Imagine if you will that you have been accused of a triple murder. Sentenced to a life sentence without the possibility of parole. Twelve jurors in Kentucky found the evidence convincing enough to convict Christian "Kit" Martin for the murders of his neighbors Calvin Phillips, Pam Phillips and Ed Dansereau.
His defense is that he was framed by a vindictive wife (Adele "Joan" Harman) that threatened to ruin him if he divorced her. The jurors got to hear very little about the backstory, a pattern of wild lies and deceptions and accusations against prior men in her lives when things didn't go her way, all discovered by private investigators.
This was a heavy circumstantial case. Joan and her son were allowed to plead the 5th and that fact was not disclosed to the jurors. Out of more than 100 DNA samples tested not one belonged to Kit. There were two key pieces of evidence that convinced these jurors beyond a reasonable doubt the Kit Martin was guilty. Kit claims those two pieces of evidence were planted so lets take a closer look:
First we have the dogtag. I mean, Kit must have done it because he left his dogtag right? There are four critical problems with this evidence:

1. The name on the dogtag read "Martin, Kit" so this dogtag is not military issue. The military only issues tags with the full name (not nicknames) which would have been printed instead "Martin, Christian." Fake souvenir tags can be purchased online (an even in kiosks in some locations) to read what you input on your order. I know a lot of military people and know exactly zero that wear their tags outside of work. But let's say for arguments sake that the souvenir tag really was Kit's. The murders were planned in "precise military fashion" according to the prosecution, yet Kit chooses to put on a souvenir tag with his name on it that morning? I find that very hard to believe.
2. This souvenir tag was tested for fingerprints and DNA and they found none. The prosecution argued that while Kit was cleaning up the blood from the carpet in the foyer, the tag must have kept getting in his way so he took it off and set it up on a shelf. That seems really far-fetched.
3. The tag was on a string and not a break-a-way chain which was also tested for DNA evidence and there was "some DNA evidence" but apparently not enough to make a comparison to Kit's. This seems really off to me. If someone had just committed three murders, I would imagine they would have sweat a bit leaving behind DNA. Yet interestingly there is no DNA evidence on the tag or string matching Kit.
4. Besides the most ridiculous idea that a murderer would even put that tag on before going to commit these murders, he had the forethought to wipe it down real good when removing it when it was in his way (to remove any fingerprints and DNA). Instead of putting it in his pocket, he places it on a shelf and then he forgets to take it when he leaves? Wow, really?

So the second major piece of evidence in this murder case was a spent 45 casing that matched the Glock found in Kit's safe. Here again there are a few problems with this evidence:

1. Kit was portrayed by the prosecution as a highly trained ranger who skillfully planned out these murders (or at least Calvin and Pam's as Ed was an unexpected variable). But then afterwards he walked across the street and placed the murder weapon in his safe instead of ditching it? That's not too bright.
2. The 45 casing was found by family members when cleaning the porch area FIVE months AFTER the murders. This was despite the porch area being processed THREE separate times; once by Christian County Sheriffs Department, once when Detective Scott Smith went to spray the scene with Blue Star (Luminol), and lastly when Crime Scene Investigators came in to try to determine where on the property the shootings took place.
3. The bullets found in Cal's body were not conclusively linked to Kit's Glock in his safe. But the 45 casing found by family members WAS positively identified as being fired from Kit's Glock.
4. Kit testified that when he first moved to the area he hung out with Cal some and did target shooting in Cal's backyard. There is no doubt that Kit was a gun enthusiast, but that does not make a person a murderer. He had spent casings in his backyard, Cal's backyard and in his truck bed. So it would be easy for someone to collect one of Kit's spent casings and plant it on the porch through the latticework.

So there you have it - so much reasonable doubt, zero DNA evidence yet Kit sits in prison with a life sentence. I want justice for the murders of Cal, Pam and Ed as much as anyone but I want the true killes behind bars. The entire case was aired on Court TV but a great book outlining this complicated triple murder along with much of the backstory was just released: https://www.amazon.com/WILL-RUIN-YOU-Twisted-Behind/dp/1960332651/ref=sr_1_1?crid=16F4EJ1ADIAFW&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.0Uv31xRkigJgf0YtFU_hoTDA5NKrUkmCjLdhWuYJt7PGjHj071QN20LucGBJIEps.JPhlG_WJosxW0v7nGrsHoDXG_IlDGM6632INYnJiFwA&dib_tag=se&keywords=emilio+corsetti&qid=1715785721&sprefix=emilio+corsetti%2Caps%2C184&sr=8-1
A good reference for this case is the Dateline episode "The Evil That Watches." https://www.nbc.com/dateline/video/the-evil-that-watches/9000190878
Another good shorter synopsis (though a HUGE mistake is minute 4:25 where he states the phone found in the driveway was determined to be Pam's. It was Ed's phone found in the driveway. Joan was actually the one that took Pam's phone into the ATT store about a month after the murders saying she found it and wanted to get it unlocked (that's a whole crazy part of evidence that also convinces me that Kit is innocent - #joanhadthephone https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2WbFF7SyeSg

