Husband uncovers wife’s secret boyfriend after she pressures him to date her friend. AITA? + UPDATE
"AITA for refusing to go on a date with my wife's best friend?"
My wife 'Liz' and I are both 32 and we have been married for 3 years. She is a teacher and has recently been telling me about 'Maria' who is one of her friends who works at the same school as her.
Liz has been saying that Maria has been down lately since her boyfriend broke up with her and Liz suggested that I go on a date with Maria just for fun. Maria does not know that Liz and I are married. Liz says that it would just be one date at Maria's house and then never see her again.
I declined this as I love Liz and to go on a date with someone else would (imo) be the same as cheating. She argued that it's not cheating if she gives me consent to do it. I stood my ground and continued to say no.
It makes me uncomfortable to even think of going on a date with someone who isn't Liz. Even if I did want to do it, it would be unfair to just ghost Maria after a first date as Liz suggested. It would probably make Maria even sadder than she already is.
Liz claims that I'm being mean and that I should just let Maria have this chance. I said that Maria can have this chance with another man. I said that I'm disgusted in her for trying to force me to go on a date.
I'm also worried that if I did agree, she would twist the story and claim that I cheated on her with her best friend. Liz has let it go for now but is still annoyed at me. Did I do the right thing?
ETA: a lot of people have been commenting asking why Maria doesn't know her best friend's husband. Maria has only been friends with Liz for about 6 months and they met at the school (definitely not long enough to have came to our wedding) and I don't know how close they are. I also wonder if Liz is purposely leaving out the fact that she was married.
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s post:
INFO: Does Liz want a threesome with you and Maria? That's the only scenario where this makes any sense at all.
personwhoeatscheese1 (OP)
I don't think so. She only ever said that I should go on a date with Maria to make her happy, but after reading the comments I wonder if she had other intentions.
How would you fake dating then ghosting her make Maria feel better? It’s actually incredibly insulting to Maria and quite condescending. Either your wife is completely emotionally oblivious to this or something else is going on.
Also, if Maria and Liz are friends and he ghosts her after one date. Is she never going to meet the husband in future? Or what if she turns up at her house to tell her about her terrible ghost problem, only to see said ghost and be all..”wtf, GURRRRL your husband’s cheating on you.” And only to find out that Liz set it up. Either this is fake or Liz has a screw loose.
She is setting you up, she has something planned and this other person is in on it or she is banging someone Etc . Don’t go and investigate your wife . Anyone who loves their partner would never allow this.
Later the same day, the OP returned with an update.
Thank you for all of the advice and comments. I had a talk with Liz, asking her what was going on. I asked her if she wanted a divorce, a threesome, or if she just really hated Maria etc.
She got defensive and said she just thought it was a good idea, and that Maria deserves to have a nice date for once. She said I'm being an AH and that there's nothing wrong with Maria.
She also said that she's already told Maria that she found a date for her so if I decline I'd break Maria's heart. That was all I needed to know this was not the woman I married. I pretended to be interested and asked Liz for Maria's number which she gave to me.
I called a couple times over the last few hours and Maria finally picked up about an hour ago. I told her that I'm Liz's husband. Maria says, "Oh, are you Max?" I say no and ask her who Max is.
Maria tells me that Max is Liz's boyfriend. Maria asked me who I was again and I repeated that I was Liz's husband and asked her about who Max was. Maria told me that Liz is not married and hung up.
I haven't talked about it to Liz since then. I've sent another message to Maria asking if there's anything she can tell me about Max and saying how I believe that Liz is cheating on me + lying about our marriage.
Also told her about how Liz is pressuring me to date her then ghost her to 'make her feel better'. Maria hasn't replied yet. I feel so exhausted and betrayed right now so sorry for the low effort update but I confirm that divorce is definitely on my mind. This will be a conversation in the morning but I just want to sleep now and hope for the best.
Here is what readers had to say in response to the OP’s post:
Bro you found out your wife has a boyfriend, lied to her boyfriend’s friend, and then gaslit you into being the bad guy for not emotionally catfishing someone she was using as a cover story??
This isn’t AITA, this is “How deep does the rabbit hole go?” You handled it better than 99% of people would have. Major props for keeping your cool and collecting receipts. Hope you sleep well and lawyer up in the morning. Liz clearly already did—just not for your marriage.
She's got a whole side dude and tried to set you up with her best friend? That's not a marriage, that's a plot twist. Serve the papers, king.
personwhoeatscheese1 (OP)
No idea. though I feel like she is trying to make me cheat to make me the bad guy, not her. I'm too tired for this.