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Woman CONVINCED her husband fathered his best friend's children. 6 UPDATES (DNA & Secrets Revealed) PART 1

Woman CONVINCED her husband fathered his best friend's children. 6 UPDATES (DNA & Secrets Revealed) PART 1

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When this woman is paranoid about her husband, she asks the internet:

"I think my husband fathered his best friend's children, and now one of them is attracted to my daughter?"

This began as a dark, intrusive thought that I could never shake off, and over the years it has bloomed into a poison flower that infects my entire psyche.

I’m a forty-two year old woman. My husband “Luke” is 43, and so is “Amy.” I met Luke in college, but he’s known Amy since they were about 7. They did everything together and understood each other implicitly. They were best friends. They’ve always insisted that they are surrogate siblings to each other.

Naturally I, as a new girlfriend, felt a little threatened by Amy and her closeness to Luke, but they both reassured me I had nothing to worry about. That their bond was not romantic and had never been se%ual.

That Amy really was just the sister that Luke never had. I believed them, and it didn’t take long for me to forget any and all insecurity I had about Amy. She became my friend too. She officiated our wedding.

Luke and I have built a wonderful life together and we always had a strong relationship. After we got married and moved in together, we still saw a lot of Amy, and I was fine with that.

I’ve passed many a night on the town trying to help Amy find a man, as she has always lamented how she is unlucky in love. Luke and I started to have children after we were married, and, at around the same point, so did Amy.

For further context, my children are Sophie, (15) Owen, (12) Louise, (10) and Carter (6) Amy’s children are Tom, (17) Kaylee, (14) and twins, Adam and Jenna, (9)

Now, Amy was not in a relationship at this point. She was not married. As far as I knew, she was “dating” but not consistently. As Luke and I had more kids and our family grew, periodically Amy would find herself pregnant as well.

It happened a few times, and Luke and I never knew anything about the father(s) in question. I kind of assumed that maybe Amy was sleeping around and not keeping in contact with her one-night stands.

Luke agreed this was probably the answer. While I did ask each time if Amy knew the paternity, she always said no, and she didn't seem that worried about the idea of raising kids on her own, so I didn’t pester her.

Of course, she had us to support her, so there was that. While Amy never asked for any help, of course Luke was never going to let his best friend struggle to stay afloat when she had children to raise.

Financially, we are very fortunate and privileged. I have a job that pays handsomely and Luke also had wealthy parents who already knew and loved Amy, so they were happy to provide for her.

(My in-laws defy all stereotypes, they are the kindest and gentlest people.) So we were able to support Amy. To get her somewhere to stay with her kids. People might be tempted to call her a leech, but I never saw it that way. None of us did. She needed help and we could provide it.

I also know people are going to criticize her for her lack of responsibility and question why she never used more reliable birth control. Honestly?

That is a long story that I don’t want to get into because even I don’t fully understand her reasoning, but it was quite important to her that she never be on birth control and that whatever came of that choice, she would accept.

It wasn’t religiously motivated, I know that, but it was that degree of significance to Amy. She really did not want to take birth control. She’s explained it to me more than once but I’m still not clear on why.

Of course, Amy being Luke’s best friend since they were kids, it’s not unreasonable that sometimes they hang out together while I’m not there. Hey, that’s fine. Sometimes I hang out with Amy one-on-one as well, though Luke does it more. She was his friend first.

This included him going over to where she was staying and at times, sleeping over there. Was I a fool to trust him and believe nothing was going on? Perhaps. But for years, they presented as being “buddies.” Like siblings. I didn’t pick up on any vibes between them, not ever.

As one can expect, our children were brought up together. Not in the same house, (our home is decently sized but even we don’t have the room for eight kids.)

But we made sure Amy’s children met ours from a young age, and they always got along and strong bonds of friendship have formed over the years, which is good. Especially if I’m right, and they share blood.

I’ve been dawdling getting to the main point. Yes. I have come to suspect that Luke fathered at least one of Amy’s kids, if not all of them. Frankly, I do suspect they are all his. I would never have believed my husband to be capable of such a thing, and he’s given me no indication that he is the unfaithful sort.

But he does spend a lot of time with Amy, and I have to confess I cannot remember seeing her with any real boyfriend over the years. She would talk to men at bars and parties, I would try to be her wing-man, and so on.

