Sometimes, your neighbors will ask you for a favor. Do you have any olive oil? Can I borrow your drill? Can you watch my kid for ten minutes so I can run an emergency errand to the drugstore?
But some neighbors want a little more. And then it gets awkward.
On Reddit, one neighbor turned to the OP and his husband for a “huge favor” — she needed the OP’s husband to act like her boyfriend so the neighbor’s mother would not catch her in a lie.
See, this neighbor is a closeted lesbian and didn’t want her mother to find out. The OP and his husband declined, and now there is neighborly strife. Did they do the right thing by not helping the neighbor keep the lie going?
“My husband (42M) and I (31M) live in a nice apartment, we aren’t really friends with our neighbors, we’re polite but that’s about it. Our upstairs neighbor Kelly is a lesbian (closet, she only told us because she assumes all LGBT+ needs to be friends) who’s never told her family. Well, she’s been lying to her mother about having a boyfriend, by describing my husband (red haired, groomed beard, former marine), she came to our apartment to ‘ask a huge favor,’ her mother was coming over to dinner she needed my husband to act like her boyfriend and break up with her. I asked if she was serious, but told Kenny it’s up to him,” the OP writes.
“Kenny held up his hand to show his wedding ring and said only way it’s coming off if someone chops the finger off and no way is he going to act as her fill-in boyfriend or a cheating husband. Kelly begged us to reconsider but I told her no means no. She brought up that gays need to stick together but I hold firm, Kenny is MY man. And he said no too! Kelly has since told her mom about being a lesbian and that made her mom leave without staying for dinner (Kelly told us). Kelly says we’re both vicious asshole for forcing her to come out and we say we aren’t because SHE lied about a man.”
Look, a pretend boyfriend never turns out well. Do Redditors agree?
“NTA, lies have consequences. It totally sucks that her mother hurt her and that she felt she need to hide who she is, but she can’t demand people come rescue her from her own lies. That boy’s a keeper though, I can see the appeal,” said BUTTeredWhiteBread.
“I also don’t get why, having failed to secure a fake boyfriend, the only alternative she could come up with was…to come out as a lesbian. She could have just lied some more, clearly she’s quite comfortable with doing so. I mean, seems like no way to live, and probably isn’t sustainable in the long run, but in the short term I’d say it wasn’t even the lying that caused the ensuing drama,” noted MeanderingDuck.
“‘She felt the need to hide who she is.’ Homophobic parents discovering their kids are queer can have pretty dire consequences. It’s not something people lie about because they jerks [‘I’m a doctor!’ ‘No, you’re actually a lab tech.’] In Kelly’s case, fortunately, at least it ended ‘just’ in emotional hurt. That being said, what she asked for is no small feat, and of course they had the right to refuse. It sounds really sad. Seems like she had nobody to turn to except a couple of neighbors who don’t even like her,” observed With_Trees.
“NTA – even without you helping her, she didn’t have to come clean to her mother. Not hard to just say ‘sorry, me and Mr Marine broke up’. I mean, you could’ve helped her, honestly something you would have laughed about and the ring thing is a bit weird but none of that makes you TA for not helping. She is misplacing her blame, but don’t be too tough on her, she’s obviously going through a lot,” advised HP_Pennypacker_III.
“I considered saying N T A, but in the grand scheme on the situation, I am going NAH. You are definitely not the asshole, and your neighbor, although she made questionable decisions, is not the asshole. My sister and I (22F) are both bi and we had concerns about coming out (we didn’t need to be because our parents are supportive), but so did your neighbor. Was it a good idea to say that your husband was her boyfriend? No. Could you have gone along with it? I suppose, but it is definitely not necessary. In my eyes the only asshole is your neighbor’s mom,” said notrobert7.
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