” she told him, breaking the comfy silence.

“London’s cool, you know apart from the rain,” he said nodding his head in agreement.

“It doesn’t always rain Alex,” she told him with a small smile as she took a sip from her coffee.

“You know most times I’ve been here the weather had actually been like this,” he admitted making her laugh. “So why do you miss it?”

“To be honest I don’t really know, when I lived here I used to moan like hell. I hated the smog, the traffic, being so far from home, the fact that they didn’t have oreos over here then. I just have a lot of good memories here though, a lot of good friends.”

“A Fiancée,” he continued for her. She hadn’t been expecting that at all and she knew she wouldn’t be able to hide her shocked expression, her eyes widening in shock and her mouth gaping open slightly would have been the dead giveaway it was true.

“How did you know that?” She whispered but she didn’t give him anytime to answer, “Actually I don’t know why I asked that, you married my sister with the huge mouth,” she scowled.

“Does Nick know you were engaged to Mark?” He asked as he lit up a cigarette.

Did Nick know? God if he knew then their fight earlier would have been a hell of a lot worse, so no Nick wasn’t aware that at one time, be it only for a short two weeks, she had been engaged to Mark Preston. Her parents didn’t even know, the people who did were a few of her ex work colleagues and Rachel, she had wanted to tell her folks in person but luckily enough she found out about Marks infidelity before she could. She called the whole thing off when she caught him in bed with her so called best friend and she had never felt so humiliated in her life when she found out his sordid affair had been going on for six months behind her back. She supposed it was her own fault really, after all he had done it to her previously, but she had been stupid enough to let him back in.

After she walked in on the pair and felt the burning humiliated tears build up she vowed never again, she would never let someone treat her like that and then worm their way back in just like he had managed to do. It was then she realised she had gone back on that vow though, Nick had managed to worm his way back in and once again here she was unhappy with the direction of her life.

“Of course Nick doesn’t know. That’s not why were fighting though.”

“Are you sure?” he asked questioningly.

“Maybe a little, I mean…Mark was at GOS this morning but nothing happened. I mean why would it? I’m with Nick and Mark is married and the bastard cheated on me with my best friend so why would I go back to that?”

“Nick cheated on you too though didn’t he?” And for the second time today Alex surprised her with how much he knew.

“You know about that too?” She asked a little shocked.

“Adie, Nick is not subtle when it comes to stuff like that. If Mark hurt you so badly with the cheating why did you take Nick back?” He asked taking another long drag of his cigarette.

“Because I loved him.”

“Loved?” he asked questioningly turning to face her, his dark eyes staring so intently she had to look down to her lap, the silence engulfing them once again. “Do you not love him now?”

“I…I don’t know. I don’t know whether I’m just feeling like this because of all the crap we’ve been through lately or whether it’s because we both want different things. I know I don’t feel like I used to about him…I care about…I,” she trailed off as her eyes began to sting with the tears she was trying so hard to repress.

“Look I don’t feel the same way about Rach anymore, not like I did in the beginning. People change Adie, as you get to know them your perceptions about them change, we’ve all got our game faces on when we’re in a new relationship, trouble is you cant keep them on forever, believe me I’ve tried,” he chuckled. “You just have to hope when all the excitement of being in that new relationship fades that, there is something there, that you love the other person for them and not for who they were trying to be.”

“Well that’s the problem right there,” she said exasperated, throwing her hands up in defeat when a few tears fell. “I don’t feel like I know the real him, he won’t let me in and I’ve tried to hard Alex, I really have but I’m losing patience’s now. If he cant trust me enough to let me in and let me see his venerable side then what the hell is the point?”

“I know where you’re coming from and I totally understand but he does love you Adie, he really does. Nick’s just been shit on for years, even before his parents spilt he was closing off his emotions, he’s been played so many times. His Mother was the worlds worst for doing it,” He tried to tell her but she had heard it all before.

Her only thoughts now were on the ominous song that they had been singing when she walked out of the sound check earlier today.

I'm looking back and wondering why
It took so long to realize
That nothing's changed, it never will
All these years of standing still
And still we stay in all this pain
And nothing's gonna make it go away

I don't wanna wait another minute
Put me out of my misery
I can read your mind baby you're not in it
And we're not what we used to be
No you wouldn't have to lie to me
If you would only let me go
And I don't wanna wait another minute to hear
Something that I already know
I know, I know, I know
Something that I already know
I know, I know, I know


So save your voice
Don't waste your breath
Can't you see we're at the end
And this goodbye is permanent
So wish me well and try to forget


And all the fights
And all the ways
We almost made it
But we never did
And it's finally come to this

Song Credit: Backstreet Boys - Something that I already know