But nothing ever seemed to really happen, so when she got pregnant the first time, I was curious. When it happened again, and again, I began to wonder if she had some sort of secret fella who she didn't want us to know about for whatever reason. But I couldn’t think of any reason why she would hide him, especially from her children.

After Carter, our youngest, was born, Luke and I agreed that the time had come for him to have a vasectomy. Amy’s twins had come just a couple of years prior. Of course, after the procedure, Luke and I continued to make love but I no longer had to think about pregnancy.

Meanwhile, Amy never got pregnant again, after the twins. Is it a coincidence that Luke had a vasectomy and then both of us stopped getting pregnant? I don’t know. But Luke would still visit her, and he wasn’t just going to see her, but checking up on her children as well.

In general, I should have paid more attention to it sooner, but Luke has always acted like a father to them, especially as they’ve gotten older. He’s the father they never had. He doesn’t neglect me, or our children, not one bit.

He’s doing double duty. On its own, the idea that he is a surrogate father to Amy’s fatherless children isn’t inherently suspicious. One could call it noble. But it combines with a lot of other little things.

There is appearance as well. I won’t go into specifics of hair color, eye color, or unique physical traits, because I’d rather limit the identifying factors of the people involved and keep this whole thing as vague as possible.

But suffice it to say, Amy’s children…they certainly look like they could be Luke’s. Kaylee has a very unusual allergy that Luke also has. The twins look very much like him - Adam in particular.

The older Tom has gotten, the more of Luke I can see in his face and personality. While their race doesn’t matter, the reality is that Luke is a different race than Amy, and Amy’s children look pretty biracial. I could easily believe their father is the same race as Luke. Doesn’t mean Luke has to be the father, but…it sure seems like it.

I have never voiced my anxieties to either Amy or Luke. I don’t want to be the “bad guy” and, guilty or innocent, I already know they would flatly deny my accusations and be hurt by them. Imagine if that drama reached the ears of my kids, or Amy’s kids?

Either way, Luke continues to spend time with Amy and her children, just as her children spend time with mine. I have hinted to Luke that I feel needy for more attention and wish he wouldn’t give as much to Amy.

But he either missed my cues or pretended that he missed them. I don’t want to push this idea that he’s favoring her, because it’s not even really true. He’s never neglected me for her. I just. I can’t shake the feeling that Luke and Amy have been intimate before, likely numerous times.

So far as I know, Amy never really wanted to be a mother, either. She wasn’t opposed to it, and when each of her children came into the world she instantly fell in love with them, but motherhood was never really a major part of her life plan or identity.

In the grand scheme of things, when we would talk about the future, she would sometimes mention a husband and children, but it never seemed like something she had her heart particularly set on.

So like, I don’t think this is a case of Luke just “giving” Amy children, I doubt that was the motive for the infidelity. That would have been a side-effect.

I’ve been letting this go and turning a blind eye for years. It was a dark thought in the back of my mind after Kaylee's allergy was discovered, but I dismissed it. Got worse after the twins were born. I dismissed it.

Then, when Amy stopped having babies, I wanted to feel reassured by that. But, Luke had gotten a vasectomy, so if anything, that made my anxiety worse.

There have been nights that I wished the twins were younger, that they had come along after Luke’s procedure. It’s been twisting me into knots for a long time, but I don’t want to be the one who rips our family apart especially since, technically, I could be wrong.

Update 1:

Except now I’m very afraid, because in the last few months we’ve had a new development in our kids’ social circle.

Tom, Amy’s eldest, asked Sophie out. Sophie, my eldest. She’s really blossomed over these last few years and become quite the outspoken beauty, so I’m not shocked to see she’s getting male attention, but Tom asking her out had me thrown.

Sophie said no, but only because I’m quite protective when it comes to her exploring dating, and she knew she’d have to ask me first. I could tell she was flattered and intrigued by his interest and wanted to say yes.

She approached me to talk to me about it, bless my girl, she did everything right. I think she expected I would see things her way and agree that she could date Tom. Much to her surprise, I very firmly said no.

