Family Isn't Blood - Fred's Life

Please read http://www.literotica.com/s/family-is-not-blood-ch-01

It will aid in understanding this story.

Recently, a friend of mine from California called and said he was getting married again. His previous wife of over 34 years, whom he was honestly devoted to, had died in a freak auto accident over 9 months ago. She had physical and emotional problems for the past 15 years. While grieving, he looked up an old flame. She was part of a close group in school. He never approached her then to take it higher, afraid to get a 'let's be friends' answer. He moved away shortly after that.

About 2 years after that, he drove the 200 miles to ask her to be his. He met her and was 2 minutes away from asking, when she said her serious boyfriend would be by in 20 minutes. He never asked and left to go home 10 minutes later. She never asked why he was there.

Over 36 years later, having never seen or even heard of her since, he starts looking her up. He finds her older brother. She's been divorced for 17 years. Phone calls, visits, more phone calls, more visits. They are getting married. I wanted Fred to have this story.

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Family is not about Blood - Fred's new Life 1

Rescuing my daughter

I got back home about 3 hours after the shower was over. Larry took me home after we spent some time at a neighborhood bar, in someone else's neighborhood. Angelka joined us after she dropped off Rita. I was still just in a state of shock. My marriage of 25 years was as good as over. I had pubicaly humiliated my whore of a wife and disowned and exposed my daughter for their disgraceful cheating. Now I was alone in the house, alone. I knew that it as going to be that way, but it did not make it any easier. I think that Larry and Angelka knew what it was going to be like, they kept me close.

Rita was moved out and I came home to a new bed. A new lonely bed. Mike had organized the move and included the purchase of a badly needed replacement. The old bed was beyond its life any way. There was no loss in it. I was not looking forward to sleeping alone, I was dreading it. You get comfortable living with someone, even if that person was bad for you. Having someone physically there acknowledges that you are still alive, and not just in your own head. And now she is gone. Needed to be done, but it still is bittersweet.

I was not 'allowed' to eat alone for the next couple of months. Larry, Angelka or someone else would just happen to stop on by, give me a call or take me out to dinner. I never knew how lonely a person could be. Don't get me wrong, I did what I had to do. And I would do it all over again. The cancer in my life needed to be cut out, I just had to live with the gaping hole while I healed.

I had given much thought about my relation ship to Cathy before the shower. She knew of her mother's cheating for years. Damn it, she could have warned me. Only if she was not so taken in by her mother. But when did she find out? When she was in college? or high school? or when? Cathy's relationship to me was damaged by this all, but something in my mind told me that I needed to find out from her directly. So even before the shower, I had made up my mind to seek her out. Even if it was just to confirm the worst.

Four days after the shower, I called her up. She had a difficult time believing that I wanted to talk with her at all. I asked that we meet away from everyone. I did not want any gate crashers. The weather cooperated, and we met by the Shakespeare statue in Lincoln Park on Saturday morning at 9AM. She would be able to hop a bus to get there, and get back home easily. Much cheaper than parking. I arrived at 8 and waited. She arrived at 8:30. I think that we both wanted to be there.

I could see her over 2 blocks away. There was the girl that I brought home from the hospital as a newborn. The one that I changed diapers, took to school, sweated with her and her girl scout projects, her girlfriends and her first boyfriends. I was the one who helped her study and supported her to do well in college. I was the one that walked her down the isle at her wedding.

She was the one that betrayed my caring and love, allowing her mother to whore around for years, not even giving me a hint of that. I felt a betrayal of my love and caring for her. Losing my whore of a wife was a good thing, painful but a good thing. The cancer has been cut out and I am starting to heal and regain strength. But to have lost my daughter too, the rest of my life?

