Breaking the Delusion

"I wish you the best for it, Ursula," Gary told her. "This new version is better than the one even in the happiest years of our marriage."

Ursula gave a hurt expression to Gary's backhanded compliment.

"Gary, she is trying," Vicki said scolding her boyfriend. "Ursula is right, we're all going to be in each other's lives so we should all get on." Vicki's choice of words confused Ursula. "Gary, we probably should tell her."

It was then Ursula noticed the ring on Vicki's finger.

"We're getting married," Gary said simply.

"I'm pregnant too," Vicki added, unable to hide an excited smile.

"Oh! Congratulations! I'm happy for you," her words were warm, but Ursula's shoulders dropped in defeat.

"Thank you, that is very magnanimous of you," Vicki told her. "I know it might not have been easy to hear."

"It's okay," Ursula assured her. "Gary has moved on with his life. I'm the one who abandoned him. I can't expect Gary to stay single although your pregnancy is a bigger shock. Violet and Xander will have a brother or sister who won't be related to me. That is tough to know but my time with Gary is long over and it was my choice. I need to work on myself before I can move on."

"I heard you signed a contract with Violet and Xander. I can see you are trying with them. They look happier than they have for a long time," Gary conceded. "I apologize for what I said at Xander's baseball game. Xander told me that he invited you and was excited that you were there. I completely misread the situation."

"It is perfectly understandable. I gave you every reason not to trust me, but I am trying to change, it isn't easy, but I am doing my best."

"Good luck, Ursula. I hope you get to where you want to be," Gary told her with a little warmth for the first time. His eyes widened as he looked past Ursula, "What the actual fuck!" he growled looking past Ursula. "What is he doing here?"

Ursula turned around and saw with dismay, David with a woman. They looked like they were on a date and were laughing and sharing a joke.

"I'm going to kill him!" Gary said with a dangerous look on his face as stood up and began to walk past Ursula who grabbed his hand.

"No, Gary, don't! He isn't worth getting in trouble for. Let me handle it, sit back down! I need to go anyway. It was good seeing you both. Whenever you come to pick up Violet and Xander please come to the door," Ursula smiled.

When she stood and turned around her smile dropped. How dare he? He left her at the altar and now he is already dating someone else. Ursula approached David's table with a sickly-sweet smile,

"Hello, David," she greeted him.

David's eyes almost bulged out of his head when he saw Ursula leaving his date looking dumbfounded at his reaction.

"I'm Ursula," she said to David's date. "David might not have told you about me. Just over three weeks ago David jilted me at the altar," her sickly-sweet smile never leaving her face. The coffee shop went silent as everyone began to watch the drama unfold. "I tried to contact him, but he completely ghosted me. Can you believe that? What kind of man does that? Tell me, are you married?" the woman nodded guiltily. "See that man over there," Ursula said indicating Gary. "I was once married to him. He is a good man and was a good husband to me, but I betrayed him for David. I gave up everything for David and I nearly lost my children in the process. I can tell you that David is not worth throwing your marriage and children away for. He is a man who preys on married women intending to break up their marriage. My advice to you is to go home and fix whatever problems you have in your marriage and stay away from this asshole!"

"What the fuck, Ursula!" David hissed angrily to her seeing that his date was believing what Ursula was saying.

"Goodbye David," Ursula said curtly, and she walked out, and she kept walking until she reached her car and began to sob.

Chapter 12

Ursula sat in her car sobbing uncontrollably. It wasn't that Gary had moved on or even that David had moved on. It was that she felt alone. In a few years, both Violet and Xander would no longer be at home, and she would have nobody to share her life with and she had no one else to blame but herself. She had so much growth she needed to do before she could even contemplate dating again.

She didn't know how long she sobbed in the car but a knock on her window startled her enough to stop her from crying. She looked out and saw Gary looking concerned with an equally concerned-looking Vicki behind him.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

"Don't worry about me, I'm just being silly," she told him with a weak smile wiping the tears away with both hands.

"It doesn't look silly. You did a real number on that asshole. He called you a crazy bitch when she asked him if everything you said was true, but I think that just confirmed it to her. He wanted to come after you, but I persuaded him not to," Gary told his ex-wife.

"Gary, you didn't do anything stupid, did you? You have a baby on the way," Ursula asked worriedly.

"Nah, he shit himself when he saw me and almost ran away," Gary laughed before he became more thoughtful. "I read your letter. Thank you, I appreciated you writing it and your remorse. It has given me the closure that I didn't think I needed. Your actions though are making a bigger statement. The effort you have made with Violet and Xander and what you said to David has made a big impression on me. I didn't say it very well earlier, but you have changed. You aren't the woman I married, and I mean that in a good way. You seem less needy, and you appear to be able to take responsibility for yourself now. You used to expect everyone to do it for you when we were married. I don't think I will ever be able to forgive what you did to me and the children but if you keep doing what you are doing then I think we can work towards getting a good relationship."

"You mean that?" Ursula asked her ex-husband with hope.

Gary nodded, "Yeah. I suppose being a father again has made me look to the future instead of the past."