That caused a bit of conflict. She didn’t even want to date him that badly, she just couldn’t understand why she wasn’t allowed to. And I couldn’t explain it to her. All I could come up with was “He’s too old for you” which he is, but it’s not really about that.

When Amy and Luke heard, I was so very curious to see what their reactions would be. If either of them had agreed with Sophie and tried to convince me that the two of them should be allowed to date, I think I would have been relieved and taken that as proof that I was wrong about something going on between them.

Wrong about who fathered Amy’s children. But, the ambiguity continued. They took my side. Both of them put their foot down, though not as fiercely as I did. Luke agreed with me, but he also worried that trying to forbid such a romance would only make Sophie want it more.

He’s probably right about that. Amy seemed more apathetic to the idea. She didn’t want Tom to date Sophie either, and she backed me up, but I don’t know, she just wasn’t taking it as seriously. She seemed to think it was a fleeting crush.

Well, it wasn’t. In the months following those conversations, Tom would spend more and more time with Sophie. They would be alone (or with “other friends”) any time they possibly could. It’s become abundantly clear that Tom is crazy about Sophie and wants to be with her.

(And he definitely wants to be physical, I’ve been watching them like a hawk and noticed his eye wandering many times.) And while I’m doing everything I can to kill this budding romance in the crib, I also am feeling somewhat powerless. Sophie hasn’t outwardly defied me, she’s still just hanging out with Tom “as friends.”

So forcing them to stop spending time together would be unreasonable, and probably encourage more sneaking around. But I’m so afraid that they’re already doing that. My nightmare is that they’re secretly dating, and doing god knows what when no one is looking.

(I’ve observed Tom being rather handsy with Sophie, and she presents no objection whatsoever.) And I just don’t know what to say. I had considered trying to convince Sophie that Tom is “like” her brother, but if she doesn’t see him that way, I don’t really have the power to rewrite their emotional dynamic or the history of their friendship.

I always saw Amy and her children as being like family, but my kids might see Amy’s kids more as “best friends.”

The problem is, of course, that if my husband has indeed been carrying on an affair over the years and I’m right about the paternity of Amy’s children, then Tom and Sophie cannot be anything more than friends under any circumstances, end of discussion.

It can never happen. I feel powerless to stop it, though. Luke has apparently “talked” to Tom about this, as has Amy, but he is unrelenting and he won’t give up on Sophie. I think she enjoys that attention and devotion.

Tom has also confronted me and asked why I’m so against this when I know him very well and I know he would be good to Sophie. I didn’t know what to say other than to fall back on her being too young for him. But that won’t work forever. If, god forbid, they’re still attracted to each other in a few years, then they’ll pursue this with abandon and once they’re legal adults, there’s nothing I can do about it.

Amy and Luke agree with me that Tom cannot date Sophie, but that’s all they’ve really done. They feel just as powerless as me to prevent “teen love.” It genuinely feels sometimes like they’ve just given up and will bury their heads in the sand about this.

Just do nothing and hope the feelings pass as Tom and Sophie get older. Which, yeah, they’re in high school. It’s unlikely Tom will be in love with Sophie forever. But my fear is that she’ll let him do something intimate with her before that time comes, something neither of them can take back.

I am this close to opening a door I cannot close, this close to screaming at Luke that all this wouldn’t be happening if he hadn’t cheated on me these many years.

If he hadn’t been all but raising a second family with his “surrogate sister” behind my back. Now Luke’s son wants to f our daughter, his ACTUAL sister, because as far as he knows, she’s just his childhood friend. And it’s all Luke and Amy’s fault for what they’ve done.

If I speak up, everything gets blown to hell. On the off chance that I am wrong, I’m a horrible monster who accused the love of my life and one of my closest friends of doing something horrible. If I’m right, it still tears our entire structure apart.

The family and social unit we’ve become over the last several years is gone, and everyone will be stressed and upset even if Luke and I don’t divorce. If I do nothing, Sophie’s eventually going to sleep with Tom and be his girlfriend.

(And I’m low key terrified it will happen sooner than later, or worse, that it’s already happened under my nose.) I hope to hell this relationship fades as they mature, but what if it doesn’t? What if they wind up being together for years? What if they marry, want to get pregnant someday?

And if I tell Sophie the truth about Amy’s kids, then everyone else finds out too, and that’s going to ruin so many lives. It would shatter my kids’ perception of their father, and their “Aunt Amy.”

