The Worst Gift

This is the story of how a simple gift bought for fun, destroyed my happy marriage, my family and my happy life.

I suppose I better introduce myself. I'm Darren, 54, married for 28 years to Caroline (known to me as Caz) 55. When I met Caroline I was 24, already teaching art at the local High School. No, we're not American, we live on the Yorkshire coast in the North of England.

I remember the first time I saw her. She had this short skirt on and I remember thinking "I never realised I was a leg man". She had a beautiful pair of legs and although only a 'b' cup she had this way of arching her back to look very buxom. She was bubbly and giggly and I thought that she was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. She never believed that she was beautiful though. I did and planned to spend the rest of my life making her feel beautiful. She just couldn't see what I saw. She saw a round chubby face and a nose that was a little larger than it perhaps should have been. I saw her beautiful blue eyes that turned green when she cried at soppy films, I saw her beautiful smile and cupid bow lips. I saw perfection.

Me, well I'm tall, 6'4'' and tower over Caz's 5'4". I have dark hair, now streaked with grey, green eyes and I'm still nice looking, so I'm told. Caz doesn't give out a lot of compliments, she reckons I know I still look good. When we first met she called me Clarkie as she said I looked just like Clark Kent with my dark hair and glasses.

It took me a while to convince her to go out with me. I always remind her that I've loved her longer than she has loved me. When we finally did get together though, it was love. We were engaged after three months -- madness I know. We were married the following year, but I never had those pre wedding jitters. I simply adored her. Simple as that. She wasn't perfect but then neither was I. She had a terrible temper and could be selfish, but she was perfect for me.

28 years later we were celebrating our son Scott's 21st birthday. We struggled a bit to have him, it took us years and we never managed to have any more. This was something that we still found painful. We couldn't complain though as some people are never blessed and our Scott was a real blessing. He was a son that any man could be proud of. He was the type of child you could also take anywhere. Now as an adult he would talk to anyone, make them feel at ease and had a funny, engaging personality. From babies to old folk, our Scott charmed them all.

Scott and I were very close and shared the same sense of humour. He would often say what I was about to say, before I had chance to say to. We spent a lot of time together and he called me his buddy as well as his dad. I know that you have to be your child's parent, not their friend, but I hope I have done both. How would I not want a kid as brilliant as him to be my pal?

We might be very similar in personality but we didn't look alike at all, all fathers want their children to look like them, I think it is some Neanderthal thing, but Scott didn't. Caz's side of the family had exceptionally strong genes, they all looked alike. Caz and her cousins looked more like siblings. Scott looked like his Mum, her dad and everyone else in her family. When we looked after Caz's sisters children, our nephews, we could never convince strangers that the three cousins weren't brothers and that Caz wasn't Mum to all three. We loved those times with the nephews as it gave us a glimpse into what life might have been like with a larger family.

Oh well, A larger family was not to be. We were very lucky, we had no real money worries. We loved spending time together. Caz and I could never understand those couples who spent their weekends apart. We used to watch our neighbours taking it in turns to go out with friends whilst the other took a turn to look after the children. We loved spending our time together, we were that sort of couple.

I still love her as much as I ever had and found her very attractive. She certainly didn't look her age, we both looked like a couple in our forties rather than fifties. This was helped by Caz's hair that still didn't have any grey in it. This was another family trait as her dad had been just the same. Their hair faded to a softer shade rather than going grey or white.

The only blot on our marriage in recent years had been a somewhat dead bedroom. We had always had a very active sex life. Caz had only had one boyfriend before me and though not a virgin when we met was quite inexperienced. I however, had been rather busy at University and Caz was very receptive and surprised at my sharing of skills. One of my favourite things sexually is to perform oral sex. I love it. It's my kink, I suppose, being a cunning linguist. We never made love without Caz coming on my tongue -- ever. I was amazed that she'd never done that with her previous boyfriend. Apparently he thought it was dirty. I think it's the most wonderful thing a man can do for women and any man who doesn't is rather questionable.

