[jonboy062]

Manchester was much the same as I had left it some seven years earlier. The drizzle probably hadn’t ceased during my absence while the grime and decay of the once
stunning Victorian architecture now depressed almost as much as the dull climate.

One thing had changed; my friends of old had long since moved to new pastures
leaving me with a lack of a social life to add to my lack of work. There were numerous occasions when I questioned my sanity for having returned to England. After all, my decision had been made along with Ian after a particularly frustrating week, an intensely depressing month in the army and a few good bottles of lager at the weekend.

Anyway, I was here now and pressed myself to make the most of it. Within two weeks, I could not live with my parents any longer and had, with Ian, rented a flat. We lived the bachelor lifestyle to the full, a pub directly across the road, helping fill our social calendar. Within a month I was back in the family business and dating Yvonne.

Yvonne was like a dream. Tall, slim with long curly blonde hair. Our eyes met across a crowded room as we felt our hearts skip a beat before we fell into each other’s arms, the world around us silent and like a million miles away. Well actually, we first met in the video rental shop below the flat. Ian, who could charm an ice cream from a child, invited Yvonne and her friend Rachel upstairs, for the obvious. Perhaps he tried too hard but by the end of the evening, or more accurately in the early hours of the morning, he had long since slumped off to bed while I was walking Yvonne home after a night of
horizontal pleasures. I don’t usually kiss on the first date, but on this occasion just let myself go.

The deeper our relationship went, the more my friends and family resisted. Yvonne was welcomed into my family with slightly more enthusiasm than a plague, putting myself in the unenviable position of divided loyalties and a certain no win situation. In fact, I doubt that I ever loved Yvonne. Though, maybe, she did love me. Perhaps we were both looking for different things to satisfy our needs. She wanted children, I wanted friendship and we both wanted sex, and plenty of it. The more my family pushed her away the closer we became and the more her family brought me in. Still to this day Jean plays mother-in-law.

Over two years we moved from the flat to one house and then into another. I attended my family events without her, which pleased both Yvonne and my family, while jointly we attended all her family functions. We took day trips out into the country, we argued in the car, in the house, in the supermarket and almost everywhere else save the
bedroom. On confirmation of her pregnancy, Yvonne quit her job at Safeway converting to a lifestyle of doing little other than preparing lists of baby products and reading pregnancy books. “Look it says I should rest, nothing too strenuous. Pass the remote control please”, her words delivered in a helpless voice.

Once our offspring had entered this cruel and brutal world, I was treated to sex just once, which hardly helped ease my ‘manly frustrations’ or our faltering relationship,
negating the basis of our relationship. There had been a sneaking suspicion for a little while that ‘my girl’ had been ‘playing away’ as the term is so innocently used. I hate the phrase if only because it implies an act innocent and childlike when in fact it is an act very much grown up and far from innocent.

I don’t know if it was the anger at being woken after one in the morning or if the penny finally dropped but when Yvonne called saying she was staying with friends
overnight, I knew ‘friends’ was really in fact singular and male. Within the hour she had collected her belongings, crammed into one holdall and two carrier bags, and our
thirteen month old baby. The fact that she strayed did not completely surprise me, but with ‘Pizza Face’, called so due to the huge craters on his quite ugly, deep-pan face, well that severely dented the tiny amount of pride I had remaining.

We could then have played out the scenario fought out by one in three of the
population, fights, recriminations, wrangling and outright hatred but for some inexplicable reason we followed the path of reason. No cars were scratched, no bricks
through windows, no porn catalogues on the doormat. Of course there have been moments with daggers drawn but far more often than not we have talked and consulted on the upbringing of our son. It pains me seeing many fathers without access to their children, many intransigent mothers with the children ultimately losing out.

Less than two years after our separation Yvonne was married to a, then decent, hardworking man. Two years and two children later her husband had walked away from the marriage but most disappointingly, his children. Five years later he has not attempted any contact with his offspring, inaction I find completely indefensible. Just before the separation he even stayed with me for three days before I delivered him a simple ultimatum, sort it out or leave but quit the bitching. He departed into the sunset leaving behind a wife, two of his children, a stepson and a father in law still paying the wedding bill.

Yvonne has changed much over the years since we first met, she has matured and is slowly shaking the lazy streak developed in the early years. She helps at the local school with reading and is far more proactive with the kids at home. Still much of her talents are wasted, left dormant but in time they will be utilized.

Had it not been for Aaron, once we separated we would probably never have seen each other ever again, a loss for us both. Through Yvonne I found valuable and good friends but most importantly we made and are crafting a beautiful, thoughtful child who will be a credit to himself and us.

With the exception of ‘Pizza Face’ she has always stuck by me, defending and
supporting me during difficult periods in the past. There are those who say one day we will get back together, she has been a cloud over some of my later relationships, but constant sunshine is not all good, the occasional cloud can bring welcome relief.

I don’t know if we will ever share a reunion but I do know I love her more now than during our days together.


The End

[Keplaz]

I guess the guy who wrote this has long since left SM but this story had loads of potential. It was rushed and didn't quite tell the story it could have. More description and info as to why the family didn't like him and less of the rushing but letting us share their relationship as it developed, fatherhood, what happened after she left, how he fixed up his life, why the narrator let the exes ex stay with him. So many good scenarios, just a little too quickly done.

It was a great story with bags of potential and I would have loved to see more work done on it.