Luke is Owen’s hero. I don’t even want to think about how much this would hurt him. And what about Amy’s children? They are innocent. They didn’t ask for this, they don’t control where they came from, and I don’t want to hurt them.

Admittedly I’m not happy with Tom at the moment. A week ago I saw him put his hand on Sophie’s butt and I wanted to knock his teeth out. But even he doesn’t deserve to be burdened by the knowledge that it’s his half sister he’s been fantasizing about.

It’s all so fd up and I don’t know what to do. I’ve been looking the other way and letting my husband and his “best friend” insult me for such a long time now. I thought I could live with it. But this business with Tom and Sophie has me distressed.

Let's see what readers had to say:

faegsy writes:

You don’t even need to tell Sophie yet, first tell your hunny that you have changed your mind and you are going to allow them to date in order to avoid the whole ‘Romeo and Juliet’ of it all.

Then just sit back and watch what plays out, immediately on his face, what he does right after, and in the following hours/day before you even move forward with telling Sophie. If hubby calls Amy right away or especially if one of the other adults stops them then you will have a much clearer understanding of your situation.

Plus, you have lived with n this discomfort for a long time now. If you are going to blow up the whole system you might as well take the time to get prepared as much as you can

knwonbeetl writes:

If you're wrong, and say nothing - no harm, no foul on all accounts. THIS IS A WIN. If you're wrong, and say something - there's a chance your marriage and social unit fall apart (but given the optics how close your husband and his friend are, and the risk of sibling dating

I'd say there's a reasonable chance it doesn't fall apart if your husband understands your POV, especially if you discuss it discretely with your husband first and voice your concerns about the kids dating). THIS IS A SOFT WIN (if handled carefully) / A NOMINAL LOSS (if not handled well).

If you're right, and say something - your husband and his friends get found out. The marriage and social unit falls apart - it's all their fault, and you protect the kids from potential incst. THIS IS A WIN.

If you're right, and say nothing - there's a serious chance the kids engage in incest without knowing. And your husband's infidelity continues to go unaddressed. Consider how the kids will feel in however many years time if this all comes out after the fact. Someone is going to do a 23&Me for the fun of it one day - the truth will come out. THIS IS A HUGE LOSS.

On the face of it, you have an impossible decision to make. If you're able to discretely do DNA tests (you mentioned taking the boy's cheek swab once), I'd suggest you do this. It'll give you the proof you need to raise your concerns with your husband if it comes back positive (I don't know what your local laws are about this though so be careful).

My personal opinion: everything you've said screams to me that your instincts are right. If you say nothing, the kids will end up committing incest. Can you sleep soundly at night if you say nothing and that comes to pass? I'd discuss with your husband discretely and approach it from the perspective of the possible inct.

fles writes:

First things first, this is the 2nd CRAZIEST thing I have EVER read to do with families. Second things second, DNA tests needed ASAP. Depending how long Tom and Sophie have been hanging out for, they have definitely, 100% done the deeds. We was all 15 and 17 once.

Also, they are some crazy match ups. You need to find out how rare that allergy is, and if it is inherited.

If they have hidden it for this long, they would not admit it, even if they was. However, the fact they have hid it for this long and no one knows about it means 2 things. One, there is nothing going on. Two, they are really REALLY good at hiding it.

As cruel as it sounds, have you ever asked Tom if he knows anything about his dad? Does he ever mention it? What has he been told?

Have you ever checked Lukes phone? Particualary, his messages with them lot, and his photo gallery? Has his se pattern ever changed, or did it ever change, unexpectedly?

Did it ever become more or less common? I'm talking mostly about it being more common whilst or after "Amy" had given birth. Has he ever suspected you for cheating as commonly, people that "live a second life" often become paranoid (you are an exception as you have ALOT of reasons, don't worry, you are NOT crazy.

OP provides 5 wild updates. DNA & new secrets are involved:

Update 2 (3 days after original post):

Reddit won't let me post a link, so you'll have to find the original post on my account page, sorry for the inconvenience. I could summarize the original, but these posts are already quite long as it is, and frankly, the TL;DR is in the title anyway. So here goes:

First of all, wow. I did not expect my post to get as much traction as it did. I was half worried that someone in my family or social circle might find it, especially when someone alerted me that the post had been shared to facebook.

