Woman HORRIFIED by best friend's behavior at family friend's wedding; 'Should I go NC? She literally FRAMED my sister.' UPDATED 2X

When this woman is disgusted by her friend's behavior at a wedding, she asks the internet:

"My [24F] best friend [23F] did something horrible at a mutual family friend's wedding, and blamed it on my younger sister [19F]. I am considering cutting ties with her but am having a hard time"

This is a bit of an unusual situation, but I'll try to explain it as best as I can. The story involves myself [24F], my best friend Caroline [23F], my younger sister Nicola [19F], and our mutual friend / groomsman Daniel [28M].

Using real names because I know Caroline doesn't Reddit, and if anyone who witnessed this happens to see this I'd love for them to get the ACTUAL facts of the story.

So over the weekend a very good family friend of both my family and Caroline's family was getting married. Caroline and I have been best friends for years - we met when we were toddlers, our moms are best friends, our sisters are friends, etc etc - you get the picture. Needless to say her behavior SHOCKED me.

We knew that both of our families would be invited to this wedding and we were looking forward to it for months. It's important to note that Caroline's family and my family have a ton of mutual friends, and this was going to be a very large wedding (guest count was in the 500s).

Everything was going fine and dandy until Caroline got completely wasted. She kept talking to me about how hot one of the groomsmen (Daniel) was, and how she'd had a crush on him for years but he showed no interest.

This was probably because he was in a serious relationship and had been dating his current girlfriend for ~6 years. The girlfriend decided not to attend this wedding because she didn't know the bride and groom very well and because Daniel would be a groomsmen she wouldn't see him very much either.

Fast forward a couple of hours and Caroline is hanging all over Daniel. She's constantly asking him to dance with her, get her drinks from the open bar, etc. She's point blank throwing herself at him and it was embarassing and painful to watch.

I tried intervening a couple of times to get her off of him, but she snapped at me and at that point I decided that it wasn't my problem.

Furthermore, Daniel wasn't completely pushing her away! He looked like he had a few drinks in him as well and seemed somewhat interested in Caroline. I decided that if he didn't care I certainly wasn't going to. If he wanted to throw his relationship away it was none of my concern. I tried.

I didn't witness this next part, but by the end of the night Caroline and Daniel were having se% in a different room of the hall (yes it escalated quickly).

To their misfortune, someone (I'm not sure who, just that it was someone's mom who knew Daniel and his girlfriend, but didn't know Caroline) walked in on them, and for some reason Caroline told this woman that she was Nicola (my sister)!!

I don't know if she was embarrassed or drunk or what, but she purposely identified herself as Nicola so Caroline herself would not be in trouble.

Word QUICKLY spread that Daniel and Nicola were caught having sex, and Nicola was mortified. People were talking about how disrespectful, homewrecking, rude, slutty Nicola was!

I honestly can't even blame them - had I not known better, I would be thinking the same things. On top of that, Caroline had gone around actually telling other people that it was Nicola and confirming the rumour she started!

The bride and groom were pissed, everyone was talking badly about my sister and Caroline seemed to not care. In fact, when I confronted her about the situation at the wedding she straight up denied it! Had Daniel not confirmed that it was Caroline he was hooking up with and not Nicola I might have even believed her.

The next day Caroline texted Nicola a half hearted apology about the whole thing, saying she was "so drunk" and "didn't know what she was doing." The texts included a lot of "lol"s and "haha"s, so I'm not sure how seriously Caroline is taking the situation.

She doesn't seem to realize how mortified Nicola is. Nicola genuinely thinks that her life is ruined. We live in a very tight knit community, and a lot of people have heard the false version of what went down.

I'm at odds with what to do. Up until this point, Caroline had been a very good friend to both I and Nicola. I'm just not sure if I can forgive her for this, especially considering her lack of consciousness about how bad the situation really is. Should I dump her? Or should I give her another chance?

Our friendship will be different regardless, my family sees Caroline in a completely different light now, so even if I forgave her we wouldn't be able to do a lot of the same things we used to (hang out at my house, do things with my family, etc).

What should I do, Reddit?

