Chapter 4: The Handshake

Aaron:

I think a true friend does not cheat with your wife and my friends were true friends. They helped me in my worst state of my life, so they were not fair-weather friends. Fair-weather friends are only with you during the good times, but leave you when things are messy. They also kept my ‘saving’ action in secret from their families to this day. I am very grateful for their help. Mainly, I am grateful to John who discovered Ken’s boastful video in time. I am forever indebted to him.

It is my deep conviction that a cheater spouse is thief of more than exactly vows or sex. A cheater is a thief of time. The cheater spouse steals that time from the innocent spouse, which could be used to find a better spouse. If the cheating was uncovered in time, the innocent spouse gets more time to find a better future mate after divorce. I got the information about Samantha’s cheating in time and she did not steal much time from me. It may be that the innocent spouse could stop the other spouse from cheating with reconciliation, if it is not already too late. Unfortunately, it usually is too late is the most cases. However, we did not have any children, so I did not hesitate to divorce quickly, except for my eight months revenge time.

John married his second wife after half a year to my divorce. It was not surprising that I was his best man at their wedding and I was not by myself at their wedding. I met Emily almost after half a year after my divorce. John was right! I recovered from my lack of trust in women more quickly than John.

It was very interesting in that we met on the net. The modern World has the new possibilities! I was surfing the net and found dating websites. The high divorce rate and my experiences persuaded me the online dating could give the same possibilities for successful marriages as ordinary dating. I looked at these websites and found some ads from Northern America. I searched for women from all over the World.

However, I stopped at an interesting dating ad. I read this particular ad twice. A woman wrote that she was looking for mate, who would like to become a daddy for common children with her. Samantha did not want any kids, so this ad was most interesting to me. The photos showed a pretty thirty-two years old woman. I read ads from almost the whole world and asd such as hers were very rare. The women described what entertainments they liked and they wanted an understanding and affectionate mate, etc. I was tired of those types of dating ads. My interest increased on her particular ad, when I learned she lived in the neighbor state.

I responded to her ad, because I am still interested in a relationship where the woman candidate wanted common children. I sent my photo along with my other data. I wrote that I divorced such a woman who did not want to become a mom at all, but only told me after several years. Yes, we argued about having kids several times, because I wanted kids, but my ex-wife was adamant. I now know this persuaded her to suggest we meet in a city halfway between our cities. The city was in the neighboring state and she suggested a hotel restaurant for a lunch at one PM. I arrived an hour early after two hour drive, so I found the hotel and I sat in the lobby to wait. We both had the photos of the other in our smart phone. We met sooner, because she also arrived earlier.

She was of medium height, brown-haired blue-eyed woman. Her cheekbones were wide and her hair was not long. She wore a nice dress with a light blue spring coat. She looked pretty in it. We greeted each other and went to the lunch. She introduce herself, she was Emily Crane: she was a career woman. A lawyer and she did not see more possibilities in her job. She thought she reached the maximum in her job, because the law office she worked for, did not offer any more advancement. She was straight and had boyfriends in the past. But when she tried for a permanent mate, the latest boyfriend left her. I told her my ex-wife did not want kids and cheated on me. She said she had a cheater boyfriend, too. She told me she had more dating ads on other websites, but this was the only ad, where she wrote about her desire for kids. The other websites brought some adventurous candidates who were not good for long-time mates or father for her future babies. She thought she had the narrowing window of time for starting a family. We were sympathetic to each other and we arranged our next meeting in her city next week.

We began slowly. Soon, it was time to meet in my city and we had sex and found that we were compatible with each other. We decided we would not waste time and get married soon. John was my best man at the wedding and he just grinned at me, because his second wife was pregnant with his third kid and he told us we would have the next kid. We went to Florida for our honeymoon. When we got back, she quit her job. I sold my condo and she sold her condo, then we purchased a nice house. She had a nice bank balance and I could use part of my secret money, because the new marriage was a very good cover to the possibility that Samantha not to guess our money trick. However, I kept secret about my secret money stash from Emily. First reason was the security it gave me. My Harley was in our garage, but we haven’t used it since Emily became pregnant. We had two kids: the first child was a girl, Aileen, and the younger child a boy, Philip. John and Sarah had two kids, also. Michael organized the secret DNA tests for John and me and our kids. Yes, we agreed Ronald Reagan’s famous saying “Trust, but Verify”. The results for John and me were positive, so I am very proud of my kids and I think my marriage with Emily is successful. She is working at a local law office now.