With all the problems in my marriage to her mother, Cathy was the source, my source, of life in that marriage. Honestly, besides inertia, she really was the reason I stayed together with Rita. I did not live through Cathy, but Cathy and her marriage to Mike was the hope for new and better things. I knew that I could never be as close to her as her mother, but there was a healthy father and daughter bond. With her mother now banished from my life, our 25 year history was more important than who the sperm donor was. Now I was waiting for her, alone and away from everyone, to find out the why about so many things.

Her gait has changed with her pregnancy, but the pep in her step was now missing. Cathy was looking worn and fearful, she saw me a block away and slowly walked to the park bench by the statue where I was sitting. She looked relieved that I was there ahead of her. The first thing she did was to ask me when I arrived. Since the previous mayor sold off Chicago's parking to the private sector, parking costs are a premium and enforced. Spending extra time means spending extra money, something she knows that I do not do without cause. I offered her a barely warm glass of the herbal tea she likes. She accepted, took a sip, and pensively waited for me to talk.

"How the hell can anyone start taking after so many bad things happened?" I asked. "What I have to know is when did you find out your mother was cheating with Paul or anybody else for that matter? I need to know this upfront. Don't lie to me. There is much I do know, and if I hear any lie from you, this conversations and all other conversations are over. Forever over." Then I waited.

Cathy was looking at the ground when she slowly answered. "I have nothing more to protect, nothing to hide that has not been exposed. Lying did me no good. It did no one any good. Telling the truth will be painful to you. It will also be painful to me. Fred, I will be honest with you, and with me." Cathy just pulled herself away from our family, she did it for me to see. It was not a put on. She was not even attempting to pull any emotional ties. She put us down as two unrelated people who shared a history.

She cleared her throat and quietly started. "I first got an inkling of it when I was in 4th grade. I came home from school early one day and he was there. I thought that it was odd, but mom sent me to the store to buy some milk and he was gone when I came back. She never mentioned anything about it. It started happening more often in 5th grade and she finally let me know for real when I was a freshman in high school. I had started to date at that time. She gave me her cover story saying that no body was getting hurt. Do you remember how difficult freshman year was for me?" I nodded. Her grades went into the basement that year and it took until the end of her Junior year to get them back to the B+ student she was in middle school. Things were starting to make some sense. I nodded, but stayed quiet and waited.

"I was never home when they were...doing it. But sometimes he was there when I came home, or he arrived when I was going. I know now that this was wrong, but it was my mother who was doing this. It just kept going on as the years went on by. Those couple of years in high school were hell for me. I had no one to talk about it with. Expose your mother's affair? In our neighborhood? At our Church? At my school?" She remained quiet after that. I started to see that as a young child, she was put into a twisted situation. If only I had known. What am I saying, I don't know what the fuck I would have done anyway.

But I had a bit of an answer, not a nice answer, but a real answer. She pulled her daughter into her life of lies and betrayal, and starting at such a young age. I remember so well her grades falling off starting in high school. I knew something was wrong, but I trusted it to just growing up and changing, not having to live her mother's lie. She watched the lie of her parent's marriage. How could Rita do something like this to my little girl? To anyone's little girl? That woman deserves to rot in hell for this. Hell is better than she deserves. Larry said that he could be the go between for the divorce. If I got near her, I would ... suddenly I realized that someone was shaking my arm.

"Are you OK?" Cathy was looking at me and shaking me. She jolted me back, and tears were starting to come to my eyes. Cathy may have done much wrong in her life, but as Mike said it so well, she came about it honestly.

"I'm sorry Cathy. This is a whole lot to take in at once. I never knew..." She broke in, "Because you were not suppose to ever know. She pulled me in, but I stayed there. I am just as guilty as she was. I told you that I'm going to be honest, way late to do any good, but honest with you and honest with me. I could have left clues around, I could have sent untraceable letters in the mail, I could have not covered up things she left out. I did not do that. I'm guilty. I can understand if you never talk with me again, I deserve it. I let you down. You who never did anything but good for me. I drove away your wonderful son-in-law. I LET YOU DOWN." She started bawling uncontrollably. That is when I reached over and held her in my arms. She jumped for a second, then collapsed in my consoling warmth. After so much pain, a bit of healing.

