“So it turns out our Petya is infertile!” her sister-in-law blurted out after a brief silence.
“What do you mean, infertile?” Lida asked in genuine surprise, looking at the fruit of their love lying in the crib and smacking his lips contentedly. “Then what about Vitya?”
“Vitya isn’t his!” Ira declared categorically.
Tell me, how can you hurt a woman? In all sorts of ways! With words, actions, or, on the contrary, inaction. And also with distrust and suspicion.
Something similar happened to Lida Semyonova. Lida, a young and happy wife and mother, noticed that her husband, Pyotr, had started behaving rather strangely toward their three-month-old son, little Vityusha.
And it happened suddenly. On Tuesday everything had still been wonderful, and then on Wednesday—well, hello there!
Her husband had started standing motionless beside the baby’s crib, lost in thought. That was especially unusual because he was normally an easygoing man who didn’t like “thinking deep thoughts” and never burdened himself with unnecessary information.
“Why are you standing there like a pillar of salt, Petya? Don’t you recognize your own son?” his wife asked one evening.
But her husband, who was usually in a cheerful mood—after all, life had worked out well for him—didn’t answer. He only gave pretty Lida a gloomy look and stepped away from the crib.
“What’s gotten into him?” his wife wondered. “You could almost say he’s secretly wiping away a tear beside the baby’s crib, like in a song.”
In short, it was obvious that something was upsetting him. For three months he had been delighted by the birth of his first child, cooing over him and fussing affectionately, and then suddenly everything changed overnight.
“Maybe he’s having trouble at work?” Lida worried. “And he doesn’t want to upset me in case my milk dries up!”
Or, even worse, maybe he himself had fallen ill and didn’t want to tell her for the same reason. The spouses had always lived harmoniously and cared about each other.
But whenever his wife asked leading questions, Petya only snorted silently and looked away.
“He cheated on me!” Lida suddenly realized. “That has to be it! And now his conscience is tormenting him!”
“Well then, are you going to deny it, or are you going to confess?” his wife asked one lovely evening.
“Confess to what?” Petya asked in surprise.
“What do you mean, what? Cheating!”
“What cheating?” her husband asked again, bewildered. But he quickly caught on and replied, “I’m not the one who should be confessing to cheating!”
“Then who is?” the young mother asked, equally astonished.
“The man in the moon!” he snapped rudely and walked away, leaving his dinner unfinished.
Lida began to think. This was serious. And it strongly suggested that she was the one suspected of cheating.
Her husband’s attitude toward her had only changed recently. Before that, everything between them had been fine. So logically, he must believe that she had cheated on him recently as well.
But that was absolutely impossible. She was breastfeeding an infant. What kind of affair could she possibly have been having?
Or maybe someone had recently told him about some supposed infidelity from her past. Supposed, because Lida had never cheated on him.
So she began investigating in that direction. She decided to start with Pyotr’s twin sister, Ira, because he was very close to her.
Lida herself also had a good relationship with Ira. That was why she called her sister-in-law first. Maybe Ira knew what was going on.
Unexpectedly, Ira was reluctant to talk, even though she had always loved chatting with Lida on the phone.
“What on earth is going on with you two?” Lida finally demanded. “First Petya gets all sulky, and now you too!”
“As if you don’t know,” Ira replied sarcastically.
“Enlighten me, sweetheart,” Lida said. “I don’t even have a clue!”
“So it turns out our Petya is infertile!” her sister-in-law blurted out after a brief silence.
“What do you mean, infertile?” Lida asked in genuine surprise, looking at the fruit of their love lying in the crib and smacking his lips contentedly. “Then what about Vitya?”
“Vitya isn’t his!” Ira declared confidently.
“Then whose is he?” Lida asked.
“You would know better than anyone,” her husband’s sister replied firmly.
“So that’s where the problem is,” Lida thought. “Interesting. Now where did this nonsense come from?”
“Listen, Ira,” Lida asked gently, “why has this only come to light now?”
“He didn’t know himself!”
“What do you mean? He fathered a child and didn’t know he was infertile? And who opened my husband’s eyes to this horrifying fact?”
“Well, Marina did,” her sister-in-law answered reluctantly.
Lida immediately became wary. Marina was her husband’s ex-girlfriend, with whom he had been in a long relationship. They had never married, though.
They had been together for five years, but they never had children, even though neither of them used contraception.
Pyotr himself had told Lida about that before they got married. Their relationship had ended because of Marina: she had found herself a richer man.
But no one had ever mentioned infertility. It was one of those things that had supposedly never existed—and then suddenly did.