Yelena watched the doorway through which the young Ashfield scion had just left for a few moments more as she pondered over the meeting they’d just had.
Precocious indeed, she thought with a smile.
A smile that only grew as her gaze flitted over to her childhood friend’s… complicated expression.
It seemed young William’s decision had come as much a surprise to his instructor as it had come to Yelena herself.
“He said no,” Joana said after a few moments.
Yelena nodded slowly as she reclined into her friend’s surprisingly comfortable chair. Given what she knew of Griffith, the Queen had half expected the thing to be harder than mithril when she first sat down - but it was surprisingly plush.
“Not without good reason,” Yelena said as she shifted about.
“Good reason?” Joana scoffed. “You offered him your daughter’s hand.” Her eyes narrowed slightly. “You offered all of your daughter’s hands.”
Yelena rolled her eyes at her friend’s tone. “And if he’d accepted I would have considered it a bargain.”
A minor scandal and the loss of a number of future marriage alliances was ultimately nothing compared to the ability to raid Kraken nests. And that was ignoring that a hypothetical means to slay kraken in deep water would undoubtedly have other applications.
Applications that would be incredibly useful in the months to come.
Though, perhaps, if young William’s plans came to fruition that coming storm could be delayed by a few years.
“…Are things truly that desperate?” Joana asked quietly.
“They’re not great,” Yelena admitted, massaging the bridge of her nose. “The Blackstones… I knew they’d resist the reforms, but to threaten open rebellion?”
She’d not expected that. Not even in her wildest dreams. Lindholm’s only human ducal house had ever been wilful, and their antipathy towards the Orcs who dwelled in the Sunlands was well documented, but surely even they could see why Yelena was doing what she was.
Regardless of what her critics said, her decision to end the slave trade in Lindholm was most assuredly not the result of ‘useless sentiment’.
Far from it.
Oh certainly, Yelena had no love for the institution of slavery, for reasons both moral and financial, but that wasn’t why she’d created the abolitionist movement.
With each passing year, the Homeland’s view of Lindholm grew ever more covetous. More and more the Sun Empress and Desert Khan’s rhetoric centred less on their ongoing deadlock with each other and more on the idea of ‘recovering wayward territories’.
Certainly, that could have been a reference to Old Growth as much as Lindholm, but Yelena doubted it.
Lindholm might have scared the Solites and Lunites into retreating by choosing to engage them over deep water, but ultimately those victories were borne of a lack of conviction on the part of her foes.
Had the two disparate fleets been willing to risk the permanent loss of a small portion of their mithril cores in order to achieve victory and push towards the mainland, they may well have been able to flip the allegiances of a number of Lindholmian houses.
Oh, certainly, the high elves and dark elves of Lindholm might have prided themselves on maintaining the strictures of equality that defined the Old Empire – but with either Solite or Lunite airships hovering over their family castles, she couldn’t help but wonder if some might reconsider their stances on their fellow elves.
No, while an invasion of Lindholm would certainly be costly, it was entirely within the realm of reason.
An invasion of the Old Growth however?
There was a reason the Wood Elves – as they named themselves – had managed to remain independent of both the other two, much larger, nations despite sharing land borders with both of them.
Their strange magics might have been muted and weak beyond the borders of their home, but within their territory they were nigh invincible.
No, if there was to be any ‘reclamation’ of any territory belonging to the old Aelven Imperium, it was likely to come from Lindholm.
To that end, the kingdom could ill afford to keep feeding people and iron into the meatgrinder that was the Sunlands. Could ill afford to keep orcs that might otherwise be valuable mages laboring in the fields under the eyes of watchful taskmasters.
Lindholm needed every mage-knight it could get – regardless of the color of their skin or the shape of their ears.
Yet after year and years of negotiations and attempts to shift public opinion on the matter, the North still remained willfully ignorant of that truth.
“Surely they know that even if they win, any kind of division between us will just see the Homeland sweep over them?” Joana said.
Yelena shrugged. “I have a feeling that Duchess Blackstone’s victories over both the Lunites and Solites has left her confident of repeating the fact should it come to that.”
Foolhardy, in her eyes, but no one had ever accused the Blackstones of being meek. Nor being incapable of backing up their sometimes insane claims. What other House could lay claim to an ancestry that had once beaten back the Old Imperium at the height of its power?
Where other human nobles had been sworn into the Old Imperium on their knees with their battered armies scattered to the winds, the Blackstones managed to resist long and hard enough that the Imperial Legions had been forced to come to the negotiating table.
Ultimately, the Blackstones had still been absorbed into the Empire, but they’d done so on their terms with their heads unbowed.
…Though it was somewhat ironic that nearly a thousand years on, it was now those same humans in the position of the old Imperial Legion while it was the free orcs who now utilized the same strategies as the old Blackstone tribes – right down to the Wyvern riders.
“I could imagine that,” Joana muttered.
“Is it strange that I think she might pull it off?” Yelena said – though only because she was sure that no one beyond her friend and silent guards was listening.
“Part of me wants to argue that, but… do you think it’s a human thing?”
Yelena thought about the Blackstones and the young man who’d just turned down a chance to be king one day.
“Perhaps,” she admitted.
Personally she thought it was because humans didn’t live as long – and there was more of them. When your life could be measured in but a single century, perhaps you were a bit more inclined towards taking risks that might make an elf balk?
…Risks like trying to take your first year team up against a third year team in the name of trying to avoid a war.
Or at least delay it.
“I still can’t believe he said no to your offer,” Joana said, something… complicated in her friend’s expression.
Yelena grinned at the sight, though she wrestled down the urge to ask a number of probing questions of her normally straight laced friend, who seemed to have a childish crush on a young man nearly ten years her junior – and her student beside.
Normally she’d be all over a scandal that delicious.
Alas, right now was work time. “I can. He gave me his reasons and they were solid.”
Well, solid enough. If you squinted a bit. And tried to think ‘human’.
Rather than all-but guarantee a war by having the Crown break off his betrothal, he intended to do it himself.
Loudly and publicly.
And if he won – and that was a big if – he’d all but destroy any kind of excuse the Blackstones might have to declare war in response. Indeed, by being ‘shamed’ in such a public manner they’d need to spend a few years at least regathering lost support.
After all, who would want to follow a house into a civil war just after their heir was publicly humiliated by a team of cadets two years her junior?
Academy fights weren’t just schoolyard squabbles. They were civil conflicts writ small. A microcosm of the constant jostling and jockeying of Lindholm’s houses.
In other words, they held weight.
If Willaim could beat his fiancée, Yelena knew she’d owe him more than she could ever truly repay. A few more years of preparation would turn an almost guaranteed defeat into something much more even.
Especially if she could scoop up who knows how many mithril cores that were otherwise just littering the ocean. Ninety percent of them would be of limited use immediately, but a few years would give her time to construct at least a few more airship hulls to house the devices.
All that was required was for William to win.
“Solid,” Joana scoffed. “His plan is to go up against a group of third years with a team of firsties.”
Yelena tried to keep the intensity she was feeling out of her tone as she leaned forward. “You don’t think he can do it?”
Joana opened her mouth before hesitating. “I… normally I’d say no. Talented as they are, the gap in experience is just too wide.”
“But…”
The dark elf rolled her silver eyes behind her glasses. “But, with William’s newest invention…” The woman paused. “Son of a bitch.”
For just a moment Yelena was treated to the rare sight of her friend laughing. “I can’t believe I thought he ‘just wanted to use it in a schoolyard fight’,” the Instructor said.
“Well, he sort of is, in a way.” Yelena shrugged. “It just so happens to be a very important schoolyard fight.”
Joana laughed. “I suppose it is.”
“Still, do you think he can win?”
Joana straightened up. “I genuinely don’t know. With his new invention he might be able to catch her off guard. If he can skew the numbers in his favor at the start, they might have a chance.”
Yelena frowned. Not exactly the ringing endorsement she wanted to hear, but that was part of why she valued Joana’s friendship.
Always had really, even when the girl had first come to court at the age of ten as a potential playmate for Yelena’s daughters and told her that her dress made her look like some kind of tropical bird.
Something Yelena realized upon closer inspection was true.
Ever since, the Queen had made a point of checking in with the girl from time to time, if only for the occasional shot of unvarnished truth.
It was a strange ‘friendship’ from the outside looking in, but one that got less so as time went by and the age gap became less stark.
“Well, let’s hope the human capacity for the nigh impossible isn’t relegated entirely to the Blackstones,” Yelena muttered.
Because if it wasn’t, the boy would either have to marry one of Yelena’s daughters or die.
She could not afford the knowledge in his head to reach the Blackstones. To that end, he’d either accept her offer – rolling the dice on the onset of war and all that might come with it – or he’d suffer an accident.
As much as it pained the royal sovereign’s heart to see such a bright and enterprising soul be snuffed out before its time.
Being forced to make such decisions was simply the price of wearing the crown.
“Still,” Joana said, and Yelena was grateful for the distraction as she looked up. “Will you actually leave him alone if he pulls this off?”
Yelena scoffed.
“Of course not. If anything I’ll up my offer.” She shrugged. “I’ll give him you, myself and half my court if it means getting my hands on what’s in his head.”
It was actually a little amusing how Joana flushed at her words, even as she shook her head.
“Yes, that sounds a lot more like you.”
Yelena nodded. Damn right it did.
Though as she did, a thought occurred to her. “Hey Joana?”
“Yes?”
“In your reports to me, didn’t you mention the Ashfield boy having some kind of nickname.”
The dark elf pondered the words for a moment before stiffening. “Hmm, he does actually. A rather apt one considering. Apt enough that I’m wondering if whatever he used to kill Al’Hundra is related.”
“Well, don’t keep me in suspense. What is it?”
Joana leaned back, her head craned upwards, as if seeking strength from above.
“Kraken Slayer.”
Yelena laughed. She couldn’t help it.
“Of course it is.”
“You killed Al’Hundra.”
William was still reeling a little from the conversation he’d just had, so he was actually a little caught off guard by a finger being shoved into his face the moment he stepped back into his teams quarters.
Ah, he thought. I promised answers.
Though it seemed that in his absence his team had managed to figure out some of those answers without him.
Glancing past Olzenya’s outstretched arm, he saw Marline shaking her head – as if to vehemently deny she’d told them anything.
She needn’t have bothered, her geass precluded it as an option. Hell, even once everyone found out it would preclude it as an option.
Which was for the best for the moment because now he wasn’t so much trying to hide what he’d done as how he’d done it. Admittedly, Marline didn’t know anything beyond the broadest details, but she knew enough to know that it was some kind of enchantment combined with alchemy.
Now it was possible the forces working against him – or rather simply to profit off him – had already figured that out and he’d hear the alchemy lab exploded any moment now, but he’d sooner put it off for as long as he could.
To that end, he turned to Olzenya – though not before politely lowering her pointing arm.
Something that, to her credit, the high elf allowed – actually looking a little embarrassed by her outburst and thus rudeness.
“Honestly, I was expecting something like that to come from Bonnlyn, not you,” he said to the slightly flushed high elf.
As he glanced over toward where the dwarf was sitting, she shrugged. “I realize I may not be the most classically polite individual around, but I’ve been a merchant long enough to recognize when someone’s got a trade secret they want to keep close to their chests.”
If anything, Olzenya flushed harder, as while she might not have been familiar with trade secrets, she was most definitely familiar with the notion of house spells that needed to be kept secret.
“I also thought ambushing him at the door was a little rude,” Verity murmured from the back of the room.
Olzenya coughed, before backing up. “Of course, I apologize for that William.”
More bemused than anything else, especially as the elf curtsied, he waved a hand dismissively. “It’s fine. Or, understandable, I guess.”
“Good,” Ozlenya smiled, glad for his acceptance… before she shouted again. “Because you lied to us.”
“I did?”
“He didn’t,” Marline said. “He said he had something to bet against Tala.”
Indeed he had, something he’d kept hidden under a sheet. After all, he’d not wanted his big surprise to be spoiled by the rumors of his coming beating him to the cafeteria.
And they would.
Rumors in the academy somehow managed to move at light speed.
“He implied it was gold,” Olzenya shot back.
“And you said Tala wouldn’t go for it, but you came with us anyway,” Bonnlyn said.
Indeed, he had implied it was gold. Or ‘something valuable enough to catch her interest’.
“To comfort him after she shot him down,” Olzenya said. “Instead I damn near tripped over my own feet in front of everyone when he pulled an honest to goddess mithril core out of his ass.”
William was actually a little thrown off – and amused – by the sudden display of crassness from the noble girl.
“But he didn’t lie.” It was actually a little surprising – and heartwarming – to hear Verity speaking so forcefully.
And that Olzenya didn’t immediately snap at her for doing so. The team really had come a long way in just a few months.
Ah, the joys of shared suffering, William thought as he watched the girls bicker amongst themselves.
“As I’m sure you’ve all guessed, I have indeed been less than open about a few things,” he said, silencing all of them – except Marline who’d yet to speak in the first place. “With that said, I’ve never once lied to you about my end goal.”
“Breaking off your betrothal,” Marline said finally.
“Breaking off my betrothal without starting a war,” he said. “If it were that easy, the Queen would have done it for me just now.”
“You met the Queen?” Olzenya sounded a little faint.
“I did.”
Oh, how he did.
“Oh ancestors, please don’t tell me you hit on the queen!?” This time Marline sounded a little faint.
And he actually felt a little offended. “What!? Why would you think that.”
“You’re doing the same thing you do when we talk about Instructor Griffith,” Bonnlyn said with studiously neutral voice. “Or Instructor Morline. Or Instructor Flen. Or some of the guards.”
“Or that one cafeteria lady,” Verity chimed in, a little red in the face.
“Or the-”
“I do not!” He’d finally had enough of these aspersion on his character.
Across the room, a number of sighs rang out, even from the elves.
“At least now I knew why he never checked me out,” Bonnlyn said. “He’s got mommy issues. And I’m not old enough to tickle them.”
“Still, the Queen?” Olzenya hissed.
“I mean, have you seen her?” Marline muttered back. “I mean, I don’t agree with him… but I get it.”
“I didn’t ‘perv’ on the Queen.” Some part of him died on using such childish language. “We had a meeting about my plans and… what occurred with Al’Hundra. Needless to say, the fact that I’m here means she’s agreed to go ahead with them and I’m also to keep quiet about anything I may or may not have had to do with any Kraken going missing. Or their cores.”
He deliberately left out the royal marriage offer.
Still, with those words the room went silent. After all, if the Queen had told him to say nothing, he was expected to say nothing. Just because the North in general didn’t have much respect for royal authority didn’t mean the rest of the kingdom did.
Quite the opposite.
“Well, if the Queen has commanded you to remain silent, I suppose there’s nothing to be done,” Olzenya muttered. “Though I would like answers some day.”
“Hell, I’d like to know why you brought Marline in on your plans,” Bonnlyn said, glancing at the Dark Elf. “You know, and not the rest of us.”
There was no missing the hint of hurt there – which he understood.
“I can promise you it was purely a matter of convenient circumstance,” he said. “And I can promise you, I didn’t confide in Marline for free.”
All the girls glanced up as the dark elf nodded slowly. “He’s not lying – though I can’t say anymore. Literally. It’s a price I paid willingly, but one I doubt any of you would be interested in.”
Almost as one, he could see the lightbulbs turn on in everyone’s brain simultaneously – except for Verity, who took a few seconds.
‘Geass,’ thought none of them said it.
This time though, when the girls looked between him and Marline, there was a definite sense of wariness to it.
“Well, I suppose there’s nothing else to say then,” Bonnyln said. “I guess we should…”
“…Go to bed,” Olzenya nodded warily.
William grinned. “Good idea. Big day tomorrow and all that.”
That was an understatement, and he could tell everyone was thinking it as they made their way over to their rooms.
Still, it was true all the same.
They’d need their rest if they wanted to stand a chance tomorrow.
Indeed, they’d need every advantage they could get.
To that end, William could only hope he’d stacked the deck in their favor enough to matter.
…It took him a long time to get to sleep.
When he did awake, in the early hours of the morning, it was to the sound of an explosion.
In the direction of the old alchemy labs if I’m not wrong, he thought with a grim smile.
It seemed someone had decided to investigate his storage room even sooner than he’d anticipated.
Annoying, but it hardly mattered at this point in time.
All that really mattered was going back to sleep.
He had a big day ahead of him, after all.
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Another three chapters are also available on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/bluefishcake
We also have a (surprisingly) active Discord where and I and a few other authors like to hang out: https://discord.gg/RctHFucHaq

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• Page Selected Title Text Color:- Change Selected color of ‘CHATS’, ‘STATUS’, ‘CALLS’
• Unread message counter color:- Change the background color for the unread message

GBWhatsApp Other Features and Advance Privacy

• Anti-revoke:- GBWhatsapp comes with an anti-revoke message feature, which means that even if someone sends any kind of message and then deletes everything on your behalf, you can still see those deleted messages by default.
  