We talked till 11:15. That was when I noticed that she was starting to fidget, and realized that the tea was gone. I think that I needed to go to the bathroom too. "How about finding a diner we can use the john, get something to eat and a more comfortable padded seat?" She agreed and we got into my car and found a spot a couple of miles closer to her apartment.

From the back of a diner, we ordered lunch. Neither of us really had anything more to hide, but we also were not spilling our guts uncontrollably either. I began to start seeing her in a new light. The light was still bad, but I was getting a feeling that she was following her mother's lead, until now. Her mother is controlling, and always wanted things her way. I could see how a child, then an adolescent could get caught up in that and become the adult she became.

I did not ask 'go in for the kill' questions, not yet anyway. By 3pm, I offered her dinner, but she said that she had to decline. She needed to go to the store and get some groceries. That is when I offered to take her shopping, and then drop her off. That is when she looked at me and began to tear up. "I thought that this conversation was going to be over in 5 minutes. I thought I was going to take the bus back home alone. But you are not doing that, after all that I have allowed to happen to you, you still want to be around me."

"Cathy, we need to meet and talk some more. Are you up for it?" I asked. I knew that we still have more to do, but I knew that we started. We started on an honest level.

The next couple of meetings were rough for both of us. She still had not shared with her mother that we were talking. She just said that she was going out. I was not going to push the honesty issue with her about it. It was going to come out sooner or later, but I could see that Cathy was beginning to explore herself. Something that would never happen with her mother.

I started to hear more of what she realized that she had lost, and how she could barely cope with it. As I expected, her mother was of little help. Rita was so wrapped up with herself that the needs of her pregnant daughter were a real after thought. I know that Rita is the way she is, but to not care about others that are hurting - especially when you were directly responsible for getting them into that situation? The more I heard, the better I felt about leaving.

At a certain point, Cathy asked me what it was like for me to live with the feeling that her mother was unfaithful, and that she may not have been my daughter, but someone else's. Serves me right for asking her difficult questions, needed, but very difficult. It was now her turn. I did not welcome that question, but I was starting to trust the one who asked it.

"I came from parents that were devoted to their partners. Healthy or ill, poor or poorer, nice or not so nice, it really didn't matter. Running away to the wide world was always an option for all of them to take. They never took that option alone. They ran away to America together. That is who I came from and chose to be."

"Many times in the course of my marriage, I looked at it, and made the choice to stay. When I was young in the marriage, I would not break my vows. Then you came along and I would not break my family. Then with an empty nest and no way to deny the rot of my marriage any more, I chose to end it. Actually, just chose to officially end it. It was unhealthy and over for years. My brother and Angelka were around, our friends were around, your husband's family added to my life. I had a life outside of Rita and marriage. Not what I wanted, not that I was really cared for, not that I was respected by her, not that I felt to be of worth, not anything I ever felt to be what marriage was to be about. Marriage and your mother were just an empty shell that held my body. All the while I hoped that things were not what I thought they were, and my life and the marriage would improve."

Then I spoke the first time about her soon to be ex-marriage. "Your unfaithfulness to Mike brought the whole house of cards down for Mike, me and Mary. We were the people that did nothing wrong, and we could not even try to have things get better. I don't think you can really understand what it does to a person when you have devoted your life to them and have them toss you aside. It destroys your soul. No Cathy, I really can not tell you what it was like. Not to the intensity that it happens. Handling death of a loved one is easier to do. There is little venom in death." I became silent with my eyes tearing up. She sobbed uncontrollably. The cost of not being faithful and honest.

It was still a couple of weeks before the delivery and she finally told her mother that we were meeting and talking. Rita was pissed as hell, but Cathy started to get a backbone and put her foot down. Rita backed down, stewed like crazy until she got over it, but she backed down. This was a real change for Cathy. She never really stood up to her mother before about things that mattered.

