Thread: Family Confrontation

My cousin Andy recently married just under a week ago. This is his second marriage, after an impulsive and disastrous marriage to a stripper over a decade ago, which ended in divorce 5 years later.

Andy's new wife, Angela, seemed perfect. She is goal oriented and has a better salary than his, which is already high. She has traveled the world, and has even worked in a few countries for a few companies. It seemed like meeting her made up for the previous marriage...except for one problem.

Michelle, Andy's sister who had moved to the other side of the country a year ago, was part of the bridal party. To her surprise, 2 days after the wedding, her long time boyfriend proposed to her. Still on the East Coast for a bit, she was waiting until the next day to spread the news to her (our) family, but had already divulged it to her parents. That same night, Andy called, wanting to speak with his sister. But Michelle dreaded this call.

The day before, one day after the wedding, Andy and Angela wanted people to come to their home and watch them open their wedding gifts, but had neglected to announce this at the reception. Angela was annoyed that only immediate family from each side came, but each family tried to quell this feeling by focusing on the happiness of the wedding. Angela hadn't slept, though. She drank all through the night, and was still on the wedding drunk fix, with Andy being the same.

At the end of the gift open bore-fest, both familes left, with Michelle and her soon to be fiance hesitating departure. Michelle wanted to address an issue she had with Angela's family. During the reception a cousin of Angela's became a bit to aggressive in trying to dance with Michelle while her boyfriend got a drink. His hands got a bit touchy, and Michelle actually had to say something to him about it, hoping that it wouldn't result in a fight between her boyfriend and this stranger. It didn't, but she felt the need to bring it up with Angela just because she felt humiliated by the advances.

Surprisingly, Angela became verbally insulting to Michelle. "That's the way my family is," Angela quipped. "My cousins...my uncle, they all grab at you. They grab at your ass," which Angela then did to Michelle, hand groping at a chunk of flesh. "They'll also grab at your boobs," Angela then grabbed Michelle's breasts, with Michelle pulling at Angela's wrists to leg go. "Oh my god, get the fuck over yourselves. My family's Italian. That's they way they are. So what if they grab? How prudish are you people?!"

Michelle was shaken, with her boyfriend watching, uncertain how to react. "We don't do that," Michelle abruptly shouted. "Don't ever touch me like that again."

Michelle and her boyfriend left, and the next day the boyfriend proposed. For the two of them, the incident the day before was something to forget as just a drunk getting out of hand.

But now back to when Andy called, with Michelle's reasoning for dreading the call being the fear of having to talk to Angela. She expected to hear an apology from her brother, which would be okay, but it was still a weird episode. All she wanted to do was tell her brother she was engaged, and get off the phone as quickly as possible.

Andy's words were slurred, as he was still drinking from the wedding, two days prior. He had no response to Michelle saying she was engaged, and instead said, "Hey, Angela's got something she needs to say to you." Michelle awaited the vain apology. Angela got on the phone and told her now sister-in-law that she wanted to meet up this weekend, but, fortunately, Michelle and her fiance were going to visit her fiance's family, who lived a few hours away. They were going to stay at the fiance's for the remainder of their stay on this coast, so she wouldn't be able to see Angela again. Angela became defensive, questioning if she was being avoided by Michelle, making the conversation more awkward.

Suddenly, Angela began to start laughing. Strange laughing. It became more intense, but there was no reason for the laugher. Angela began to laugh more and more through the phone, and both Michelle and her fiance looked at the house phone, baffled by the laughter. Then it almost rapidly transitioned to sobbing. Angela began to loudly cry into the phone. "Are you okay, Anne?" Both Michelle and her fiance waited for a response.

"Now I remember why I called you," Angela started. "You know why? Because I hate you. I fucking hate you, you fucking whore. You mother-fucking bitch! I fucking hate you so much! I just fucking hate you!" Angela was screaming this louder and louder, her voice cracking as she became more violent over the phone. Michelle's fiance grabbed the phone and hung it up. He held it down on the phone station, adding that "If she calls back, we won't answer. Your parents are in bed, so we'll just let it ring."

Michelle hadn't moved. She started to tremble. "What'd I do?" She waited for the fiance to tell her the answer, but he could only shrug. They turned out the remaining house lights, and sat in the darkness together.

