1. Bastard

BASTARD

" W hat did she say?"

"She said, okay."

"That's great, isn't it?"

"Yeah, it's great. I can't believe how easy it was. I thought for sure she'd make a fuss." Why didn't she make a fuss? She seemed almost like she didn't care. How could that be?

I was always the love of her life. We were happy; our life was the envy of everyone we knew. So why is she being so blasé about me cheating? I looked over at my affair partner as she drove us back to her place.

An hour ago, I thought this was what I wanted. I was sure of it. I'd built up the nerve to tell my wife that I'd been cheating for the better part of two years. It took me months to work myself up to confess.

I had a lot to take into consideration, not least of all the kids. We have two. I haven't been in love with her since about the first week after our first was born. I'm not sure how it happened; I can't even remember when I first realized it.

She'd had a hard pregnancy with a lot of physical impairments that led to us not having sex as often as we used to. The affair didn't begin then, though, that only started about a year later.

Wendy was the new hire at the job. She was young, smart, vivacious. All the things my wife once was before life, and kids got in the way. She went from being driven and career-oriented to wanting to be nothing more than a wife and mother.

Financially, it was doable; I made more than enough. But she lost that glow she used to have from the moment she made that decision. Maybe I should've told her how I felt, but I, too, thought it was best if she stayed home with our kids.

She put her all into being the best wife and mother she could be, but it wasn't enough; the spark was gone. We still slept together and still did everything we used to before the kids, but my heart was no longer in it.

Wendy was there; she wanted me; she was exactly what my wife used to be when we first met. How could she have changed so much? She'd become someone I didn't even recognize.

The affair started out hot. There was more passion than I knew what to do with. Every chance we got, we'd sneak off to have sex. In the office, a parked car. The best was when we had to travel together for work.

We'd kept separate rooms for appearance's sake, but we spent each night together, making the most amazing love I'd ever experienced. In the beginning, I was afraid of being found out, but the longer it went on without my wife Rachel figuring it out, the more at ease I became.

Rachel never suspected anything, which made my time with Wendy as smooth as possible, given the situation. But then Wendy got tired of being the other woman. She hated that I went home to Rachel and my son every night, leaving her alone.

And then Rachel got pregnant with our second and Wendy kind of spiraled. She knew I wanted to be with her, but she couldn't deal with the fact that my wife was pregnant with my second child while she felt like her life was on hold.

I told her to wait until after Rachel gave birth, which she agreed to. But this pregnancy was just as bad as the first, and I had to play the dutiful husband again.

Now, my oldest is three, and we have a six-month-old. My son has no idea that I just upended his world, and my daughter is too young to understand anything.

Wendy had given me the ultimatum once my daughter made it to the six months mark. If I didn't tell my wife, she was going to leave town, but not before coming clean with my wife and burning everything to the ground.

It was kind of liberating having her make the choice for me. On the one hand, I could lose her, and my wife and kids, or I could just lose my wife and kids and keep her. I chose the latter; it was the right thing to do. It's what I wanted.

So why do I feel so hollow? Why does it feel like the worst thing I have ever done? Wendy seems so happy. I'm happy for her. Maybe I'm just in shock. That's it. The prospect of starting over with someone else, the fallout from family and friends.

I'd thought of all these things before coming clean, but the reality feels different, and it's all because of Rachel's reaction. At first, I thought she was going to make a scene. I know the signs. At first, she had tears in her eyes, but then I saw her look at our son in the corner of the room playing with one of his toys and then down at the baby in her arms who had fallen asleep while nursing.

She took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and then uttered the words that left me feeling confused and bereft. "Okay, if that is what would make you happy." Even then, she had to be perfect.

Wendy was going on about the future and all the things she had planned. "Pull over."

"What?"

"Pull over!" She found a spot and pulled over just in time for me to exit the car and throw up on the side of the road. I felt hot and cold all over, and the world spun.

Wendy got out to join me. "What's the matter? Did you catch something do you think? Is one of the kids sick?" I just shook my head and got back in the car. I closed my eyes as she continued driving and talking.

The divorce was relatively amicable. I had a lot of guilt, so though Rachel didn't push for much, I gave her the house because I didn't want to uproot my kids' lives any more than I already was. She didn't fight me on anything; in fact, the few times I saw her since the confession, she looked as if she didn't have any fight left.

