Friendly neighbors can make a new house feel like home, but when does kindness cross the line?

What would you do if you thought a neighbor was flirting with your spouse? Would you confront your spouse about it, or would you go behind your spouse’s back and confront the neighbor?

This man let the neighbor kids paint outside with him, and the kids’ mom often hung out with them too.

Her husband didn’t like that, and now the neighbor’s wondering if he messed up.

Read the story below to find out more.

AITA for telling neighbors wife why I stopped hanging around their kids?

I (27M) just moved into my new house a couple of months ago in a nice neighborhood.

It was a house my late uncle was renting out.

He left it to me

The neighbors next door have 2 kids, ages 8 and 11.

This man started painting outside his home.

When I first moved in, I started painting outside.

Not a professional, but I used to love it in high school, so I decided to try again since I’m not really busy with work and have the free time.

The neighbor’s children joined his afternoon painting sessions.

The boys would notice me outside in the afternoons, and the eldest asked me once if they could borrow my paint so they can make something, too.

And that’s where it started.

I’m a kids’ guy and hope to have my own one day, so I let them start coming over to paint after they were done with school.

Sometimes, the kids’ mom would also hang out with them.

We got along great, and they enjoyed learning how to paint.

Their mom hangs around when I’m outside with them to look at their work, and I’d chat with her.

This has been an everyday thing for the last couple of months.

The mom’s husband confronted him.

Well, until a few weeks ago, the dad approached me.

This is the second time I’ve seen him since I moved.

He never leaves the house even when they do.

He was really mad because he didn’t appreciate me “flirting” with his wife in front of his own house, and he also doesn’t like that I’m using his kids just to talk to her.

He tried to explain and apologize.

This caught me by surprise.

I’ve never behaved in any way that would be inappropriate around her.

Most of our talks are about her kids or everyday stuff.

I did try to explain and apologize if I crossed any lines.

But he just said to keep my distance from his family.

So, that’s what I ended up doing.

So, he started making excuses to dismiss the kids.

When the kids would come over, I’d tell them that I’m stuck with work stuff.

It makes me sad to bum them out, but I didn’t want to overstep with their dad.

Then on Friday, neighbor’s wife came out while I was watering my lawn.

She said she hopes they didn’t bother me too much and was sorry if they took up so much of my time.

He told the kids’ mom what really happened.

It’s because she thought I stopped having the kids over because I was tired of them or something .

I didn’t want her feeling bad since it probably seemed that way with how I abruptly ended the painting sessions.

So, I told her that her husband didn’t seem happy about it, and he asked me to keep my distance.

He made things worse.

I didn’t go into details, I only said I didn’t want to upset him.

It was obvious she didn’t know from her reaction, but she thanked me for telling her.

But that just seemed to make things worse because he came at me this morning even worse than before.

The husband was enraged, saying they had a fight.

He was beyond mad that I told her anything, and now, it’s my fault they had a fight.

Now, I feel awful.

I really hate conflicts, and the last thing I wanted was to make my new neighbors hate me for causing them issues.

Now, he’s wondering if he did the right thing.

Thinking back now, should I have told her anything?

I really didn’t want any issues but ended up doing that anyways.

Was I the jerk for the way I handled things here and causing them problems?

The husband seems to be overreacting. Maybe he could join the boys on the painting sessions if he’s so worried about the neighbor flirting with his wife.

Let’s find out what others have to say about this on Reddit.

This user thinks the husband was threatened.

Here’s another valid point.

He sounds like a jealous jerk, says this person.

Short and straightforward.

Finally, another honest opinion here.

Some people confuse kindness with flirting.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.