• App Lock:- App Lock allows you to require a pattern, PIN, password or fingerprint to enter apps and access your messages. This adds a layer of security, and makes your WhatsApp chats even more secure so that no stranger can access your personal chats. And also keeps your messages hidden from people who have access to your phone. If you want, you can show the PIN and password while typing.
  
• DND Mode:- It has an inbuilt Do Not Disturb mode. If you are using any other app on your Android phone and do not want to be disturbed by WhatsApp messages then you can use the DND feature to disable the internet connection only for GB WhatsApp Pro. can do. Through this feature you can pause your WhatsApp for some time. And you can use other apps without any problem.
  
• People Nearby:- Developers added People Nearby to WhatsApp to exchange contact information face-to-face. With this update, people nearby can help you meet new friends. This allows you to automatically connect with everyone around you without any contact.
  
• Anti-Ban:- Some users may have trouble using third-party WhatsApp mods GB WhatsApp developers have integrated anti-ban features to reduce the risk. This assurance means you can enjoy additional features without the constant fear of losing access to the account. Now you can use this WhatsApp for a long time, this time the developers have given anti-ban form to this WhatsApp.
  
• Hide Last Seen:- With GB WhatsApp you can hide your last seen status. This allows you to appear offline to others and also see their last seen status. Unlike the original WhatsApp where hiding your last seen prevents you from seeing the last seen of others. GB WhatsApp offers the ability to hide your own Last Seen while retaining the ability to view the Last Seen of others.
  
• Block and Restrict Calls:- Now restrict callers without blocking them with GBWhatsApp Apk download. This is an amazing feature of this app because you don’t need to block the person or turn off the internet if you don’t want to talk to them. Go to the calls section of the app and block the caller from calling you. He will be able to text you and share his voice notes with you, which you can listen to at your convenience.
  
• Show Double Ticks after Reply:- This is an exciting feature of this app that you can use to take your privacy to the next level. The messages will be delivered to you. But the sender will see a tick on his message. Double and blue ticks will be visible to him only when you reply otherwise he will think that you are offline or for some reason his message has not been delivered yet.
  
• No In-App Ads:- Despite being a free application, it is an ad-free app. Advertisements are the main reason to distract users from using any app. GBWhatsApp comes with an ad-free interface and just like the original WhatsApp, you will never see a single ad while using this app.
  
• Change Chat Names:- GBWhatsApp app will allow you to have maximum control over the chat. You can easily change the name of a chat without changing the name of the contact in the contact list. Set nicknames for your chat with this beautiful app and talk to them with more passion and love.
  

Other Features

• Forward messages to anyone without forwarding the tag.
• You can select all chats at once from the home screen of this app.
• Add new fonts and icons.
• Anti-ban feature, you will not be banned from using WhatsApp.
• Stickers from other apps can be added.
• You can select all chats at once from the home screen.
• Enable drag to reply in group call.
• Hide the last seen.
• You can send a private reply to groups.
• The ability to send a group message supported by photos and videos.
• One-time photo and video viewing.
• Feature hide visiting cases to your friends.
• Hide the two check marks (correct) when receiving the message.
• Get notified of deleted messages.
• You can now read the description of the group in the title as the normal case.
• Airplane mode has been added so that the internet can be locked off from the WhatsApp application only.
• The possibility of sending 100 documents at once instead of 30.
• The feature of uploading your friends’ statuses.
• Video Now you can send a file size of up to 50 MB.
• You can send a group message to up to 600 people at once.
• With the theme option you can easily change the appearance.
• Make a list of who can contact you.
• Send up to 90 photos at once.
• The possibility of making a lock for Watts GP against blocking.
• You can download gbwhatsapp for free with a direct link

Conclusion

In today’s article we have told you about some special features of GBWhatsapp. We hope that you have understood all this information well. As we have mentioned earlier that WhatsApp is a third party app which cannot be trusted blindly. Most of the people around the world are using it but some people also say that all the data of this app has been leaked. Actually GB WhatsApp promises its users that no WhatsApp user’s data will be leaked. But you have to use it very carefully so that you never face any problem due to which you have to worry. Apart from this, there are many other flaws in it due to which people have to get a little worried.
Therefore you will have to be very careful while using it. Although we have given you all the information about this WhatsApp, but if you have any doubt about this article then you can tell us by commenting. We will definitely solve all your problems. Apart from this, we write many useful articles on our website which are very useful for people. If you want to know more things related to this, then you will have to visit our website as much as possible. So that you can read our every post first. GBWhatsApp Pro is a great app for those who want a more personalized and feature-rich WhatsApp experience.

I'm putting fake names... (A lot of the timelines are spread out but they talk about those specific moments, I hope they make since)
I have a friend, I'll call her J. I have known J for almost 9 years. She and I grew up pretty close and we were inseparable. Over the first few years of our friendship she had lost my parents trust from an incident involving a boy, she wasn't allowed to stay over for sleepovers and I practically lost my whole summer that year. I was pretty angry at my parents and blamed things on them. I regret my actions and I did learn but in my mind I thought J was the only person who understood me.
After the whole incident settled down. School started up again and she would jokingly push me into a boy or a locker. She started putting her arm around my neck, trying to choke me. She would continuously punch me or smack me on the head. I honestly got annoyed by it but I acted like it was nothing. She had suddenly became obsessed with TikTok and she posted a whole TikTok about her friends, their was a video of me that stood out. I wasn't wearing a shirt. Which completely made me uncomfortable because I wasn't wearing a shirt and she took the video while I was changing. She didn't take it down. She also would post photos without my consent. Like ones that made me feel ugly or disgusting. And I would tell her how they made me feel. But she would still post them. I started telling her no when she asked for photos and she always would sneak one when I wasn't looking. She doesn't take no for an answer. She will start whining when you don't listen. I used to trust her with my feelings and I would tell her about everything. And now I feel like she knows too much.
This past school year all of my friends (king, J, Joe, Bell) and I went to SDYC. And well when we went J was lying a bunch and starting a bunch of drama and it threw all of my friends off. We all didn't trust J and Joe that well during that time. I felt like the only people I had was my friends King and Bell. Because they both understood how I felt.
After that. King, J, and I had a sleepover. During the middle of the night I was watching a movie and J began to bug me. She started pushing on me saying I was taking up too much room. But honestly I was the one who was sleeping in between two couches there's no way I was taking that much space because I was falling in the crack. She then proceeded to call me a fat roll. I said "no your a fat roll" jokingly. And then she freaks out and she went to tell her boyfriend. It annoyed me because all her boyfriend knows how to do is talk bad. After that sleepover. She started working at the same place as me and I told her about my big crush on this coworker of ours. And so then she decided to start flirting with him in front of me. She would throw something at him jokingly and giggle. I didn't try to think anything of it. But then when we were talking about him the next thing she decided to say was, "your just jealous because he talks to me and not you". The thing is I don't want to talk to him that's why I don't try to talk to him. He has talked to me before, but I rather admire him from afar. He's like 13 years older than me. He was just hot to me at the time.
I'll just say I am lighter than a 5'6 girl. I might have a little bit of belly fat but that's just my body. And I do have an eating disorder. I don't eat enough, I practically starve myself. J honestly made me feel worse and I started having moments where I would basically pass out from no iron in my body. J continued to body shame me even from the amount of food I would eat. She straight up made is feel like she was calling me ugly and fat. It hurt and it made me angry. I told my dad and he said she's just jealous and not to worry about it. I brushed it off but she basically would say something everyday. It got to a point where I was crying all the time.
During my last year of highschool J didn't have a vehicle. So she would ask me to drive her places. I didn't mind because we would be going to the same places. And I started offering to pay for her drink or something. I didn't think much of it in tell I was always taking her places and buying her drinks but she still wanted me to pay her back for stuff when I didn't have much money. She managed to buy a vehicle for a small price by saving up the money she didn't spend. I feel stupid for offering. One day her mom even texted me asking for the small money I "owed" J. But my parents think I don't owe her anything because I have given her most of my money and that she owes me money.
J also does this thing where if you don't give her your attention she'll keep tapping you. Over and over again. Everytime she asks for my attention it's always for something so pointless and stupid. Nothing serious. And everytime I ask for her attention she'll ignore me. She does it a lot. She only wants to have the attention. I stopped telling her about how I feel because all I know is she'll either use it against me or not actually listen and move past it. Like once she asked me how I felt and when I told her that I cried about something she moved on from it into her talking about her crying over some movie she watched.
The way she treated me made me so angry that I texted her boyfriend anonymously asking him to control his girlfriend and get her to be nicer to others. He didn't like the message and told his girl on the spot and J tried to call my fake number. I didn't answer and then she ran to me to tell me the tea. She later assumed it was a boy she was flirting with that she pushed away.
I hate her boyfriend but he deserves better.. because she has talked to another boy behind his back. When I started liking this one boy. I told her about it and then she began to tell me how she met this UK boy and she thinks he's all that. She later found out he was lying about his age and she got back to reality before she lost her in person boyfriend.
She told king I was flirting with this one dude but I wasn't. J told me to add this guy she found on Facebook on snap, I said okay and I called the dude a nickname like a Grandma would call their grandchildren. And I thought it was funny and the guy thought it was chill. I didn't think anything of it and then I blocked him because I didn't want to talk to him. She then decided to add the guy on snap. And she starts talking to him. The amount of times she has lied is crazy. I blocked him but she still has him on snap. For what reason I don't know.
J and Joe and I have recently had a lot of problems with each other. It's always J and Joe fighting and I'm between listening to them both argue about each other. I was getting tired of it. J hit my breaking point when she decided to ask me for my boyfriends sisters snap. You don't just ask your friend for her boyfriends sisters snap. That's weird. She also asked for my boyfriends and she looked him up when I told her no and she added a bunch of dudes with the same name. She didn't find him but there is no way I want her knowing him or his sister. I have too many trust issues with her. She's the main reason why a lot of my relationships didn't work out. They didn't like her and she manipulated me into saying things that upset them. She makes me so uncomfortable. She made me seem lesbian once when I know I'm not. But she made a TikTok about it and a lot of people from my school saw it. I don't like false accusations. I'm pretty sure she used it for clout. But also my parents think she's inlove with me because she can never leave me alone and she always HAS to hold hands or hug.
J doesn't understand a lot of things. And she calls me stupid. I honestly want karma to come get her but that's bad and I don't mean to say that. It hurts a lot.
I had blocked J on everything. But since I worked with J I saw her and she started bawling her eyes out at me saying she did nothing, I felt bad but I was annoyed because she kept bugging me. So I unblocked her. I decided to block her again after because my boyfriend said she was manipulating me. And well the more I had her blocked the nicer she was. After a while Joe did something to make me give up on my friendship with her too and J expected that to be a chance to get me back. And well she did practically. She was a lot nicer and I felt like she changed. But Man was I wrong.. Just today I was working my second night shift. I said something as a joke because I was hoping J would get what I meant. Her boyfriend was on the call... He took everything out of context and said something that made me feel less about myself. I already feel like crap being the person I am. I want to better myself but the more people say things the more I give up. I want to be encouraged not dragged down. I don't know why he has to be so mean. I never did anything to him. I don't know why they both have to be... I listen to her call people ugly all the time. Like just stop. I want her to stop. I'm leaving for the military soon, and she said that I can't get rid of her. That sounds psycho. And it honestly makes me want to get away more. I'm tired of the toxic environment and I want to get away. But she's everywhere. She knows everything about me. She has photos of me I hate. She has so many things she can use against me. I'm honestly scared. I want to block her again but I know she's just going to keep bugging me about it. And she might turn people against me. She's good at talking to people. I'm not I'm an introvert. I don't want her ever find me again once I leave. But I know she might try. People always find a way. And she's creepy. Because I know she'll be able to. But I just want to move on with my life. I don't know how to remove her from my life. What should I do?

