Second Chances Ch. 01

My stories of late have taken a turn to the dark side. I have decided to take one in a different direction.

This story is based on a true story about a guy, who was in my unit in the military, before Ipads, cell phones and E-mail.

My name is Jon, I am 26 years old, married to Susan, who is 25. We have been married for 5 years and no children. We live in San Diego where I am stationed.

The unit I am in is a RPU, Rapid Deployment Unit, similar to the one in the tv show, The Unit, only much more mundane, for the most part.

We had been deploying quite often the last couple years. I know that it was taking it's toll on Susan and our marriage. Her job as a nurse kept her busy but I know she was down in the dumps about all the time I was gone.

I could be called away at a moments notice and never knew when I was coming back. This is what happened this time. I got a call at 8PM and told to report for deployment at midnight.

Susan and I managed to get a session of love making in before I had to leave. Little did I know that it would be the last time we would make love before a deployment.

I was gone about 3 months. Because of where I was and what I was doing, I only got mail when I came back into a base. Sometimes that was as long as a month. In the first three months I got a letter a week. She would number them on the envelope so I could read them in sequence.

The next op in the field, I got shot and had to be flown to Germany for reconstructive surgery on my left arm and rehab for it and my left leg. The letters stopped coming.

As I said there were no cell phones, so I had no way of contacting her until I got to Germany and was able to call home. I called once a day, but after 4 days of no answer, I called a buddy back home to have him check up on her and find out what was wrong. I gave him a number he could get a hold of me on.

Next day I received a call from him. Susan was gone. The landlady said all of her stuff was gone and only mine and the furniture were still there and she was waiting to see what to do with it. The rent was overdue by a month.

I asked him if he could get some help to move it to a storage facility until I could get home. He said he could.

I finally got home two months later and had no idea where to look for her. Her Dad or brother hadn't heard from her. She had not reported for work in weeks. Our friends had no idea where she was. She had just disappeared.

I was finally sent back to San Diego for rehab. I found that she had taken half of our savings and $250 a month from the allotment I had been sending to the checking accont.

My rehab was coming along good and I finally got sent back to my unit and the deployments started again and went on for years. I had a hard time at first. I missed Susan so much. I had no idea what happened to her. She had just vanished. The $250 a month was withdrawn every month, though. I had long ago lowered the allotment to just that much. If nothing more than to let me know, that she was still alive somewhere and I think she did it for the same reason.

By the time I had 15 years in, I started having problems with my leg and was unable to do my job, so they medically retired me. I was able to get a job on the base, so I stayed in San Diego.

I started paying more attention to my health. I would go to the gym everyday and would do a slow jog every day after work along Mission Bay.

Saturday mornings I would do my jog, so I could spend the day at the beach. But this one Saturday, I had a hangover, so I didn't go jogging until mid morning.

After I finished and stretched, I laid back on the grass to relax and watch the people walk by. Some interesting characters.

I saw a woman and a young girl walking towards me and my heart skipped a beat and I got light headed. There was Susan with a young blonde girl, I guessed to be about 9 or 10.

It took all I had to get up and walk towards them. Susan was talking to the girl, when she looked up and saw me.

He hand went to cover her mouth, as she saw me she dropped to the ground, starting to cry. I ran over to her.

"Susan, Susan where have you been." She looked up at me and burst out crying again.

"Why did my Mom fall down and cry when she saw you Mister."

"Your Mom is my wife. She left a long time ago."

By now people were all around us wanting to know what happened and was she alright.

I told them she was alright, just a little dizzy.

"Help me get your Mom over on the grass. What's your name."

"Jennifer."

Oh, my God, that was the name we had picked for a girl, when we started our family. But she was a blonde and there are no blondes on either side of the family.

By the time we got Susan laying down on the grass she had composed herself, threw her arms around me and said, "Jon, I am so sorry."

Jennifer said, "You look kinda like a picture Mom has on her dresser. Only older."

I helped her up and got her into my truck. Susan was in a daze, just staring at me.

"Jennifer where do you live?''

"Pacific Beach, I will show you. We walked here."

"How long have you lived there?"

"All my life."

She had been right here all along. She never left San Diego.

When we got to their place, we put her in bed and Jennifer got her undressed and covered her up.

"Where is your Dad, Jennifer?"

"I don't have a Dad. When I asked Mom about that, she told me she made a bad mistake and I would never have a Dad. It was just her and me."

"Who are you. You said Mom is your wife. That makes you my Dad." How do you answer that.

"Listen, when your Mom wakes up and is feeling better, we will sit down and explain this all to you. I don't want to say anything until she is with us."

