I really didn't have anyone to blame but myself. I could have stopped it in the early stages, but I let it go on because it just didn't matter to me. I had no idea that it would go as far as it did.

Camryn and I met in college, dated for a while and then moved on to other relationships. A year later we were at the same party, got to talking and started dating again. We went steady for about a year and then broke up again. It wasn't a bitter break up, just one of those 'not ready for anything permanent' break ups. The year after graduation we met at another party and started dating again and that time it went from dating to going steady to getting engaged. One year later we were married.

We were a good fit for each other and the marriage was a happy one for the first five years. Both of us were career oriented and we had decided early on that we didn't want children. I took the precaution of having a vasectomy so we wouldn't have to mess with condoms, birth control pills, diaphragms and the like. I never told my parents about that decision though because they had their hearts set on a herd of grandchildren. My father especially, he wanted a grandson to carry on the family name. I didn't worry about that because I had two brothers who could see to it the line was carried on.

Camryn and I worked hard on making it in our respective fields and both of us made progress and began moving up. The promotions came along with raises and bonuses and like most couples in this day and age as our income increased our life style changed. Our little two bedroom was sold and we moved into a four bedroom which was in turn sold so we could move into a bigger four bedroom with a swimming pool and a tennis court. We joined a country club, bought matching BMWs, moved in a smarter set and in general enjoyed our success.

Our success did not set well with my parents. One day my father said to me, "You are doing well enough. Camryn doesn't need to be working. It is high time she get around to starting a family."

I lied to him of course, "Dad, were trying. Camryn will quit work as soon as she gets pregnant, but until then she sees no need to give up her career. We are doing every thing we can. We are watching her cycles, plotting out her most fertile times and we have even tried some fertility drugs. But until the rabbit dies she is going to keep on working."

Camryn threw a birthday party for me and my two brothers were there. The three of us found ourselves out on the patio alone at one point and Harry asked Bob and me if we were getting the same pressure from dad that he was to produce an heir. I laughed, "He's on me at least once a week. I tell him that Camryn and I are trying hard, but the truth is, we don't want kids."

"Neither do Laura and I" said Bob.

"Ain't that a bitch" said Harry, "Nancy and I want kids, but it doesn't seem to matter what we do it just isn't happening."

I shrugged and said, "You are still young bro, there's plenty of time yet."

"Tell that to mom and dad."

Then the economy went sour and for six months both Camryn and I worked even harder at our jobs. We could both see the hand writing on the wall and we knew if the economy didn't get better there would be some down sizing and some personnel cut-backs as our company's retrenched and we wanted to survive the cut. We both had the old fashioned belief that hard work would be noticed and rewarded when times got tough. NOT! Camryn's company went through a down sizing and she was let go. What really steamed her was that the company kept two women who did little else except spread their legs for management. Camryn did get a pretty nice severance package and she wasn't real worried because she knew that she could find something else and she was right. She got a ton of job offers, but all at a salary fifty- percent lower than what she had been making. Eventually she had to take one of those offers and that is about when things began to go bad.

We had lived on what we made and what the two of us had made together was what had enabled us to live such a great life style. With Camryn no longer making as much some things had to change. First to go were the matching Beemers. They were replaced by a Honda Accord and a Buick. We had to stop giving parties, which meant that we had to cut down on going to them since we could not reciprocate. The country club membership was not renewed when the dues became due and I started packing a small lunch in my briefcase and I cut way back on going out to lunch with the guys I worked with.

I didn't find out until way later about the day that tipped everything over. I was in my den and had been looking through the Yellow Pages trying to find some railroad ties for some landscaping I wanted to do behind the house. I found what I was looking for, called them and got some information and then went out back to make some measurements.

While I was gone Camryn came into the den looking for me and saw the open book. She glanced at it and saw not the page that said, Railroad Equipment and Railroad Ties, but the page opposite that said "Real Estate." Camryn left the room thinking I was getting a line on a realtor preparatory to putting the house up for sale and she was determined that she would never let that happen.

Camryn started putting in longer hours at work. She worked late several times each week, worked on occasional Saturdays and once she even went in on a Sunday. The one thing she didn't do was talk to me about selling the house.

Two months went by and then one day my mom called me at work. "I just had to call and congratulate you. I'm just so happy for you and Camryn and I know that your father will overjoyed when I finally get a hold of him and tell him."

"Slow down mom, you are getting ahead of me here. What are you talking about?"

"Why about Camryn getting pregnant, what else?"

What else indeed I thought. I tried reaching Camryn at her office, but the receptionist said that she wasn't back from lunch yet. Three-thirty and not back from lunch? Must be nice. Oh well, it would wait until I got home.

Camryn was standing by the wet bar building herself a drink when I got home. "Make one for me too honey and then come over here and tell me all about what you and my mother talked about that has her all excited."

Camryn took a long pull on her drink and I could tell she was not looking forward to the coming conversation. She refreshed her drink, made me one and then came over and sat down opposite me.

