Page 3 of Who's Your Daddy?

2. Lia

That’s it. I’m no longerliving like this. Today is the day I reclaim my life! I’m not going to live in thissqualoranymore, like some hobo. Opening one eye, I peep at the disgusting, roach-infested motel I’ve been living in for the last two weeks. It’s so detestable that I squeeze it shut a second later. I can’t even bring myself to face reality. How did it come to this? From a penthouse apartment to this dingy motel room. From Egyptian cotton sheets to dust-mite-riddled rags.

I thought he loved me. How could he dump me so callously, knowing I would end up like this? He was the one who told me not to get a job. He said he would take care of me. And he did. Teddy was the perfect boyfriend. For the fourteen months we were together, he set me up in a fancy penthouse and bought me anything I wanted. He even paid for regular spa treatments to make sure I was always pampered and looked my best.

I want all those things back. Today I’m going to demand that he restore my privileges because that’s what he promised me. He offered me the world, told me he would give me the life of a princess. Well, newsflash, Teddy. Princesses don’t room with roaches and dust mites!

Even in my head, I acknowledge that I sound like an entitled, spoiled brat, but I blame that on him, too. I grew up having a lot of perks, but it was nowhere near the type of luxury Teddy introduced me to. He got me hooked on this lifestyle.

I was just going through the motions, trying to make ends meet and get my life together. A rough patch, some would call it. A train wreck is what I think is more adequate.

In my senior year of high school, the counselor and a police officer called me out of class one day. With a solemn voice, the police officer delivered the devastating news that the plane carrying both my parents back from their second honeymoon had crashed. There were no survivors.

Just like that, my life was turned upside down. I lost my home and family all in one day. I remember the sinking feeling in my stomach, like a hollow cavity had cracked up inside me and sucked my entire essence into it. I was never the same after that. Left a mere shell of a person, walking around like a shadow of my former self.

Right after it happened, I was engulfed by a whirlwind of emotions - grief, despair, and uncertainty. But practical matters soon loomed over me like a dark cloud. Although my parents were well off, they weren’t financially savvy. They left no will and marginal savings that were eaten by outstanding debt. Our house still had a mortgage, and the bank foreclosed on it after a few months of non-payment. I was evicted from my childhood home. They sold the few things of value and tossed the rest of our belongings out in the street like it was garbage.

All the little things I had taken for granted growing up, like my mom’s recipe books and my dad’s ties, were strewn across the sidewalk, waiting for garbage day to be collected. All of a sudden, those little things became treasures of infinite value. But I couldn’t hold on to any of them. I was forced to let everything go because I had no place to keep them. I no longer had a home.

My parents died twelve days before my eighteenth birthday, so I was an adult by the time I got evicted. The only family I have is an estranged aunt and grandmother on my dad’s side who both live in Ohio. I haven’t seen either of them since I was twelve, so with no relatives to take me in, I was forced to drop out of high school and try to make it on my own. I had this dream of going to college one day and getting a degree in bioengineering, but that dream died a painful death, too.

They say time is a relative concept, an ever-shifting, elusive wisp of existence. During times of happiness, months and years can seem so short. They can be condensed into a mere moment, a simple memory of a smile, a hug, a kiss. Sometimes, if you’re lucky, that perfect moment of bliss can be captured in a photograph.

That’s all I have of my parents now, a single photograph of us at Lake Tahoe when I was fifteen years old. I rummaged through trash for two days, desperately trying to find one other picture, a photo album, anything. But in the end, all I’m left with is this one photo. That’s the relativity of time. My entire childhood has been condensed into that single photo, yet on the flip side, my grief and pain expand over every microsecond, lengthening them into infinite years.

My parents have been gone for just over two years now, but it feels like I’ve spent decades wading through the vastness of my loneliness and despair. But those are feelings I generally keep hidden. I’ve learned to suppress them and put on a brave face because life was giving me a beating that I couldn’t just take lying down.

I had to learn how to survive. I worked two, sometimes three, jobs just to scrape by. Life was bad. No, scratch that. Life was straight-up brutal. I was scrounging at the bottom of the barrel.

