A Matter of Court Record in Dramedy

“Mom, who is my dad?”

I am unprepared for the question my 8 year old lobs at me over dinner, as he swipes a milk moustache off his face with one swipe of his grubby hand. The answer seems so obvious, that I think he is joking. I live with my ex, his father. He has never met any of the other men I have dated or fucked since his father. We have always referred to this ex as Dad…and though I have referred to a man I’ve loved as Daddy before, it is usually in settings that would not be appropriate for my son to be in, where he would overhear it. Pretty cut & dry, I thought.

“Dad is your dad,” I say nodding at my ex.

“No, mom, I know-but who is my biological father?”

“DAD,” I italicize with slight irritation. I mean, for 8 years, has he really been wondering who his dad is?

R. shakes his head, “I know Alex died, but if he had lived, he would’ve been my father, right?”

If Alex had lived…If Alex had lived…It’s a phrase that runs through my head like ivy, curling down the walls of my mind, choking the structure with its hungry roots. If my husband, Alex, had lived…And while there are many things that I think my husband might’ve done if he hadn’t been beaten to death by some cruel god, being R.’s dad was never on my If Alex Lived bingo card. Write a book? Sure. Find a lover? Yes. Move to France? Maybe? Be a father to my children? No.

I tell him gently, “No, baby, Alex never would’ve been your daddy.”

R. says, “I know. Because he’s dead. But if he wasn’t…”

“Baby, in no way, shape or form would Alex have ever been your daddy…Alive, dead or undead…he just wouldn’t be your daddy.”

R. pauses to think, chewing a lump of bread slick with butter. “But why?”

I try to respond carefully. Because he was a drug addict? Because his reproductive system was an underachiever from all the junk he shot up? Because he stopped desiring me, stopped making love to me? Because even if one of his sperm was not too high to find the egg, I would probably still be forced to remove you from the environment that surrounds a drug addict? Yeah, this is not the conversation I planned to have after “How was school?” and “What did you have for lunch?” Fuck. I realize Blue Eyes is looking at me, waiting…the lump of greasy bread already slid down the gullet.

“Because…he…didn’t help make you.

I am hopeful that maybe this answer will satisfy him, but for some reason, R. looks surprised. “Dad carried me in his belly?”

“What? No. I carried you in MY belly.”

“Then how did he help make me?…Ya know, if I never was in his belly.”

Are you there, God? It’s me Margaret.

By this point, I’m squirming & my ex is smirking. I turn to him and mouth, “Help me or I kill you.”

I don’t tell R. this, but all of this—his paternity, my messy marital situation–is actually a matter of court record. I left Alex long before I met my children’s father. After being separated for a year and finally moving on, I sent Alex an email telling him it was time to divorce. His response was to tell me what a despicable cunt I was and how I never satisfied him sexually and how I should just go and blow my dog. He responded with such vitriol, such venom to the suggestion that I was scared to bring it up again for a long time. I did try to start the paperwork up using an Employee Assistance Program through work. At the time, our EAP was a bizarro, married couple. The husband had been a lawyer who had embezzled from a former place of employment. The wife claimed she had worked for the Clintons. However, how much work she had done for them and in what capacity, was always vague. Maybe she killed Epstein for them, maybe she just volunteered at a fundraiser. Anybody’s guess. The thing I remember most about her was that she had a massive dowager’s hump, one so large I almost couldn’t believe it was real.

The wife was more interested in trying to counsel me than helping me complete the divorce paperwork. She wanted to talk to me about why I had stayed married to someone who had so many issues, “After all—it’s not about him. What does that say about you, dear?” I’m a sad, fat girl with no self-esteem? Or maybe that I just really, really fucking loved that man. She wanted to do some visualization techniques with me. I also wanted to do visualization techniques. I wanted to visualize I was single. They then insisted I do a mediation session with Alex, which, surprisingly, he agreed to attend. It was a sad meeting—with him bringing up the fact I had robbed him of his chance to be a father…that he had never forgiven me for aborting his baby when I was younger. But he agreed to the divorce. In the parking lot, he kissed me gently on the forehead and that was that. I never saw him again.

