He's Yours

Jake sat on his sofa in the dark, deep in thought. Xena, the cat he bought for company, slept on the armchair on the other side of the room. The remnants of his dinner sat on a tray on the coffee table in front of him. The only light came from the TV that showed the end of the film he had lost interest in.

His thoughts were the same thoughts he had had for the past year and a half. Why? Why did his wife of seven years, Carrie, the woman he had been with for eleven years, cheat on him and leave him for her gym instructor and lover, Brad? What did he do wrong?

He knew he had done plenty wrong when he discovered her affair. For three months, he fought for her. The pick-me dance, they call it. He willingly gave her the space she wanted while she tried to decide between Brad and him.

He should have ended it then. It would have saved him so much heartbreak and money spent on therapy.

He didn’t. She then came back to him. They had a wild night of sex. The following morning, Carrie told him she had chosen Brad. He begged. He pleaded. But her heart was with Brad, and he could do nothing but let her go.

The following months were hell, but slowly, he started to rebuild his life.

He tried dating. It quickly became obvious that he wasn’t ready. He still wasn’t, but he needed company, so he got Xena, his cat. She brought him comfort. It felt good to be needed. She kept him company. On cold nights, she slept on his bed. She often sat next to him on the sofa.

Jake glanced at Xena. She was sulking because he wouldn’t share his dinner with her.

With Xena’s help, he slowly found indifference towards Carrie. It was surprisingly easy to find. Therapy helped him see he was better off without her. It pulled the blinders of love from his eyes and showed him who she really was, and he found he didn’t like her. What was taking him such a long time to recover from was Carrie’s disrespect, the damage to his self-esteem, getting used to being alone after so long, her lying, his shame at not spotting her infidelity and the betrayal itself.

The doorbell interrupted his thoughts. He checked the time. It was getting close to nine o’clock. Who would call at this time on a Tuesday night?

Jake turned on the lights and opened his front door.

“Carrie!” he exclaimed with surprise.

“Jake!” Carrie exclaimed with relief that her ex-husband was in. She had her back to him as if she were about to walk away. In her arms, a baby was crying. “Can I come in?” she pleaded desperately. “Max is hungry, and I need to feed him. He gets cranky when he’s hungry.”

Jake sighed irritably and opened his door wider to let her in.

“Thank you,” Carrie said gratefully as she hurried past him and into his lounge to sit on his sofa. With one hand, she removed her coat and took out a breast. Max turned and latched onto Carrie’s exposed nipple as if he owned it.

Jake appeared with two cups of tea. He gave Xena a disdainful look, annoyed that she was in the armchair, forcing him to sit with Carrie.

“You have a cat,” Carrie said, stating the obvious.

“I wasn’t ready to date after you left, and I’m still not. I decided I still needed a woman in my life, though, so I got Xena. She’s very loyal.”

Jake’s loyalty dig made Carrie look away with a shameful expression.

“You’re looking good,” she said, trying to save the conversation.

“I’ve looked better,” Jake replied irritably, refusing to take Carrie’s bait. “I haven’t looked good for a long while. Do you want to tell me why you’re here with Brad’s son?”

Carrie’s eyes filled with tears, looking down with love at Max.

“Brad threw us out. I didn’t know where else to go,” she whispered shamefully in reply. Jake didn’t fail to notice the desperation in her voice.

“Brad threw out his girlfriend and son?” Jake refused to hide his disgust. “Why did he do that?”

“Because Max isn’t his son.”

“What!?” Jake began to laugh at the drama Carrie had brought to his door. “Did you cheat on Brad, too?”

“I found out I was pregnant with Max just after I left you,” Carrie explained with a heavy heart. “I was sure he was Brad’s, but Brad didn’t appear to be as excited about being a father as I hoped. All he did was complain that we weren’t having enough sex. It was like it was all he cared about. He didn’t seem to care that I felt sick or tired. The further into my pregnancy I got, the more distant he became.

“I think someone was telling him all the time that I was carrying someone else’s baby. His family never liked me, especially his mum. My parents didn’t like Brad either. They still love you. They called Brad the worst mistake of my life. They didn’t think Max was Brad’s son either. I was so angry with them. I was angry with everyone.

“I would have left, but I had convinced myself that Max was Brad’s. I would have left him if I thought Max wasn’t his. Brad only let me stay because Max might have been his.

“When Max was born, Brad changed. For the first time, he looked as if he was happy to be a father. The first few weeks after I gave birth were crazy as we got used to Max being here. Then Brad became distant again. I heard him have angry phone calls. Whatever was being said to him must have affected him because he did a DNA test without me knowing. The first time I knew about the DNA test was when he confronted me with the results. He said I cheated on him and that Max looked nothing like him.”

