"What?" she finally asked.

He'd been standing there for a few minutes looking like a scared little boy with his hands stuffed into his pockets and his eyes cast down.

"Well I-," he paused, "maybe you should sit down."

"I don't want to sit down, I want you to talk to me. What's going on? Who's Mackenzie?"

"Um, well, I," he was really nervous, wiping his palms on his jeans," I have something very important to tell you."

Duh, she'd pretty much figured that out already.

"Okay, what is it? You can tell me," she reached out to touch his face.

He was freaking out so badly and she wanted him to calm down so he could explain to her what the problem was. but when he reached up to remove her hand and hold it in his own, a chill ran down her spine.

"I-I kissed someone else."

And then everything was black for a second. Her head was spinning and she felt like she was going to fall over. All she had was tunnel vision and when everything re-appeared she was sitting on the bed with Justin's concerned eyes watching her every move.

"What?" she asked.

His eyes looked down again. He was partly hoping that she wouldn't remember he'd said anything and then he could just take it back. He could forget the look her face.

"I kinda kissed another girl. Me and Trace went to this club and we were drinking. I didn't really want to drink, actually Trace made me," he pouted, "and there was this chick, Mackenzie, hanging out with her friends at the bar and Trace was hot for her friend so they came and sat with us and it just kinda happened."

McKayla pulled her hand out of his and stood up.

"It just happened? Why do men always say it just happened? She just kinda fell on your lips and you just kinda liked it and kept doing it? Things don't just happen, you have to want them to happen."

"That's not true."

"Yes it is! Do you know how much effort it takes to kiss someone, how many calories you have to burn? You had to want to kiss her, as much as I'm sure she wanted to kiss you. How much of the rest of the article is true? Were you really dancin' on tables? Stumbling around grabbing other girls' butts? Not caring about me?"

He went to protest and she held up a hand.

"I can't, I can't do this."

Justin's eyes widened. Was she talking about them?

"What?"

"I can't do this right now," she put a hand on her tummy, "I can't be around you right now. The stress is bad for the baby. I need to be alone for awhile. I gotta get outta here," she was heading for the door when he grabbed her arm.

"Where are you going?"

"I don't know," she said it like he had no right to ask.

"You're not leaving."

If he let her out now he might never see her again. Her eyes rolled.

"Right now I don't think you're in a position to dictate my actions."

"I'm serious," he continued, "I'll leave if you want, but you're not going anywhere."

McKayla's eyes lowered. She wanted him to leave. Was that wrong? Justin's fingers slipped from her arm and he stepped out of the room, pulling the door closed behind himself. It opened again almost immediately.

"I don't know if it'll make a difference to you at all, but I'm sorry. I was drunk and lonely and I couldn't help it. But as soon as I realized what I was doing.... I never meant to hurt you and I'll spend forever doing whatever it is you need me to do to make it up to you."

Her brown eyes only glanced up at him for a second, and he slowly pulled the door shut again. A few moments later, after she'd lowered herself onto the bed she heard one of the cars start up and back down the driveway.

Shouldn't she be crying or something right now? Feeling furious and unappreciated? But for some reason she wasn't. She was just, stunned. She didn't want to scream and shout and cry and have a big fight. She just wanted to... she didn't know what. She didn't know what she wanted. She didn't know what was happening to her. she could feel herself becoming hard and cold. Maybe she wasn't strong enough for this. Maybe she'd been on the ege and this just pushed her right over.

Actually now that she thought about it, she wasn't reacting enough. Like she'd said, she was supposed to be screaming and crying, instead she was sitting here, half her brain chewing over this new problem and the other half wondering what was happening on MTV's Making the Band. Oh God! Did she not care? Maybe she was one of those wive's who had fallen out of love with their husbands and couldn't give a rat's ass what and who their men were doing. Nah, if she didn't love him she wouldn't have wanted to move back home with him as bad as she had.

Maybe she wasn't freaking out because there wasn't anything to freak out over. Yes, he had cheated. His silky soft lips had been on someone else's, and then when said hoodrat-hoodrat hoochie mama had told, he'd tried to keep it from her. But think about why, things like this cause women to leave their men everyday. Justin had always been the fighter for them, the one holding her hand through it all, telling her that he'd always do everything in his power to keep her, that he was never letting go.

