Picture Perfect

Chapter Three: Tyler

As I poured milk onto the cereal, I realised I was being weirdly overanalytical of a bowl.

The doorbell rang, and I checked my watch, frowning. Saskie's carpool wouldn't be here for another half hour, and I wasn't due to leave until then. I walked to the door and opened it, confused, and then blinked at the person on my doorstep.

"Hi," Colin said awkwardly. "Sorry to drop in unannounced, but Saskie left her jacket in the car yesterday and I didn't realise until this morning."

I also hadn't noticed that Saskie's jacket was gone. "Oh, right," I said, taking it from him. "Thanks, I appreciate it."

I expected him to leave, but he just stood there uncomfortably, almost bouncing on the balls of his feet. I cleared my throat. "Saskie's just having her breakfast, if you want to see her."

"No, I won't bother her, she'll get too excited before school," Colin said, although I could tell that he really wanted to see her. I felt bad, because no matter how much he had hurt me, he hadn't meant to hurt her, and he didn't deserve to be kept from her. He cleared his throat. "I, uh... I got a call last night. From Sorcha."

"Okay," I said, and then in a rush I remembered the call I had last night from Sorcha. "Oh. Shit. Sorry, she called me last night and I told her about the divorce. I did not ask her to call you."

"She mentioned that about fifty times, yes," Colin said, and then a sharp humourless laugh escaped him. "She said, in no uncertain terms, that she despises me, hopes I die alone and unloved, etcetera."

I bit back the urge to laugh at the comical levels of insanity I was dealing with. "Yeah, like I said, I didn't tell her to call you. I think she's just... we were together seven years, Colin. All of our friends are our friends, and one way or another they're going to make a decision on if they want to continue being friends with both of us."

"You could at least not fuel the fire," Colin muttered suddenly. 

I looked at him, the words sinking into my brain. My mouth almost dropped open. I could tell he regretted the words immediately, because his eyes widened and he said, "I didn't mean that, I just-"

I looked at him with pure disbelief on my face. "Fuel the fire? Are you kidding me? I didn't fuel the fire, Colin, you did that all by yourself. It's not like I can lie about what's happened here. I'm hiding as many of my emotions as I can when I tell people, so that they at least know that I wouldn't judge them or hate them for being friends with you. But there isn't exactly anywhere to hide when I tell them the facts of, 'Colin met someone. He asked for a divorce. We're splitting up but remaining amicable'. People put two and two together, Colin, they figure out you cheated, I didn't have to fuel anything."

Colin looked wretched, and he closed his eyes as though it might remove him from the conversation. "I know, I know what I've done, and I know how messy I've made this - I wish I'd done this any other way than the way I did it-"

"I don't want to go over this again," I interrupted him, avoiding eye contact when he opened his eyes again. "I don't want to hear it. You told me what happened. We talked about it. I got all the answers I needed. I don't want to hear about how you love him, how sorry you are, how it had to happen - I don't want it, not one part of it."

"I just want some warning!" Colin blurted out, his voice a little louder than normal. "Just some warning so that when someone calls, I know to expect a verbal beating from someone I care about - so that Andrew doesn't have to hear the shit my friends are going to say about him-"

Colin's words stopped, because two small arms pushed against his leg. He looked down in surprise to see his daughter trying to push him away from me. She was crying, tears streaming down her cheeks, and she was angry, really truly angry for the first time in her life.