And the guilt just kept coming. She didn't fight me on custody arrangements. I got to see my son one night a week and two days on the weekends. My daughter was too young so I got to see her at the house for a few hours whenever I chose.

Rachel didn't fight me on any of it. She was very accommodating, in fact. Wendy was having fun playing mom to my son Kevin and griping about seeing my daughter. She'd started calling them our kids.

She'd started making harsh comments about Rachel, which I thought were unwarranted, but the one time I mentioned that, she got very irate. She seemed to think that there was something wrong with my soon-to-be ex-wife because she wasn't putting up more of a fight. It was almost as if she wanted her to make things more difficult for us.

She'd even started claiming that Rachel was a manipulative bitch, because she never said a bad word about Wendy or the affair. She never tried to keep me from the kids, and she never interfered when our son was with us.

It seemed like the more forgiving and peaceful Rachel was, the more incensed Wendy became until I dreaded coming home to her. All of her conversations now surrounded Rachel and her life. She seemed way more interested in my ex than I was.

Then, the divorce became final, and I thought things would get better, but they only seemed to get worse. I still saw Kevin, now two days and one night during the week and Saturdays.

Wendy kept pushing the envelope, wanting more. It's like she wanted to erase Rachel completely, dropping hints here and there that we should go for full custody, which I didn't understand because she never wanted kids before, as far as I knew.

I put my foot down there, though, because I knew it would break Rachel. It's when Wendy inferred that that is exactly what she was after that I started second-guessing everything.

My family was part of the problem, along with my best friend since childhood. They refused to accept my new relationship and forbade me from bringing Wendy around, even though Rachel was still welcomed with open arms.

My family always loved my ex, and that didn't change after the divorce. She was still invited to my family home, where I was welcome to come as long as Wendy was not with me. As you can imagine, that did not go over well, and every time I went anywhere without her, it caused problems in our relationship.

Yesterday was Sarah's first birthday, and my parents held the party at their place on the water because it's always been the go-to place for family get-togethers. Wendy was livid and even tried to get me to keep Kevin home with us since it was our day with him.

I told her I couldn't do that, which set her off again. I was finally able to convince her that I would only be gone for a couple of hours at most, but I couldn't miss my daughter's first birthday. I was already skating on thin ice with my whole family and didn't want to rock the boat any more than we already had.

I convinced her that if we did this, it would kill any chance of my family accepting her, and that was the only thing that made her see reason. But now I wish I hadn't gone. It was the first time we had all been together since the split.

My whole family was there to celebrate, along with some old friends, including my best friend Jacob. I hadn't realized how close he and Rachel had become or that my son was so well acquainted with him.

Then there was the fact that my old friend group, some of whom knew me long before I met and married Rachel, seemed closer to her than when we were married. There were times when they would be talking and laughing about some shared experience that I knew nothing about and I felt like an outsider.

It's been a while since I'd spent any time with any of them because they refused to socialize with Wendy, the homewrecker, and they were not shy about calling her that to her face. But what struck me most and hurt like hell was Rachel.

She seemed so much like her old self. Happy, glowing, vivacious. I noticed that she and Jacob seemed closer, but I knew it was just my mind playing tricks on me. Neither of them would go there; I was sure of it. They had too much respect for me, and it would be too confusing, especially for my son.

When the party was over, Kevin didn't want to leave with me; he wanted to stay with his mother and cousins, which kind of pissed me off. In the end, it was Rachel who got him to behave by promising to have his cousins over the following Sunday.

I offered to help her get Sarah into her car seat, but she put me off with a smile of thanks. Then, I watched as she allowed Jacob to help her. My daughter chortled at something he said, and I could see from that one interaction that they were well acquainted with each other.

I left there confused and hurt. I have no idea what's going on. I spent the night sitting up in bed, wide awake, with Wendy oblivious beside me. She initiated intimacy, which I gave into, but for the first time, my heart just wasn't in it, even if my body reciprocated.

I just couldn't get over the way everyone had acted the day before and how they all seemed to be connected while I was the odd man out. I felt real fear for the first time since the affair began. Fear of what? I have no idea, but there's something curdling in my gut that kept me up all night, and now I'm sitting here over my morning coffee, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

In a few hours, it would be time to take Kevin back to his mother. Something I've been doing for months now with no problem, but for some reason, I'm counting down the hours, the hours, until I see Rachel again.