When she thought back on it, in their young marriage they'd survived his ex, his racist friend, her evil cousin, the conseption of a baby she hadn't really wanted in the beginning, a sepereation, and the death of a close friend. On a scale of one to ten his kissing someone else didn't really seem all that bad. She couldn't hate him for having a bad night. Lord knows she'd had her share of them.

But could she really let this go? Could she really let it slid? Yes, she could. After everything that'd he'd taken from her over the past few months, she could do this simple thing for him. Yes, simple. Simple because he was sorry, and if he went through so much trouble to hid it, he had to regret it. You don't cover up the things you love to do, you cover up the things you're ashamed of.

So was it wrong that right now she really want him to come back home?

~*~

"I just left your house like 5 minutes ago. You really are a minute man aren't you Justin?" Trace smiled.

The look on Justin's face told him he wasn't in the mood for his smart remarks.

"Uh-oh, I know that look. What happened?" Trace leaned against the door.

Justin ignored his question and walked into the house.

"You busy?"

"Nope, Shannon's upstairs asleep."

Justin turned to him, ready to make a smart remark about their relationship. The two had semi-officially gotten back together since this whole thing started happening and Trace had spent a solid week at Shannon's.

"Dude, don't even," Trace held up his hand.

"Come on, we need to be outside for this," Justin lead the way over to the backdoor.

Justin took a seat at the patio set while Trace chose to stand near the door shivering.

"Well what's going on man? Why do we have to be outside, I'm freezin my nuts off out here."

Justin cocked an eyebrow at him, but chose to let that one go.

"I told Kay about Mackenzie."

Trace's shivering paused before he slide the backdoor closed, now understanding that Justin didn't want Shannon to wake up and over hear any of their conversation.

"Shit," he breathed.

"Yeah."

"How'd she take it?" Trace moved closer to him and blew air into his palms before rubbing them together.

"Surprisingly well actually. I was expecting her to throw some glasses and kick me out."

"Me too."

"But she didn't. She just said she needed to be alone. That is a good sign right?"

Trace shrugged.

"I suppose so. She could be doing one of two things right now. Sitting there thinking it over, or packin up one of the cars."

Justin gave him another look.

"I'm sure she's sitting and thinking. So, what made you tell her. Guilt just got to be too much?" Trace pulled out the chair next to him.

"Yes and no. I was feelin' guilty but that wasn't it."

"So...?" Trace pushed.

"I was on the phone with Johnny and she picked up."

Trace made a face like someone had just pinched him.

"Ouch. Harsh way to find out."

Justin nodded.

"But fuck I don't know. She took it well and she didn't take it well and how well is she supposed to take it, I mean it's not every day you find out your spouse cheated on you."

"It is if you're married to Governor Arnold."

Justin chuckled but acted like he was ignoring that little interuption.

"And sometimes it's so hard to read her. I don't know what she needs me to do right now. I didn't want to leave her, but I didn't want be all up in her space or whatever."

"You said she said she needed to be alone right?"

"Yeah."

"Well, in my experience with Shannon, everytime she says she needs to be alone, is exactly when she needs me to stay with her the most."

Justin chewed on his lip. He could see that being true.

"And you have been gone for awhile right?"

Justin glanced at his watch. He'd been away for an hour or so. He'd driven around before coming over here.

"Yeah."

"So, I think you should head back."

"I dunno, she might still need-."

"Dude, you're cock-blocking. Get the fuck outta here."

"Alright, alright. I'm going. Say 'hello' for me."

"Yeah I'll say something for ya," Trace laughed.

~*~

McKayla had moved down to the living room, and had seated herself in the middle of the sofa, watching some infomercial. She actually kinda wanted this toaster thing they were showing. The chicken was spinning around and around, the fat dripping right off. You could 'set it and forget it', as they kept chanting. But the headlights flashing through the house pulled her out of her 'bored shoppers heaven' and back into the reality that was her life. Right now, her reality sucked.

She heard him come into the house, drop his keys on the foyer table and hang his jacket up. She waited till he rounded the corner into the room before she moved. She clicked off the TV, and dropped the remote onto the table before slowly standing and moving to stand infront of him. Her gaze moved from his worried eyes down his face to his lips and for the first time, she felt like crying.

Her space, her territory, had been violated, trespassed on by someone else. It was a feeling that ate at the pit of your stomach. She sniffled, but nothing was coming from her eyes.

"After everything, I don't have the strength to cry anymore," she said softly.

