She knew as soon as he sat down next to her that this was the talk she had been dreading. He had already tried talking to her at Coop’s birthday a week ago but luckily her son had saved her by being cranky and overtired due to all the excitement and she had managed to make a quick escape. She knew that this time she wouldn’t be so lucky.

Cooper was safely tucked away in bed, sound asleep, their Mother was out for the evening and he had just dropped by because he was in the neighbourhood, neighbourhood my ass she thought to herself when she had opened the door wide enough so he could come in. She knew that her Mother and him had been concocting this for weeks, that this would be his little intervention and so after she handed him the coffee she called him on it.

“Look I know why you’re here so can we cut the small talk and just get straight to it?” She said sitting in the arm chair.

Tim eyed her for a few moments before slowly saying, “Why do you say that?”

“Because I know you, so can we get this out of the way so I can go to bed?”

“Fine,” he sighed, “I want to know why you’ve not been coming to church, why you’ve been avoiding it?” he asked.

“You really need me to answer that? You really need a reason?” She asked.

“Yeah I do,” He answered.

“Fine are you ready to hear them? Because there are quite a few.”

“Tell me,” Tim told her softly placing his coffee on the table.

“He took Dad away, he gave me Cooper and then stole my husband from me, he fucking blew him up with a bomb, he’s taken away Cooper’s chance of ever knowing his Father, of only growing up with me, how am I supposed to love that child enough for the both of us?,” she ranted her breath coming out ragged as hot tears started to fall from her eyes, now a deep shade of green from the anger and upset. “How….how …how am I supposed to get through life by myself?”

She leant her elbows on her knees as she buried her face in her hands and just cried, fighting against her brother when he tried to wrap her in a hug, she didn’t fight for very long though and just sobbed into his chest.

“It’s okay,” He soothed.

“No it’s not,” She sniffed, wiping at her eyes as she pulled away from him.

“You’re angry, it’s okay to be angry.”

“I’m more then angry Tim, how can I…believe in something when all he’s done is cause me so much pain, so much suffering? How can I go to church without being a hypocrite?” She asked him.

“You get passed it, it’s okay to be angry Cait, it’s okay to question his motives but this is just all part of his plan for you, for Cooper and for James,” He unsuccessfully tried and now she was just mad at him.

“What?” She scoffed moving further away from him. “Part of some fucking plan? Is it a plan to make me miserable to not want to be here anymore? Because if it is it’s working goddamned well,” She hissed.

“What do you mean not want to be here anymore?” he asked concerned at her admission.

“Nothing. It doesn’t matter,” she said wrapping her arms around herself.

“No if I think what it means it does matter, you not thought about…were you seriously thinking about leaving Coop here all by himself? About making him an orphan?” He asked becoming mad himself now and what he just said sent chills up her spine.

She had thought about it, came as close to shaking the pills out in her hand but then her little man had crawled into the kitchen and pulled himself up to his feet for the first time, giving her such a toothy, cheeky grin at his accomplishment. She knew she could never leave him, no matter how much pain she felt, no matter how miserable she was, he was her reason for living, he was her reason to get up each day.

“For like two seconds a year ago Tim, it’s not like I’m thinking about sticking my head in the oven everyday, although right now it seems like a pretty good plan if it gets me out of talking to you,” she bit back her voice rising.

“So that’s it, too many horrible things have happened that you’ve just lost all of your beliefs? All of your faith?”

“How are they my beliefs? When was I ever asked what I believed? I was told as a child, we all were from an early age that this was the way it was, that there was a God and that if you were good you would end up in heaven. I was just foolish enough to believe it, even after Dad died. Did you try and preach to Kevin when he stopped going to church after Dad?” She asked.

It was true too and she knew her Brother knew that. They had all been bought up with faith and God playing a major part of their lives, they had been told what to believe, educated in a way to make it seem like the beliefs were their own. Kevin had been the first one to question it, when their Father had died he lost his faith while the rest of the family had clung to it. Now here she was, following in his footsteps, how could she believe with all the shit that happened in the world?

“Yes actually but I’ve learned from him that I can’t force you to believe, you’ll come back when your ready when you need him again and you know what, he’ll be there. I just wanted to talk to you, to find out why you were avoiding church because Mom asked me too,” he told her.

“Well you’ve done that haven’t you? So can you just go now?” She asked.

“No your upset, I’m not leaving you like this,” he said crossing his arms over his chest.

“You are the one that is making me like this, please just leave,” she said pointing to the door.

Tim eyed her for a few moments before walking over to her kissing her on the head and then leaving but before he made it out of the door he turned, “I just want you to be happy, you know where I am if you want to talk.”

***

Tim had left over an hour ago and yet she was still crying, her tears mixing with the water cascading down her body from the shower head. She hated this, she was so sick of the tears, of feeling like she was in some dark abyss that she just couldn’t pull herself out of no matter how hard she tried. Every time she thought she had a grip on things something would knock her back, a dream, the way Cooper looked so much like James with some of his expressions, the looks her family would throw her. She didn’t want their pity, she didn’t want them to tell her they understood, that it was okay to feel the way she was. All she wanted to do was forget.

Yet she felt to guilty to do that. It was like saying he didn’t matter, like she was disrespecting the man she had loved, the man she had a child with and no matter how hard she tried she knew she could never get away with forgetting him, Cooper would always have questions, would always bare such a resemblance to his Father.

She managed to calm herself enough to stop crying and when she started shivering under the warm spray she knew it was time to vacate the shower for somewhere warmer. That warmer place ended up being her bed, the place that had offered so much solace after James had died. In the months after he had died and her Mother had returned home it had been such a struggle to even contemplate getting out of bed and if it hadn’t of been for Cooper she was sure she would have just stayed there forever. She threw the comforter over herself and snuggled into her pillow, willing sleep to come but all she could do was toss and turn when it didn’t, becoming angrier at herself by the second.

