Every Other Weekend

Every other Friday, it's toys and clothes in backpacks
Is everybody in, okay? Let's go see Dad

Charlie always hates second weeks. It's not like they're a bad thing, at least, not for the kids anyway. They seem to enjoy every day, luckily. Charlie doesn't want to take that away from them by being a downer just because of his own feelings.

Plus, the thought of them being always happy is giving a balm to his ever frazzled sanity and constant anxiety at the moment as his hands automatically pack their school bags for Monday as he'll be seeing them in the afternoon and not in the morning like normal.

It's Friday afternoon now and Charis, Luca and Aurelia are happily playing outside in the courtyard of the slightly smaller ground floor flat he's found himself in after selling the house and getting the mortgage repaid on it split equally between him and Nick. It's a far cry from what they once had in many ways, but it's all he can do right now till he's back on his feet.

Even if it's been almost 12 months since he promised himself that.

Shaking himself off too dispel the thoughts more than get rid of them (as he's tried that hand it makes them worse), he quietly walked from the bland, beige kitchen to the back door to call out for them to come inside and get ready to go see their father for his weekend with them.

Same time in the same spot, corner of the same old parking lot
Half the hugs and kisses, they are always sad

He practically gets his ears talked off by the time he actually gets to their meeting destination with them. Apparently, Nick's wanting to teach Luca to swim again, which will be terrifying for both parties involved most likely like last time, but at least he will not be there to witness it unlike before. As well as that new tidbit of information, he's gotten Aurelia a new princess dress for her birthday that he missed due to work and Charis is hoping to learn more French words as best he can while they are together.

He shouldn't be jealous that they love Nick, it's unreasonable and it's just his bitterness that's been hovering around since last year. He loved him too once (and still does, though he won't admit that for his own good and others), he knows how they feel. Nick's...something.

He's not surprised that Nick turns up at 3:45PM on the dot, like always and the entire back seat of his tiny Prius become a wall of noise that's only curbed by releasing the pack of children turned wild animals in school uniforms with overnight bags and school backpacks laden in their arms as they jump at him excitedly and his arms wrap around them while his smile sets Charlie spinning again like it always has.

We trade a couple words and looks and kids again
Every other weekend

It's only when Nick notices him standing there still that his face drops a few scales down on the enthusiasm metre and he clears his throat. "Hi."

"Hi." The word feels extremely sour in his mouth and it almost makes him wince in place as they stand 5 feet from each other awkwardly. God, even hellos still had meaning after everything they'd gone though. Would it ever stop hurting? "You look good."

"So do you." Nick nods back, stubborn freckles that he'd not grown out of since his teenage years moving with his now 30 year old facial expressions as he struggled to continue the conversation, despite not needing to. "Have you been seeing your therapist still?"

"Yeah, he's been...back for a bit now." He almost lied, but felt a ball of acid build up in his gut at the thought of lying to Nick again. He was pretty sure that he'd done enough of that given they were in this situation. "Still has shit rugby tips though."

Thankfully, the nervous joke lands and it makes Nick laugh and Charlie holds onto that sound like it's a good cigarette. "Yeah? Tragic. Needed to know if he thought the Falcons were going to win against London in the premiership this week."