“Survivor” alum Bret LaBelle and his much-younger boyfriend, Chris Stanley, were mistaken for a father and son while shopping together.
Stanley, 23, shared the story in a TikTok video posted on Nov. 27, telling his followers that he and LaBelle, 50, were purchasing a Christmas tree when their cashier made the assumption about their relationship.
“As I was checking out yesterday, buying this beautiful tree — yes, it’s real — my boyfriend is handing the cashier his credit card. But I’m like, ‘No, no, no. Let me pay for this,’ so I get out my credit card, and I hand it to her,” the YouTuber said.
“She gets all excited, and she’s like, ‘Oh, yeah, nice!’ And I’m like, ‘Why is she so excited that I’m paying?’ And she’s like, ‘I believe the more you give, the more you get this holiday season.’ And I’m still kind of like, ‘Why is she saying this?'”
Stanley said with a laugh that the cashier “must have seen the look” on his face because she then asked, “‘This is your dad, right?'”
He recalled looking at LaBelle, who subtly shook his head to indicate that he did not care to inform the woman they were a couple.
“So I’m just like, ‘Yeah, yeah. That’s my dad,'” the social media personality continued. “And I’m left wondering what the look would have been like on her face if I had told her.”
It wasn’t the first time the pair — who often joke online about their 26-year age difference — were mistaken for father and son.
In May, a TikTok user asked Stanley whether LaBelle was his dad, to which the influencer responded, “No, he’s my dad-dy” before giving the reality star a kiss on camera.
The couple started dating after Stanley messaged LaBelle on Instagram during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Sometimes people make the outrageous claim that I was ‘groomed’ or something, which … isn’t the case,” the TikToker told the Advocate in August. “In reality, I am the one who pursued him.”
During the same interview, the Boston Police Department lieutenant acknowledged that his beau “looks young” but made sure to clarify, “He does not look 15.”
LaBelle famously came out as gay on “Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen X” in 2016. He later competed on “The Amazing Race” with his friend Chris Hammons.