But, as far as I can tell, no one in my family has seen it. I want to thank all of the kind commenters who wished me well. To those who were more frustrated with my indecision, I get it.

But I was operating with an uncertain situation and the stakes were incredibly high. I feel like no matter what choice I made, something could and likely would go wrong. I’ve spent the last five years imagining different scenarios based on different ways I could go about this if I ever decided to act on it. To everyone who was clamoring for an update, I have one for you.

I previously said that I was going to do a secret DNA test, that I had decided on that course of action. In the end, I couldn’t go through with it, and now I am regretting that, because the window to do so has essentially closed. I just felt like it would be out of line for me to do that to another person’s child behind their back. Ethically, it was dicey.

I’ve since consulted with my lawyer as many commenters suggested, and she advised me against doing so, because no matter what the results were, it would make me look bad in a potential divorce proceeding. But I really wish I had done it anyway, and just not told anyone.

Because I really, badly need to know, and I still don’t know for sure. Likewise, I wanted to tell Sophie in confidence, but the more I thought about it…even that seemed over the line. Like I had no right to plant such ideas in her mind about her father without even talking to him first.

So, what I ended up doing was confronting Luke and Amy. Many comments suggested this as well. I finally told both of them that we needed to have a serious talk. It felt counterproductive to approach just one of them, because I figured they would tell the other about what happened in their own words before I could prepare my own. I wanted them both to hear what I had to say.

Once all the kids were at school, I laid down all of my suspicions and the reasons. I made it clear how much I love both of them, but a combination of clues had led me to notice the similarities between Luke and Amy’s children - and I didn’t even list all of them in the original post.

(For example, Luke has been a sleep-walker in the past. So have Sophie, Tom, and Adam) I said over and over, how much they meant to me and how I didn’t want to believe it, but the thought had crept into my mind in the past.

How I had dismissed it before, but now, with Tom and Sophie having crushes on each other, it became necessary to pose the question. So I asked if they had ever crossed the line, if Luke had ever been unfaithful, if there was even the slightest possibility that any of Amy’s children were his. I was just trying not to cry.

Well, they reacted exactly as I would have expected. Their responses were perfect and so very well rehearsed. I genuinely can’t tell if it was honest emotion or powerful gaslighting. Amy was more upset than Luke, or at least more outwardly upset. She was angry, offended at the accusation.

Luke just seemed heartbroken by it. Maybe they were just acting, but I don’t know. Somehow, they had reasonable responses to all of the points I brought up. They asked questions I didn’t know how to answer. I had never objected to them having alone time before, why did it suddenly bother me now?

Do Amy’s children really resemble Luke that much, or are things like hair color pretty basic traits to have in common?

The whole family had always treated Amy and her kids as part of our unit, and I had previously commended Luke for stepping up and being a father to Amy’s kids since they didn’t have one…why was I now saying it was a bad thing? What exactly did I want them to do? How could I think such a thing about them? Why had I waited so long to say something?

Luke was more understanding than Amy. He respected my feelings, or at least he acted like he did. Amy appeared to feel more betrayed by what I said. I ended up apologizing several times even though I’m not sure I did anything wrong. Luke also apologized for “anything he’d done” to indicate he was unfaithful.

I asked Amy more pointedly that, if not Luke, who HAD fathered her children? She snapped back that it was none of my business, and I could tell she was in no mood to get personal or vulnerable with me after my accusations.

I’m not proud to say that I lost my temper, and said that after everything we had done for her and her children, such information was not a lot to ask and perhaps she owed it to us. I regretted the words as soon as I said them, but Amy shouted back that *I* had never done anything for her, that it was Luke and his parents who had kept her afloat all these years, not me.

She went on a longer tirade about how I had always acted superior to her, which I don’t believe I did, though it’s possible that I gave off that vibe unintentionally. Luke did his best to calm her down, but the room was still fraught with tension.

I don’t know, Reddit, I just don’t know. It’s driving me to the edge of madness. There is a way to be certain, of course. Not certain of my husband’s fidelity, but of the paternity of Amy’s children.