"Thank you," Ursula replied with a bittersweet smile. "I know I don't deserve it, but it means a lot to me that you have noticed. I hope you will be very happy together and good luck with your pregnancy, Vicki. I'll see you soon."

**************

Ursula and Gary worked on their relationship as separated mother and father, trying to be on good terms. There were a few triggers for Gary where he lost his temper which ended up with them both apologizing. They worked out boundaries, especially with where Vicki fitted into it all regarding Violet and Xander. As time went by, they worked it out. They ended up somewhere not as friends but more than acquaintances.

Whatever you could call their relationship it meant that they could go to Violet's high school graduation ceremony, and both watch their daughter proudly. When Vicki gave birth to a baby girl, Ursula bought a present and found some old baby clothes of Violet's in the attic that she could never bring herself to throw away.

Ursula settled into her job. Two years later her supervisor left for a new job, and she was offered the position with an increased salary. The extra money helped her save and within a few years allowed her to be able to afford to buy her parents' share of her house.

Not long after her promotion a newly hired project manager. came in with questions about the pay of the laborers working on his project. Ursula was instantly attracted to this large but attractive man, and she sighed inside because she thought she still wasn't ready for a relationship.

The project manager, Kyle, returned regularly. Ursula's staff gave each other knowing smiles when he came to ask an exasperated Ursula payroll questions which could quite easily been answered by email or telephone.

Kyle had only arrived in the area recently to start his new job. He was in his mid-forties with slightly greying hair which added to his attractiveness for Ursula. He was divorced with a daughter who had only recently started college.

When they bumped into each other outside work Kyle plucked up the courage to ask Ursula to join him for a coffee. When Kyle wasn't on site, they had lunch together. Kyle soon became a welcome distraction for Ursula from the loneliness at home. Violet had left home for college by this time and Xander was rarely home. She had few friends because of her affair with David and the few she did have, because of her new hobbies, were all married with younger children so rarely went out.

Ursula and Kyle went out for dinner for their first official date and for the first time since David left her at the altar, she felt she had met someone she wanted a relationship with, but she knew she had to tell him about her past before anyone in the town did.

"Kyle," Ursula tearfully told him, "I need to tell you things about me that you will hear from other people. Some unpleasant things I did that happened when I was married which was the cause of my marriage to fail." She proceeded to tell Kyle her story. "So, you see, you needed to know this. I want to keep seeing you and you are such great company but people might warn you to stay away from me so I will understand if you want to stop seeing me, but I have grown so much as a person since my marriage ended. Also, I need permission from my children before we can go any further."

Kyle looked at Ursula incredulously then began laughing, "That is the first time I've heard a parent seeking their children's permission to date!"

Ursula began to laugh too, "I know it does sound ridiculous, but I have a contract with them."

"Look, I don't know about how you were in the past, I just know how you are now, and I have been crazy about you since the first day I met you. I don't know so many people here, so I don't care what they gossip about. Ask your children for permission and tell me what they decide."

Ursula nervously got Violet on a Skype call with her and Xander. She told them about Kyle and that she wanted to date him.

"Do you like him, Mom," Violet asked first.

"Yes, I do. I like him a lot," Ursula had felt so nervous in her life.

"Is he an asshole?" Xander asked next.

"Xander! We talked about your language," Ursula reproached her son. "No, he isn't anything like David, which is what you are really asking, isn't it?"

"You can date him, Mom," Violet said. "It's obvious you haven't been happy for a long time, and I have wondered why you have looked happier in the past few weeks, now we know."

"Yeah, you've been pretty miserable," Xander said bluntly, "so go for it."

With Violet's and Xander's permission, she began to date Kyle. Their first kiss came on their first official date after Ursula received her children's permission. Ursula melted into it. She had forgotten the happiness of having an emotional connection with someone. A few dates later, Ursula nervously brought Kyle home while Xander was staying with Gary, so they could have sex. She was terrified but when Kyle entered her, her fears disappeared. Sex was everything she remembered but the orgasms Kyle gave her were nothing like she had felt before.

As beautiful as sex was with Kyle, sharing a bed with him and the joy of waking up next to him gave her even more happiness as her loneliness was finally banished.

After three months, Ursula introduced Kyle to Violet and Xander. The meeting went better than Ursula could have imagined. He bonded with Xander over their love of baseball. Kyle confessed to having a baseball scholarship when he was at college.

"Turned out that even if you have a baseball scholarship, you still need to study. I never got close to Major League Baseball and I partied far too hard, so I left college with a useless degree," he shamefully admitted.

Ursula then travelled to meet Kyle's daughter who was at college Virginia State.

Roger and Helen loved Kyle and the happiness he brought their daughter. They even welcomed Kyle's daughter. They felt an intense pride in their daughter in how she turned her life around.

A year later Ursula and Kyle moved in together and a year after that they married. Ursula was never tempted to cheat on Kyle. His company gave her the happiness she had always craved ever since high school that no one, not even Gary, could give her.

Ursula and Gary began to see less and less of each other as Violet and Xander grew up and moved out of home. They saw each other at Violet's and Xander's weddings and the baptisms of their grandchildren but eventually they had no reason to see each other. They occasionally asked their children about each other but they spent the rest of their lives happy with other people.