The moment I entered the bar, I felt his eyes on me. He smiled warmly and leaned down to kiss my cheek.
Tall, dark and handsome, my breath caught when I looked at him.
All the nerves I had felt upon meeting him disappeared and in their place I felt a tingling, flushed, warm sensation.
As he leaned his head back and laughed at something silly I’d said, I realized with a start that it felt a lot like a teenage crush.
I can’t possibly like it, right? What the hell was wrong with me? My reaction sickened me. After all, this wasn’t a first date, but rather the first meeting with my newly discovered half-brother, Hugh. So any hint of attraction was completely inappropriate.
However, as the weeks passed, I couldn’t stop thinking about him and looking at photos on his social media accounts with lustful longing.
I appreciate that this is a shocking and disturbing admission. Attraction to a sibling is the ultimate social taboo for good reason.
But when I, in a panic, researched online, I was comforted by the fact that I was not alone.
After we met, I couldn’t stop thinking about my new brother and looking at photos on his social media accounts with lustful longing.
Genetic sexual attraction is a known phenomenon and can occur when close relatives reunite after a long period of separation.
It is not uncommon in cases of adoption or in this era of donor conception, where people can fall in love with a sibling without knowing it.
Apparently it may be because there is a basic human attraction towards those who have similar physical attributes to our own.
Hugh and I look a bit alike with the same eye color and similar features. Some experts believe this is a delayed byproduct of the “missing union.”
In some cases, the power of attraction can be so strong that it wreaks havoc on existing relationships.
In my case, I did not dare to be honest with my husband for ten years. What the hell would he think of me? Inappropriate aside, we were happily married, had three children, and a lovely home. I prayed that it would turn out to be a passing infatuation, albeit a very unpleasant one.
Six months earlier, Hugh’s father had written to me out of the blue, informing me that the kind, gentle father who raised me was not my biological father. My mother, who had died of cancer eight years earlier, had had an affair with him, a family friend she didn’t remember.
Why tell me now? In his letter he said he wanted to contact me after Mom died, but he hadn’t contacted me before because he was married.
It was when his third marriage failed that he asked a mutual friend for my contact details.
At first I thought it was some kind of terrible joke.
My parents had had a normal, happy marriage, right? I had no idea that Mom had ever been unfaithful to me; The revelation was overwhelming.
Everything I had believed – my entire identity – was a lie. My biological father was eager to meet me in person, but first he had to understand everything.
Genetic sexual attraction is a known phenomenon and can occur when close relatives reunite after a long period of separation.
My husband was as surprised as I was and we both wondered if it was true. I talked to my older sister a few days later and she couldn’t believe it either. How could we not have known this about our own mother?
I didn’t respond to my biological father’s letter for weeks, and months passed before I dared to tell my father. How could I address it or ask if he knew? What if he felt differently about me and couldn’t love me anymore?
To this day, we’ve only had one difficult conversation about it. He had no idea that Mom had been unfaithful. I only saw sadness, not anger or bitterness. He kept saying how much he loved Mom and I could see he felt betrayed.
We have always been close and he was a very hands-on father, reading my bedtime story, teaching me how to ride a bike, etc. This revelation changed none of that; If anything, the fact that he wasn’t my biological father, but had unknowingly stepped up to fill that role and become so central to my life, made me love him even more.
Desperate to learn more about my identity, I purchased a DNA test online. He showed that he had a mixed heritage with some Eastern European roots and a dozen distant relatives he had never heard of, including Hugh and two half-sisters.
He had another brother, but since he had never had a DNA test, he didn’t show up. My biological father had already told me that he had spoken to his children, two from his first marriage and two from his second marriage, before contacting me.
While they were surprised, I could contact them directly.
Would they look a bit like me? Would we get along? The first two were a couple of years older than me, the second two more than ten years younger. I imagined Walton-style family dinners around long trestle tables, putting the world to rights over wine.
I discovered that my biological father must have had an affair with my mother when his oldest two were very young. I wasn’t surprised that they weren’t that interested in staying in touch with me at first. Hugh and his sister Jessica were from his second marriage, born years after me, and were receptive from the start.
