The nurse asked me for the baby’s names so she could complete the birth paperwork. I could only tell her not to put me down as the father or give him my surname. Didn’t go down too well with the in-laws.

Okay, so it was a real shitty thing to do to my in-laws, not good at all. I genuinely hated to have to do it; they’d always been more than okay with me, and I’d liked them back. Trouble was, as I’d feared might happen, my hand was being forced before I was quite intending to lower the boom.

There was a positive side to this moment coming a little earlier than I’d anticipated; Stephanie was still being cleaned up after the birth, so we hadn’t yet been allowed in to see her, and I hadn’t needed to pretend that I was thrilled and delighted that my wife had just given birth to her first-born son. Yeah, you read that correctly. Her, not our.

I looked up from the file of papers I’d been studying for the past few hours. I knew I hadn’t done a satisfactorily thorough job of reading them and I’d have to go through them again before reporting back to my client, but it had helped pass the time and allowed me to avoid having to make polite conversation with Howard and Hildy. We’d come in to the hospital at ten in the morning when her waters had broken, and it was now six o’clock Saturday evening. Apart from getting some lunch, we’d been in the waiting room all day.

Could have been worse timing for the little guy to arrive, I guess. I might have lost all of a night’s sleep, or missed some productive time at work. Weekends for the last month or so had just been me running around after Stephanie as she whined that she was too big to sit or lie comfortably, and that the baby was kicking her bladder all the time.

It had taken all my patience (and my lawyer’s repeated advice to stay cool) not to tell her to fuck off over to her lovers if she wanted yet another back rub. Boy, I reckon people have won Oscars for way less convincing acting performances than I’d put on the last few months. Well, the time for pretense had now gone.

The nurse repeated her question slightly louder, maybe thinking I hadn’t heard her the first time.

“I need to know what names you’re giving the baby, so I can make out the Birth Certificate.”

I tipped my head to acknowledge that I’d heard her, sighed, dropped the file of papers in my briefcase, closed it and stood up from the waiting room chair. The woman was only doing her job, so I tried to control myself and be calm and polite as I said goodbye to my marriage. I put a smile on my face, but I’m betting it didn’t reach my eyes.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, I have nothing to do with the baby, other than currently being married to his mother, and that’s not going to last very much longer. I wasn’t with her when he was conceived. You’ll have to ask her for the first names she prefers; I’ve no idea whether she’ll go for Ed or Jim, but then I guess she doesn’t yet know which of the two of them was the sperm donor and is a daddy again. What I CAN tell you is that you are NOT putting me down on the certificate as the father unless the hospital wants a lawsuit, and that you’d probably better get the DNA testing signed off before you put a definite name in that slot. Both Ed and Jim are currently married, though that also will probably change shortly, and the poor little bastard is going to be in the queue for child support behind their own children.”

The nurse was visibly shocked at my outburst, but her professional training held up and she merely nodded and went out, presumably to pass this little treat to someone higher up the food chain. My current mother-in-law, Hildy, had been listening intently, and it hit her hard. She screamed in horror and outrage before slumping down in her chair, her head in her hands. My soon-to-be-ex-father-in-law, Howard, was clearly torn between attending to his wife’s distressed sobs and attending to me with his fists. I turned to look at them, genuine pity and sadness in my eyes.

“Mom, Pop, I’m real sorry that you had to find out this way. You asked me again just a few minutes ago why my parents weren’t here at the hospital on such an important occasion? Why I wasn’t trying harder to get hold of them? It’s because this isn’t their first grandchild, so it’s nothing to do with them. Same reason why I didn’t go in to hold her hand during the birth, and I’m not going in to take a look at him. I would totally understand if I’m no longer going to be welcome at your house, but I do wish the two of you well in the future, and thank you for your past love and friendship to me. I couldn’t have asked for better in-laws; it’s just a crying shame that I chose the wrong wife. Once again, I’m more sorry than I can say, and I hope you get something worked out. Goodbye, and Good Luck!”

I picked up my briefcase and coat and left the room. The other families waiting on their new arrivals were staring at me as if I’d suddenly grown two more heads; they’d certainly have something new to talk about!

Howard was too shocked to even attempt to get up and chase after me; besides, Hildy needed him bad now. I would have hugged them both in sympathy if I could have done; it wasn’t their fault their daughter was a slut. Leaving them to suffer hurt me inside, I so wanted to comfort them.