So I asked Luke, for my own peace of mind, for the sake of our daughter, and for our family unit, if he could please get a DNA test done, a paternity test. I went on to say that I knew he disliked and distrusted such things, but that I really needed this. I could see the pain in Luke’s eyes.

Maybe it was an act, but he did seem genuinely hurt that I was asking for this, that him giving me his word that he had always been faithful was not enough for me. But he very reluctantly agreed to participate in a DNA test.

Unfortunately, Amy did not, and that’s where we hit a roadblock. I was afraid of this. But Amy was infuriated at the whole concept and told me in no uncertain terms that I would not be getting samples of her children’s DNA and basically told me to f off for asking, several times in several variations.

I pressed Luke, and honestly he was a bit useless but probably right. He tried to convince Amy but she wouldn’t hear of it, and he kind of shrugged to me when I pushed him for further support. Because he can’t force her to get the tests done, if she refuses, that’s really a dead end. Trust me, it is, I looked into this quite a bit and consulted with my lawyer.

The problem is, Luke could, in theory, petition the court to demand a paternity test for Tom and the others. The issue is that, to do this, he’d essentially be claiming he slept with Amy and he believes her children to be his. That would be the version of events he’d be maintaining.

But Luke has staunchly insisted that nothing ever happened with Amy. That he never cheated on me. Whether or not he’s being honest about this is another story, but he’d essentially have to go on record and make a claim that he isn’t prepared to make. He is quite certain the children aren’t his and he has no intention of fighting for custody of them.

So no judge is going to compel Amy to submit samples of her children’s DNA. Tom is also old enough that his consent would be a factor. If both he and Amy refuse to participate in the test, it’s unlikely that Luke would have a case. He’d have to “target” one of Amy’s younger children, like say, one of the twins.

But he doesn’t want to do that. He doesn’t want to take his best friend to court to prove something that, in his words, he already knows isn’t true. Luke is asking me to please just let this go, and trust him, because pursuing this will fracture everything. And according to my lawyer, it’s not realistic anyway.

For Luke to establish paternity, he would need to admit to an affair in the first place, and he’s not doing that. And if he did, that would pretty much be all the proof I needed to be certain, even if I’d need more in a court case.

I pestered him further about Tom and Sophie. Insisted that I didn’t want them dating. Luke agreed, and apparently Amy still agrees. Luke plans to have a talk with Tom and activate protective papa bear mode. Among other things, he’s going to remind Tom that in a couple of months when he turns eighteen, him being intimate with Sophie will literally be a crime.

I…wouldn’t actually press charges against him as I know he’d never do anything against Sophie’s will, but I’m not above implying the threat. Thankfully, Luke isn’t either.

I did ask him if he’d be open to potentially swiping a sample of Tom’s DNA to do a private paternity test, but he was very hesitant about the idea. Like me, he viewed it as unethical. He also pointed out that if we were to do this and Amy found out, it would mean the end of our friendship with her, most likely.

Things are, Luke believes, still in a salvageable state, where Amy and I could reconcile and become friends again, and I can see how much he wants this to happen. But, if I did a DNA test on Tom behind Amy’s back and she found out, I think she would hit the roof and I wouldn’t entirely blame her.

Though I’d be very interested to see the results. Luke ended up going to see Amy and spending the night. I know all of you are cringing and throwing up your hands, and trust me, I wasn’t happy about it.

That was a very long conversation. But he was adamant that he needed to perform damage control. So they spent the night together. With Luke maintaining that nothing happened. I did not sleep a wink and I kept texting him for updates. So far as I can tell, Amy will cool off, but she needs a little time.

Luke and I talked things over when he came back the next morning. It was an emotionally fulfilling conversation and we ended up agreeing to take the kids (our kids, not Amy’s) to visit their grandparents for a few days.

It was an impromptu visit but we’ve done it before and they were delighted to have us. I just really wanted our family to spend some time together away from Amy’s “side” of the family, so to speak.

I always love getting to see my in-laws. (I’ll refer to them as “Jim” (75 M) and “Cat” (67F) . I know Reddit is famous for stories about the “MIL from hell” but in my life that couldn’t be further from the truth. I feel safe with them.

