A man is accused of being the father of a baby abandoned on his doorstep and it costs him his marriage and his way of life.
Kyle Greenbecker had spent a year working on an oil pipeline in Alaska, but finally, he was on his way home to his beautiful wife. He and Lisa met in high school, and Kyle had never regretted marrying her at nineteen.
Maybe he was old-fashioned, but Kyle was proud that Lisa was the only woman he’d been intimate with in his life. He didn’t need and didn’t want anyone else. It never occurred to him that Lisa would ever doubt him — and with good reason.
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When his plane landed, Kyle collected his luggage and walked out with the other passengers, scanning the crowd for Lisa’s beloved face, but she wasn’t there to pick him up.
Probably, Kyle thought, she’d been held up at work with some emergency. He sent her a quick text telling her he was on his way home but got no reply. He hopped into an Uber and in an hour he was walking up to his front door.
The lights were on in the lounge, but Lisa wasn’t there. He made his way to the kitchen and stopped in the doorway, stunned. Resting on top of the kitchen table was a bassinet, and Kyle could see a small arm waving aimlessly.
He took a step closer. There was a bassinet with a baby on his kitchen table! The child was looking back at Kyle with that astonished look babies have, and Kyle stared back just as astonished.
Then he saw a folded paper on the table next to the bassinet. He picked it up and unfolded it. Inside was another sheet of paper with a message in a handwriting he didn’t recognize: “You had your fun, now take responsibility for your child.”
Meanwhile, the note addressed to him in Lisa’s elegant script read:
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“Kyle, yesterday I found this child on our doorstep with that note attached. I always suspected you cheated on me during your business trips, but I didn’t hold a grudge on you for that — after all, I had plenty of flings while you were away — but saddling me with someone else’s byblow is too much. I’ve filed for a divorce, and I earnestly hope I will never see you again.
“P.S. And about the baby, don’t worry, I only left when I saw you walk up the drive. Enjoy your life, Kyle, I certainly intend to enjoy mine.”
Kyle sat down and dropped his head in his hands. He couldn’t believe this was happening to him. This child wasn’t his, he’d never cheated on Lisa, ever! A soft cooing sound made him raise his head.
The baby was waving its little hand in the air, so Kyle brought his own hand closer and to his surprise, the child grabbed onto his index finger with incredible strength.
“Well, baby,” Kyle said. “I guess it’s just us two, and I don’t know what to do with you!”
The baby cooed again and gurgled, then screwed up his face in an alarming way and turned bright red. “Oh my God!” cried Kyle. “What’s happening?” A certain smell quickly elucidated him.
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Yep, it was diaper time. But was there even a diaper? On the floor next to the table was a large backpack with several snap pockets that he’d never seen before. Kyle found a bewildering array of items inside and the diapers.
He quickly googled diaper change and watched carefully as a woman on YouTube demonstrated on a life-like doll how to change a diaper.
Kyle started following her instructions but things didn’t run that smoothly. The woman’s life-like doll didn’t move its legs, or sink its kicking heels in the stinking and unmentionable contents of the dirty diaper! After wiping the baby clean, Kyle realized it was a girl, and he didn’t know anything about girls!
“I won’t be giving you dating advice,” he told the baby solemnly. “But I can teach you how to ride a bike.”
Kyle realized in that moment that he intended to keep this baby.
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He picked up the freshly diapered baby and said, “You need me, and I guess I need you too. So how about it, kid?”
Kyle once again consulted the YouTube baby-guru to prepare the formula and settled the baby in the crook of his arm for her feed.
“You need a name, you know that? How about… Celeste? Do you like that? Or Lily…”
If anyone had told Kyle that he would settle into fatherhood so easily and so smoothly he would never have believed it. Lily had her moments and her tantrums, but somehow things worked out.
Kyle registered Lily as his child and enrolled her in daycare. For him, her birthday was on the day he’d found her. But it was on Lily’s second birthday that Kyle’s world fell apart.
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A woman knocked on her door. “I’ve come for my baby,” she said. Kyle just looked at her. She was tall, blonde, and thin, with huge breasts that were obviously a product of a plastic surgeon’s art.
“Your what?” Kyle asked.
A real parent is the one who loves and cherishes the child.
“My baby,” she snapped. “I left her here two years ago? Sorry about that, but I was a bit stoned and my boyfriend lives on the next block over and I got confused. You know how it is!”