In recent years, since Caz had hit the menopause she'd lost all interest in sex. Penetration was painful and she complained about my girth. I didn't want to hurt her, so I continued to perform oral on her instead. We both enjoyed that but it was rarely reciprocated. However, soon any sexual contact became a rarity. This upset me greatly and did cause some frustrations in our marriage. I suppose it made me feel less of a man and less attractive too. Caz would just display her legendary temper whenever I tried to broach the subject, I found it so difficult because not only did I still find her so attractive, and I had still had a rather teenage libido too. So, at 54 I was still taking myself in hand, so to speak, on a daily basis. Apparently it is essential for a healthy prostate.

Anyway, I loved I loved her so much, it was something that I reluctantly learned to live with. It hurt, but I wasn't going to step outside the marriage. Fidelity and trust was all important to me. I had an older colleague once, Trevor. He was in his late 50's at the time and recently divorced. He got very drunk at a staff do and I was nominated to see him home. Home was now a rather bare little flat and over a coffee he told me his story. He was very much in love with his wife but when he started to suffer from some erectile dysfunction, she decided to fulfil her needs elsewhere. She looked at it as entirely separate from their loving marriage and seemed beyond shocked that Trevor had divorced her.

Trevor's ex-wife now lived alone in another flat, still shocked that her lack of loyalty to her husband could result in her new life. The sad thing was a simple change of blood pressure medication later solved all Trevor's problems in that department. Too late for his first marriage but just in time for his second that provided him with a very happy retirement. I could never be unfaithful to Caz just to fulfil my sexual needs. My beautiful Caz had given me a wonderful son, home and memories. I owed it to her, to deal with this new stage in our lives in a loving way.

One of the things that Scott and I shared together was a love of genealogy. We were very excited to find that we were related to royalty. Yes, my 30th Great Grandfather was a King! Yes, I know along with many thousands of others, but still exciting. We ended up with thousands of names on our family tree. Caz wasn't interested. She said it was just a list of dead people. We tried to interest her, but she really wasn't bothered. When I got my DNA kit a few years ago, I offered to get her one but she had one of her legendary tantrums. She was very much against it, saying 'they' would know all about me. I wasn't quite sure who this big brother like 'they' was and what they intended to do with those information about a rather ordinary secondary school teacher? Anyway, I let it slide. It just became my thing and it was Ok to have a separate interest, for once.

Anyway, a few years later, Scott and I still occasionally dipped into the ancestry website, particularly after an interesting message popped up. Our interest had lessened a little after we realised we weren't going to find any more illustrious relatives. Scott did like to check on my DNA matches from around the world that popped up often as more people joined. I suppose that it was my Irish ancestry that ensured matches across the globe, So many people had scattered after the potato famine. So, I decided that as an extra little present for Scott's 21st I would get an ancestry DNA testing kit. The fact that it was on special offer probably helped too. Being a bit busy in the lead up to his birthday, I ordered it a bit late. When it eventually came a few days after his birthday we quickly completed it and I posted it on my way to school. I didn't mention it to his Mum as I knew her feelings on such things. Anyway it was one of my things with Scott. I certainly didn't want her to start all the big brother type 'they' stuff again, who would be watching Scott now too.

I realise that all you people out there have realised long ago what is about to happen next. Looks obvious, doesn't it and you would be right? All I can say is that it wasn't obvious to me. In fact when I came home one night a few days later to find my life as I knew it had ended, I couldn't have been more shocked. Caz was crying on the settee in the conservatory. Crying as though her heart was truly broken. My first thought was to wonder who had died. I rushed to her and held her in my arms, she couldn't speak for a while, so I just held her, begging her to tell me what had happened. She eventually manage to stutter that she had been talking out the recycling and seen the cardboard box the DNA testing kit came in. At this point I started to feel a bit sick, this was a major overreaction, even for Caz. I was starting to panic and I felt like my stomach had hit the floor. I could barely take it in when she said,

"Scott's yours Darren. He is. You're his Dad, but someone else got me pregnant. I did it for us -- I swear."