I had looked them all up online before meeting them in person and couldn’t help but notice that Hugh and his older brother Edward were handsome men.
They had all attended a top boarding school and seemed to have incredibly glamorous lives: yacht parties, music festivals, etc.
Desperate to learn more about my identity, I took a DNA test. It showed that she had about a dozen distant relatives she had never heard of, including Hugh and two half-sisters.
I could have gone to a private school, but it was a day school in the East Midlands. They had clearly had a more prosperous life than me and I was envious of their privilege. One image showed Hugh lounging nonchalantly in a chair, looking directly into the camera. He had a sort of half smile on his lips and a slightly raised eyebrow. With his strong jaw and athletic build, he could have passed for a model. ‘God, it’s beautiful!’ I caught myself thinking.
When I sent a screenshot to three of my closest friends, who had been incredibly supportive of me throughout the entire process, they joked, ‘Wow, he seems just your type!’
In fact, he was the kind of charming, public-school-going kid I would have chosen in my 20s and 30s. But now she was happily married and those days were behind her. Or so I thought… until we met and got along.
The connection with Hugh was instant. Although we both admitted to being nervous, our conversation flowed easily, and despite the craziness of the entire situation, he made me feel very comfortable. “It’s a pleasure to meet you,” he said. I confessed to him how difficult the last few months had been.
He seemed understanding and leaned down to put his hand on my arm. I couldn’t deny the spark of desire that ran through me at his touch. I didn’t want the night to end, but we both had to get up early for work the next day, so I reluctantly said goodbye. When my husband asked me how it went, I said, ‘Good. It was great.’ I couldn’t exactly admit that I’d been attracted to my own brother, could I?
After that I couldn’t stop thinking about Hugh. We followed each other on social media and I studied photographs of him. According to experts, this fascination with a newly found sibling is not uncommon.
I even found myself imagining what it would feel like to kiss him. Would he really feel that bad? Did he feel the same?
Fortunately, there were no such feelings with the other brother, Edward, who got in touch a few weeks later.
He was perfectly pleasant but quite distant when I met up with him and his sister, who kept the conversation going.
Meanwhile, Edward’s eyes continued to look around the room as if he were bored. I was hoping Hugh would come that time too, but unfortunately he was working.
We texted and exchanged voice notes several times, mostly about the strangeness of the situation, but it was hard to keep messages going between work and the kids.
We didn’t meet again until about six months later for a “family” lunch with all the brothers. Seeing Hugh again that second time with the other brothers in tow was less intense.
We chatted politely, but I didn’t feel any of the butterflies I’d experienced the first time, which was a huge relief. A few months later, Hugh unfollowed me on Instagram without any explanation. What had I done to upset him? I felt devastated, but I have my pride, so I unfollowed him too.
In retrospect, it was a success. The lack of contact calmed my mind and helped me focus on real life again.
But that was about a year ago and I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about Hugh since then. But it’s more of a melancholic question than a lustful longing.
I look at his social media from time to time (luckily he hasn’t blocked me) and I can see that he is now with a beautiful blonde girl.
It wasn’t until I met all my half-siblings that I agreed to meet my biological father. Unfortunately, I found him to be a difficult, defensive character and an unreliable narrator.
He has changed his story about his relationship with my mother several times. She went from being the love of his life to someone he had a brief affair with.
More importantly, he has refused to take any responsibility for the damage he has caused by not showing up for 40 years. “It’s been very difficult for me,” he said, hoping for sympathy. In fact, I have no feelings for him. In my eyes, he’s little more than a sperm donor.
I’ll send him a Christmas card this year and the occasional text message, but I don’t feel the need to pursue a proper father-daughter relationship with him.
The bond I hoped to have with the other new siblings has not materialized for one reason or another, but I have accepted it. All in all, it has made me appreciate even more the sister I grew up with and the lovely father who raised me.
Looking back, I’m so glad I didn’t act on my feelings for Hugh; I can only imagine how catastrophic that could have been. It may have been a fleeting fantasy, but at one point it felt very real.
And I will never stop wondering if he felt the same way.
Marianne Thomas is a pseudonym. The names have been changed.