Slip of the Tongue

I need to express my appreciation to the following for their contributions: Vandemonium1 for the basic story idea and comments, and Bumblingfool, Vintage_dm, and Currentparameter for their comments which made the story better.

Yes it includes tropes (what story does not?). It has been told before in other forms. But this is my version. Comments are appreciated, but calling me names and insulting my IQ will not offend me. I may even start deleting those.

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The scene was idyllic. A Norman Rockwell painting of family life. Of course this one would never have made the cover of the Saturday Evening Post. My mother in law stood on the left side of the hospital bed, my mother stood on the right, both gazing lovingly at the bed's two occupants, my wife and her one day old baby suckling at her breast.

Newborn babies are not cute. Far from it, but of course parents and grandparents think otherwise. But as I watched, I had to agree this little girl was not bad looking. At least the mottled red of her face had changed to a light pinkish color. The waxy vernix that looked like lard and had covered her the day before had been washed away. Even her cone-head shaped skull was already rounding out nicely.

I suspected that in time she would grow to resemble the woman whose left nipple she was latched onto, Susan, my wife of the past six years and the love of my life.

My wife sat in the bed covered to the waist but bare above that. Although they were now engorged by the hormones causing them to swell and produce milk, my wife's breasts had always been large and firm. While she was proud of them and called them her best feature, she had a great body overall and everyone who knew her would describe her as cute. She had that bubbly "girl next door" quality about her. Now she pushed her 'assets' forward for the little thing to feed. Part of me was enjoying the scene. Part of me was repelled, not by view, but what it represented.

I stood quietly and watched Susan nurse the baby while both her mother and mine coached her needlessly. I say needlessly because Susan was a natural. Plus she and I had attended hours of parenting classes that included breast feeding instruction as well as the rest of newborn child care.

I stepped to one side as the labor and delivery nurse and another woman knocked and then stepped into the room. "This is Ms. Denkins from admin. She has the application for the certificate of live birth for you to fill out, " the nurse, whose name escaped me, said.

A brief thought flashed through my mind how this would be surreal in any other setting of our society: A woman sitting bare-chested nursing a baby while others discussed business. Here it was a usual occurrence.

"Don't rush. Finish nursing your baby." Ms Denkins instructed Susan. "When you get a little time, fill in the information in the highlighted blanks. Of course your hospital records already have most of the information we need, like place and date of birth, but we will need your and your husband's full names, and your maiden name, your ages, and several other things. Take your time. We will enter the rest and submit it to the Parish courthouse for you. You will get a copy of the birth certificate itself in the mail in a couple weeks." With that, Ms Denkins turned and left.

"Honey, why don't you take this and fill out the information. After all, I am kinda busy right now." Susan suggested with a smile I did not return.

"No, I think I'll let you fill it out later when your hands aren't full." I answered. "Besides, I think we should wait until the DNA tests come back to know if I am the father or not."

If this were a scene in a movie you might hear the screech of the needle as it scratched across the record. All movement stopped. For those of you who were born in the digital age and don't know what a record is, it is a disc made of vinyl onto which sound was embossed mechanically with a stylus into grooves. With the use of a needle following those grooves and the magic of electricity, the sound was recreated. But I digress.

To say my audience was shocked would be an understatement. Three of the four females stared at me, frozen with mouths agape. The fourth, the baby, was the only one not looking and the only one to make a sound when the nipple she had been sucking was pulled forcefully from her mouth. Her wail did not quite block the loud gasps the three women made collectively.

My mother in law was the first to react. "Are you out of your mind? Why would you even think such a thing?" Then she looked at Susan whose face showed astonishment, morphing into speculation, and then to an angry glare.

"How dare you accuse me having another man's baby!!? What kind of woman do you think I am?" Then she stopped and attempted a smile that did not quite work. "Oh, I get it, today is April Fool's day. You are pranking us. Well, that kind of joke is not funny. You should know better!" Her body posture belied her words. Her shock was evident.

I stood there watching her. "Oh, I'm not kidding in the least." I stated coldly. "I'm sure a strong possibility exists I am not the father."