The husband of the EAP team, then, helped me start the paperwork—but only after telling me that he didn’t really believe in any of the ridiculous visualization crap his wife did. Oh, ok. Well…wow…hopefully you don’t have to draw up this kind of paperwork for yourself. Unfortunately, before we were finished with the paperwork, my agency decided to part ways with the EAP couple & so my divorce was left half-done.

A couple weeks later, I found out I was pregnant. On Alex’s birthday.

This completely changed the game. I didn’t want to have to tell Alex I was pregnant and I was sure if I asked for a divorce, I would have to disclose that. The problem was: in New York state, if you are married and pregnant, the husband is automatically recognized as the father—regardless of whether or not he actually is. It doesn’t matter if your husband is completely dickless and around the time of conception, you participated in a gangbang with the whole New York Yankees team—if you are married, that man is recognized as the father. You cannot even put anyone else on the birth certificate, if you are married when you get pregnant. When I gave birth to both my children, I had to go through the embarrassing experience of explaining to the nurses at the hospital that they would have to list the father as Unknown…Explaining that I actually DID know who the father was, it just wasn’t my husband, didn’t make me look any less like a ho. Ironically, for the first time in my life, I found myself in the same situation as Kim Kardashian. She was married when she first got pregnant by Kanye. This presented problems with establishing the paternity of her child…Samesies, Kimmy.

So…on both of my children’s birth certificates, the father was listed as unknown. As things went south between my children’s father & I, he began to get antsy that his name was not on the birth certificates and he filed a paternity case against me, in the event that there was about to be a custody dispute…American Gladiator Style.. For those of you who have never had the joy of going into court to establish paternity for your children—I envy you. I realize there is an easy solution to this—just don’t be a whore…but too late. I was. I made my beds and I lied in all of them. Usually underneath men. Or so it would appear.

Anyway…

The court sent a summons to both Mike (my ex) and I and also to Alex…I’m unsure what address they had on file, I certainly didn’t have one. He did not show up. We then sat in a crowded court room and had to answer incredibly intimate questions. “When did you conceive your daughter? When did you conceive your son? What was the last date you had sexual relations with your husband? Did you sleep with the person filing for paternity around this time? Did you sleep with anyone else around the time your children were conceived?” As I try to dust my vagina’s memory off and recall all the various sex dates, I look around to see the court stenographer writing what I’m saying…just firing off the date of the last time I had sex with my husband with her little tappy fingers…entering it all into court record…paper scrolling out of her little typewriter with all the dirty little deets of what I had going on in the sheets. The bailiff (and all sorts of other courtroom personnel) are listening to me recount that I know my children were conceived on certain dates with my ex—because 1) we were celebrating my birthday and I was super drunk and so we didn’t use protection 2) we were celebrating Memorial Day…we hadn’t gone out to my ex’s sister’s with the rest of the family and were bored and fucked around and I got pregnant, even though the relationship was already on a downbound train to Splitsville. I then had to explain why my husband hadn’t shown. (He’s on drugs most likely.) And why I hadn’t gotten divorced. (I don’t want to pay him alimony because he can’t hold down a job and I’m slightly afraid of how he’ll respond. He once punched a wall near my head in anger.) A few weeks later we get amended birth certificates listing my ex as the father… So, little R., there is no doubt, legally or otherwise, that your dad is indeed your dad.

But, of course, I can tell him none of that. Instead my ex and I try yet again to explain to R. that we will explain more when he is older, but that it takes a mommy and a daddy to make a baby.

“Why do you need both? What exactly does the dad DO to make the baby if the baby is in the mom?”

My daughter, B., cracks up at the awkwardness of the conversation and gleefully shouts, “Oh R., you innocent boy!” I whip my head around and ask her what she knows about the topic of making babies…Wanting so badly to believe she knows nothing, but also realizing if she already knows that it is one less awkward conversation that I have to have with her.

Then, I just smile at R. and say, “What does the dad do? Well, I guess he handles the paperwork that makes it all official.”

Last updated January 27, 2024