“And how does Marina supposedly know all this?” Lida asked. “And where did she tell him?”
“They ran into each other at a shopping mall. She was there with her daughter.
“When Petya bragged about Vitya, she told him! She said they never had children because of Petya. Apparently Marina even had some kind of test done! And then she basically congratulated him on being cheated on!”
“What kind of test?” Lida asked, astonished. She was far from stupid. “A sperm test or something? If they weren’t using protection, then how exactly was she collecting his biological material, may I ask? Sounds like a nice story, but I’m having trouble believing it.”
“Why are you so hung up on the biological material?” Ira replied irritably. “How should I know? But the fact remains: she and Petya really didn’t have children, and now she has given birth. So it means your Vitya isn’t Petya’s!”
Lida knew the whole story about Marina very well, including the fact that she had left the supposedly hopeless “loser” who had no future.
“But why is this only coming out now? I mean, the whole biological-material story? Why didn’t she say anything before and instead wait three years?” Lida kept pressing for the truth. “Her leaving him would have looked much more respectable and justified back then, wouldn’t it? ‘I want a child, but he’s infertile.’”
“How should I know about all these weird details of yours?” Ira replied.
“Listen, could Marina simply be lying? What do you think?” Lida asked.
“Why would she? Petya said she was with her two-year-old daughter, she’s married, and everything is fine between her and her husband! So there you have it, Lidia! You’d better confess!” Ira said and hung up on that cheerful note.
Lida sat thinking. It was obvious that the “ex” was lying. But why? There had to be a reason.
And her husband was no better. He had believed the stories of a woman who had deceived him for a long time and eventually left him!
He knew perfectly well that Lida had never shown the slightest interest in another man and had never given him any reason for suspicion. Yet somehow he had simply believed Marina.
And instead of sitting down with his wife and directly asking her whatever was tormenting him, he had just sulked and snorted.
Lida felt deeply hurt and insulted. Many women in her place would have reacted exactly the same way.
So she paid for a DNA paternity test out of her own savings.
Then she left the result in a prominent place, took Vitya, and went to stay with her parents, who lived in the same city.
Pyotr called her as soon as he came home from work and saw the result:
99.99% probability of paternity.
And then everything went as it usually does.
“Forgive me, Lidusha! I don’t know what came over me! I love you—I’ll buy you a tram if you want!”
But his wife wasn’t in a hurry to forgive him.
“You insulted me with your suspicion and distrust! How could you even think something like that? You, my beloved husband and the father of our child—and you could believe this?”
And really, how could he?
Marina had planted the idea in his head, that was how. Until then, he had never even suspected he might be infertile.
So Pyotr went to visit his ex, who still lived at the same address. He needed to put the matter to rest and understand exactly what had happened.
After questioning her intensely, he discovered that Marina had completely fabricated the story about his infertility.
“But why?” Petya asked in astonishment.
“So that you would leave her and come back to me!” the woman explained heatedly.
“But you’re married!”
“He left me! That rich guy took off right after our daughter was born, and he doesn’t even pay child support. So my little girl is growing up without a father!
“And then I saw you—all happy and successful. I thought I might as well try. Even if you’re not her biological father, at least she would have a dad. Come back to me, Petya! Remember how good we were together!” Marina pleaded.
“But I’m a loser, remember?” the man replied.
“Oh, come on,” his ex said peacefully. “You’re not a loser at all. I just lost my temper back then.”
“Lost your temper?” an astonished Petya thought. “Is that all?”
It took him quite a while to recover from that breakup. Fortunately, eventually he did.
And now Marina had appeared in his life again, bringing nothing but trouble once more.
“So, are you staying?” Marina asked hopefully. “My little girl is quiet. She won’t bother you!”
But Petya left. He had learned everything he needed to know.
Now all that remained was to beg his wife for forgiveness.
And kind-hearted Lida eventually forgave her trusting Petya. Yes, doubts had started tormenting him. But after all, it wasn’t an affair—and people sometimes forgive even those!
So Lida and her son returned to their rented apartment.
But from then on, Lida never missed an opportunity to tease her husband.
“Well, Detective Pinkerton, are you still searching for the genes of some mysterious other father?”
“Oh, give it a rest!” Petya would grimace. He hated remembering that unpleasant episode.
Besides, as Vitya grew older, he began looking more and more like an exact copy of his father.
So, in the end, everything that had been “lost” was found.
But the bitter aftertaste would probably take a lifetime to disappear.
And Lida learned something else as well: family life is fragile. It can crack from a single careless
