Chapter 1

As I walked up to the front door I was greeted by me of thirty years ago. One look at the face and I was seeing myself as I used to look when I was 25.

"Dad, why haven't you replied to any of my mails?" Roger asked as I stepped up the staircase to open the gate.

"I read the mail and found out that you were sorry about what you guys did 10 years back and then closed the mail. There was nothing there that warrented a reply. You wanted to let me know that you were sorry and I know it. What more do you want?" I spoke calmly as I opened the door.

He was still looking at my face when I shut the door. Even with the door between us the pain did not subside. Here was son who called me an asshole for fighting for my money. When his mother, Wendy, and I divorced the scene was quite ugly. I had caught her cheating and wanted my pound of flesh. I fought for an 80-20 split and got 60-40. With the house sold and not enough money to buy the house in town anymore I bought a house in the outskirts which demanded an hour's commute to my office. Things were rough but I held on. Even with a 60-40 split I was in deep financial difficulty and paying off Child support for two children drained my resources. On top of it all my son resented me for fighting for my rights and refused to talk to me. He was not a child at 15. He knew very well that his mother had been cheating on me for six months and did nothing because he wanted to avoid us being divorced.

I did not go to his graduation or to his wedding. Wendy married the asshole who she was shagging regularly and set up house with him and my son and daughter. My daughter, Sue, was 17 at the time of the split and had the option of either staying with her mother or I and she too chose Wendy. She did come up to meet me on a couple of weekends but said that it was interfering with her social life and dropped off my horizon. She also told me that I was asshole in not forgiving Wendy and that if I really loved the children I would have hung in. I told her in no uncertain terms that I was miserable in the marriage and it would have made their lives hell in the long run but she refused to listen.

In fact I had a soft spot for my daughter and I did send her some gifts and extra money from time to time. One day I came home to find all the gifts, still packed, lying on my doorsteps and that was it. I tried to give the best of me to my family only to be discarded like a used apron. Six months ago the family business that the asshole Darin used to run went under. From being a fashionably rich family Wendy and Darin went to a lower middle class lifestyle. No more club membership and no more cruises in Caribbean.

My business has picked up due to economic downturn. I offer consultations on keeping the bottomline low in a business without letting a lot of people go and my specialty was in high demand by mid size businesses. I even had an offshore oil rig as my client was making more money than ever before. This is not to say that money was the factor that my ex-family was after me. I had come to know that roger was a doctor in making and Sue was a doctor as well and they were doing quite well financially. To be honest, I did not know why they were contacting me but I did not want to know either. I am a bitter man today with more home entertainment systems than you can imagine - a beer cooler in each room, a centrally plugged music system which played music across the whole house, a huge TV set in the living room and an equally huge TV in my bedroom which I made by knocking together three rooms and was a little larger than my living room, a gym in the basement and a pool in the back. The downside? I have not had a single friend since the divorce. All of my sanctimonious friends thought I was being too harsh to Wendy and dropped me like hot cake.

As I closed the door I realized that I was suddenly very tired and I flopped on the sofa. The bell rang and I opened the door to find both Roger and Sue standing there.

"I was in the car." Sue said, "We need to talk to you even if it is the last time you talk to us."

"I have nothing to say to you the two of you. That said, I have never denied you kids anything in my life and I am not starting now. Short of a relationship with me you can ask for anything." I said as I asked them to step in.

Roger and Sue looked at the living room and were impressed. I could see them treading softly as if they were walking on egg shell.

"Don't be a stranger. You can break anything you see here. I always loved to indulge the two of you even when your mother said that I was spoiling you. The two of you have turned out alright, though I am not sure if it was my indulgence or the right upbringing that Darin gave you, but I am happy." I said smiling as I opened up the cooler to take out a beer. "Either of you game for a beer?"

"No, thank you." They said in unison and took a seat opposite me.

"So what do you want to talk about?" I said taking a sip.

"Why did you not reply to any of our mails?" Roger asked again.

"Unless you want me to repeat myself for the benefit of your sister, I have nothing new to say. You said you were sorry and I got the message. What else was I to? I did not want to read too much into it only to be told that I was an asshole all over again or be told that I was interfering with your lives." I said. I could see a feel of pain and shame in their eyes and I did not want that. "But, that said, it is water under the bridge. I have missed the chance to be a father to my children and have lived a lonely existence thanks to all my friends thinking I was an asshole. I guess all of you could not be wrong. Everyone, my wife, my children, my friends and my family thought I was asshole of the highest order and I think there must have been valid reasons for doing so. Just to be safe, I have not gotten myself into another relationship because I did not want to hurt anyone else after having hurt your mother and the two of you."

"We deserve it. You know as well as I do that you did nothing wrong. You were reacting to a very hurtful situation and we compounded your pain by being the insensitive teenagers that we were. We did not know better, as a teen ager you tend to live lives with your head shoved up your ass. That is what happened to the two of us. After the divorce nothing changed for us. Instead of you, it was Darin buying us stuff and with all the money that he had we thought that it was hell of a nice thing that mom had traded up because our lives had become a lot brighter. It hurts just to think how selfish we were but we were just children back then and we reacted selfishly to all of it." Roger said as his eyes teared up. "I have missed you all these years and I do not know how to make up to you. I feel so rotten inside that I cannot even bear to look at my face in the mirror."

As Roger broke down crying I could see Sue also sobbing.

"Dad, is there any way that we can make it up to you again so that we can have a semblance of a relationship?" Sue said between her sobs.

"This is not a matter to be discussed between us anymore. We are not the same family that broke up so many years go. The equations have changed. When your mom and I were married, it was the four of us that took any decision and that was the rule of the house. I was working a full time job and running a consultancy on the side to bring in enough money to keep up with the lifestyle that my family demanded and these joint decisions were the only way that I could be involved in your lives. For the last year of my marriage, I was not invited to any of these decision making meetings. I was the outsider who was cut off from my own family by an affair that was illicit and immoral. I am telling you all this because I have welled up these feelings inside of me for ten long years and it has made me a skeptical and bitter man." I said as I got up to get another can of beer.

"Any discussion to our future relationship has to involve all parties concerned. That would include, your mother, your father, the two of you and me. We should all meet this weekend at this place to discuss the future and I promise I will not bring the past into play too much. I will not insult your mother or your father and I will not insult the either of you. I will go by my way of collective decision making and then we will see what happens." I said with a finality to it.

The two of them stayed for a while and repeatedly told me how sorry they were and left after a promise to come on the weekend with their parents.

It was on Saturday that I saw three cars come to a stop in my driveway and a whole lot of strangers get out of it. There was Wendy and her husband, Roger with his wife and an infant and Sue. I asked them to come in and take a seat in the living room. I was casually dressed in a tennis shorts and a Tee having just arrived from a refreshing game of tennis.