To the point that, when they took notice of how distant Luke and I were from each other, I finally relented and confessed my fears. I told them of my anxiety that Amy and Luke were having an affair, and that Amy’s children might be his. Here’s where things got a little bit interesting. When I told them what I was feeling, Cat just gave Jim this pointed look, and did a big, dramatic sigh.

So it turns out, Cat has had similar misgivings to mine and genuinely suspected over the years that Luke and Amy were closer than they’d ever admit, that they had crossed the line in the past. Jim, on the other hand, simply refuses to even consider the idea.

He has always insisted that Cat is seeing things that aren’t there. He maintains that Luke and Amy are “like siblings” and would “never” do such a thing. Cat thinks his stance on this is naive and that, even if she and Jim had taken Amy in and loved her like a daughter, that didn’t mean Luke viewed her as a sister or that she viewed him as a brother.

But Jim just continued to insist that this is what they are and had always been. I could tell that he and Cat have already had this conversation before, and they kept going in circles, with Cat getting exasperated.

She pointed out that, surrogate siblings or not, Luke and Amy were not actually brother and sister, so nothing was stopping them from being physical together if they felt a mutual attraction.

At that point, Jim just sighed and walked away from the conversation. So yes, Cat has privately wondered if Amy’s children weren’t fathered by Luke, which is part of why she has always treated them as her grandchildren.

Which was never something that I minded, to be clear. I also don’t mind that Cat never voiced these concerns to me. She had no proof, and she saw far less of Luke and Amy’s closeness in our adult lives than I did.

As for the kids? They’re doing alright. I don’t know what Amy told her children, but I think the general consensus, the “official” version of events, is that Amy and I had a “fight” and need a “break” from each other. That’s what Luke and I told our children, and when pressed for more information, Luke did defend me and shut down the questions, saying it wasn’t their business.

I don’t know if Amy kept to that version of events, but my children and her children have each other’s phone numbers and social media, so they’ve presumably still been in contact over the last two days. I think my kids would have kept Amy’s kids in the loop on the updates, and if Amy had told them anything else significant, they would have relayed that information to my kids.

After all, we know Sophie and Tom are very close. I did try and talk to Sophie about that more, but the timing was off, because Sophie rejected my counsel and interpreted my reinforced reluctance as being attributed to my fight with Amy. She maintained that she wasn’t dating Tom (to what degree that’s actually true…I don’t know.)

But she was going to remain close friends with him and while she isn’t usually a disobedient child, she made it very clear that she was putting her foot down on this one, and, to be fair, I can’t really justify trying to separate them or forbid them from being friends.

They’ve known each other for years. Luke has my back on them not being allowed to date, but he wouldn’t have my back on them not hanging out anymore.

I wish I had a more definitive update. If anything significant happens in the next few days, I can let you guys know. I’m mostly just kicking myself for not having done the secret test, even for my own peace of mind, as now I feel like I’m locked out of the only way to get definitive proof one way or the other.

Relevant Comments

OOP on Luke’s father possible covering for him and if his mom, Cat, suspects the same thing

OOP: Jim being "in on it" did cross my mind. He's a good man but Luke is his son, if it came to it, he'd probably support him, though I feel like he'd condemn the affair.

One thing he said toward the end of the argument was that Luke is a good man and has been a good husband to me, and did Cat really think he'd see another woman. And Cat just looked at him and said "If the other woman was Amy? Then maybe."

Update 3 (a few days later):

I didn’t expect to have another update so quickly, but after posting my first update I did a lot of thinking about my kids. I ultimately decided that whatever else happened, I needed to warn Sophie about the situation, and do so immediately. To hell with Luke and whatever that meant for him. To hell if that meant all of the kids learned of the situation. She needed to be aware of what she might be getting herself into.

So I discreetly kept her out of school. We went back home, to our home, last night, and this morning, I dropped everyone off and saved Sophie for last, before driving right past her school and telling her that we needed to talk.

Always a frightening thing for a teenager to hear from a parent, but I was quick to establish that she was not in trouble, but she needed to know the truth about why Amy and I were fighting, why her dating Tom was out of the question.

I very gently explained that because of Luke’s closeness to Amy and Tom’s resemblance to him, I had come to suspect that perhaps Luke and Amy were intimate at some point over the years. If that was true, and there was any chance Tom’s father was actually Luke, that would be a significant problem.

