Father? (Frerard)

Prologue

I remember when Toni was only three years old. She was my little baby and with me having just barely finished college, she was something spectacular. I loved her with all my heart and the more it pained me when I had to tell her the terrible news 17 years later.

I never expected to be in that situation. Nobody expected me to be in that situation and I didn't know how to be myself when I told my wife, my father, my loving mom but most importantly I didn't want to hurt my baby girl. I didn't know how to even tell her. It was much easier with my wife.

Jamia had known me ever since high school and sometimes she even knew me a little bit better than I knew myself, so when I worked up the courage to tell her, tell her I still love her no matter what, but I just couldn't pretend anymore, she just smiled and said "I know, honey, It's going to be okay."

But, I didn't know how to be that person. At first, I wasn't sure I was that person, but then he came along and I realized what I should have realized a long time ago. I'm not saying I regret marrying my lovely wife who was okay with everything that came along with me, that came along when he came to our lives. I'm not saying I regret being a parent and living a wonderful life with my two ladies, but I know if Jamia didn't get pregnant and if I didn't love her as much as I did and still do, we would have probably broken up and maybe I would have experimented more and maybe I would have realized that I was an entirely different person.

She wasn't mad, my wife, she was disappointed. Not in me, shockingly, she thought I knew who I was ever since we got together and that she held me back from my true self, that she somehow prevented me from being happy in my life. Which wasn't true, I never really realized my true self until I met him, but she knew and I didn't. I liked my life before and after and I told her, I knew she would eventually find someone else and we would all be happy, she just felt as if we could have done that before. We couldn't because I didn't know myself because I didn't know him.

Jamia hyped me up, she held my hand as we went over the things I was supposed to say to our daughter. I thanked her, for everything she has ever done for me, but it was hard for both of us. We didn't know better, we've never been with other people, which isn't necessarily bad, but you can always get into a situation where you won't be with that person anymore. Like us, except I already had someone else to be with, Jamia would be starting from the beginning without a backup.

I felt selfish, I cheated, I lied and I sneaked around with someone else just to come back home and pretend I was the perfect dad and husband. I was neither at that moment. But then Jamia told me she knew and that she understood and that she was sorry when it was me who did all the wrong things and so we agreed on a divorce eventually. It was fine until we had to tell Toni. She was an adult and she would understand that we were splitting, people do that sometimes, but that wasn't the hardest part.

I needed her to know why I and her mom were splitting after we've been together for 22 years. I needed to somehow tell her who I was dating so she would understand why I needed to divorce her mom and that it didn't mean that I didn't love them both anymore, just that I wasn't that person anymore and now that I knew what I wanted I couldn't let it go, let him go. He already sacrificed what he loved to be with me and if I told Toni I knew it would tear her apart, but I hoped she would come around and accept her new father.

And so I took a deep breath and Jamia and I walked out of our bedroom hand in hand for the last time, before we broke our family to become who we were always supposed to be.