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Trading in my cheat

It wasn't just my fella I was going to get rid of...


Published by: Clare Stone and Paul Carter
Published on: 8 September 2011

Fingers clamped over my eyes, my boyfriend guided me into our new home.
‘Ta-dah!'
‘It's amazing,' I cried.
We'd had a rough few months. I'd been made redundant from my admin job. Then Lee had lost his engineer's job.
We couldn't afford our rent any more, so were moving into a council house. Only, when we'd visited it, my heart had sunk.
‘It's disgusting,' I'd wept. Paint was peeling off the walls, the garden was a jungle.
‘It just needs some TLC,' Lee had said.
I hadn't been convinced, until now. The walls were freshly painted, the carpets cleaned and, out in the garden, our three-year-old daughter Ella's swing was set up.
‘All this house needs now is a family,' Lee whispered, hugging me. He'd done the work with help from friends.
When I'd met Lee three years earlier, I'd been working in a pub, loved going out, had no intention of settling down.
Then Lee, 32, a regular, had asked me out. ‘Only as friends,' I'd warned.
But who was I kidding? I'd fallen for his light blue eyes and cheeky, dimpled grin instantly.
Within three months, we were living together. I'd put the brakes on single life, but you can't plan falling in love.
‘I'm so lucky to have you,' I smiled, kissing Lee.
And our luck only grew. Lee got a new job as a self-employed kitchen fitter, and I fell pregnant.
But when Jamie was born, he suffered severe colic, screaming the house down night and day. Constantly exhausted, me and Lee began bickering.
‘Can you do the dishes?' I asked one night.
‘In a minute,' he mumbled.
‘Fine!' I snorted. ‘I'll do them.'
‘For God's sake!' he yelled. ‘Stop nagging.'
‘Nagging?' I fumed. ‘You think I'm...'
‘Look,' sighed Lee, holding his hands up. ‘We're exhausted.'
‘I know.' I fell on to the sofa next to him. ‘Maybe we need some down time. We could do with seeing our mates.'
‘Great idea,' he smiled.
Over the next couple of months, Lee went out on Fridays with his friends, I'd get Saturdays with mine. We both appreciated the time to let our hair down.
Laying on the sofa one Friday night, I started to remember what relaxed felt like.
Chuckling along to Graham Norton on the telly, my mobile rang. Lee's name flashed on the screen. ‘Hello?' I answered.
I could hear a woman's muffled voice. ‘Oh yes,' she groaned.
‘H-hello?' I stammered.
Then I heard another voice. Lee's! ‘Love you,' he groaned.
‘Oh God!' I cried, dropping the phone like it had electrocuted me. That sounded like Lee having sex!
But surely I was hearing things, there had to be an explanation - he was in a busy pub, one of his mates was mucking about...
Composing myself, I called Lee. ‘Where are you?' I asked.
‘In The Bull,' he replied. I rang the pub and asked if he was there. ‘Nope, not seen him all night,' said the landlord.
The lying... what was he playing at?
Hearing the front door go 30 minutes later, I flew at Lee. ‘How could you?' I spat. ‘I rang the pub, you weren't there.'
‘W-what?' he spluttered.
‘I heard you having sex with another woman, your phone rang me,' I spat.
‘Okay, just breathe,' he said. ‘I got the pubs mixed up and you probably heard the telly in the background there.'
I stared at him, panting heavily with rage.
‘I'm telling the truth,' he urged. He'd never given me any reason to doubt him before, and it did seem a ridiculous conclusion to jump to.
‘I'm sorry,' I said.
‘Let's get to bed,' he said, flashing me a dimpled smile. I barely slept, though. Had I been imagining things, or had I heard Lee having sex?
Desperate to put my mind to rest, before Lee woke, I tiptoed over to his jeans crumpled on the floor and found his mobile phone.
‘There'll be evidence on here,' I mumbled to myself, scrolling through texts and phone numbers... Nothing.
Still, after he'd left for work, I rifled through the dirty laundry.
‘Aha!' I cried, pulling out the shirt he'd worn the night before and sniffing it for perfume, checking the collar for lipstick. Nothing again!
‘I'm losing my mind,' I wept, sitting on the bed.
Still, that niggling doubt continued, so I decided to ring around his friends. ‘It sounds silly, but I think Lee's cheating on me,' I told them. ‘Is he?'
They all insisted he wasn't. By the time I rang his workmate Dave, I could barely speak for crying.
‘I'm going mad,' I sobbed. The line went silent.
‘Yes, he's cheating,' Dave sighed. ‘I'm sorry.' I felt sick.
‘It's a girl on your street,' he explained. ‘It started when you were pregnant.'
‘No,' I cried. Our son Jamie was 10 months old now.
I sat there, tears streaming down my cheeks. I had no idea how to react. There hadn't been the slightest hint Lee was cheating, no late nights or secret phone calls, no text messages, or suspect lipstick marks.
All I could think was he was seeing this woman during his Friday nights out - the ones that I'd suggested.
Just then, Ella walked into my bedroom. ‘Mummy, can I do my street sale today?' she asked.
She wanted to earn some money to buy magazines. We'd already made perfume using flower petals, and I'd given her Jamie's old toys to sell in our front garden.
Suddenly, I hatched a plan. ‘Sure,' I grinned wickedly. ‘Daddy's got some stuff to sell.'
Racing down to the shed, I yanked out his £1,000 mountain and racing bikes.
‘Sell these,' I told Ella.
Then I rampaged through the house - the house he'd worked to turn into a family home - grabbing his laptop, Xbox and Wii. I even struggled outside with his Panasonic TV.
‘Start selling,' I grinned to Ella, before hurtling upstairs.
I was reaching for his DKNY coat and sunglasses when Ella appeared. ‘Mummy, a boy's only got 20p. Can he have the Xbox?' she asked.
‘Yep,' I beamed.
Back outside, I took a photo of Ella's stall on my mobile and sent it to Lee with the message, I'm selling your stuff.
Before long, his van came screeching around the corner. ‘What the hell are you doing?' he screamed, bursting through the front door.
‘You've been cheating,' I hissed angrily at him, jabbing my finger in his face.
‘I-I...' he stammered.
‘I heard you having sex,' I snapped.
Lee stared at the floor, a beaten man. ‘Get out,' I sneered.
As he was leaving, he spotted his bike in our neighbour's garden. ‘Oi,' he cried. ‘That's mine!'
The man grabbed the bike. ‘I paid a fiver for this,' he growled.
Ella made £40 selling £4,000 of Lee's stuff. People certainly bagged a bargain - and my cheating fella paid the price. He deserved it, though.
Lee moved in with that woman and it lasted a week, although I don't want to know anything about him or her now.
And I don't regret flogging his stuff. I just wish I'd kept the receipt for him! 

Lee Battersby, 32, said: ‘I regret everything I did. It was my fault. I don't agree with what Keeley did, selling my stuff, but these things happen.'


Keeley Haworth, 23, Oldham, Manchester