EDIT: At this point, a lot of people know that it was Caroline with Daniel, and not Nicola. However I'm not sure how many is "a lot." Our family friends know, but there were a lot of guests at the wedding who knew Caroline's family better than they did mine. I'm sure these people still think it was Nicola.

EDIT 2: Another issue is that Nicola is also terrified of the potential ramifications from Daniel's current girlfriend. I have absolutely no updates on the situation with the girlfriend, I don't know her well and I don't know what Daniel has chosen to share with her, if anything at all.

EDIT 3: Because a lot of people are asking me how I could even consider remaining friends with Caroline - prior to this experience, she was honestly a great best friend. Of course we've had our ups and downs like all friends do, but she has always been a kind and caring person and I really valued our friendship.

I've known her my whole life and the evening at the wedding was very uncharacteristic of her (including her coming onto a man who was in a relationship). Throwing away a friendship with someone who you have been close with for 15+ years is extremely difficult, however am I prepared to do this if it's the right thing to do.

tl;dr: Best friend hooked up with a taken groomsman at a mutual friend's wedding, when got caught said she was my sister. Everyone was upset with my sister and I don't know how to proceed.

RELEVANT COMMENTS

OtherKindofMermaid: If Caroline wants to continue your friendship, she needs to make this right and tell everyone that she lied. If she doesn't, then I would personally cut ties. Being drunk is no excuse for what she did.

I think Nicola needs to stand up for herself, as well. She should be very clear with people that she would never do something like that. Tell her not to let someone else ruin her reputation. If Caroline won't set the record straight, Nicola, you, and your family can.

OOP: Thanks for the suggestion - I haven't actually considered asking Caroline to go public and own up to the situation. I think I'll do this, I actually have no idea how she will react. Caroline is usually a decently moral person but she also hates confrontation so I wonder how she'll take that.

My family and I have been trying to set the record straight but it's really hard to un-do a rumour that has spread around to so many people (a lot of which we are not that close with), mostly because nobody actually wants to talk about it to us directly. Most of the talk goes on behind our backs but of course we know it's happening.

Before we give you OP's updates, let's take a look at some top responses:

gahau writes:

Everyone's saying Caroline needs to correct this, which is true, but if she refuses, I'd go to Daniel and ask him to straighten things out. Point out how much worse it looks for him if everyone thinks he was fg a drunken teen than the woman in her mid-twenties who was all over him.

Regardless, you and Caroline are never going to be quite the same again. Maybe in the instant I could see blurting out a false name (though I don't know why you'd pick that of a real person or how this whole thing went down.

What, did the busy body open the door and Caroline swivel around to shake her hand and introduce herself? Fg weird all round) but then to hold to that? Let everyone slut shame an innocent teenager? Despicable.

feash writes:

I had a best friend who messed up massively while "drunk" a couple of years ago. She slept with my boyfriend during a night of partying after I had fallen asleep in the next room (of my apartment)!

She denied for days even despite the fact that my boyfriend had told me. When confronted, she said she did it because she thought I was a bitch. I haven't spoken to her since and have no plans to.

At the end of the day, how important is this friendship. Is this something that you could see her repeating some day or doing something of a similar caliber? Would she be willing to own up and help you and your family set the record straight?

I mean this is all very sketchy and I would think it would be incredibly hard to trust her again. I know that after my incident, I had a hard time trusting any of my friends around my boyfriends.

Personally, I would cut ties and help your family fix the mess and move on from it. It's not worth the stress.

chirapra writes:

Caroline can have consensual se% with whoever she wants. The actual wrongdoing was done by daniel, and whoever walked in on them and then blabbed all over the family.

Yes, caroline lied and it hurt your sister, and may she be judged for those consequences, but the actually Really Bad thing is the rumor-spreader, especially when she didn't know if it was true.

I would suggest avoiding the people who give any amount of shit what some random mom says about Nicola - those are the people who are actually toxic, you just learned it sooner because of the lie.

