He left everything to his wife in the divorce—even his mother.
“He showed up at my door with just a backpack,” Anna said, her voice trembling as she spoke to her friend in their small rented flat in Manchester. “Everything he owned, he left for his family. And every month, without fail, he pays child support. But I… I don’t know how we’re supposed to carry on like this.”
Ten years ago, Anna, then a 19-year-old university student, fell head over heels for Alex. He was 34, married, and a father. The age gap didn’t stop them. Their passion burned so bright that Alex left his family—his wife and two sons—for her. They’ve been together ever since, living in a shared flat, but their happiness is weighed down by the past, dragging them deeper into regret.
When Alex walked away, his boys were just 6 and 9. Now they’re teenagers, but back then, they were still little lads who needed their dad. He didn’t just leave his ex-wife, Claire—he left her everything: the house, the car, the savings. Yet along with the property, she also inherited his mother, Margaret, who became more of a burden than a blessing.
Their story began in Claire’s tiny one-bed flat, a hand-me-down from her grandmother. When the kids came along, space ran out. That’s when Margaret, freshly retired, offered a solution. She had a small place in a nearby town. She sold it, and the young couple found a buyer for Claire’s flat. Combining the money, they bought a spacious three-bedroom house where Margaret became an equal part of the household alongside her son and daughter-in-law.
At first, it worked. Margaret helped with the kids, cooked meals, and Claire returned to work quickly after maternity leave. Money wasn’t tight—they went on holidays, bought a nice car, furnished the house. There were rows, of course, but overall, the family got on. Margaret was like a second mum to the boys and a rock for Claire.
Then Anna came along. Alex fell for her like a lovesick schoolboy and walked out without looking back. He left Claire and the kids the house, but with it, his mother. Margaret had nowhere else to go. At first, they tried to make it work, clinging together for the sake of the boys. Claire and her mother-in-law split chores, forced civility. But without Alex—the glue that held them all together—it fell apart.
The house, once warm and bright, turned cold. Claire, barely 40, was raising two teen boys. Margaret, with her aching knees and weary eyes, stayed in one of the bedrooms. They barely spoke, dodging each other in the hall. The woman who had once laughed with her over tea was now a stranger. Every glance, every footstep down the corridor, was a reminder that this was no longer a home—just a battleground.
More than once, Claire asked Alex to help sort out the house. Margaret begged him to find a way so she could live separately. But Alex, now paying a mortgage on a flat with Anna, had nothing left. “I’m doing all I can,” he’d say, shrugging. “I pay the support—what more do you want?”
Listening to him, Anna felt a stab of guilt. She knew she was the reason his family was trapped like this—but what could she do? It hurt to see him torn between his duty to his sons and the life they’d built.
Meanwhile, in that house in the heart of Manchester, the silent war dragged on. Claire, worn down by work and raising the boys, looked at Margaret and saw the ghost of her husband’s betrayal. Margaret, lonely and unwell, felt like a burden but had nowhere to go. The kids, growing up in the shadow of all this, withdrew further, wondering why home didn’t feel like home anymore.
They lived under the same roof, yet each was alone. What had once been a happy family—full of laughter, the smell of Sunday roasts—was now just an echo. Claire dreamed of freedom. Margaret wanted peace. And Alex, who’d chased new love, had left nothing but wreckage behind. No one knew how to bring back what they’d lost.