"How could you think I'd ever cheat on you? Have I ever given you the slightest reason to suspect me? Name one time I did. Just one time I gave you any reason to think I was seeing someone else."

Instead of answering her question, I said. "So you went with your default response. Deny, deny, deny. And you are even doing it with a straight face. I'm impressed."

I turned to my mother in law. "Perhaps I should move the car seat from my car to yours so you can take her and the baby home this afternoon. I hope you can stay with Susan for a while. I know both you and Mom offered several times but we told you we could handle it. She could use the help since I am not going to be there."

I turned to walk out of the room and only stopped because I reacted automatically to the terse command from behind. "Stop right there, Jason Louis Fontenot!" my mother's voice reached out and froze me in place. "You DO NOT just walk away after a statement like that!"

I turned and stood in place like the obedient son I'd been raised to be as I formulated my response. Both Mom and my mother in law looked back and forth between me and Susan who had now started crying hysterically, "No, you can't leave me and little Connie. She is our baby. You are her Daddy."

Before I answered my own mother, I answered my wife. "I know I am supposed to be the Daddy, but am I the FATHER? There IS a difference you know."

My Mom caught my attention with a jab to my chest. She had closed the short gap between us and grabbed the front of my shirt and pulled me close to look me straight in the eye, just like she'd done when I was a child. "What the fuck is wrong with you, Jason? Why are you acting like a brain-dead idiot now all of a sudden? You can't be getting cold feet about being a father! That time has passed. You've been over the moon since Sue first announced she was pregnant."

"Dammit! You've been running around reading every book written about taking care of babies. You bought and assembled the crib, changing table and everything else in that nursery, not to mention you painted the walls pink and yellow with little animals all over. Every damn week you bring home a new toy for that baby. Hell, some of them she won't be able to use until she starts walking." Mom finally took a breath as she stared intensely into my eyes. "So why the change now?"

"I've had a little revelation." I said. "I'm not so on board with the program. I'm sure you noticed."

"Yeah!" Toni, my mother in law piped up from the side. "We all noticed you have not once held Connie or even looked really closely at her. We thought it funny and figured the reality of being a parent was just now hitting you. What the Hell is going on?"

"If that baby is mine, I'll step up and take care of her. I'll do my best to be the best damn Dad I can." I said with an intensity that made both my mother and Toni step back. "I WAS totally into being a Dad. But that ended last week when I found out I might not be the fucking father! I am NOT going to connect with a baby that I am not going to help raise." "What?!!" came from three voices, not quite simultaneously but close enough.

"I'll support the baby if she is mine but if not, Clive Adams can step up and support his own kid." I announced loudly.

Hearing that name, Susan suddenly screamed. "Clive and I never did anything! We never had sex! How can you say that?"

Mom and Toni looked back and forth between Susan and I as I stepped to the foot of her bed. "Really? You are still going to deny you and he did not have sex, did not have an affair for almost six months? And that you broke it off seven months ago only after you found out you were pregnant and told him? From what I understand, he told you to make sure I never found out he might be the one to have done the deed."

"No! We did not and anybody who says that is a damn liar!" Susan yelled.

"Who the Hell is Clive Adams and who told you they had an affair?" Toni demanded. "I want to know who is spreading stories about my daughter!"

I ignored the first question. My answer to the second question was simple. "Clive Adams, himself." I said quietly.

Before she could think, and probably because she was a bit sleep deprived and obviously distraught, Susan screamed, "Clive would never tell you that. He promised!"

Toni looked from me to her daughter and back. She'd caught what Susan had said. "I need to know what you know." I ignored her for second or two, then addressed my wife.

"Clive confessed it all and told me all about you. Of course, I had his balls in a vice at the time so he told me everything between his screams." I said.

"Bullshit! Clive was fine yesterday when he called to check on me and the baby." Susan screamed back. She was stressed, having just undergone childbirth and might not have realized what she said. But her words rung true. All three of us heard her. Toni slumped momentarily. I glanced at my own mother who stood wide-eyed, taking it all in.

