‘My husband was everything she was looking for, the neighbor confessed’
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In the beginning it was all holadijee, until Mariska found out how her new neighbors really were.
Mariska (35), married and mother of Kyran (9), Livia (6) and Bowie (1):
“We were so happy when our neighbors – a family of six who shouted us out of bed at 6:30 every morning through the wall – announced that they were going to sell their house. Five months later, Pauline and Sami moved into the house with their two children – the other part of our semi-detached house – and that was a huge relief.
No more noise pollution, and as a bonus a friendship that quickly developed. It actually started with Sami and my husband Marcel, they went running and cycling together and regularly ended on a terrace. ‘She on the beer, we on the wine’, Pauline and I would text each other, and so we spent the necessary weekend afternoons together. We often joined together for dinner, also because the children were playing so much fun together.
A copy of her ex
During one of those dinners – we had already consumed the necessary alcohol – it was about exes. Laughing at first, but the atmosphere grew awkward when Pauline confessed that her ex was a copy of Marcel. And that she still missed him sometimes. Because such a man was all she’d ever wanted. The funny thing was that Sami was wrong and didn’t mind at all that his wife said this about her ex. I myself was just shifting in my chair, hoping we could change the subject soon. Marcel laughed it all away, anyway his way of dealing with situations he doesn’t know how to handle.
Also read – Friendship broken: ‘I always went beyond my own limits’ >
To flirt
In the time that followed, I tried to forget what Pauline had said, but she didn’t make it easy for me. When Marcel came close, something in her attitude changed. Then she got giggly and flirtatious. Marcel told me not to make it bigger than it was, but it just was. And it kept getting worse. It didn’t stop with laughing and flirting, she also touched him all the time when it wasn’t necessary. Even the kids noticed.
“She came to borrow Coke in a tiny bikini”
In the summer it was also bad: Pauline had put a bath for the children in the garden, where she then lay down in a minuscule bikini. Until she realized she had run out of Coke and came to borrow it from us. She knew perfectly well that Marcel was home alone, he worked from home. She probably hadn’t counted on me coming home just then.
No idea what you’re talking about
I trust my husband one hundred percent. No matter how hard Pauline tried, Marcel didn’t go along with it. But that doesn’t change the fact that her showy attempts to flirt with him started to irritate me more and more. So much so that I even asked her directly if she wanted to stop. But then she acted like she didn’t know what I was talking about. The friendship between us was already a lot less then, Marcel and I kept off contact very much.
And now it’s done
The bomb exploded at a neighborhood party last September. Pauline looked sixteen, the way she walked around in her dress that was way too tight and with her flirty look. Even Sami seemed to be bothered by it, but not so much that he said anything. Pauline kept fluttering around Marcel, really embarrassing.
“She looked sixteen, the way she walked around in her much too tight dress and with her flirty look”
Other neighbors noticed it too and everyone laughed about it, until Pauline got really drunk and sat on Marcel’s lap. It was like a kind of lap dance, very special.
Then I was completely done with it and screamed that she had to get away from my husband. Marcel himself also said that he had had enough of her crazy flirting and we left the party with our children. Since then, the atmosphere has been icy, but the good news is: the flirting has stopped.”
This article can be found in Kek Mama 05-2022.
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