Time passed...maybe ten minutes. Then, abruptly, a car came to screeching halt in the driveway. Then footsteps outside. And then a sudden pulse of rapid bings. The doorbell being pushed.

Michelle and her fiance turned to each other in panic. They approached the front door of the house in the darkness, knowing that they couldn't be seen by the people outside. From a window beside the door, they saw Andy. "It's your brother," the fiance whispered. The fiance then looked to the other window beside the door, jerking back. "Shit! She's here."

The doorbell stopped ringing. Metallic crunching began to be heard. The door handle started to jiggle. Andy was using his key to his parents place to get them in. Michelle turned, ran, kept running, she ran to the back door of the house, flew out it, ran down the long back yard, made her way to the woods in the distance, the cool grass making her bare feet rise faster, until she found a large tree to hide behind, just like she did when she and Andy were kids.

Meanwhile, the fiance locked the back door, turned, and took a seat in a room.

Andy and Angela came into the home, turning on a trail of lights as they moved though, with Angela calling out for Michelle. Instead, she found her fiance. "Oh...it's Ed." The fiance looked at Angela, who literally had a wine glass in her hand, some wine still remaining in it.

Ed asked, "Why are you here?"

Angela paused, caught off guard by the question. "I'm here," she started. "I'm here to...get some stuff. We need milk."

Angela stumbled over to the refrigerator. She grabbed the first thing she could, but it wasn't milk. She stumbled back to the hallway, clearly signaling Andy to take over.

Andy then stumbled into the back room, blurting out, "Ed, where's my sister?"

"Andy, are you drunk? You drove here and you're drunk?!"

"Ed, where's Michelle?"

"Just go home, Andy."

"Ed..."

"Andy, your parents are asleep upstairs. Just go home, and she and I will try and forget all about this."

"I'm not going to ask you again, Ed." Andy moved his way over to the fiance, who was still seated. Standing over him, Andy stood tall, making a tough guy face. "Don't make me hurt you!"

Fortunately, the awkward moment was interrupted by the sound of a car horn. Outside, Angela was honking the horn, tired of waiting. Andy turned to the bitch whistle that beckoned him, but not before turning back to the fiance. "Heard you proposed...took you long enough." Andy then moved out of the house, and drove off with his wife.

The next day, Michelle and her fiance came over to my mom's house, where I am. We're not even 5 minutes away, so their visit was expected, but this story was not. They told it to my mom, hoping she'd have an answer about what to do. Both of Michelle's parents claimed they didn't hear the confrontation. They weren't able to hear the phone call, the car screeching outside to a stop, the constant ringing of the door bell, the back and forth of Andy and the fiance, or even the car horn...or maybe they didn't want to.

Michelle kept saying she knew her parents would ignore it. This is Andy's second marriage. Their family is Catholic, so the first marriage and divorce was an extreme embarrassment to his parents. Now insult is escalated by learning his 2nd wife is crazy in less than a week of being wed. Michelle was afraid to go back home, so we let her and her fiance stay with us late into the night, but we didn't know what to do.

Michelle made us keep the story quiet, as she didn't want this to get out, which is why I'm typing this here. My concern is not just over Angela's violent, verbal attack on Michelle, who did nothing wrong, but also the manipulation of Andy. He's a coward, a pussy, a dip-shit, absolutely. But it also seemed clear that Angela had no control, and he had no control of her. His spineless acts endangered his own sister.

I'm also alarmed by Angela's statements about her touchy family. This sounds like a girl who was molested as a child, and has grown to accept it as part of her family. Her even adding that her family 'being Italian' makes it okay shocks me, as she's making excuses for it. I fear the idea of she and Andy having children, as I wonder what type of environment they would raise their kids in.

But what can I do? Do I tell other people in my family? Or should I keep my mouth shut and let my cousin(s) and his wife sort this out? What if they try to keep it quiet? Isn't this a concern? And how the fuck did no one notice this behavior prior to the wedding?

Someone please help.

Why did you write this up like a piece of fiction?

Hard to treat this as a real query and provide an answer. I think that the you character won't be able to do anything. The situation will just have to play out. Pretty good writing though!