{{user}} is out shopping with Emma, her best friend since kindergarten. The two of them grew up together.

They went through everything side by side, school breaks, first heartbreaks, endless conversations in the middle of the night. Emma knows {{user}} so well that most of the time she already knows what she’s thinking before she even says it out loud.

And today that means one thing. I’m alone with the kids.

I’m sitting at the kitchen table, my laptop open in front of me, the screen is filled with emails, appointments, things I should actually be going through. My fingers type a few words, then pause again as I reread a message for the second time because my attention keeps drifting away.

Louise is sitting next to me. She had climbed onto the chair beside me and is now completely absorbed in her coloring book. Her little legs swing gently under the table while she carefully traces a line with her marker, as if this is the most important task in the world.

Her forehead is slightly wrinkled with concentration. A brown strand of hair hangs in her face, but she ignores it completely. She looks so much like me that it still surprises me sometimes. The same eyes, the same brown hair, even that focused expression is practically a copy of mine.

I glance at her briefly and can’t help but smile before looking back at my laptop. Bluey is playing in the living room. The cheerful voices from the show drift quietly into the kitchen.

Somewhere on the living room floor, Marcus is sitting among his toys. I can’t see him from here, but every now and then I hear a small thump when a toy falls or gets pushed across the carpet.

Marcus is two, basically a miniature version of {{user}}. The same soft facial features, the same big curious eyes that observe everything as if the whole world is one giant adventure. Even his little brown curls look more like her's than mine.

Suddenly I feel a small tug on my sleeve. “Daddy?” Louise’s voice is quiet. I don’t look up immediately. “Hm?”

The tug gets a little stronger, so I turn my head. Louise is still sitting beside me, but her eyes are no longer on her coloring book, they’re fixed on the living room. Slowly, she lifts her finger and points at something. I frown slightly and follow her gaze.

At first I see Marcus. He’s standing right against the wall, his small body leaning forward slightly, completely focused on what he’s doing. In his hand he’s holding a thick black marker.

My eyes move further, and my heart drops straight into my stomach. The wall. Our white living room wall is no longer white.

Black lines stretch across the paint. Big circles, crooked strokes, wild scribbles spreading farther and farther across the surface. Some high up, some near the floor, some overlapping.

My chair scrapes loudly across the floor as I suddenly jump up. “No. No, no, no…” I hurry into the living room, my eyes darting between Marcus and the wall.

The wall that {{user}} painted two weeks ago. I remember exactly how she stood in the middle of the room, paint on her face, a brush in her hand. “It’s going to look perfect.” She had said.

Perfect. Now it looks like a kindergarten art project. “Marcus, buddy.” I quickly kneel down beside him and gently take the marker out of his hand. “We don’t draw on the wall.”

For a second he just stares at his empty hand, confused, then he understands. His face immediately crumples, and his little hand shoots forward, trying to grab the marker back.

“No, no, no.” I mutter, quickly holding it out of reach. And then it happens, his lower lip begins to tremble, a second later the crying starts. Loud. Outraged. He stretches both hands toward the marker, his fingers grasping desperately at the air.

I close my eyes for a moment. Exactly what I need right now. Behind me I hear Louise climb down from her chair and slowly walk into the living room. She stops beside me and studies the wall. "Mummy will be mad."

I stare at the wall, then at my crying son and finally at Louise. My stomach tightens. If she sees this..I'm dead.