Our discussions kept on going. What we were talking about started to change. Cathy was starting to use our time to talk about herself, what she did, felt, thought and became. She was questioning her life and the hell hole of a life she got herself into. I'm not a trained therapist, but I realized that was the role I was partially doing. I was also the role of her father too. I was a safe place for her.

With the birth of her child getting near, we gradually moved on to those issues, those issues were more pressing. One of the outstanding things that were the gifts for her child from the shower. Some of those gifts were from people who knew that she was cheating on Mike. I told her that she needed to send out thank you notes to everyone. Both her side, and Mike's side too.

She did sent out notes, but it was not a thank you note alone. In her hand written notes she apologized to each and every one of them about what she had done and asked for their forgiveness. Then asked them where she should return the gifts to, as her dishonesty did not warrant their kindness.

Without knowing what Cathy did, I started getting calls from these people asking, as one of them put it so kindly, "WHAT THE FUCK IS GOING ON NOW?" The next time Cathy and I met was interesting to say the least. She told me what she had done, and more important, why. On her own she was stepping up to the plate and putting herself on the line. To be honest, I do not think that I would have had the courage to do what she did. Not a single person asked for the gifts back, but some gave a charity address to her if she felt she could not keep their gift for her child. I learned something about our circle from that. Something I was very proud of.

I took her to the hospital when her water bag broke and called into work to take semi-planned vacation time to be there the entire time with her. Her mother showed up later. We attempted to stay away from each other as much as possible. Paul was no where to be seen, heard, or even spoken about. As Rita does not drive, I was the one who took Cathy and Sofia home. Thankfully, her mother was waiting for her there.

The next couple of months for Cathy was wonderful and difficult. Starting with the loss of her husband and on to her friends and relatives, the normal people that would help a new mother were not there. I was there, and even her mother was a bit more helpful. We kept our distance, but it became easier after she signed the papers that ended the sham of a marriage.

In those initial months, Cathy hunkered down with Sofia. She was seeing a bit of her self in that child, the part of being all alone in the world and needing others. She was seeing that Cathy and Cathy alone was responsible for that little girl. She was serious about taking care of that new life.

It was three months in when I started to hear something about Sofia's apparent name change. It was not Sofia, it was Franciszka Sofia AND I WAS PISSED. I thought that Cathy and I were going to be honest with each other, and here she was not telling me something as important as this. I was steaming mad when I saw her next and demanded an answer. Then she floored me by quietly saying, "It for your mother raising such a great son who really is my dad." I lost it, Cathy lost it, and even little Franciszka may have been crying too. I guess it was her turn to stand up to her father to do what she thought was right.

I really did not tell her what to do very often, but I would suggest things. Sometimes she would agree and other times, not. But I kept moving her toward the future and being emotionally healthy. After all, I had a granddaughter that I was concerned about.

When we were going out, sometimes to Mass or just out to eat in the neighborhood, I would offer and about half the time, was allowed to carry Franciszka about. I loved it. I never minded changing diapers, crying babies, feeding or spit-ups. It was just part of being a grandfather.

The more time Cathy, I and the little one spent together, the more I was astonished I was of her changes. There comes a time in life where people can put on an act, and this was not one of those. This is not to say that everything went well. That was definitely not the case. There was anger and yelling and stomping off. There was crying and stress that would have wilted a granite mountain. But she grew during this whole time. From that, she never wavered. She was becoming an adult, a crash course to become an adult, but an adult and a responsible mother. I saw that she was dropping what she learned from her mother and picking up caring about others from her father.

She started to reach out to more people during this time. Having the child was actually helpful. It gave her a way to start the conversation in a neutral way, and then later, to speak in a serious way with them. She got a few angry and nasty responses, but she kept at it and began to make some headway. In some ways, not having Mike around when going to mass helped. She needed to make her own way in life now, one with her daughter.