But then, not even a year after the worst tragedy of my life, Teddy breezed in and changed all that. Sure, the circumstances that brought us together were all based on lies, but our love for each other was very real. Aren’t the most memorable love stories those that begin unconventionally? My unconventional beginning with Teddy blossomed from a misunderstanding.

I was down to my last dime, and even though this is not something I would proudly admit out loud, I lied about my age and applied for a job as a‘dancer’at a nightclub. I didn’t know this at the time, but I’m actually the doppelgänger of Ivana Alawi. I was quite flattered when I Googled her and found out that she’s a gorgeous model from the Philippines. In fact, she’s ranked number four on the“Top 10 Most Beautiful Filipino Women”list.

She’s part Filipino, part Moroccan. I’m part Filipino, part Caucasian. Somehow, the mixed heritage from our respective parents has resulted in almost the exact same physical attributes – thick chestnut brown hair, lightly tanned skin, and dark hazel eyes. Even our bow-shaped lips are the same. The only difference is she’s five-foot-six while I’m five-nine. Other than that, anyone would swear we were identical twins.

When I showed up wearing a very provocative little number for my *ahem*dance, the bouncer mistook me for Ivana and escorted me to the VIP section of the club. Apparently, there was some celebrity after-party happening, and I got sucked into it because I reminded him of a model he saw online. He just assumed that I was invited, even though I don’t think mine or Ivana’s names were even on the guest list.

But I’m not complaining because that’s where I met Robert Teddrick, the handsome entrepreneur and business mogul.

Despite our age difference, we hit it off. He was so wise and worldly with the added bonus of being rich. He was also funny and kind and caring. Yet even with all these pros stacked in his favor, I was still skeptical to take it further. He pursued me and wooed me for almost a month before I finally caved to his charms.

I fell for him, gave myself to him in every way. I wouldn’t necessarily call this part a con. The sex was...good. He was slightly out of shape and sometimes had trouble getting or sustaining an erection. But that was a minor inconvenience, not a con. It didn’t happenallthe time, so it was something I easily overlooked because he took such good care of me.

He swept me off my feet, told me all the things I wanted to hear, gave me everything I needed, and turned my life around. He wrapped me up in his comforting arms, and that earned all my affection as well as the nickname – Teddy Bear.

Now, did I keep up the façade that I was a beautiful, sophisticated model? Yes, but only for the first week. After that, I came clean, and he was surprisingly fine with it. More than fine because once he found out that I didn’t have a glamorous job, he rescued me from my broke-ass existence and allowed me to live in his penthouse.

I wasn’t so forthcoming about other information, though. I lied about my age. He told me he was forty-six, so I told him I was twenty-four because I was only nineteen at the time. Admitting my true age would’ve made him think I was jailbait, and I didn’t want to ruin what we’d built. I kept that secret for the entire duration of our relationship. Am I ashamed about that? Yes, but it’s not like he was completely open and honest with me, either.

I found out two weeks ago that he’s married! Right after spending the most amazing 4thof July weekend together, a text came in from a woman named Jessica while he was in the shower. And I read it. And I confronted him about it only to find out that Jessica is his wife. I was shocked. I was devastated because he had just told me how much he loved me while we were havingsexfifteen minutes before that.

The level of deception still makes my mind reel every time I think about it. He told me he loved me, and then fifteen minutes later, confessed that he, his wife, and theirfoursons were all living happily in some posh mansion in the suburbs. I’m sorry, but his lie is worse than mine. I threw a hissy fit. He told me not to overreact. He assured me he wasn’t in love with her anymore, and I was the one he wanted.

Naturally, my follow-up question was whether he was going to divorce his wife so we could be together. I thought it was a valid question, considering he was coming over toscrewme at least three times a week. He got mad and then the heartless bastard chucked up all my stuff into fricken garbage bags and kicked me out of the penthouse. He did that to me, knowing about my parents and the eviction, which made his actions even more sinister and cruel. He cut off all ties after that argument, and I’ve been living in this dingy motel room ever since.

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