On the way out of the hospital to my car, I pressed the speed-dial on my smartphone and spoke to my lawyer, telling her that the news was out and it was time to serve the papers. She knew we were at the hospital and was expecting confirmation from me that Steph had given birth; she said she’d go into her home office come the morning and get things moving. I thanked her, picked up a take-out pizza, went home, unplugged the land-line and drank a couple of beers with my meal. Then I put fresh sheets on the bed, took a shower, and crashed out. Some Saturday night out, some celebration of my wife’s firstborn!

Yeah, I guess it was also a bit cold of me to have Ed and Jim served at their homes early on a Sunday morning, with another envelope for their wives containing some explanatory photos. Not as despicable as knowingly screwing a married woman, though. I’d had many weekends made miserable by knowing my wife was cheating on me; it was about time their home lives hit the reality of what they’d been doing in work time. It was worth paying the extra to the process server.

Monday I called in and took a personal day; my colleagues knew Steph was close to popping and were expecting it around now, so it was easy enough to arrange at short notice without further explanation. The locksmith arrived at nine to change everything over; I spent the time he was working boxing up Steph’s things. Once he’d left, I went over to the bank and straightened things out with the manager. I cancelled and paid off the joint cards; even if she got stupid, she couldn’t now affect my credit rating. The joint account, with a much reduced credit balance, became hers alone, and I opened a new account for just me.

I dropped in at my attorney’s office after lunch; she had some more news for me.

First up, the hospital had rolled over on the demand for a DNA test about a minute after they’d been told that their bill would not be countersigned for payment by my insurance unless they carried it out and certified the results. That meant I had to go in with some photo ID and let them take a sample from me, which I was expecting to do anyway.

Secondly, the company had gotten served at their offices while I was waiting on the locksmith, the enclosed photos proving that Steph’s team leader and line manager were both tapping a married subordinate in the office after working hours, blissfully unaware of the two cable repair guys in their bucket truck outside the building. Their employee handbook was quite clear on the subject of inappropriate relationships; as we’d expected, the company’s first thought had been to protect itself from further lawsuits. Ed and Jim had both been terminated with cause and escorted from the building way before lunch break.

I had a feeling that I wouldn’t get the normal welcoming smile from the receptionist and security guy next time I dropped into the office to see Steph, but, hey, I didn’t have any reason to go there any longer. I now didn’t have a wife who worked there. By the time she finished her maternity leave, if she actually had a job to go back to, which I very much doubted, she wouldn’t be my wife.

Thirdly, my lawyer had arranged for the note informing Steph that I’d changed all the locks on MY house, and that she wasn’t coming back there ever again, to be hand-delivered to the hospital that afternoon. Sure enough, my phone started going even more wild about four o’clock, but I didn’t pick up. I listened to a couple of the voicemail messages; Steph was bouncing between screaming and begging; I couldn’t work out from what she was saying whether she was hurting and sorry because she’d betrayed me, or because she’d been caught. My money was firmly on the latter.

I dropped the boxes of her stuff off at her folks place at seven in the evening while they were visiting her in hospital. I put a separate letter in their mailbox, apologizing again to them for the way I’d been forced to handle it, and acknowledging that it must have caused them added hurt. I hoped Howard and Hildy would read it rather than just throw it in the trash. I was genuinely sorry for causing them pain.

Steph left the hospital Tuesday and took the baby home to her parents place. I had her served the papers and photographs Wednesday morning. The process server reported back that she started weeping as she accepted the envelope. At least her parents were on hand to look after her. I guessed that she’d probably already heard about being served from Ed, Jim or work. Or all three. There were a few more messages on my voicemail, this time more of the ‘we can get past this’ variety. Now she knew that I had the evidence, she was on to damage limitation. Pity she didn’t understand that the ‘zero tolerance’ attitude to cheaters that I’d always expressed especially applied to my wife. I’d have thought that she’d have known me better, maybe not.

I kept her on my insurance for the moment, just in case the impossible had somehow happened, I was mistaken, and it was my child. My lawyer had also advised me not to be too harsh; I could use the continuing medical benefits as ammunition when her lawyer tried to screw more money out of me, as the judge would give me credit for it and we’d deduct it from the total. For the same reason I continued her cell phone plan; it didn’t cost me a whole lot as part of our family deal, and my lawyer told me that it also gave me the right as the bill payer to demand a list of calls, which would strengthen my insistence that Steph was an adulteress who was still in touch with her lovers.