Welcome back to a little more MARRIED Mary Mania before I wrap things up with The Abridged Goblinization. I decided that this bit deserved its own chapter. Some of you seem to be entertained by Mary (or at least entertained by your own loathing of her), so I hope this will prove amusing. In my life, I've encountered an inordinate number of low-key lolcows (probably because I was far too patient and far too passive for far too long), so I might as well throw just enough distortion on the page to protect the good guys and the genuinely reformed beards. But I'm also gonna shine a bright, unflattering spotlight on the lolcows, creeps, weirdos, pervs, and BEARDS, both neck and leg.
And I'll very, very cautiously tiptoe over the bit where I do a bunch of mental gymnastics, squint my eyes, tilt my head, and convince myself that dating Whisky might be a welcome change of pace. I have no delusions when I look back on it. This was a dumb move in retrospect, but all the mental gymnastics in the world can't bring me to a reasonable scenario where I was psychic and thus able to predict what he'd become once he stopped pretending to be a gentleman. Nor can the most elite, Olympic-level mental gymnastics execute a double salto layout with a half-twist perfectly enough to force me to concede the "logical point" that I should have spotted warning signs that I'd never freakin' seen before. Okay, that's enough saltiness for today. Don't worry. This chapter mostly focuses on Mary's mania. Whisky's just kind of... there.
So there I was... dating a guy who called when he said he would, remained constant in his affections, never asked for weird stuff in the sack (in fact, we weren't even intimate at that point), and claimed to be a secular humanist who practiced elements of Hinduism (as opposed to conveniently becoming born-again whenever it suited his needs to wallow in shame). And we seemed to have similar enough tastes in media, which made for pleasant movie nights and enjoyable conversations about nerdy stuff. It felt like a step up. It felt safe. At that point in time, I was content.
But here's a shameful admission for ya. My original intention was to make Whisky the "for now guy." I knew I could do better. I was formally educated, I was in shape, I was normatively attractive, and I tended to be successful in both my theatrical and academic endeavors. Plus, I was super friendly and good with people. Whisky was kind of a bump on a log. Sure, he seemed nice. He was sometimes able to make interesting conversation. But my overall sentiment regarding the relationship was, to quote Whisky's favorite catch phrase, "Meh."
I knew he was mooching off his mysterious "big bro," and he wasn't doing this with the intention of saving up and eventually becoming self-sufficient. He just kicked up a fuss whenever he wanted something, and... it usually appeared. I still thought he was physically unattractive, too. I hate nasty-ass beards, I have a strong preference for shorter guys (they don't need to be as short as Dennis, but I don't exactly love being towered over), and Whisky had whatever the dude version of resting bitch face is. I admonished myself for being shallow and decided to soldier on. Date after date. And I did kind of get used to all the shallow things I objected to.
But, really... Dating Whisky at all was a dick move on my part. Then again, how many Nice Guy (TM)s want girls to do exactly what I did? Not attracted? Think he's kind of a bum? Find him a bit boring? Just give him a chance!!! Go on a crap-ton of dates with him until you like the familiarity enough to settle for him. That's the key to a healthy relationship!!! It never works. You could flip this around and apply it to Nice Girls who want pity dates, too.
Anyway. Lucy knew I was dating Whisky, and she thought it was great. She was honestly just happy to see that I was no longer pining over Dennis and that Whisky was no longer getting relentlessly stalked by Mary. Speaking of Mary... She'd had an imaginary dramatic breakup with Scumbanger not long after she crashed Lucy's brunch. Murky aside... The following summer, I'd do another show with the pervy pest and I'd find out that Mary had given the former Rum Tum Tugger a tug in the parking lot of The Imp and had let him motorboat her. When dozens of lewd messaged filled his inbox the following day, the most indiscriminate playboy I'd ever met in my freakin' life blocked that clingy legbeard's number and never had any further contact with her. But seeing as neither of them are especially reliable sources, my best guess is that the truth is somewhere in between.
After the dramatic "breakup" with Scumbanger, Mary immediately became obsessed with the new tech guy (and his wife). They allegedly had something of a throuple situation going on, but no one ever witnessed any hard evidence of this. And then Mary and Tech Guy's wife allegedly had a catfight in the middle of the fancy restaurant where the three spent their date nights. Mary did have a shiner and a scraped knee for a few weeks, and she intimated to me that Chuckie was actually the one responsible for her looking a little rough...
I believed her because there was something very different about her demeanor when she told me this. When she was in larger groups, she just screeched about how she thought the catfight was foreplay until Tech Guy ghosted her. Yet again, we'll never know the truth. But I err on the side of belief when someone tells me that DV is going on in their home, even if I generally regard that person as a delusional pathological liar. Plus, Mary had never badmouthed Chuckie before and she never made excuses for her philandering. She just felt entitled to any ding-dong she desired. Bottom line, I think there was an unfortunate incident, and I urged her to report it. She didn't; but that doesn't mean it didn't happen.
And, yes. I think we're allowed to show compassion for Mary if Chuckie did indeed do what she was accusing him of. She absolutely deserved to get dumped in a spectacular fashion. No one deserves violence, though. But I think we're also allowed to laugh at Mary when she's acting like a crank-crazed maniac.
Moving on to lighter topics! Mary claimed to be having a hot, steamy affair with the artistic director of The Imp. At first, this seemed outlandish. But he had been the one to hire her. And he repeatedly refused to replace her when she consistently failed to learned her lines, ran around naked, and contributed little more than mukbangs to the comedy (again, I personally found it funny when she did that, but I was in the minority).
Some skullduggery was definitely afoot. Was it "sexy time," as Mary enthusiastically claimed? Who knows. Chuckie might have been paying the dude to give Mary a hobby. But not long after Mary started boasting about boning the artistic director, he suddenly began calling her out on her unprofessional behavior. They "broke up," but Mary managed to avoid getting kicked out of the improv troupe, bragging that she could sue the director for sexual harassment if he fired her.
And then... there was the pièce de résistance of Mary's misadventures in mating. She met a biker dude at Filthy McNasty's. This guys was disgusting. Most of her previous dudes had been questionable, weird, or possibly imaginary. But we all saw this one. He was as fat as a Hutt, he smelled like a grease trap, motor oil, B.O., and a very specific type of cheese... The few teeth that he had were black and green, his fingernails were yellowed and a few of them oozed pus. Finally, the volume and crackly, bubbly properties of his frequent farts indicated to George Gay that he, "definitely had a virgin booty." Mary's lard-ass loverboy called himself "Hogg," which was probably a reference to the two-wheeled vehicle that he was very obviously too large to actually ride. Or it might have just been an obvious nickname for a filthy fat fuck.
But Hogg, like Tech Guy a few loverboys ago, had a wife. And she made frequent appearances at Filthy's as well. Hogg's wife was shockingly... kind of pretty. A little rough around the edges. Didn't smell the greatest. But she stood in stark contrast to her repugnant hubby, even with her fried hair, her sloppily inked tats, and her imprecisely applied eye makeup. Her teeth were free of obvious rot. She had a beautiful figure. And she had a carefree attitude that was probably attractive to a number of people. She'd fart right along with Hogg, she didn't shave her legs, and the profane compound nouns she came up with always cracked me up (lard-tard, smegma-booger, felch-belcher).
And Mary was once again claiming to be in a throuple with The Hoggs. But this time, there was hard evidence. They'd get busy in some corner of the establishment, and even got booted from the dive bar a few times for lewd behavior, offensive odors, and illegal drug use. On one particular night, Mrs. Hogg lit one of her hubby's gargantuan ass-rippers while Mary was doing her thing, completely shrouded by his big belly. The blue flame ignited some spilt booze on the dingy floor, and a small fire erupted. The staff were able to stomp it out, but the nasty throuple was unceremoniously banished.
Alas, management allowed Mary to re-enter the bar because she apparently had some sort of sway with one of the bartenders. Instead of meeting her...uh... "partners" for some more boom-boom, Mary decided to come back inside and gush about Hogg's majestic rooster to all of us. She smelled like D cheese, ammonia, and burnt farts as she plopped down at our table, already screeching about how much bigger her "new boo" was, compared to that vile turd of an artistic director.
George Gay: Fuck me, Mary!!! You reek. Go wash the uncircumcised methhead off your hands and then you can sit with us.
Mary started to protest. Lucy cut her off. "Your whole body is probably a veritable Petri dish from fooling around with those nasty-ass people." She handed Mary some Purell. "Was the junkie junk off, keep the bottle, and don't you fucking touch me when you come back!"
Mary's bottom lip began to quiver and she looked pleadingly at me. "Just wash up," I told her. "You're too pretty to go around smelling like that.”
Off she went to the dingy bathroom. Maybe I wasn't harsh enough, but flattery got results in this instance. And when she returned, she had managed to dilute the stench enough so that we could stand to sit at the same table with her.
Mary took a deep breath in preparation to gush about something that would have undoubtedly been disgusting, but George cut her off this time. "Mare. How do you even BANG someone with a belly like that?"
Mary (speaking a bit more quickly than usual): Oh, it just takes some creative positioning. We get him to lie down. If Mrs. Hogg is taking in the rod, I hold his bowl of jelly up with both arms and stick my cooter in his face. He eats it like his mommy made it! And when it's my turn to get blasted, the missus uses a bunch of yoga straps to hold it up. I have to take it from behind because my own little tiny bit of va-jiggle-jaggle bumps up against his bowl of jelly if why try to smash like vanilla people. It's so much fun, though!!! And then he props his bowl of jelly up on the coffee table and plays with himself while he watches his honey strap on a dil...
George: I so regret asking.
Mary: They're sooo fun to fool around with! I think they might be my forever partners! (Her hands were too shaky to slide down her body in unbridled ecstasy, so she clasped them together and hid them underneath her itty bitty little gunt.)
Lucy: So when are you gonna dump Chuck?
Mary: Well... Hogg and the missus don't have much scratch. And what they do have, they spend on smokeables. When I meet a real sugar daddy, I'll get rid of Chuckle. He pretended to be a baller before we got married. But he's just middle management and he's content to stay there. Pffffftt. No ambition.
Mary launched into another long, unnecessarily graphic gushing about her garbage partners and their nasty-ass boom-boom. So I decided this would be a good time to clear my conscience about dating Whisky. Mary hadn't so much as mentioned him in months. She was inexplicably smitten with The Hoggs. And her ultimate dream man was obviously some filthy rich dude (perhaps a literally filthy dude who was also rich), which took Whisky out of the running. I still think it would have been amusing if Mary had tried to date Mori...
I waited for her adult film star gasp to wind down before I finally interjected, "Wow. Sounds like you've got a fantastic sex life right now!"
Mary: I do! You need to get over that born-again weirdo and find a real man so that you and I can have good girl talk!
Me: Well... I'm not banging anybody, but I am dating somebody. Sort of. It's not really that big of a deal. I'm not even sure that I'm completely into him. But he's been super sweet to me...
Lucy put her arm around me, almost as if she knew I was about to need protection.
Mary: TELL ME!
I hesitated. "Well... It's Whiskers."
In an instant, George jumped up and grabbed Mary by the shoulders, lest she lunge at me.
But Mary got very quiet. Silent tears welled up in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks. She gasped and buried her face in her hands, now emitting one seemingly endless, impossibly high-pitched whine.
George loosened his grip and began to pat her on the back. Lucy's grip tightened on me and she whispered, "Here we go. Overreaction sequence has commenced."
Mary lifted her red, tear-stained face and glared at me. "HOW COULD YOU???"
Me: Mary, I swear. I thought you hated his guts. I haven't heard you talk about him in ages. When he asked, I thought it would be good for me to give him a chance since he's always been really sweet to me.
Mary: But what about the way he treated ME??? He was such an asshole!
Lucy: Was he? Mary, you stalked the guy. If he was rude, it was only because you weren't taking NO for an answer.
Mary: He never told me he wanted to end things. He just kept ghosting me. But whenever I showed up at his house and jumped on him, we always wound up smashing. Eventually.
I didn't have the gumption at that point in my life to suggest to Mary that it's wrong on every imaginable level to coerce someone into intimate activity, regardless of gender. And even knowing what Whiskers would eventually become, he didn't deserve THAT. I should have called her out. Instead I tried to steer the conversation back to her current bedroom bliss and try to get her to resume thinking the disgusting thoughts that delighted her so much.
Me: Who cares what he's doing now?! Aren't you insanely happy with your fun new lovers???
Mary: NO! THEY STINK! HE'S FAT. I want my sexy Whisky-Boo Whiskers back!!! Give him back, Valley! Puh-leeee-eeee-eeeee-eeeease.
Me: I don't "have" him. I'm just seeing him. If he hurt you this much, why don't you try to sit down and have a real conversation with him? It might be good for both of you to clear the air.
Mary: He blocked me on everythi-iiiiiii-iiiii-iiiiiing. Waaaaaaaaaah!
Me: Well, I guess that's your answer. You probably overwhelmed him. He seems like a bit of a softy. Personally, I need a softy right now. But I think you need a manly man.
Mary rose. She gave me an icy stare. And then she cooed in an unnervingly sweet tone. "I love you, Valley-Boo. I know you didn't mean to break my heart."
Me: Thank you, Mary. Really, I wouldn't have even considered his initial invitation if you hadn't been calling him "Satan," and telling us all that you hated him, and dating all these new guys. I didn't do it to spite you, I swear. It just happened.
Mary (still creepily, icily sweet): Yes. We're so alike, you and I. It's perfectly understandable that the same guy would go for both of us. But you owe me. You owe me big.
Me: I'm gonna disagree with that. If you think I slighted you, just tell me to fuck off. If you really do understand that these things happen, then you'll accept that there was no malice on anyone's part.
Mary: Mmmm-hmmmm. We'll see about that.
She jiggled her Jupiters, tossed her hair, and stalked out of the dive bar...