She said , "Okay." Pretty resilient kid, I thought and the more I looked at her the more of her Mom I saw in her, but none of me.

What the hell happened. I guess I would know soon enough.

Susan woke a couple of hours later. I heard her go into the bathroom and when she came out she was crying.

I went into her bedroom. She looked at me and came to me, put her arms around me. I hugged her back and told her we need to sit down with Jennifer and talk but first we needed to talk, just the two of us.

"What happened, why did you disappear. I had no idea where to look for you. No one, family, friends or the hospital, knew anything. Where did you go?"

"After you left that day, I was so lonely. We had hardly any time together since you last got home. Then I got pissed and went to the club on base, on that Friday night."

"I had a couple drinks and danced with some of the guys, when this blond hunk came up to me and offered to buy me a drink if I danced with him. He bought, I drank, we danced and the next thing I know I am in a bed in a motel, by myself and it was morning. By the mess and soreness, I knew that I had sex in both holes."

"I was devastated and went straight home and tried to get my life back together. I didn't even remember his name, if I ever knew it. I went back to the club to find him the next two Friday nights, but he was not there."

"Then I missed my first period. Then the second. The home test showed positive. I went off the deep end. You were gone, I had no idea what I was going to do. So I took half our money and some I had saved for us to go on a nice vacation and went to Portland. A woman that worked at the hospital, had moved there and told me if we ever got up that way to look her up. I called her and told her my situation and she let me live with her until after the baby was born."

"I knew as soon as I saw her that she was not yours."

"Now that I had a baby to care for, I got a job in a preschool as an aide and took classes in Early Childhood Development. That is what I used the $250 I took from your account for.

"Portland was not for me so as soon as I had saved up enough money I moved back here. Gail was good enough to let us stay with her, so I could save most of my money.

I am a Preschool and Kindergarten teacher in a private Christian school. I love it.

"I have not dated, even once, since then. It has been only Jennifer and me. Now you are back in my life and I don't know what to do or even who I am now."

"Tell me about your life since then." She said.

"Did you know I had been shot and spent a lot of time in the hospital and rehab?"

"NOOOOOOO, Oh god, no."

"I was hit in the right shoulder and leg and needed reconstructive surgery and months of rehab. I was able to do my job, for 5 more years and then I started to have problems with my leg, so they medically discharged me last year. I am working on the base now and working out in the gym and jogging each day. I wouldn't even have been there this late, if I hadn't partied to hard last night and had a hangover this morning. So I came jogging a couple hours later. Then I saw you."

"Jon, did you ever divorce me. I abandoned you."

"No, Susan, I never did. I couldn't afford to have a PI look for you and thought that maybe you would show up sooner or later. As time went on I just never considered filing for divorce. I really didn't see the need as I decided to never get married again. I had found the one true love in my life, you, and you were gone, so I figured what the hell. I've dated a few times over the years but never more than once with anyone."

"Susan, I have to say this...........I never stopped loving you, I still love you. I just don't know where to go from here, now that we are face to face again and what about Jennifer. Our name for our first daughter."

"I never even considered naming her anything but Jennifer. We need to sit down with her and talk like you said, she is pretty savvy for a nine year old, going on 20. She knows most of what happened but not the details."

"Yah, I know. She told me she has no Dad, just you and her and that I looked like the picture on your dresser, only older and since I told her you were my wife, she said that if you were my wife, that I must be her Dad. I told her we would talk with her when you were up and feeling better."

"Jon, I never stopped loving you and I hoped you never stopped loving me. I knew that this day would come, just never thought it would be today. But one question, why did you keep putting that $250 dollars in the account each month?"

"As long as you kept taking it I knew you were still alive and well. After I got retired I kept doing it for the same reason. The whole situation was so bizarre. I just left things the way they were.

She started crying again. "That is why I kept taking it. I wanted to let you know I was still out here but couldn't face you. I know it was selfish of me to take your money, but it helped, honey, it helped me get through some hard times."

"I hoped that was what it was all about. It is amazing that after this many years, that we hadn't at least caught a glimpse of each other." I said.

"Susan, we need to get with Jennifer, soon. She can't be kept wondering what is going on and going to happen now."

"What do you want to happen, Jon. Now that you know do we get divorced and get on with our lives?"

"Susan, it is not what I want, but what we want. I know I still love you, but I would need to fall "in love" with you again. I want to at least give it a try, but if you want a divorce to get on with your life, I will grant you one.'

"No, I think I want to see where this goes, with us back in each other's lives and with a child that only belongs to one of us. That could be a sticking point."