Silence seemed to surround me for a second until I found myself heaving, I rushed to the door of the conservatory and brought up the contents of my lunch all over the steps down into the garden. Caz actually stroke my back as I was ill, soothing me, like she cared. Eventually I calmed down enough to turn to her and I screamed at her

"For us?"

"Yes, to make us a family," she said quietly, then the old Caz was back and she shouted back "It had been so long Darren".

I knew that I couldn't talk calmly to her, I was just too angry, but I just couldn't walk away until I knew more.

"You heard what the doctor said Caz, you heard him say that there was nothing wrong with either of us. No reason why we couldn't' have a baby. My swimmers might not have been Olympic standard but they were perfectly average and capable of getting the job done. There was nothing wrong with you either. I know that one of your ovaries wasn't firing on all cylinders but the other one was fine, that's why they didn't intervene earlier, we just needed time."

"I was running out of time though Darren. I wasn't alright. I kept thinking about what the doctor said about my ovary. I thought that if I got some stronger sperm it would counteract my lowered fertility."

"So Clarke Kent's sperm wasn't good enough for you, then. You decided that you needed Superman to do it with his superhuman sperm. So where did you find that then?"

She looked at me shocked

"Where!" I shouted.

"It was Angus" she said quietly.

I don't actually remember leaving the house. I know logically that I had to walk through two rooms and the hallway to get out of the house but I have no memory of it. What I do remember was that if I hadn't left at that point I was capable of doing something that I might later regret.

I roared out of the drive and eventually pulled up on a quiet bit of the promenade. Out of season it was almost deserted. Angus! As in my best friend, our best man and the closest thing in the world I had to a brother. She might as well have stabbed me.

Angus and I had been friends since we first met aged 18 at University. We were both doing art degrees. I took mine into teaching but he moved into art restoration. Wherever we went at University people assumed we were brothers rather than roommates. We were the same build and colouring, though my eyes were a paler green than his. He was an inch shorter than me in height. We shared a room so I also knew that he was an inch or two shorter than me in other departments too. Why had I thought about that? Typical male, now I took a small crumb of comfort from knowing that, I suppose.

We were best mates, inseparable at Uni. He was my best man and later I was his. Caz and Angus didn't actually meet till a couple of weeks before the wedding as he'd been living in France for a year working in a gallery and honing his restoration skills. Caz laughed when she met him, saying how we must have come out of the same pod.

He was excited when he came back a fortnight later for the wedding as he had met Kate a few days before. She later became his wife. He had really fallen hard, a bit like I had for Caz. See, I told you how alike we were. He was at home visiting his parents on the Lancashire coast and he'd met Kate at their church. His parents and Kate were part of what I called a 'happy clappy' born again type of church. He was a member but he certainly didn't make an issue about it in the student union bar. He was a member of the Christian Union though and I knew he was virgin and intended to stay that way until marriage. When he later married Kate I know they were both virgins. I knew he was anxious about that on the morning of the wedding, so I tried to give him a pep talk. Anxious and a virgin does not make for a fulfilling wedding night I would have imagined.

Anyway, at the wedding her family all assumed that I was his brother and not his three actual brothers that were there as I looked most like him. I was an only child so this link with Angus was very important to me. I treasured it. He really was the closest thing I had to a brother and had been my friend for 37 years. I loved him.

Kate and Angus had gone on to have 4 children. Three girls -- Rachel, Ruth and Rhian -- before we had Scott. They had their boy, Jake six months after Scott was born. As an only child I relished being Uncle Darren, both to then and to Caz's two nephews.

Although they lived on the opposite coast to us, it was only a few hours away, so we tended to visit them as we only had one child to transport. Scott loved being part of this large family and we got together for high days and holidays every other month or so. Jake and Scott were best pals too. They both loved anything to do with transport, a bit like myself. Angus wasn't interested in that, so I took the boys to lots of car museums, bus fairs and classic car rallies. It was our thing. Angus and I talked weekly, later sending texts and more recently daily jokes and memes that we'd found online.