AND THEN SHE BANGED DENNIS.

I'm putting fake names... (A lot of the timelines are spread out but they talk about those specific moments, I hope they make since)
I have a friend, I'll call her J. I have known J for almost 9 years. She and I grew up pretty close and we were inseparable. Over the first few years of our friendship she had lost my parents trust from an incident involving a boy, she wasn't allowed to stay over for sleepovers and I practically lost my whole summer that year. I was pretty angry at my parents and blamed things on them. I regret my actions and I did learn but in my mind I thought J was the only person who understood me.
After the whole incident settled down. School started up again and she would jokingly push me into a boy or a locker. She started putting her arm around my neck, trying to choke me. She would continuously punch me or smack me on the head. I honestly got annoyed by it but I acted like it was nothing. She had suddenly became obsessed with TikTok and she posted a whole TikTok about her friends, their was a video of me that stood out. I wasn't wearing a shirt. Which completely made me uncomfortable because I wasn't wearing a shirt and she took the video while I was changing. She didn't take it down. She also would post photos without my consent. Like ones that made me feel ugly or disgusting. And I would tell her how they made me feel. But she would still post them. I started telling her no when she asked for photos and she always would sneak one when I wasn't looking. She doesn't take no for an answer. She will start whining when you don't listen. I used to trust her with my feelings and I would tell her about everything. And now I feel like she knows too much.
This past school year all of my friends (king, J, Joe, Bell) and I went to SDYC. And well when we went J was lying a bunch and starting a bunch of drama and it threw all of my friends off. We all didn't trust J and Joe that well during that time. I felt like the only people I had was my friends King and Bell. Because they both understood how I felt.
After that. King, J, and I had a sleepover. During the middle of the night I was watching a movie and J began to bug me. She started pushing on me saying I was taking up too much room. But honestly I was the one who was sleeping in between two couches there's no way I was taking that much space because I was falling in the crack. She then proceeded to call me a fat roll. I said "no your a fat roll" jokingly. And then she freaks out and she went to tell her boyfriend. It annoyed me because all her boyfriend knows how to do is talk bad. After that sleepover. She started working at the same place as me and I told her about my big crush on this coworker of ours. And so then she decided to start flirting with him in front of me. She would throw something at him jokingly and giggle. I didn't try to think anything of it. But then when we were talking about him the next thing she decided to say was, "your just jealous because he talks to me and not you". The thing is I don't want to talk to him that's why I don't try to talk to him. He has talked to me before, but I rather admire him from afar. He's like 13 years older than me. He was just hot to me at the time.
I'll just say I am lighter than a 5'6 girl. I might have a little bit of belly fat but that's just my body. And I do have an eating disorder. I don't eat enough, I practically starve myself. J honestly made me feel worse and I started having moments where I would basically pass out from no iron in my body. J continued to body shame me even from the amount of food I would eat. She straight up made is feel like she was calling me ugly and fat. It hurt and it made me angry. I told my dad and he said she's just jealous and not to worry about it. I brushed it off but she basically would say something everyday. It got to a point where I was crying all the time.
During my last year of highschool J didn't have a vehicle. So she would ask me to drive her places. I didn't mind because we would be going to the same places. And I started offering to pay for her drink or something. I didn't think much of it in tell I was always taking her places and buying her drinks but she still wanted me to pay her back for stuff when I didn't have much money. She managed to buy a vehicle for a small price by saving up the money she didn't spend. I feel stupid for offering. One day her mom even texted me asking for the small money I "owed" J. But my parents think I don't owe her anything because I have given her most of my money and that she owes me money.
J also does this thing where if you don't give her your attention she'll keep tapping you. Over and over again. Everytime she asks for my attention it's always for something so pointless and stupid. Nothing serious. And everytime I ask for her attention she'll ignore me. She does it a lot. She only wants to have the attention. I stopped telling her about how I feel because all I know is she'll either use it against me or not actually listen and move past it. Like once she asked me how I felt and when I told her that I cried about something she moved on from it into her talking about her crying over some movie she watched.
The way she treated me made me so angry that I texted her boyfriend anonymously asking him to control his girlfriend and get her to be nicer to others. He didn't like the message and told his girl on the spot and J tried to call my fake number. I didn't answer and then she ran to me to tell me the tea. She later assumed it was a boy she was flirting with that she pushed away.
I hate her boyfriend but he deserves better.. because she has talked to another boy behind his back. When I started liking this one boy. I told her about it and then she began to tell me how she met this UK boy and she thinks he's all that. She later found out he was lying about his age and she got back to reality before she lost her in person boyfriend.
She told king I was flirting with this one dude but I wasn't. J told me to add this guy she found on Facebook on snap, I said okay and I called the dude a nickname like a Grandma would call their grandchildren. And I thought it was funny and the guy thought it was chill. I didn't think anything of it and then I blocked him because I didn't want to talk to him. She then decided to add the guy on snap. And she starts talking to him. The amount of times she has lied is crazy. I blocked him but she still has him on snap. For what reason I don't know.
J and Joe and I have recently had a lot of problems with each other. It's always J and Joe fighting and I'm between listening to them both argue about each other. I was getting tired of it. J hit my breaking point when she decided to ask me for my boyfriends sisters snap. You don't just ask your friend for her boyfriends sisters snap. That's weird. She also asked for my boyfriends and she looked him up when I told her no and she added a bunch of dudes with the same name. She didn't find him but there is no way I want her knowing him or his sister. I have too many trust issues with her. She's the main reason why a lot of my relationships didn't work out. They didn't like her and she manipulated me into saying things that upset them. She makes me so uncomfortable. She made me seem lesbian once when I know I'm not. But she made a TikTok about it and a lot of people from my school saw it. I don't like false accusations. I'm pretty sure she used it for clout. But also my parents think she's inlove with me because she can never leave me alone and she always HAS to hold hands or hug.
J doesn't understand a lot of things. And she calls me stupid. I honestly want karma to come get her but that's bad and I don't mean to say that. It hurts a lot.
I had blocked J on everything. But since I worked with J I saw her and she started bawling her eyes out at me saying she did nothing, I felt bad but I was annoyed because she kept bugging me. So I unblocked her. I decided to block her again after because my boyfriend said she was manipulating me. And well the more I had her blocked the nicer she was. After a while Joe did something to make me give up on my friendship with her too and J expected that to be a chance to get me back. And well she did practically. She was a lot nicer and I felt like she changed. But Man was I wrong.. Just today I was working my second night shift. I said something as a joke because I was hoping J would get what I meant. Her boyfriend was on the call... He took everything out of context and said something that made me feel less about myself. I already feel like crap being the person I am. I want to better myself but the more people say things the more I give up. I want to be encouraged not dragged down. I don't know why he has to be so mean. I never did anything to him. I don't know why they both have to be... I listen to her call people ugly all the time. Like just stop. I want her to stop. I'm leaving for the military soon, and she said that I can't get rid of her. That sounds psycho. And it honestly makes me want to get away more. I'm tired of the toxic environment and I want to get away. But she's everywhere. She knows everything about me. She has photos of me I hate. She has so many things she can use against me. I'm honestly scared. I want to block her again but I know she's just going to keep bugging me about it. And she might turn people against me. She's good at talking to people. I'm not I'm an introvert. I don't want her ever find me again once I leave. But I know she might try. People always find a way. And she's creepy. Because I know she'll be able to. But I just want to move on with my life. I don't know how to remove her from my life. What should I do?