“When did that arsehole confront you?”

“Today with the DNA test results. It took me a long while to pack and load my things into my car while looking after Max.”

“So, who did you cheat on Brad with?” Jake asked. “Who’s Max’s father?” Disbelief at the mess Carrie had made of her life was written all over his face.

“He’s your son, Jake. That’s why we’re here.”

The colour drained from Jake’s face. His eyes alternated between his ex-wife and Max, unsure what to say or do.

“How?” was all he could muster.

“It could only have been when we had sex the day before I left.”

“You said you were on birth control.”

Carrie looked guiltily away.

“Oh my god! You were going to baby-trap Brad, weren’t you? Jesus Christ!”

“This is better, though, isn’t it?” Carrie said hopefully, without any real conviction.

“What do you mean?”

“We can be a family, you, me and Max. The three of us can live here together.”

“Are you serious?” Jake asked incredulously. “After what you did to me!”

“We were good together, weren’t we? You used to always talk about us starting a family. This is what you always wanted, isn’t it? I’m giving you Max to make up for what I did!”

“I don’t believe this! You bring problems wherever you go and expect people to bail you out with no accountability to yourself.”

“That isn’t true!”

“Isn’t it? Therapy made me realise that our marriage was awful. You weren’t good for me, but I was too much in love with you to realise.”

“Please, Jake! Don’t be horrible!”

“Horrible? Horrible is having the love of your life cheat on you and make you lose all your self-respect before leaving you.”

“I’ve changed?”

“Have you? It doesn’t look like it!”

“Can we at least stay the night? We’ve nowhere to go. We’ll leave in the morning.” Tears streamed down Carrie’s cheeks, distraught at her desperate hopes falling in tatters in front of her.

“Unlike Brad, I’m not an arsehole. I’m not about to throw a woman with a baby on the streets.”

“So, you believe me that Max is your son? We can be a family?”

Jake was startled by Carrie’s doubt that he would let Carrie stay. The problem was that he trusted Carrie so little.

“I accept there’s a chance Max could be my son. I need to do a DNA test first. I’m sorry, but I can’t take your word for it. You can stay until we get the DNA test results. While we wait for the results, you need to search for somewhere else to live in case it turns out I’m not Max’s father. If Max is my son, then we can talk some more, and you both can stay longer.”

“So, there is a chance we could get back together?”

“For Christ’s sake, Carrie! There is no us. There will never be an us again. There stopped being an us when you started cheating on me.”

“But you said…”

“Don’t you get it? You made a wreck of me! Even if Max is my son, I missed his birth, and another man held him for the first time. You took that away from me. You even took away the excitement of knowing Max was on the way, and what for? A guy with perfect abs. I don’t think I will ever be able to forgive that. No, we won’t be a family, but for Max’s sake, you can live here for a while.”

“You’ve changed,” Carrie bemoaned. “You would never have said those things when we were together.”

“I grew a backbone,” Jake snapped as he continued to twist the knife in. “I should thank you. If you hadn’t left me, I would never have grown one.”

Carrie began to sob, bending to kiss Max to seek comfort from her son.

“I have changed,” she insisted. “I will prove it to you. Max has changed me. The old me would never have come back. All I think about is Max. All I want for him is to have a family. I love him more than anything.”

“He would have if you hadn’t cheated! He might have had a happy home. Your affair wrecked that for him!”

“I’m sorry,” Carrie said so quietly that Jake barely heard her.

“What?”

“I’m sorry,” she wailed, looking like she was in physical pain.

“Sorry for what?”

“Sorry for everything. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I wish I had never cheated on you!”

“Look,” Jake began more calmly, trying to control the emotions in the room. “If Max is my son, he will have two parents who love him. I hope you have changed, but we will never be a couple again. I am prepared to go to therapy with you to build a relationship where we can parent Max together without bringing up the past.”

“I’m glad Max is your son and not Brad’s. You have changed. You’re stronger than you used to be. You’re stronger than Brad. You’ll be a better father than Brad.”

“We don’t know if Max is mine, yet.”

“I do. He looks like you. He has your eyes and nose. His crankiness at being hungry is like you.”

Jake snorted in disbelief.

“You had better bring your things inside.”

“Can you hold Max while I do?”

“Sure,” Jake replied, unable to remain angry. “What are you making me do?” he asked Max as he slept contentedly in his arms.

As he looked at Max’s tiny face, it felt like he was looking in a tiny mirror. He would do the DNA test, but deep down, he could see Max was his son. Jake couldn’t help but smile and kissed Max gently on his forehead.