She reached out and switched on the bedside lamp, squinting when the light made her eyes sting slightly. She rolled over so that she was flat on her back and looked up to ceiling, she didn’t want to go downstairs, her Mom would be home soon and she couldn’t deal with her questions about the mood she was in, it would only lead to another argument. She turned her head to the side and noticed her book lying haphazardly on the side, reading at night always made her sleepy, hopefully it wouldn’t fail her tonight.

After reading the same paragraph for the tenth time she realised that it was futile, she couldn’t concentrate enough and so she marked her page and threw the book to the night stand groaning when it knocked her cell phone off and onto the floor. She reached down and retrieved it, frowning when she realised there was a text message she hadn’t read, wondering how she hadn’t heard it go off. She quickly pressed a few buttons and read the message, smiling when she realised who it was from and what it said.

She laughed out loud as she sent a txt back, Y would you want 2 rip off ur ears?

It didn’t take long for her phone to beep at her again and she eagerly opened the new message up, laughing loudly again when she read what he had written.

She was just about to reply when her phone beeped again.

How was she? Could she even answer that question? She just felt constantly numb, lost, like she had no clue where her life was going, she had no direction, no plan, she just seemed to be blindly floating through each day, barely sleeping each night, she just felt drained. She wouldn’t tell him that though.

He was quick to reply, U r such a crap liar!

She shook her had and smirked as she replied with, Am I that obvious? She didn’t expect what happened next but she was happy that he decided to call and she answered quickly bringing the phone to her ear, he didn’t even give her the opportunity to say hello.

“You’ve always been a crap liar!” He joked making her laugh.

“Really? Then you’ve always been crap at keeping secrets!” She retailed sitting up a bit more in bed.

“I know that, I tell that to people before they tell me stuff, they’re just stupid if they continue to tell me. So why you lying?” he quizzed.

“Because people are going to start to get sick of me soon. Being depressed isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” she said without thinking.

“C…why haven’t you called me?” he asked concerned.

“Forget I said anything, I just…Tim and I kinda got into a bit of a fight. I’m just feeling a bit sorry for myself is all. I’m fine, really,” she even faked smiled as she said it, rolling her eyes at herself, it’s not like he could see her over the phone.

“You don’t sound fine,” he replied but was slightly drowned out with some background noise.

“Where are you?” she asked fideeling with a strand of her hair.

“A club.”

“I’ll let you go then,” she tried unsuccessfully.

“No we haven’t finished our conversation yet,” he told her sternly.

“You’re busy,” she tried again.

“C it’s a club, now talk to me, tell me what this fight was about.”

She sighed as she settled back against her pillow, pulling her knees up, wrapping her free arm around it as she contemplated what to say. “He wanted to know why I haven’t been going to church…told me everything that’s happened is part of some fucking plan. I’m so angry Nick, how dare he say that to me? How dare he try and tell me that this is okay? That the way my life is now is okay?”

“I don’t know sweetie. You know people…in tough times people tend to do one of two things, cling to their faith or pull away from it. We both know what category we fall in to but Tim, he holds on to his. What?” he asked when she started laughing. “What’s funny?”

“It’s just…you…you sounded really grown up when you said that,” she chuckled.

“Oh thanks Cait,” he whined.

“See right there, that’s the Nick I know. You dishing out advice…well…”

“Kinda weird huh?” He laughed.

“Yeah. I get what you mean though but I just can’t…my family have always clung to their beliefs, when my Dad died…I think my Mom kind of had to hold on to the hope that he was some place better, I can’t do that,” she admitted the last part coming out in a chocked whisper.

“It’s okay you know. You don’t have to believe. Do you want to change the subject?” He asked and she nodded, slightly shocked at what he said next, “I can’t see you nodding Cait.”

“How did you…that was weird. So why is my brother pissing you off?” She asked.

“The usual. Yelling at my ass for the smallest thing that I do wrong.” She could practically seem him roll his eyes and she smiled.

“So it’s because you’ve been late, you’ve been messing around, not paying attention, talking back?” She laughed.

“Yeah all of the above. You have to come and save me because I don’t think it’s going to be to much longer till the Backstreet Boys are a quartet,” He joked.

“As much as I would love to, I can’t,” she sighed.

“Why?” He pried.

“Because I have Coop.”

“Bring him along, He’d love it. Baylee’s here we have like a family bus going on and then a bachelor bus,” he told her.

“A Bachelor bus huh? For you and Alex?”

“Yeah it stinks and it’s messy.”

“And there’s lots of porn isn’t there?” She finished making him giggle. She loved that about him, his laugh was just so infectious and dirty and when he got started on a giggle fit it was so difficult to get him to stop, even Kevin who could be in the middle of a rant would just look at him and then end up laughing himself.

“There might be some. So are you going to come out?” He asked again.

“I can’t.”

“Yes you can. PLEASE!!!!! PLEASE!!!! PRETTY PLEASE WITH CHERRIES ON TOP!!! PLEASE!!!!!!” He whined down the phone making her laugh even more.

“I’ll think about it okay?” She conceded.

“You better do. Look I have to go you’re brother is throwing me death glares from inside.”

“Smoking again?” She asked knowingly.

“I don’t see why he has such a problem with it, he doesn’t rag on Alex’s ass as much as he does mine and he’s been smoking forever.”

“Go before he kills you,” she said rolling her eyes.

“I’ll see you soon C,” he said cockily.

“Yeah maybe Carter.”

“BYE!!” he said loudly into the phone as he hung up and left her with the dial tone.