TW: Alcoholism, drug addiction, violence, suicidal ideation, sex abuse
This is going to be a LLLLLOOONNNNGGGGG one. This story goes back quite a way, but yesterday was the tenth anniversary of the ending to this story and I'm feeling it, still got some guilt about everything that happened, wondering what I could have done differently and I just want to vent it out and hope to get some closure from it.
This story started in 2010.
Characters in this story (names are fake, duh!):

• Me, Guy, 32M at the time, 45 now.
• My BFF Stephanie, 33F at the time.
• Stephen, 40M at the time, Stephanie's boyfriend.
• Maryse, 27F at the time.

Background and intro
I had known Stephanie for many years and we had the kind of friendship that made her BFs and my GFs uncomfortable to put it lightly. We had never crossed that boundary and I wouldn't consider us in the friendzone, we were just friend, but the kind of friend where she would sit on my lap with her arms around my neck or her head on my shoulder.
At the start of 2010, Stephanie met her then boyfriend, Stephen. He tolerated me and my friendship with Stephanie because I also had a gf back then. She liked Stephanie, wasn't at all jealous of my friendship with her, so he didn't deem me too suspicious. Then my gf and I broke up for reasons unimportant and all hell broke loose for Stephen. He became convinced that I would try and steal Stephanie from him. He insisted that Stephanie introduce me to her female friends or female friends of his. Thus began what I called the year of the 50 blind dates. It was probably closer to 20, but still I like saying the year of 50 blind dates. Most of them were unremarkable and never went beyond the first date. There are some fun stories in there if anyone wants to hear them eventually!
In July of that year, I had to switch gears because I had to focus up and study for a professional exam for a certification important to my career. This exam required close to 600-800 hours of study over a 3-4 month period. So I hunkered down, told Stephanie to stop the blind dates for now because I had to focus on that. She respected my wishes and, other a text here or there, we went low contact for the last two months before the exam.
Except for one fateful night in September. Her birthday was in September and she always threw these big bashes at her house. She would throw a big pool party that started around noon and would go on to the wee hours of the morning. I knew she would harass me to go to her party, so I made some quick math and figured I would lose more energy and time trying to dodge her calls, texts and most likely visits at my place than by just going to the party itself. So when she called me to ask, I just said: "Okay I'll go to your damn party, now git." I texted her I would get there in the evening probably around 8. She texted back "Great, can't wait. Now study, bitch!"
So I ultimately get there around 8PM. Basically everybody is already drunk off their gourd. Stephanie sees me, squeals in excitement and runs to me in her bikini and just jumps in the air and slams into me, wraps her arms around my neck and her legs around my waist and gives me a big hug. I hug her back and just keep walking back to the pool where she had started, carrying her with me. I just duck my head around hers and say hi to Stephen, who just glares at me.
She drops back down and I give her her gift. We chat for a few seconds and says "There's beer in the fridge and food in the dining room." I told her I'd be right back.
I go inside and grab a beer from the fridge. I head to the dining room and the table is against the wall with a buffet of sandwiches, tomato pizza, salads, etc. I grab a plate and start putting food on it. I was focused on the task because I was starving. I barely noticed, sitting at the end of the table one of the most stunning woman I have ever seen. I just see her in my peripheral vision and I do a quick double take, quick glance at her and back to the food. I do that a second time. And finally a third time. At that point she is just straight up staring at me and I can't help but chuckle and whisper under my breath "Subtle Guy, sub-tle".
Thankfully she starts laughing too, saving me some embarassment. I look at her and greet her. She says "Hi, I'm Maryse and I'm guessing you're Guy?" I just nod and we start talking. At that point, I just thought I have no shot with her, she's so far out of my league that I'm just gonna talk to her until she sees one of the "models" hanging out by the pool and ditches me for him.
So I'm not feeling like I'm playing for anything, so I'm just myself and not nervous, just talking to her as I would any friend. We chat and she laughs at all my jokes, she gets all my cultural references. She never gets up or ditches me. The plate of food I had made and the beer I had gotten are sitting on the table next to me untouched, I was too busy with the convo to think about food or beer anymore.
After what felt like only 20-30 minutes, Stephanie comes in and tells me, fake grumpy: "So that's where you disappeared to. I invite my best friend to a party and he spends the whole night talking to someone else." I laugh and go: "What do you mean the whole night? I haven't been here that long." She says "Dude, it's 2AM. You've been here for 6 hours..." My jaw dropped and I just said: "Wow, time flies when you're having fun." Maryse chimes in, with a big smile: "It sure does!" That made me happy as you can imagine.
Now I was a little stuck because where Stephanie lived, there's no night service for the bus and the subway had been closed for an hour or so. I figured I would cab it. So I turn to Maryse and tell her: "It was absolutely lovely to meet you and I enjoyed our conversation very much." She says that she did too. I continued with "At the moment, my schedule is incredibly hectic. I'm basically working full-time, studying full-time and sleeping part-time. So I don't have a lot of free time, but if she was interested, whatever little free time I had, I would love to call her or text her to keep on getting to know her."
I see Stephanie in the backgroudnd, looking like a proud mama at how smooth that came out, knowing I was always anything but smooth with women, as proven by the string of blind dates! Maryse has a big smile and we exchange numbers. I go to Stephanie to wish her a happy birthday again. While I'm talking to her, my phone buzzes with a text from Maryse: "Just checking!"
I asked Stephanie "What's the best cab company to call in this area?" Maryse chimes in: "Where do you live?" I tell her where I lived and she goes "It's on the way to where I live, I can give you a ride if you want." Stephanie raised an eyebrow in surprise. I learned later, she did it because it absolutely was not on the way to her place, like, at all. I say that I would love that as it would give us a chance to keep talking.
We get in her car, driving to my place. We talk, she asks me what I'm studying as I hadn't mentioned it earlier. I tell her all about the boring maths I had to study. Much too quickly, we get to my place. She parks in front of my building and we keep talking. At some point, I tell her: "Normally, this is where I would try to "trick" you into coming up to my place..." She interrupts me: "You wouldn't need to trick me. I'm willing and able!"
I tell her that "As tempting as that sounds, I know who I am and I know that if you come up and things proceed to where they're going, I'm not going to be able to study for the rest of the month. I have a kind of obsessive mind and when I find someone or something I like, I can push everything else to the side in favor of that. So to make sure I can still focus on my studying, I have to go up by myself."
She looks at me, a little disappointed but then says, half-jokingly: "We don't have to go up, there's a backseat right there!" We laugh and I give her a kiss and wish her a good night. I managed to stay strong and go back to my condo. Damn it, why did I have to stay strong!!!
My exam was at the beginning of november. During the month of october, we texted a bunch of times and talked on the phone. We went for coffee a couple of times and dinner once. She respected my boundaries and never pushed for more, which I appreciated but also hated at the same time, if that makes sense. The exam came and it was a monster of a Friday. I slept for basically 18 hours after the exam as the adrenalin dropped and my system crashed.
I texted her when I woke up at around 1PM. She was working at the clothing store Stephanie owned. She said "I'm off at 5PM, wanna meet me." I said: "Duh! Why do you think I'm texting? ;)" So I met her at the store downtown. I asked if she wanted to grab a drink, go for dinner, or what. She proposed going to her place and getting some take out. Stephanie who was closing the store at that moment, came up to us and said: "Hey, so what are we doing?" I said: "WE, that is Maryse and I, are going to her place and getting some takeout. Bye!" I'm sure you'll understand when I tell you that no food was ever ordered that night!
Thus followed a whirlwind month of November where any free time we had was spent together, and I wasn't going to complain!
The troubles
By the start of december, things were still going great with us. One saturday night, we were having dinner at a restaurant and I mention that this coming Friday is my office Christmas party, that it's employees only, so we wouln't see each other that night. She tells me: "Oh sure, that's fine! It'll give me a chance to go see some girlfriends I've been neglecting lately." I said "Great! BTW I also got us a reservation at [this great restaurant she had mentioned a few times] for next Saturday, so we could go there and I'll tell you all about my party and you can tell me all about her night with the girls!"
That was settled, I thought. I was wrong. On Thursday, we had spent the evening together at her place and I was about to leave to go back to my place. She tells me: "So are you coming to meet me at the store tomorrow or do I go to your place?" I reminded her: "Neither, tomorrow is my office Christmas party and we won't see each other tomorrow." She said: "Oh right, I forgot." I asked her if she had made plans with her friends like she had mentioned last saturday. She said that they were all busy tomorrow and weren't available.
She suggested "If your party is boring, maybe you could come meet me." I retorted that it wasn't going to be, knowing who was going to be there.
"Yeah but what if?"
"But it won't"
"But what IFFFFFF?" she kept insisting and I kept saying no. After what felt like 30 minutes of that (probably only 2-3 minutes in reality), I had enough and just said to end the argument: "Okay, if it's boring, I'll come. but it won't be." She said: "Cool" with a big smile on her face. I came to learn that that smile meant "Challenge accepted".
The following night, my colleague and I were pregaming in a conference room before leaving for the party proper and my phone buzzes. Maryse was wishing me a good party. I replied. She texted me again. I replied. She texted again, but I was in a conversation with a colleague so I didn't reply or even look at the phone. My phone buzzes again. Still talking, and didn't want to be rude to my colleague. Another buzz. I just kept talking. Phone buzzes differently, she was now calling because I hadn't answered her texts.
"Why aren't you replying to my texts?"
"Hey, sorry, was talking to my colleague Patrick."
"What? you don't want to talk to me?"
"I am talking to you now."
"Why didn't you reply to my texts?"
"Because it would have been rude to my colleague to pull my phone out while talking to him."
"But you're talking to me now."
"Because I thought something was wrong, maybe it was an emergency."
"I wanted to talk to you, that's all."
"Well, gotta go back to the party. Talk to you later."
She kept texting and if I didn't reply right away, she would call after two or three missed texts. After about 2 hours of this, I stopped answering the texts. When she called back, I asked her: "Aren't you supposed to be working?" which started another round of guilt-tripping of "why are you asking me this? you don't want to talk to me?" At that point I had had enough and wanted to enjoy my party. I remembered that the Blackberry (no shaming old tech!) I had had an annoying feature, but I was hoping to put it to good use at that moment.