“Sorry, I don’t know how that is because I’ve never abandoned a child on anyone’s doorstep,” Kyle said coldly. “I’d get a move on if I were you, or I’ll call the police.”
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“Now look here,” the woman said sharply. “I figured I made a mistake about a week later when Burt didn’t take my calls, but now I need that baby!”
“You need her?” asked Kyle angrily. “What do you need her for?”
“Burt just got himself a Major League contract,” the woman said. “And that baby’s gone make sure some of those millions land in my bank account!”
Kyle ran the woman off, but he had a feeling he hadn’t seen the last of her. He was right. A week later he was summoned to family court. A Miss Cherish Vegas was contesting his adoption of baby Lily.
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Suddenly, Kyle was showered with injunctions, was visited by Social Services at odd hours of the day or night, and his friends and co-workers were being questioned. Cherish really meant to get her hands on those millions!
Finally, the day of the hearing arrived. Kyle nervously handed over Lily to the social worker for the duration of the hearing and walked in. Cherish was there, of course, and a tall man with Lily’s blue eyes was on her side of the court. This could only be the famous Burt!
Cherish cried and sniveled and told the judge how much she loved and missed her baby, and how her wild college days (now long past and deeply regretted) had led her to place her in Kyle’s care.
The judge looked down at the papers in front of her. “By in his care, you mean on his porch, isn’t that right, Miss Vegas?” asked the judge.
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Cherish flushed red. “Well, I’m still her mama! No one can deny that!” she screamed.
The judge looked at Burt. “You sir, you are the father?”
Burt lumbered to his feet and said, “I guess I must be…”
The judge fixed him with a flinty eye. “Are you prepared and able to take on the parental responsibilities for this child?”
Cherish screamed, “You bet he is, judge, he just signed a three million dollar contract to play ball…”
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“Oh!” cried the judge. “Finally, the truth is out! Tell me, Miss Vegas, what name did you give your daughter?”
“Name?” asked Cherish, confused. “Why, she’ll have her daddy’s name., since he’ll be paying child support!”
Kyle stood up. “Your honor,” he said. “May I address the court?”
“Yes, Mr. Greenbecker,” said the judge. “Please do.”
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“Ma’am, my daughter’s name is Lily, and she does have her father’s name — mine. Since the moment that child came into my life I’ve loved her, and she loves me.”
At that moment, Lily, who had been playing with the social worker’s necklace noticed that Kyle was standing up. “Daddy!” she cried and stretched out her arms.
“Well, ladies and gentlemen, it seems to me that the case has been decided by the principal party,” the judge said. “I hereby overturn all claims of custody of the child Lily Grennbecker and confirm Kyle Greenbecker’s custody and adoption.
That night, Kyle celebrated his victory in court and he and Lily spent the evening catching lightning bugs in the garden. “Stars!” cried Lily. But for Kyle, the brightest star of all was his little girl.
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What can we learn from this story?
- A real parent is one who loves and cherishes the child. Kyle took care of Lily and loved her as if she were his own.
- A heartless woman will use anyone, even her child, for profit. Cherish didn’t want Lily, she just wanted Burt’s money.
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If you enjoyed this story, you might like this one about a man who taught his son how to be the best husband in the world.
This account is inspired by our reader’s story and written by a professional writer. Any resemblance to actual names or locations is purely coincidental. All images are for illustration purposes only. Share your story with us; maybe it will change someone’s life.
See 1970s icon Faye Dunaway now at 83
Among the few living real legends is Faye Dunaway.
The legendary actress, well-known for portraying strong, resentful, and challenging women, is among the best in movie history.
And the eighty-three-year-old continues on…
Dunaway is best known for her twisted cry in the campy cult film Mommie Dearest, “No more wire hangers!” She also starred in Hurry Sundown with Michael Caine and Bonnie & Clyde, winning the main part over Jane Fonda and Natalie Wood.
The Florida native actress, who was also awarded three Golden Globes and an Emmy, was born in Bascom.
It’s difficult to discuss Faye Dunaway’s career without bringing up the film Mommies Dearest. Channeling Joan Crawford’s energy, Faye Dunaway shocked the Mommie Dearest crew when she initially appeared from the dressing room in the legendary role of the four-year-old actress.