"So you are still talking to your old boyfriend." I offered. "Did he offer you any more words of advice or encouragement about how to keep me in the dark about his possibly being the father? "

Susan began to bawl. Her screeches were so strident, two nurses rushed into the room. "We were so careful. You could not have known. Nobody knew."

"She's had a little shock." I said in explanation to the first nurse. To give her credit she glared at me in defense of her patient. I guess my tone of voice was a little 'off' to her way of reckoning. "We were discussing possible fathers for her to name on the birth certificate application." The nurse still stared at me. "Well, apparently she expects me to write my name in the space. I want to wait to see if I am the father or it's the asshole she was having an affair with when she got knocked up."

I could see the light was coming on by the nurse's change of expression. She turned her attention to soothing Susan. "Ms. Fontenot, let's calm down now. Big breaths, just like you did when you were in labor. Cheryl will go get something for you to take that will calm you a bit if that doesn't work. We really don't want to have to give you something that might get into your milk, do we? So let's try a natural method first. Breathe with me. Take a big breath."

I was watching the nurse work her magic calming Susan and did not see both Mom and my mother in law step close. "You better explain what the fuck is going on!" Mom hissed in a low voice. I was shocked. Mom usually did not use that word. Today she'd used it twice already.

"Something happened. That is obvious from Sue's reaction," my mother in law stated. "I want to know what, when, and how. This is totally out of the blue!"

"Well, that should be obvious." I said, glaring back at both women. I was getting pissed I was the subject of their ire and not Susan. "She was screwing a guy she works with when she got pregnant. Well, one guy other than me. One guy I know of for sure, anyway. I have no idea if there were others."

Susan got control of herself remarkably quickly for a woman seemingly on the verge of a breakdown moments before.

"How? We were so careful." she asked pitifully. I got the look from Mom and Toni as well. They wanted to know.

"Yes, you were very discreet. I had no idea. Nor did anybody else." I admitted. "Unfortunately, Clive is the consummate salesman. In order to get his next sale or in this case, latest seduction, he had to prove himself."

"You know Cheryl Watkins of course." She nodded. I knew she did as she and Cheryl had worked in the same office for the past few years. Cheryl and her husband Steve were friends and we ran in the same circles.

"Well, Clive worked on Cheryl and had her almost convinced to go with him to a rented hotel room. Her sticking point was that Clive might let the cat out of the bag and her husband would find out. She was just not sure she could trust him to keep his mouth shut. To show he knew the value of discretion, he told her of a few of his earlier, what would you call them, conquests? Liaisons? Girlfriends? He named a few names and gave enough details to convince her."

"He asked her if she'd heard of anybody he might have been with. Not the few girlfriends he was dating publicly. But of any married women, or even single women around the office for that matter. Of course she could not."

"So to convince her he could keep a secret he named a few women at the office she knew. The one before you was Sandy I believe. She got cold feet after a few months when she worried her husband was getting suspicious. Then you for six months, but you broke it off when you found out you were pregnant. He said you hoped your husband was the baby's father, but he was not willing to keep the affair going. He told Cheryl it was crucial her husband, meaning me, would never find out because he might 'toss Sue to the curb and I sure don't want to be saddled with child support'."

"At the time you were quite vocal and let everybody know when you got pregnant. You were very happy and made it known to everybody at the office as soon as you found out."

I did not add that while Susan was excited about being pregnant, she did not seem a bit concerned about her baby's parentage. I supposed she figured I'd never suspect and even if I did, I'd be invested in the child and give her a pass. That was not on the table as far as I am concerned.

"Apparently, Lana Richard was his next lover. Her husband got upset about her suddenly working late and she had to cover her tracks. She was late picking up their youngest kid at daycare a few times when it was her turn. So with that downturn in his sex life, Clive turned his attention to Cheryl and scored again. Like I said, the consummate salesman, he told her what she needed to hear to drop her panties. Apparently he was fairly proficient in bed as well. He kept his married women happy and willing to come back to him for months at a time."

Toni and Mom looked at me and then Susan. "How or should I say why did Cheryl make this supposed confession then?" Mom asked.