It was an interesting week, if you think of it in the way of the old Chinese curse: May you live in interesting times. I seemed to spend half my time deleting unheard voicemail messages on my cell phone; Carly, our receptionist at work, threatened to quit unless I got a restraining order forbidding Steph and Hildy from calling me.

I did meet up with Howard at my lawyer’s Friday; he looked ten years older than he had just six days before. He’d read the file and seen the photos. I apologized again for having him find out that way; he in turn admitted that he was ashamed of his daughter, but had to side with his own flesh and blood. He did ask if there was any way at all that Steph and I could get through this; I grimaced in sympathy at his forlorn expression as I told him no way, not even if she put the baby up for adoption. She’d cheated on me for too long and too deliberately for it to be forgivable. I just would never trust her out of my sight, and that was no way to live life. He told me that he had to ask, but that he would have done the same in my place. He said that he’d try to get Hildy off of my back, we shook hands as we parted, not friends but not enemies, and Steph duly got herself an attorney.

Financially we were about level; we’d been earning pretty much the same salary. I conceded a point and made the divorce grounds irreconcilable difficulties rather than adultery; there was no point in making her antagonistic and dragging things out. Her lawyer was of course still trying to get more out of me – presumably to pad his fees – so we would have to go in front of the judge anyway.

My lawyer advised me to go with it; we’d given ground and they hadn’t, and he’d tell the judge exactly that. We got ourselves a court date and I started concentrating on work once again.

How did I find out my wife was cheating?

I probably would never have noticed.

Steph had clearly studied the Cheating Wives Handbook, especially the paragraph on page two where it said not to reduce or change the amount of sex your clueless cuckolded stupid doofus of a husband was getting. She had no need to make calls to her lovers to arrange meeting up; she could talk to them in person every day at work, and fuck them in their private offices while ‘working late’. All they had to do was wait for their other colleagues to clock out and head for home. It was all very convenient for her, and for them. A near-perfect arrangement, until they’d gotten over-confident.

Like most of these ‘clueless husband’ discoveries of their wife’s betrayal, it was purely down to chance.

I’d had a couple of clients coming in to see me for their annual review, so I’d cleared my diary to take them to lunch afterwards, and then at ten o’clock the wife called to say that they had a family emergency and needed to reschedule. My meeting table was covered with their files, so I cleared that up and then decided to walk over to Steph’s office and eat with her instead. It was only a few minutes away, so I didn’t bother to call ahead. I was just rounding the street corner when I saw her walking towards me, arm in arm with her supervisor Jim. They were laughing and totally engrossed in each other, and I managed to duck into a shop doorway as they passed. They stopped for the lights to cross the road, and kissed while they were waiting.

The crossing lights weren’t the only ones that were flashing red warning signs.

I could hardly believe they were being so blatant only a couple of blocks from the office. I followed them, not having great difficulty staying hidden with the lunchtime crowds helping me, and woke up enough to get my smartphone out and take a couple of snaps of the two of them together.

They went into a small restaurant, and took a table in the window. Part of me was tempted to stand against the glass and glare at them until Steph noticed me, but the more sensible side of me decided to stay covert and gather information. I could see them well enough from a service doorway the other side of the street, and the way they held themselves told me quite clearly this wasn’t just two colleagues having a quick lunch together. The affectionate glances, the ease with which they talked; I had absolutely no doubt that they’d been intimate.

They took the full hour, and a little more, over lunch, and then they strolled back to their office. I followed on the other side of the road, and they linked arms until just before they got to the building. Jeez, it was so darned arrogant. It was like they didn’t especially care who saw them.

I took myself off to the park for the afternoon. I found a bench over in one corner and sat, lost in my thoughts. I have no idea if anyone came near me; my senses were all aimed inwards. MY Steph was having an affair with Jim. That made her no longer mine, but it was one helluva shock realizing and accepting that. Jeez, we were expecting a child together!

(Of course, once I’d woken up to the fact that she was cheating on me, the clues were all out there to be seen. The overtime hours which didn’t seem to be reflected in her unchanged monthly paycheck. The showers when she got home after a long day in the office. Her frequent unavailability at lunchtime or just after. I often got myself something like a sandwich that I could eat at my desk so I was available to clients; seemed that Steph was now lunching out near every day.)