The sensationalized movie Mommie Dearest (1981) is based on Christina Crawford’s memoir of the same name, which describes her troubled connection with the late actress Joan Crawford, who was her adopted mother.
Dunaway managed to create a combination of charm and terror.
In her unsettling portrayal of Crawford, Dunaway blurred the boundaries between reality and resurrecting Joan, both on and off the set. She was so desperate that she declared, “I want to climb inside her skin,” to a Hollywood biographer.
Dunaway either developed her method acting skills to a high degree or her spirit took over. In her memoir, Looking for Gatsby, she writes. “I was told by one that it felt like Joan herself had risen from the dead.”
In reality, the media began to believe that Crawford was haunting Dunaway.”(Dunaway) appears to have borrowed it for 12 weeks from the ghost of Joan Crawford,” the Los Angeles Times remarked about her voice.
In a part that will live in legend, Dunaway expresses remorse. She told Entertainment Tonight, “I think it turned my career in a direction where people would irretrievably have the wrong impression of me—and that’s an awful hard thing to beat.” “I should have known better, but sometimes you don’t know what you’re getting into and you’re vulnerable.”
Working with some of the sexiest men in Hollywood, like Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Kirk Douglas, and Johnny Depp, Dunaway showed extreme self-control and maintained a platonic connection with her co-stars.
A few individuals were drawn to particular things; perhaps Jack (Nicholson) and Warren (Beatty), but not many. Though Steve McQueen was contentedly devoted to someone at the time, Warren was at that point in his bachelorhood. “I wouldn’t mess around with something like that even if it were offered, but it wasn’t,” Warren said.
“You simply don’t,” she remarked in a Harper’s Bazaar interview. “You don’t do that because you know it will ruin the performance and the movie. That’s my rule.”
The dapper, Italian award-winning actor Marcello Mastroianni, broke the rules for the timeless beauty with her delicate high cheekbones because he was too much of a temptation.
Life imitates art in her connection with the Italian celebrity. starring in the 1968 film A Place for Lovers, which Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times referred to as the “most godawful piece of pseudo-romantic slop I’ve ever seen!”-Dunaway portrays a fashion designer who is having an extramarital romance with Mastroianni, a race car driver. She had a brief but intense three-year romance with the actor in real life, which she ended when he refused to leave his wife.
Dunaway stated, “I was deeply in love with him,” in a People interview. I had never encountered a man like him before, and I felt incredibly safe with him.
She wed musician Peter Wolf, the lead vocalist of The J. Geils Band, in 1974; they separated after five years.
According to a Marie Claire article from 2017, Dunaway began an affair with renowned British photographer Terry O’Neill because she was dissatisfied in her marriage to Wolf. With her Oscar from the movie The Network on the table next to her, O’Neill captured a picture of her lounging by the pool at The Beverly Hills Hotel.
After being married in 1983, Dunaway misled the public for many years, claiming that her son Liam, who was born in 1980, was actually her biological child. In 1987, Dunaway and O’Neill were divorced.
Dunaway is alleged to be a manipulative diva who is very difficult and unpredictable for co-stars, production personnel, and even hotel employees.
She was fired from her role as Audrey Hepburn in the off-Broadway production of Tea at Five in 2019 for creating a “dangerous” and “hostile” environment, and she was fired by Andrew Lloyd Weber from his Sunset Boulevard production in Los Angeles, California, in 1994.
She was dubbed the “gossamer grenade” by one of her leading men, Jack Nicholson, and when Johnny Carson questioned her in 1988, “Who’s one of the worst people you know in Hollywood?” “Faye Dunaway and everybody you can put in this chair would tell you exactly the same thing,” was the swift response from the feisty and unrepentant Bette Davis. “I don’t think we have the time to go into all the reasons—she’s just uncooperative,” the woman said. For Miss Dunaway, Miss Dunaway is Miss.
Dunaway is still a very talented performer despite her challenging, frequently harsh, and nasty demeanor.
She was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1996, and in 1997, People magazine listed her as one of the 50 Most Beautiful People.
Regarding her romantic status, she is now single.
She stated in a 2016 People interview that she was still open to dating. She says, “I’m very much a loner.” “I always think that if I could find the right person, I would like to have a partner in life, and I would.”
Her most recent credit dates back to 2022, when she costarred in the Italian film L’uomo che disegnò Dio with Kevin Spacey.
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