"What me not being her biological Dad. I'm not sure that would be a problem. We just gotta talk with her."

"Lets go get something to eat and see how she is taking all of this. Then we may have a better idea of how to approach this with her." She agreed. We got Jennifer and went to dinner.

"When are we going to sit down and talk about the three of us, Mom?"

I'm thinking, "the three of us." This nine year old girl seems to have a better handle on this than the adults involved.

"Whenever you want to, sweetie."

"When we get home. This is weird. Your husband is not my father. You need to explain how that is. You said you made a bad mistake and that is why I have no father.

I figured I would start out with how things were before her mother started.

"Jennifer, your Mom and I were together for 5 years, before she left, that was when she found out she was pregnant with you. I was gone a lot of the time. My job called me to work at all hours of the night and day and I never knew when I was coming home. This was very hard on your Mom. She never knew if I was alive until she saw me come home. I think she got lonely and needed a friend and that is where you came into the picture. Do you understand any of this?"

"Yah, Mom fooled around and got pregnant with me." We both looked at her in astonishment.

"Honey, did you just now figure this out."

"No Mom, there are lots of kids like me, that have no Dad. Their Mom's fooled around and got pregnant or their Dads left. I know all about that. I just want to know what's gonna happen now."

I could see Susan was at a lose for words.

I asked Jennifer, "What would you like to see happen?"

"I'm not deaf, I heard you and Mom talking. I want to see you fall in love again with my Mom and her fall in love again with you, then we could be a family and you could be my Dad. I heard you say that Jennifer was the name you both picked out for your daughter, well here I am, Jennifer."

My eyes starting to tear up. I looked at Susan and she was too. This kid had it all figured out.

So much had happened in the last 8 hours.

"Okay, here is what I think we should do. Lets all sleep on it tonight. Absorb what has happened since noon and I will come back when you and your Mom want me to. I won't interfere in your lives any more until then.

As I left, I kneeled down by Jennifer and whispered in her ear, "I would love to be your Dad." She smiled and walked into the house. As I got into my truck, I saw Jennifer looking out the window. Damn, she is still the love of my life. Even after all that has happened.

I guess maturity has a way of letting you look at things more clearly. I couldn't even get mad at her. I think I have forgiven her everything. Not only that, she is not that fresh faced 25 year old anymore. She is a beautiful, more mature looking 35 year old.

Susan called me on Wednesday and wanted to know if I wanted to go with them to Jennifer's soccer game. I said sure.

While we watched the game, Susan said that her and Jennifer want me in their lives, but not living with them until we get to know each other again.

"Do you want to keep our marital status as is or what?"

"I want to keep it the way it is for now. If we find we are no longer compatible then we will look at starting the process but you know what, I have a feeling that is not going to be necessary. I have to see how Jennifer gets on with you. That is a major concern right now but once again it looks like that may not be a problem either."

The three of us got together at least 4 or 5 times a week. I was falling in love with my wife again and I believed that the feeling was mutual. Jennifer asked if she could call me Daddy Jon. I told her it was okay with me if it was okay with her Mom.

Susan and I dated and I felt the intimacy returning. It took awhile but I feel I convinced her that I did not hold it against her for leaving and not coming back. To much time had lapsed since that time, over 10 years ago.

We had not slept together yet. Both of us were ready and I knew it would happen soon. It had been over 2 months now since that day at the Bay.

Jennifer had a sleep over at a friends house on Friday evening, so Susan and I had the whole night to ourselves. After we had gone out to dinner, I asked her what she wanted to do and she said, "Let's go home. I want to be with you tonight. I want you to hold me and kiss me and make love to me like we used to. I am ready to be your wife again, that is if you will have me."

"There is nothing I want more than to have you as my wife again. I love you, like never before and I feel that I have fallen in love with you again."

"I feel the same way and my love for you has never been stronger. Lets give our new relationship time to grow again but in the meantime, I want to us to think about a date sometime in the future to renew our marriage vows. Except this time I want us to write our own to each other."

"You have given this some thought, haven't you Susan"

"Yes I have and while I don't want to drag this out I don't want to jump head long into this without thinking it through, because we would have Jennifer to consider, also."

"But in any case, we are going to make love to each other tonight and in the morning we will see how we feel about things. Jennifer will be home by 9, so she'll know that you stayed over and we'll see her reaction to that. I guess this will be either the beginning of a second chance at love or no chance at all."

Part II will undoubtedly be in another genre. Romance, Erotic Coupling, Loving Wives one never knows at this point.