Kate was an odd one. I really liked her and I could always make her laugh, but I sometimes found her a little brittle and inflexible. Harry Potter and Halloween was banned because of their religious beliefs. She did insist that Angus became more involved with the church. I did sometimes think that she was a little harsh with Angus where the kids were concerned. At his 40th birthday she really lost it with him before his party over something trivial. After the party we actually came home a day early. I wanted to defend him, you see, but I knew better than to get between a husband and wife. She knew it had bothered me though and said that she felt she could let rip on front of me because I knew what he was like. "Everyone else always thinks that he is perfect but only you and I know him warts and all."

As I sat in my car on my own, I realised that I didn't know my oldest friend at all. In fact, I didn't have an old friend. The two people I trusted most in the whole world had betrayed me and I only had Scott left, but what if he didn't want me either?

I texted Scott straight away. I needed to see him before he saw Caz. I needed to tell him that whatever happened, he would always be my son to me and nothing would ever change that. I could only trust that he would feel the same about me. We had managed to buy a few buy to let properties and he lived in one of those.

He was worried when he first saw me approach his little flat and instantly said

"God Dad, you look awful. Are you ill?"

As he came forward to hug me, he pulled away,

"Have you been sick? You stink. What's going on?"

I repeated what had happened as best I could and told him that I always wanted to be his Dad before I broke down in sobs. He got hold of my face, like I was the child and he was the father and said,

"You are the best dad, my only Father. I don't even want to know who this other guy was. I don't need to know. He means nothing to me. He doesn't matter. I don't want to ever meet him."

He must have seen me flinch at what he must have thought were reassuring words.

"I have already met him, haven't I Dad? I can tell by your face."

I could only nod.

"Who."

"Uncle Angus."

"The bastard. I'll kill him. You stay here. I'm going to talk to Mum."

I washed up as best I could. I needed to be strong for him now. I couldn't shake away the feeling that just a few hours ago, my life seemed almost perfect. Now it was all a lie. Every foundation that I based my life on had crumbled, except my love for Scott. After showering I put on some of Scott's joggers and a t shirt. They were a bit snug, but I knew he wouldn't mind. He returned less than an hour later. He was seething. He also had a small bag of my clothes.

"I've told her you're staying here tonight and she'd got till teatime tomorrow to pack her stuff. She can move in here and we will go home. Why should you not be in your own bed, just because she wanted to sample someone else's? I'm not leaving you on your own Dad and the way I feel about her at the moment. I doubt I will be speaking to her for a long time."

"What else did she say, son?"

"She said that she loves you and we will get over this as a family. She's delusional Dad. She's lost the plot."

"You do know that I can never forgive her, don't you? I don't care if it was just a one off because she was feeling desperate. She deceived me and lied to me every day for over 20 years. I can't forgive that."

"You will need to talk to her yourself Dad. Although I don't think that anything is going on now, from what she let slip, it was definitely more than a one off. I've already given her the spare key, so you can just go home after school tomorrow as normal. I'll meet you there. You will be OK to go to work tomorrow, won't you?"

"Probably not, but it's a training day before the half term, so I will have to manage. They are very awkward about you being ill or whatever on the day before we break up for the holidays. They think we're faking for cheap flights!"

Scott passed me the bag and said,

"Dad, I think I've got what you need in here, anything else, just take mine. Mum was very reluctant to let me take anything but I didn't give her much choice. I'm sorry I won't be here when you get up Dad. I've got a very early start but I'm only a phone call away. We'll get through this and I'll be with you every step of the way."

I was so proud of this young man, I looked at him and said quietly

"I'm meant to be supporting you, that's what my job is."

"Dad, you've looked after me always and now it's my turn to look after you. I won't lie, I'm shocked and very angry. The only difference is I haven't lost anything. I've still got you and Mum's there if I choose to accept her. That's my decision and I don't know what that will be yet. I haven't really lost anything, but you have. I promise you, you'll never lose me."