If you have any part in this brand of rumormongering, even if you didn't in this case, I firmly advise that you reconsider your own behavior. Whatever "tight-knit" community you have sounds particularly toxic to me and I'd advise you to rethink how you affect one-another negatively.

beabewa writes:

What an awful situation! Your sister is the innocent party here & must be feeling terrible. I think your friend Caroline needs to understand the full repercussions of her actions here. Not in sleeping with Daniel (I agree with Chiropractor below; that's his issue, not hers), but in indirectly attributing her actions to your sister.

Caroline may have been a good friend in the past, but she is certainly not demonstating this in her current behaviour & actions. I would explain this to her & the effects on Nicola and give her the opportunity to come over and apologise to your sister (and your family) for the stress she has put her through.

It may be unpleasant & she may not feel verybwelcome in your family home, but a heartfelt apology in the cold & sober light of day might go some way to help repair some relationships.

If she seems reluctant or is unable to bring herself to do this, then I would definitely reconsider your friendship - you don't need selfish people like that in your life. Either way, good luck & I hope Nicola recovers from this unfortunate situation soon.

straightpep writes:

I'm not at all surprised by the end result of Caroline not getting held accountable - everyone in this circle (excluding Nicola) sounds trashy af.

Caroline is so thirsty she's been throwing her kitty at a taken person for the better part of a decade. OOP knew that Caroline was seducing someone in a relationship but did nothing to stop it.

Forget the morality of it (because people can argue how much accountability is assigned to whoever) - you knew your BFF was doing some risky, tacky shit that would ruin your friend's wedding day. And she was caught! So now whenever somebody brings up the wedding they're going to talk about Caroline hunching on the groomsman.

They're all at the age where you start side-eyeing them because this isn't something you can write off as being young and dumb. They're closer to mid-twenties than early twenties at this point - it's just their character.

aruka writes:

I've gotta say the fact OOP is still willing to be friends with such a shit person like Caroline makes me think she is a asshole as well. Granted, maybe that can change but with how it seems at the end, her annoyance at what happened isn't enough to cut ties.

Caroline throwing OOP's sibling under the bus to cover for her cheating is just ugh and the fact she was praised for a confession she wasn't going to do is infuriating. I shouldn't have read this story before going to bed, now I'm just annoyed as hell.

Update 1:

First off, I wanted to give a HUGE thank you to everyone who responded. I definitely did not expect such a large of amount of help and guidance from everyone. This community is awesome and I really appreciate everyone's time and advice.

I unfortunately could not respond to very many people's posts as I left the thread overnight and once I woke up it was locked, so I figured the least I could do is provide an update.

So about a week and a half ago Caroline casually called me and asked to sleep over. She wanted to attend an event downtown and my place was much closer to the event than hers.

At this point, it became very clear that Caroline had no idea anybody was upset with her, despite the fact that Nicola and I hadn't spoken with her since the wedding. I told Caroline that I didn't think her sleeping over was a good idea, and when she had asked why, I brought up what happened at the wedding.

She laughed and said Nicola needed to grow up and get over it, and it really seemed like she expected me to agree and laugh along with her!

Well Reddit, I took your advice and let her have it. I told her how selfish and inconsiderate she was, and if it truly was "no big deal," then she should have no problem taking full responsibility for her actions and publicly acknowledging that SHE was the one who hooked up with Daniel, and not Nicola.

I told her she needed to make things right because Nicola was still mortified over something she didn't do.

At the end of the phone call I gave her an ultimatum - post an apology to Facebook, and spill the beans about what actually happened, or our friendship was over (thanks to the Redditor who suggested this!).

To my complete and utter surprise, she did it. I thought it would make me feel better, but people were actually commenting on her FB status commending her bravery, and the fact that she "did the right thing!"

I was super annoyed because of course she would never have done this had I not forced her to. But at the end of the day, Nicola is happy and her name is in the clear.

Oh, and an update on Daniel and his girlfriend: According to his Instagram, they are happily together. Whether or not she knows about Caroline, I don't know and I don't care. Not my trainwreck.

tl;dr: Gave Caroline an ultimatum to post the truth on Facebook or stop being friends. She posted it on Facebook. Daniel and his girlfriend are still happily together. I'm still rolling my eyes.