My Coworker Doesn't Know That Our Unborn Babies Are Siblings
One man destroyed our world.
Alexei Vladimir / Shutterstock He was hers first, that I won’t deny.
I never thought of destroying their relationship, because I also had my own. Of course, I wasn’t happy and neither was he, and no it’s not an excuse. We never cheated. I broke up with my boyfriend, gently for sure. He ended things with her. I never asked him to leave her, but I was truly in love with him.
Like every other woman in love, I saw a beautiful future for us: Kids — he already had two — marriage, a big house in the country, and jobs that made us happy.
The thrills of this love flowed through my body and I wanted nothing more than to be his. We talked about moving in together and getting married. I remember he wanted to teach me how to drive and brought me to get my learner’s license. He saw a minister and asked about getting us married.
I’ve never introduced a boyfriend to my mother before.
When things got official between us, I introduced him to my mother and sister, and grandma and all my aunts. This 6 ft 4-inch beautiful man was now a part of my family and I was truly happy. For two months we’d had uncontrollable chemistry and intimacy. It all felt so surreal, almost unbelievable. It made me wonder if I even deserved this kind of love.
I never wondered about the other woman.
He never gave me a reason to worry and he never sneaked around. He never went into another room while on the phone and he never hid his phone while texting. For all I knew, he and his ex were done.
He planned a romantic getaway at one of my favorite hotels. I guess you can call it our four-month anniversary: Candles lit in our hotel room, red wine, my favorite of course.
We spent most of that weekend in bed. I remember laying in his arms and he asked me to marry him. Can you believe I hesitated? After four months of being in love with this man and fantasizing about our future, I hesitated when he proposed. I said yes.
But then he asked another question, one I wasn’t ready for.
“Can we have a baby?” He stared into my eyes, smiling that seductive, dark, chocolate-skinned smile that always makes me weak to him.
So, that night, we tried to have a baby. It worked.
The day I told him I was pregnant was the day everything started to feel strange between us, almost like he was preoccupied with someone or something else. I couldn’t quite tell because we didn’t live together yet and we weren't in each other’s skin most of the day anymore.
I was now five months pregnant, going to doctor appointments alone. No drives to work or pick-ups to go home. To him, everything was fine, he was just busy with work. But to me, we were disconnected.
I sent him a text as I lay in bed, asking him why we weren’t spending more time together. He said he didn’t want to hurt me and that going forward, it would just be best to co-parent our future son before things got worse between us.
I didn’t know what he mean by that.
I kept asking him why. I kept asking him to just tell me what happened between us and we could work it out. I begged for my heart’s sake, for our love’s sake, for our unborn son’s sake. It wasn’t enough.
A few weeks later, he came by to drop off the baby stuff he bought. I could only stare at him with pain and hatred as he placed everything in the middle of my room.
It was only the next day I saw her. His ex-girlfriend. I smiled at her. I didn’t want to seem sad or like my world had crumbled. We were about to pass each other at a crowded bus stop near our workplace.
And then I saw it: Her baby bump.
I looked away quickly, but I could barely breathe. How? That was the only question I could ask myself. Even when I tried to ask him, he never came clean.
I cried, cursed every word you could imagine.
I knew he was the father and he couldn’t try and deny it.
This man destroyed my world and stained our child’s life. Our children, because this woman must be hurting as much as I am, right? Did she even know about me?
The sad part is I have to see their faces every day. We all work at the same company.
Chantel Knight is a Jamaican writer and a video/film producer.