He was like a robot over the next few days. The vibrancy in his iridescent blue eyes gone, a veil of grey hanging over him as he shuffled around the house to get ready or fix his dinner.

He didn't look at me.

He didn't speak to me.

He didn't do anything when he got home except turn the TV on and stare at it.

He would get up, get ready for work, leave, come home, watch TV, have dinner, shower, and go to bed. Then it would all repeat again.

Like maybe if we didn't speak about it, what happened would go away.

Like maybe if he didn't look at me, I would go away.

I didn't know what I could possibly do to make it better, so I went on like nothing happened as well. Hoping, praying, something would fix itself.

Tyler tried seeking me out first thing at uni on Monday. I didn't even speak back to him. I just kept walking. When he tried to sit next to me in class, I changed seats. It was a reaction I should have done long ago, before I ruined everything. And thankfully by Friday, he seemed to give up on me.

Though I knew it wasn't completely his fault. He was intoxicated and would have never done this otherwise. And I did kiss him back...

Even worse, the part I hated the most was that I was caught... not that I did it. Because while I laid in bed next to Cory at night, the thrill of Tyler having kissed me still lingered on my lips, causing stomach-fluttering aftershocks. Then I began to wonder if perhaps Cory did deserve better than me.

On Saturday morning, Cory's day off from work, instead of sitting in front of the couch, he grabbed his keys after his shower to go out. I tried asking where he was going, but he said nothing. It was like I was a ghost in the house, someone haunting him, bringing him despair, but he could no longer see me.

So I called Casey.

"What's up Lils?" was the first thing she said when she sat across from me at the cafe.

"How do you know something is up?" I replied, wondering if Cory was talking to Tristan about it. Wondering if Tristan spoke to Casey. Wondering if Casey could then tell me if Cory was planning on leaving me.

"You called me and asked to meet. Not exactly a thing we do often anymore."

"Oh... I'm sorry," I whispered. I wanted my best friend to vent to, but the fact that even she felt pushed away felt like another jab to myself. This whole time I had been running from those who knew me, who knew about the last pregnancy, who knew Cory and the fact I was now a mother to be... And in turn I messed everything up.

"Hey, it's okay," she said softly.

I was confused by her change of tone, until I lifted my hand to grab my drink, only to notice it was trembling. Then suddenly a drop of water landed on the table.

"Don't cry, Lils. Whatever it is, it will be okay."

"Do you know?" I croaked.

"Know what?"

"Was Cory not at yours this morning?"

She cocked her head to the side. "I haven't seen Cory since the baby shower."

I looked down, unable to meet her curious gaze. "Casey, I messed up and I don't know how I'm going to fix it."

"Messed up how?"

"Cory caught me kissing someone else," I blurted.

She went quiet. While the distant chatter of the people around us continued like normal, the lack of conversation between us felt all-consuming. I was more than aware of the echoing silence across our small space. "Okay..." she whispered. "Okay... Who?"

"Tyler."

"Who the heck is Tyler?"

"This guy from my classes..." I began blabbering about how we met and the pretenses that I used to lead him on, the lying about my pregnancy, the hiding of Cory, telling him about Cory... all up until that night.

She nodded when I had finished talking, eyes not showing any emotion. Was she sympathetic towards me? Did she too hate me?

"Please say something," I mumbled.

"Well, Lily... I don't know what to say," she sighed, leaning back in her chair. "I suppose my first question is what do you want?"

"What do you mean?"

"Well... we don't just go crushing on other people and kissing them if we are happy in our relationship. And I don't think you can blame this completely on the fact you're pregnant or the trauma of your last relationship. Because if what happened with Jake was the issue, then I highly doubt you'd be trying to find someone who isn't Cory. So my question is, what do you want from Cory? And what is the underlying problem you have with him?"

"I don't know," I whispered. "I love Cory. So much."

"But are you in love with him still?"

"What's the difference?"

"Well, you can love someone because of the connection you've had, but you can also be in love with someone when they are your world. You need to figure out just what Cory means to you right now, what exactly was going wrong, and whether you want to even fix this."

"Of course I want to fix this." Instinctively my hand went to my stomach, rubbing the bump.

"Because of the girls?" Casey asked, eyes following my hand.

Biting my cheek, I gave her a nod.

"You can't have your children be the only reason you stay with someone, Lily. You need to be with Cory because, regardless of those babies, you actually want to be with him. At the end of the day, you will face so many struggles together as parents. If you're supposed to be living together, raising them, how are you going to do it when you're not in love with him? How are you going to give those children a strong home if all you and Cory do is fight with each other? What are you going to do when they become teens and don't need mum and dad's attention all the time? How are you going to keep a relationship going with Cory once you two don't have your kids taking up all your time and you're forced to confront each other once more?"

"I don't want them growing up in a broken home," I whispered.

"Firstly, a home can be more broken if the parents hate each other and stay together. Secondly, two homes can sometimes be better. My mum and dad split up when I was young. I got two birthdays, two Christmases, and they were civil."

I fiddled with my hands.

"Look, I'm going to support you based on whatever decision you make, Lily. If you decide you're in love with him and need to win him back, I'll help you plan that. If you decide that perhaps your feelings for this other guy are more important to follow or that maybe you're just hanging onto Cory because he's your closest friend and perhaps you should let him go so you can both be happy, I'll help you get over that heartache. Just because you break up with him though, Lily, doesn't mean you and Cory won't be in each other's lives. You're having kids. You two will see each other all the time, though not just as close."

I could feel the tears welling in my eyes at the thought of not waking up to Cory every morning. Not having him around to hold me when I was sad, to tuck me in when I'm sick, to make my cup of tea just how I like it... But was it enough? Or were we really drifting apart and I never noticed it until now?

"But what if we find our way back to each other? What if I'm not in love with him right now but work on doing it again?" I asked.

She shook her head. "I love you, Lily, but Cory is Tristan's best friend. You two can't play tag teams in cheating on each other and expecting the other to forgive. How will your children cope with that? You both deserve better than this."

"How do I even go about figuring out if I just love him or if I'm in love with him?"

"Well, firstly, the person you should be talking to is Cory. You need to talk this through with him. Explore where you guys were going wrong. Discuss your insecurities with each other and what you think the relationship is lacking."

"How do I do that when he won't talk to me? He just shuffles around the house like I'm already gone."

"Can you blame him? He barely has looked at another girl since you lost the first baby... That was enough to scare him into the reality of his actions. So to think you could break him like that—"

"But he always did this to me! When we started out, he was always—"

"You were kids then, Lily. We've all grown up. All I know is you should be the bigger person than he was back then. If you're not into him, if you're looking over your shoulder, leave him."

"I don't want to let him go," I confessed.

"You two may not be a fit right now. But maybe one day in the future, when you've both had the chance to fall in and out of love with other people, you may find your way back to each other."

I shook my head. "No. It's not going to happen." And then I collected my phone and keys in my hand, shoving them back into my bag.

"Lily, don't lead him on if you're going to hurt him again."

"He's done worse to me, Casey."

"Yes. Almost two years ago. Are you really going to hold against him what he did when you were still in the process of breaking up with Jake? Really?"

I could feel my bottom lip quivering. It was just a kiss... A stupid, little kiss... that my heart and body thoroughly enjoyed.

But rather than getting in my car to find Cory, I headed to the place I shouldn't go. To get to the root of all these feelings once and for all. Because surely if I settled this, I could push my heart back towards Cory.