Justin's face softened even more, if that was at all possible. He hated himself for putting this burden on her right now, if he could, he would go back in time to that club and undo every single second of it. He wouldn't have gone at all, because none of it was worth this.

"Justin I need to ask you something and I need you to be real wit me. Did you like her?"

"No," he was quick to answer.

"Did you want her?"

"Baby I didn't even like her, let alone want her. I didn't want anything to do with her, she just reminded me of you I guess. I didn't want her then, and I don't want her now, regardless of what she tells some paper."

"You know Trace may have taken you out and Trace may have bought you drinks, but he didn't make you do anything. You're a grown man, you knew what was going on."

He nodded in complete aggreement.

"Did you get her number?"

"No."

"Did you want it?"

"Baby," he grabbed her hand, "I didn't like her, I didn't want her or her number and I wasn't all over her and I wasn't anything but missing you. I don't ever remember her. I only know her name because of that stupid paper and all this stuff with Johnny. It was a mistake, a stupid stupid mistake okay?"

Her face didn't hold much emotion, she was just blank as she glanced back and forth between his eyes and his tainted lips.

"Okay," she whispered running her fingertips over his lips, "Okay. It's okay."

Justin's face displayed alittle shock, before relief filtered in. He pulled her hand away and squeezed it as he kissed a straight line from her forehead, down the bridge of her nose, to her mouth. For some reason though it wasn't the same. She wasn't quite elated, probably because she was more wondering if this was how he'd kissed that other girl. But she wasn't going to ask, she was going to do her best to kiss away the memory, and the feeling of someone else.

Once he pulled away he pulled her closer to him, wrapping his arms around her waist and sighing into her hair.

"If we can make it through everything else then this is a piece of cake right?" she spoke.

"Right, you're absolutely right," he pulled back and swing their intwined hands between them.

"And you realize that you are not allowed out of this house ever again with me being with you, right?"

He chuckled, but nodded.

"That's fine. I don't need to go anywhere cause all I need is this right here," he put his hand over her bellybutton, "just you, me, and him."

"Her."

"Whoever. Our baby. All that other shit doesn't matter as long as it's the three of us."

"Right," she nodded repeatedly as he went back to placing kisses on her face.

Was she assuring him or herself? It didn't really matter, they both needed it right now. That and sleep.

"Randall?" she halted his movements, "Can we go to bed? I'm really tired."

He nodded and took her hands, leading her up the stairs and into her room. Once there she pulled off her socks and climbed in, not carring about what she was wearing. A day that had started out pretty good, suddenly felt very long and she was drowsy. Justin went into the closet to change before joining her under the covers. He opened his arms to her and she leaned back against him, one of his hands lazily drawing circles on the side of her tummy.

"You know, we really should start thinking of names for this baby," she said through a yawn.

"Justin Jr."

She snorted, "No."

"Why not? It's a good strong, solid name."

She snorted again, "Justin's too common, plus it's a girl."

"Well, Justina. Justine. Justanne."

McKayla giggled.

"Nevermind, just go to sleep. I'm sure all this thinking has done some damage. You're brain must be hurting."

"What are you trying to say? Is that an insult?"

Her hand reached up to rest against his chest as she yawned again.

"Ofcourse not baby. I'm just saying, thinking up all those sophisticated, original, meaningful names, for example 'Justina', must have required alot of effort and now you must need some rest inorder to restore some of that energy."

"You're not going to talk like that around our kid are you?"

"What's wrong with the way I talk?"

"'For example, in order to, restore, supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'. All these big ass words and proper dialoge."

"Well if it were left up to you our baby's first sentence would be 'shit I need to get high.'"

"Not high Kay, buzzed. It's buzzed."

"It's stupid."

"Is that why you're always in my stash?"

"I have never been in your stash."

"Have too."

"Have not."

"Have too."

"Have not."

"How do you explain those little 'episodes' of yours?"

McKayla's forehead crinkled and she looked up at him.

"See, no come back. That means you go in my stash."

"Oh shut up," she chuckled.

"Go ahead, back down while you still can."

"Justin, shut up."

"Just admit it. You can tell me. You know, if we both like it we can name our kid after it."

"What? Lil' Joint Timberlake?"

"No, something like Leaf, like Leaf Garret."

McKayla out right laughed.

"You must be stoned right now if you really think I'm gonna go for this."

"Buzzed Kay. For the thirty-millionth time it's not stoned, it's not high, it's buzzed. Say it with me now, buzzed."