"If you have talked to your mother then you already know that I am pregnant."

"Do you want to shower or freshen up your make up before I alert the media?"

"Alert the media? What are you talking about?"

Well Camryn, we both know that I'm not functionally capable of making you pregnant so we need to let everyone know about the long awaited Second Coming."

"Don't be facetious. You know full well what my being pregnant means."

"Who is the lucky daddy?"

"I don't know."

"You don't know? That sounds suspiciously like there has been more than one lover in your life."

"There have been several and they weren't lovers. All they were, at least to me, were sperm donors and there were several because I didn't want to know who the father was."

"That sounds like you set out to get yourself pregnant."

"I did."

"If you felt the need to have children why didn't you come to me? They can reverse vasectomies these days."

"I didn't have time."

"Camryn, will you please just tell me what the hell is going on and get it over with. Don't make me drag it out of you a little at a time."

"Your mother had Laura, Nancy and me over for lunch about three months ago. She made the announcement that she and your father had decided that there wasn't sufficient motivation for us to start producing grandchildren so they decided to stir up some competition. She said they would give whoever produced the first grandchild two hundred and fifty thousand dollars and they would make it five hundred thousand if it were a grandson.

"I don't know how Laura and Nancy took the news, but my attitude was 'who cares' until the day I came home and saw that you were looking for a realtor to sell the house. I will not lose this house. I had to give up a lot when I lost my job, but I will not lose my house!"

"I've never looked for a realtor. We aren't even close to having to sell the house."

"But I saw it. I saw that you had the Yellow Pages open to Realtors."

"What the hell are you talking about?"

"I went into your den looking for you and I saw the Yellow Pages on your desk. It was opened to the section on real estate."

"I don't have a clue as to what you are talking about Camryn. This house is not for sale and I've never even thought about selling it."

Her face went pale and I asked again, "Why didn't you come to me and talk it over?"

"I didn't have time. I was in a race against Laura and Nancy; I couldn't afford to take the time it would have taken to get your vasectomy reversed."

"What the hell happened to the logical mind that you used to have? Did you not take the time to think it all the way through? What did you think would happen when I found out? All you did Camryn, was guarantee that the house would be sold."

"No baby, no. I've got it all worked out. We take the two hundred fifty thousand and pay the mortgage down and then we refinance. We'll be okay."

"No Camryn, we won't be okay. This is a community property state. The house will have to be sold and the profit from the sale will be split between us in the divorce."

"Divorce? What divorce?"

"Oh come on Camryn. You can't seriously think that I'm going to stay married to you after this? You cheated on me. You fucked other men and got yourself knocked up by one of them. You are a whore Camryn and I'm not having anything to do with a whore. This marriage is over Camryn, it's toast!"

"No baby, no. I did it for us Davy; I did it for you and me. You can't leave me Davy, you just can't."

She was right, but I didn't know it at the time. And then it was more of an I wasn't allowed to leave her than I couldn't leave her. It wasn't an hour after Camryn ran crying up the stairs to the bedroom that my mom and dad showed up. My mother came rushing in the door, "Where is she? Where is my little Madonna?"

I pointed to the stairs and said, "She's in the bedroom, but th..."and before I could finish she was running up the stairs. My father watched her go and then he said, "Thank God Davy. I think you may have saved your mother's sanity. Come on, fix your old man a drink and let's toast the new baby."

"What do you mean I may have saved her sanity?"

"You know, I've been on you boys pretty hard to get a bun in the oven and I won't lie and try and pretend that I don't care about a grandson to continue the family name, but the fact of the matter is that we needed a grandchild — either sex — for your mother's well being. I don't know what it is in women, and it may not be in all women, but in a woman like your mother there is something about children, grandchildren, and maybe even great grandchildren that just can't be denied.

"She has been so upset these last few years over not having any that I've had to take her in for psychiatric help. First Harry and Nancy find out that Harry's sperm count is so low that he can never have children and then Bob and Laura just flat out told her they did not want children and never were going to have any. You were the last hope and when Camryn never got pregnant something let go in your mother. She hasn't been the same these last few months. When Camryn called today to give her the news it was like seeing your mother come back from the dead. You can't even begin to know how happy you have made her and, it goes without saying, me too. Well, here's to the newest member of the family" and he clinked my glass and downed his drink.

As I sipped mine I wondered just how in the hell I was going to get out of that pickle. I had an unfaithful whore of a wife whose bastard child was the only thing keeping my mother out of a mental hospital.

Throwing Camryn out on her ear was suddenly out of the question. At least until some way could be found to end her pregnancy. Maybe induce a miscarriage or get an abortion. Camryn, not being stupid, was having none of it. She read the situation perfectly. As long as she had the baby I couldn't get rid of her without causing God only knew what problems for my mother. My dad wouldn't be a problem; he would just tell me to get rid of the worthless slut, but my mother? What would happen there? What made it worse was now that Camryn was pregnant my mother was around constantly and if she wasn't at the house she was on the telephone.