Sophie was quiet during all of this, and even after I had stopped talking to let her respond, she paused for quite a while, before she finally said that we needed to get Tom and discuss this with him as well. I had no objections, so she texted him to meet with us.

They’re both skipping school today, but Sophie gets straight As and this is extremely important, so I looked the other way. Tom came to meet us, and Sophie had me relay what I told her to him as well. I apologized to him for any indication I might have given that I didn’t think he was “good enough” for my daughter, and to both of them for not telling the truth sooner.

Tom and Sophie just gave each other this oddly knowing stare. And, Reddit, that’s when they blew my mind.

Sophie spoke first, with Tom backing her up. They revealed to me that in fact, they had already known about Luke and Amy, or at least they had strongly suspected. Apparently Tom has overheard conversations that are…questionable. As well as overhearing the sounds of se% from Amy’s room, sounds he would just as soon forget, but all signs point to Amy’s lover having been Luke.

Tom had wondered for a very long time, and back in January, he finally voiced his fears to Sophie. She agreed with them. She could also see a strange sort of closeness between her father and his mother.

They agreed that Luke was likely having an affair. They agreed that, because of Kaylee’s allergy, Luke might very well be her father. And if Kaylee was Luke’s daughter, the rest of Tom’s siblings could be Luke’s as well. Tom could be Luke’s kid himself. The math led them to the same places as me.

So Sophie and Tom came up with a little plan. As it turns out, they are not in love! They never were. They’re still just best friends.

But they had the same instinct as me, that they didn’t want to blow up our entire family and social unit without more direct evidence (which Tom has been working on acquiring) and though Sophie very badly wanted to tell me the truth, she was hesitant because she knew it would shatter me.

She had no idea I was already suffering in silence. Sophie apologized for not voicing her suspicions sooner. Honestly, we both cried, and I made sure she understood that none of this was her fault, and that I loved her very much.

So, the bottom line is, Sophie and Tom already know they could be half-siblings and aren’t actually interested in being a couple. That was their idea for how to rock the boat.

To force Luke and Amy to do something about the situation rather than just keep making a fool out of me. I also think it was Tom/Sophie’s way of punishing them for their affair. Teenagers can be vindictive. So they concocted this idea that they wanted to date.

Every flirtation I’ve witnessed, every inappropriate touch - all staged, apparently, and for the benefit of Luke, Amy, or both. This was supposed to make them sweat and Sophie/Tom expected they would jump out of their seats to forbid it from happening.

When I was the one who did instead, that kind of threw the kids for a loop. They couldn’t understand why I cared more than the actual cheaters. They began to suspect that maybe I knew. Tom confronting me that one time about “Why can’t I date Sophie” was him trying to gauge if I knew or not.

Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised. Sophie and Tom have always been close friends and confided in each other. Maybe I should be a little more concerned at how sneaky they’ve been, but honestly I’m just so relieved they’re not dating.

(Sure, they could be lying to throw off the scent, I guess, but they apparently already knew that they’re likely related, they didn’t blink at all when I told them.) We even had a bit of a laugh together when Tom mentioned how he had been “a little offended” that I was so against him dating my daughter before.

I kind of jokingly asked him, “So you don’t think she’s gorgeous?” And Tom, bless his heart, shrugged it off. “She is. But so is my English Teacher, and I’m not asking her out either.”

Either way, the question now is…where to go from here? We have to figure that out. I will say that it is such a relief to have told Sophie and I feel like an elephant has taken one of its feet off my chest. Having her in my corner, and Tom in my corner as well, means a lot to me, and even though I basically just got it absolutely confirmed that Luke is sleeping with Amy…I kind of already knew that anyway.

So now it’s just a question of how to proceed. Tom has already volunteered to submit his DNA so I can compare it to Luke’s, and both he and Sophie advise me not to tell Luke and Amy when I do this, which I agree with. They’re both completely on my side, which means more to me than I can ever express to them.

Tom has also been trying to set up a camera in Amy’s room to catch her and Luke in the act. Sophie told me flat out that I needed to divorce her Dad, and hearing that from my own daughter made it clearer than it’s ever been. She’s right.

Click here for part 2

Sources: Reddit
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