I found out that my wife left her children for a new marriage.
I met Catherine at a company party when I had just started working there. We were in different departments, so I hardly knew anything about her. She immediately caught my attention—tall, slender, with a gentle smile that was hard to look away from. We spent the whole evening together: dancing until we dropped, laughing, chatting about everything imaginable. After the party, I called a cab and saw her home to a residential area in Birmingham. The next day, I rushed to work as if I were flying—I was so eager to see her again.
On the way, I stopped at a florist, picked up a bouquet of roses and a box of her favorite chocolates. Catherine greeted me with a beaming smile, and from that day on, we were inseparable. We were both over thirty and didn’t want to drag out the romance—we were too mature for prolonged courting. I asked her to move in with me, and she agreed without hesitation. Life with her was like a fairy tale: Catherine was a wonderful homemaker, cheerful and always ready for adventure. No worries, no clouds on the horizon—just happiness and harmony.
I decided it was time to take the next step. I bought a ring with a small diamond, got down on one knee, and proposed to her. She said “yes,” and we plunged into wedding preparations. But when we started discussing the guest list, I noticed something odd: Catherine hardly had any family. She explained that she had some distant relatives she had lost touch with long ago. I shrugged it off—we all have our family stories.
The day before the wedding, she headed out to a beauty salon with her friends to get ready for the big day. She forgot her phone at home on the kitchen table. I picked it up, thinking of taking it to her since I knew the salon’s address. But as I sat in the car, a call came through. The screen read “Mum.” I hesitated but decided to answer—what if it was urgent? A tired, shaky voice of an elderly woman came through, immediately launching into accusations: “Cathy has lost all conscience! She left the kids with us, the old folks, doesn’t send money, and now she’s vanished! They’re ill, there’s no medicine, how are we supposed to look after them?”
I introduced myself, feeling my hands grow cold. “What’s happened?” I asked, and the truth poured out like icy water. It turned out Catherine had two children she’d left with her parents in a village near Birmingham, moving to the city for a “better life.” She used to send money, but then stopped. The elderly couple were supporting them on a meager pension, and the kids were growing—they needed clothes, food, doctors. I asked for a bank account number and transferred as much as I could for medicine and groceries. Then I turned the car around and headed home. The beauty salon faded in the background, as did my illusions.
At home, I packed her belongings into suitcases—carefully, but with a heavy heart. When she returned—well-groomed, with a new hairstyle and a sparkling manicure—I handed her the luggage without a word. She seemed confused, started asking what was wrong. I threw her the phone without saying anything. Her eyes widened—she understood everything. She started explaining, making excuses, but her voice was just noise in the void. I didn’t want to listen. After talking to her mother, she was dead to me as a woman, as a human being.
You can deceive men, play tricks, wriggle out of situations—we are all flawed. But to leave your children on the shoulders of your elderly parents, to forget about them, not help, and lie to me that there is no family? It didn’t make sense in my mind. She stood before me—beautiful, yet empty, like a burned-out shell. In that moment, I saw her true self, and it was unbearable.
The wedding didn’t happen. I cut all ties with her and erased her from my life like a bad dream. But questions lingered. Do you think it’s possible to understand Catherine? Can a woman who betrays those closest to her be a faithful wife? Is it worth believing her words of love, her vows that things will be different with me? I look to the future and see nothing but the shadow of her lies. Maybe I’m too harsh, but for me, a mother who abandons her children for a new life is not a woman but a ghost I never want to see next to me again.