Whenever the battery would get really low, like less than 1%, it would let out an ear-piercing BEEP for about 3 seconds, reminiding you to charge it and giving you a heart attack all at the same time. It would do that even when you were in silent mode. It had happened a few days earlier when I was with Maryse. I figured, if I press a button on the Blackberry, it would make a beep too that could be heard through the phone. So while I was talking to Maryse, I pressed my thumb on the space bar for a good 3 seconds and sputtered; "what... the .... what?" trying to put on a somewhat believable performance.
She asked what that noise was and I tell her that it was my blackberry letting me know I was low battery and it might shut off any second. I told her "Listen I'm gonna wish you a good night, I'm having a good time at my party so I'll see you tomorrow at 5PM to go spend our evening together. I hope you have a good....." and hung up mid-sentence. I promptly shut my phone off and went back to the party. I concede that I may be a bit of an AH for that move.
The party was great, I got drunk much quicker than I expected owing to the fact that I hadn't had a drink in over two months because Maryse didn't drink so I didn't either when we were together, and we were always together. At 1AM, I went home and passed out on my bed.
This is another place where I may have been an AH. I didn't turn my cell phone back on and I unplugged my home line too, because I wanted to sleep the deep sleep of the drunkard. I woke up at around 1:30 PM, not knowing it was already too late. In my mind, I was meeting Maryse at 5PM to go out on the town that night. Maryse had other ideas as you'll see.
So like I said, I woke up at 1:30PM and was sticky with alcohol sweat, so I went straight for the shower to get clean again. While in the shower, my stomach grumbled with hunger and I started daydreaming of bacon and eggs. That pushed me out of the shower right quick. I dried myself off quickly, tied the towel around my waist and went to the fridge. No bacon.... booo. Looked at the egg compartment... no eggs... booo again. Okay then, how about a cream cheese bagel. No cream cheese, damn it. Look in the pantry, no bagels.... god. I was starting to get angry. Okay, cereals then. I pick up the cereal box, that mofo was empty and I get mad: "who's the idiot who puts the empty box back in the pantry?" I remembered I live alone.
I close the fridge dejected and see the grocery list stuck on the fridge, taunting me with everything I wanted to eat for breakfast written on it. But I felt like if I went to the grocery store hungry as I Was, I'm just gonna pay 600$ and not get one single healthy thing to eat. I then remembered there's a restaurant next to the grocery store that serves breakfast until 3PM. I get excited! I get dressed quickly, grab my wallet and keys, put my boots on, my coat on, wrap my scarf, my tuque and my gloves and go to the restaurant. If you notice, I didn't mention my phone in there.
I get to the restaurant and confirm that they still have breakfast and get even more excited when she confirms it. I order the "heart attack", at least that's how I nicknamed it: 3 eggs, 3 servings of bacon, 2 sausages, and, I guess to give one peace of mind, fruit (or to be precise, one single solitary slice of orange). Now that the food is ordered and coming I figured I would check if I have any messages. I pat the pocket where my phone always is. No phone. uh-oh. I start clutching evert pocket, no luck.
I wonder if I should go back home after the meal before going to the grocery store and decide against it, it would be too long a detour. So I scarf my breakfast down, rush through the grocery store. I get home and set my bags down in front of the fridge. I go pick up my blackberry. I turn it back on. The little tape icon tells me there are messages on my voicemail, at that time there were no red dots with a number in it to tell you how many.
I connect to the voicemail while starting to put the groceries away. The little automated voice tells me "You have 25 new messages." I pull the phone away from my ear, look at it in disbelief as if saying: "are you f'ing kidding me?" So I press 1 to start playing the messages.
Remember: Maryse knew I was at a party with a dead phone, no chargers and I probably wouldn't get home until 1AM. From 6:30PM, when my phone died, to 11:34 PM, when she went to sleep she left me 9 messages. BTW I know she went to sleep at 11:34PM because she left me a message saying "it's 11:34PM and I'm going to bed. Thinking of you." The 9 messages were in the same vein. These are the salient details, but the messages were all much longer.
She woke up at 7:15 the following day, I'll let you guess how I know that tidbit of information! She left me 5 more messages like those from the day before: 7:15 woke up. 7:35 going to take a shower. 7:55 out of the shower. 8:25 getting ready to leave for work 8:50 walking out of the subway to go to the store.
She leaves me another message at 9 that was different. She sounded very excited as if she had had the best idea in the world: "Hey it's 9AM, I'm about to start my shift. I know we're only supposed to meet after my shift, but what if you came and met me for lunch so you could tell me all about your party." I just did my best Scooby-Doo "Ruh-Roh" and chuckled that I blew that, not thinking the calamity that was awaiting me.
Another couple of messages to talk logistics: "I could take my lunch at 12 or 12:30, let me know which you prefer." "I'm taking my lunch at 12:30"
A slightly worried message: "It's 11:15 and you stil have not said if you were coming or not, are you okay?"
The first bomb goes off and I knew I was in trouble then: "Where are you? We're supposed to meet for lunch and you still haven't given me any sign of life, you're not answering your home phone either, what happened?" Reminder: we were not supposed to meet for lunch, she suggested doing so a couple of hours earlier and I never agreed to anything. I guess she told her colleagues I would meet her for lunch and it was now fact and could perhaps make her look bad in front of her colleagues.
The second bomb drops: "It's almost noon now, WHERE ARE YOU? Stephanie says you're probably sleeping off your drunk, but I don't believe her. I'm sure you got yourself a slut and cheated on me. Didn't you? didn't you, you asshole." Stephanie knows me very well, but that wasn't enough for Maryse it seems.
Ensued four more messages from 12:30 to 1:15, where she starts sounding more and more drunk and accusatory, spewing more attacks like in the message above. At that point I already knew it was over, there was no coming back from that. I can understand having trust issues, but that was nuclear. I don't tolerate jealousy because of horrible experiences with a couple of jealous toxic exes.
A final message comes in, and it's a different voice, that of my best friend being more than a little angry: "Hey Guy, listen, Maryse tells me you had a Christmas party yesterday, so I'm guessing you're sleeping off your drunk, still. But call me when you get this. I put Maryse, who's f'ing drunk, in the backstore so she can dry off and "do inventory". She can't be on the sales floor obviously and I just don't feel safe sending her home in the state she's in. Call me to tell me how you want to handle this."
At that point I had finished putting away my groceries and had put my boots and my coat on and was making my way to the subway to go to the store. I call Stephanie and tell her I got the messages and I was coming. She was right, I was sleeping off my drunk and had just woke up (didn't feel the need to mention the breakfast and grocery store). I ask her if she knows what I'm gonna do when I get there. She says that she knows and understands. She knows my bad history.
When I get out of the subway, I call her again before getting to the store. I ask her how she wants me to do this. It's her store and I don't want to create drama in front of her customers. Does she want me to wait outside and she tells Maryse to meet me in the street or do I go in the store and she takes me to the backstore and I do it there? She says to come to the store.
I walk in the store and every saleswomen on the floor looks at me and gives me the biggest case of the stink-eye. They only have Maryse's side of the story, so they think I did all these horrible things. I see Stephanie in the middle of the store and I walk towards her. She shakes her head and points me towards the cash register. I look over there and see Julia, a salesperson that I've known for a couple of years and really like, who also happens to be the biggest gossip in the store. I understand what Stephanie is trying to do. She's gonna make me tell her my story in front of Julia so Julia can spread the "good news" to the other employees and rehabilitate my name possibly.
So I get to the register and say Hi to Julia. She barely acknoledges me. Steph joins me. She asks me:
"How are you?"
"I was better an hour ago, before I listened to those voicemails. I had gone to our office party last night, had a great night, got drunk off my ass, got home at around 2 and woke up around 2."
Julia asks "Maryse told us you were supposed to meet her for lunch."
"No we weren't. I have a reservation for tonight at XYZ restaurant. I was supposed to take the day to do errands, stuff around the condo and meet her here at closing time. She suggested that it could be fun if I came at lunchtime to meet her, but that was never the plan."
Julia asks again "But why didn't you answer your phone?"
"It ran out of battery last night during the party and when I got home, I was so drunk that I forgot to plug it back in. I only plugged it when I woke up at 2. That's when the messages came in."
Julia asks "She says she tried calling your home line and you didn't answer and your machine didn't kick in."
"Yeah, that one's my fault, I knew I wanted to sleep and telemarketers have a habit of calling me early saturday mornings so I didn't want to be awoken by a call for a rug cleaning service, so I unplugged it yesterday morning, knowing I would be drunk when I got home and forget and be angry if I was awakened by a telemarketer."
Julia gave me a hint of a smile, showing me she was starting to believe me. She asked me a few more questions and then she asked what I was gonna do. I told her that whatever I'll do, I would tell Maryse first.
I looked at Stephanie and said: "Can you open the back store so I can go see her?" So we went to the backstore. As we reached the door, it swung opened and out popped Maryse, looking absolutely terrifying, I actually jumped back when I saw her. Her usual perfect makeup was completely smeared, her mascara streaking down her cheeks from the crying. Her hair was disheveled. She was a mess. Apparently, she had had enough of waiting back there and was planning on leaving the store to go home and had put her coat and boots on.
When she saw me, she went into an unhinged rant about me being an asshole for cheating on her, me not being great in bed, me not treating her right, etc. I let her vent everything she had to say, I looked at Stephanie and apologized for creating such a scene in her store. I tell Maryse we should go outside and talk in private. She keeps on yelling, but when I grab her hand to lead her outside, she follows.
When we get outside, her anger had started to wane a little, or maybe just her energy. I was able to talk to her to explain everything, how I had gotten drunk, had overslept (alone) and woke up at 2PM. I reminded her that we were only supposed to meet at 5PM not for lunch. The anger was leaving her and a smile almost appeared on her face. Through all of this I was being very calm and patient with her, which she interpreted as me not being mad at her. I then said in a firmer tone: "However..." and let it hang for a second.