"Not on purpose. Seems Cheryl likes to get vocal when having sex." I said. "She called out Clive's name in the heat of passion. Her husband, Steve, grilled her and she talked."

I grinned for a second as I remembered what Steve had said as he related his story over a beer or three. Cheryl was not one to just yell 'Oh God, Oh God', and issue guttural screams like 'NNNNGGH! NNNNNGH, I'm coming' like Susan does in the throws of orgasm. Cheryl likes to talk and put her desires into words. Like 'Fuck me harder. I need your cock.' Apparently one night she and her husband, Steve were getting it on and Cheryl screamed out, "Give it to me, Clive. Pound my pussy with your big cock. Fill me up. I love it when you do me hard."

I resumed my explanation. "'Steve' does not sound anything like 'Clive' and Steve of course, knew Clive and was well aware of his reputation as a ladies man or rather what us guys call a pussy hound. He put two and two together and came up with sixteen. Steve got in Cheryl's face. That was how he put it to me when Larry, Lana's husband, was there. He was a little concerned Larry, being a cop, might say something about him telling his wife, "Bitch, you better start talking. If you don't, I'm going to have to decide if I want to beat you to a pulp or choke you to death before I feed your ass to the gators in the swamp." She decided talking was the smart way out.

Steve is an honest man and an honorable one. He told me, "Jason, I just felt I needed to let you know you might not be the father of that baby in your wife's belly. I'd like to think you'd tell me if you found out my wife was cheating'." I assured him I certainly would.

As we sat there we pondered Clive's fate. "To tell ya the truth, if he is that baby's father, I'll let him have the kid and the bitch attached. He'll piss himself trying to pay support." I said. "I'll let him know if he doesn't do right by the baby he might not have the equipment to screw around any more."

Steve told me Clive might not have his equipment that much longer as it was. He was going to tell Sandy's husband who he did not know as well as he knew Larry and me. He remembered the guy vaguely from high school as having a quick temper and might reveal what we knew too soon. He agreed to hold off for a week to let Susan have her kid without the added stress of her affair being known publicly. Larry was hopping mad himself but agreed to keep quiet for another week or so as well.

Now that the baby was here, it was time to reveal all about Clive and his women. I gave Toni and Mom a sanitized version of the story. Both appreciated my not 'rocking the boat' during Sue's last stages.

Toni and Mom pushed me into the hallway where we could discuss this without upsetting Susan any more. The second nurse had whisked the baby, Connie, off to the nursery for the time being.

"So how are you so calm?" Mom asked. "I can tell you are upset but not nearly as much as I'd expect." My answer that I've had a full week to come to grips with the situation appeased her a little. "Okay, you've had time to think. I'm sure you will let me, uhh us, know when you are ready." Mom knew me well.

"So when are you going to take the samples for the DNA test?" Toni wanted to know. She was a little surprised to know they'd already been submitted. I'd talked with the head nurse yesterday after the birth. Because Susan and I were married, I was already the supposed father so did not need Susan's permission to test the baby. I'd paid for an expedited test and it would take two to three days to get the results.

"I guess my next question is do you think you can possibly forgive Sue and let this go even if you are not the baby's real father?" Toni asked hopefully. I noticed she used the term 'the baby' and not calling her by name as she had every time before. Toni was not a bit naive and read me well, but she obviously had her hopes. A glance at my own mother showed me she had already surmised my intentions and while she understood, was not happy.

"To tell you the truth, I'm not sure I can let this go even if I am the father." I admitted. "I've had just over a week to think this through. This was not a mistake like a one night stand after getting drunk. This was a six month affair. I can no longer trust her. She not only showed her blatant disrespect for me and our marriage, she knew full well the risk of getting knocked up by that asshole as we were actively trying for a baby. She'd told the whole family we decided to try to get pregnant. Her continuing to screw Clive shows me she simply did not care which of us got her pregnant."

"Have you considered marriage counseling?" Mom asked. I guessed she brought this up to get ahead of arguments from Susan's family. "And I want you to consider the baby. It is not her fault. That little girl is going to need a Dad. Even if you are not her actual father, you could still be her Daddy."