The beginning smile vanished. I continued: "When you accused me of cheating on you, that broke me. That triggered memories of toxic exes who would always accuse me of cheating, not trusting me when I would tell them where I was, snooping on me, stalking me. Because of those experiences, I have a zero tolerance policy for jealousy. I told her that if she was behaving like after only two months of dating, it didn't bode well for the future and I have to protect myself."
At that, the tears started again and she just turned and ran/waddled away. I told her to wait, but she didn't hear me. I turned towards the entrance of the store to see basically all the employees and customers milling around the door trying to catch the drama. I went back inside to talk to my best friend. The mood had definitely changed and no one was giving me the stink eye anymore, but I didn't really care. I was just sad that it had ended, but proud of myself for having stood up for myself.
So AITA for getting drunk and keeping my phone turned off?
There is a lot more to this story and if you want to learn what happened afterwards, then read on.
The immediate aftermath
So I went back inside the store and talked to Stephanie. I told her that I had a reserrvation for XX restaurant and if she wanted to go with Stephen, she could take it, I wasn't in the mood for a dinner. She said "I already have plans for tonight, but thanks for offering." Julia said she would go with me if I wanted, but I just said that I wasn't in the mood to go out. I just wanted to crash and eat a pizza and get into a food coma.
Stephanie said she didn't feel comfortable leaving me by myself and I should join them at her house. They were having friends over to play board games and it could at least distract me a little. I said why not. So brimming with enthusiasm, I went to play bored games. I left early as I wasn't in the mood. I was feeling a little better, but still a bit down. I thanked Stephanie for the invite and left. I got home and just passed out on the bed.
I woke up at around 7AM the next morning and I saw along the corners of the window the tell-tale signs of a snow-drift and got excited as it was the first snow of the season. I pushed the curtains aside and looked on to see a beautiful white carpet outside. It was early enough that very few cars had marred the whiteness. I was admiring it when I noticed that, against the red bricks of the building across the street, there was a pink blotch. As I focused, the blotch became human shaped and I cleared my eyes enough to realize that it was Maryse and she was raising her cell phone to her ear.
On cue, my phone rings. I pick it up. Still sounding drunk, she asks me if we can speak. I ask her to give me five minutes to get dressed and I'll meet her down there. She asks why she can't come up. I say that I'm not sure I want her in my apartment. She says that it's cold out. I say: "Good, then this will be quick."
I get dressed and meet her outside. I'm still bleary-eyed from having woken up 5 minutes ago, but I try to get my wits together. I tell her that we're going to walk to the subway. It 's a 10-minute walk normally, but with her drunkenness, it might take 15-20 minutes. That's how long she has to tell me what she wants to tell me.
She wants to apologize for accusing me of cheating on her. She says she knows I'm a great guy and... I may be the A-hole at this point too, but I start to drift off in my little bubble and start daydreaming about, if I go back to bed, would there still be some residual heat or would it be cold? I could take a hot shower and warm the bed that way. I could still hear her in the background making excuses, saying how she had been cheated on, but I wasn't really listening.
During the daydreaming I notice it got quite quiet. I look on my left and she's not there, I turn around she's a good 5-6 steps behind me looking angry and she says: "you're not listening" I just say: "when you're right, you're right." I tell her that I understand she's been hurt too in the past, and I hope she can work to resolve her issues, but I was done and I'm going back to bed. I was a bit harsh there, but I was tired and still down.
I walk past her and get maybe 10 paces past her when I hear a scream coming from her. I turn around and I see her messing with something inside her coat. She pulls out a chef's knife with like an 8-inch blade. That wakes me the fuck up. Byebye bleary eyes, hello wakefulness. better than a cup of coffee or a red bull I tell you!
So she's got the knife, she's screaming something that I can't quite understand. She gets quiet and then she charges at me with the knife. If I'm being honest I could have stayed where I was and she probably would have missed me anyways, but someone charges at me with a knife, I'm gonna nope out of there. I take a massive side step and once she gets to where I was and realizes that I'm no longer there, she turns her head towards me and says heyyyyy.
At that point, I have a moment of clarity and see what's gonna happen. She's drunk running one way and looking another, I know she's gonna trip. As I predicted, she stumbled over her feet and starts falling to the ground. I start praying to god and anybody who would listen: "Please don't let her cut herself. I don't want to have to explain this to the doctors, EMTs and nurses. I don't want her drunk ass deciding to take revenge on me by saying I did it."
Thankfully, she winds up in a sitting position on the sidewalk holding the knife up and it was clean. Thank god for small miracles. She starts crying and, other moment of clarity, I know she's gonna turn the knife on herself now. I jump towards her and I realize I was right, the knife starts moving towards her left wrist. I tackle her, grab her right wrist and twist it so she drops the knife. I pick the knife back up and put it in my pocket. She looks at me crying and says: "Why did you stop me?"
I pick her up and take her back to my building. In my building there was a couch in the lobby, so I take her there and I sit her down and plop myself next to her. I look at her and wonder out loud: "What am I gonna do with you? What can I do?"
She goes: "Just let me go, I'll be good." I tell her that's not going to happen. I realize I have three options and I give her the three options.
"So here's the choice I give you.
1- I pull out my phone, call 911 and tell them about the attempted murder back there and they send the police to arrest you. I don't want to do that because that could derail your life and not get you the help you need. Besides, they might not do anything anyway as it's your word against mine.
2= I pull out my phone, call 911 and tell them about the attempted suicide back there and that you need to be placed on a 72 hour hold. I could do that, but at the same time, again it's my word against yours, so maybe they don't believe me.
3- I'm gonna hazard a guess here. From what I've seen, you have alcohol problems. So I'm gonna guess you were in AA, had been sober for a while, I want to say 6 months, maybe less, when we met."
She confirms my guess.
"alright so option 3, I'm guessing you had a sponsor in AA." she nods "we call them up and tell them about your relapse and what happened this morning. Can they come get you and take care of you?"
She takes her phone out and picks a contact and calls. She hands me the phone. Someone answers and I explain the situation. They said they were coming right away. I give them my address, they get here 15 minutes later. Maryse had fallen asleep in the meantime, so I wake her up gently and help her to the car. Off she went.
I went back to my apartment and just crashed back to sleep.
A month later
Mid-january, my phone rings and I see Maryse's number on there. I send her to voice mail. Another call. Voicemail again. 5 minutes later, Private number calling. "Gee I wonder who that could be." Voicemail once more.
Afterwards, I didn't get any unidentified callers for a little over a week. One afternoon, I was at work and my phone rings and it's a number I do not recognize. I pick up.
"Hello."
"Hi, is this Guy?"
"Yes, to whom am I speaking?"
"This is Hannah, Maryse's sponsor. we spoke last month." I started fearing the worst.
"Yes, I remember. How can I help you?"
"Maryse tried to reach you last week and you rejected the calls. I think it could help Maryse if you listened to what she had to say. You're obviously not obligated to entertain her, but I think despite everything that happened, you still care about her or you would not have called me that morning."
"You are right, I do still care about Maryse. I'm just not sure how good it would be for her to meet me this soon after everything that happened. I understand wanting to work through the 9th step and making amends, but..." She interrupts me.
"So you know about the steps."
"Yes I have friends in the program. which is how I could guess that she was in the program too that morning."
"You know it's important."
"I know. I know. How about this: we meet in public at a cafe, you would have to be there. Not necessarily at the table with us, but nearby in case she needs help, in case meeting me causes her pain. Tell her I promise to be in a more receptive mood than I was that morning."
So we make an appointment for that saturday afternoon.
I get to the coffee shop. She's already there, and so is her sponsor. I realize happily that she's not wearing makeup. I say happily because that means she understands that this is not a date, but something serious. She's still stunningly beautiful, and I feel sad almost right away.
I grab a coffee and go join her at the table.
"Hey" I say,
"Hey. So this is gonna be uncomfortable, but thank you for agreeing to meet me and for coming, I appreciate it more than you know. I'm sure you heard I quit the store."
"I have, I'm sorry about that, I hope you didn't do it just because of me."
"No, I needed time to focus on myself for now."
She proceeds to tell me about how I wasn't far off with my guess. She had been sober 4 months when we met. Now she had 39 days. She tells me that in AA, if you are single, they recommend not dating anyone new for at least the first year of your sobriety as it can cause issues, similar to what happened with us. I was like her "drug" and as long as I was available, she could get her fix. But the moment I wasn't available all hell broke loose, and that is what led her back to drinking that day.
I told her I'm glad to see her back sober again this quickly and I hope she can get all the help she needs from it. I ask her if she wants to talk to me about her drinking.
She starts to share a story about how she started drinking at around 11 years old. When puberty hit her, she got into a deep depression because the sexual feelings she was starting to feel were triggering responses. As a child she had been abused by two of her uncles repeatedly and her parents never believed her. They accused her of trying to make herself interesting. That was until they caught one of those uncles red-handed.
They finally believed and took the necessary steps to protect their daughter. But they were poor and they couldn't afford therapy. So she never really got help for it. At 11, she started self medicating the depression with alcohol. When alcohol wasn't enough, she added drugs.
At that point, I was full on crying. She asked me if I wanted her to stop. I told her that she doesn't have to stop. That the tears are there because that was one more thing we had in common. I was also a survivor of sexual assault as a child. In my case, it wasn't a family member, it was only a stranger, so it only happened once. But I also self-medicated with alcohol at the onset of puberty, switching to drugs later on too. I was lucky to avoid the pitfalls of addiction, but I was still dealing with my demons, slowly making peace with them.
So there we were, sitting at a coffee shop, both crying and holding each other. I tell her that I think it's great she's getting help for her alcoholism and addicion, but was she doing anything to help with the underlying issue, the original trauma? She said no, she couldn't afford therapy. I tell her that I am a member of a survivors group and if she is interested, I could get her into a meeting and perhaps learn to heal that part of herself too.
She said that she could give it a try. I tell her I have to talk to the other members to know if I can bring someone new and I would let her know. If they said yes, we would go to her first meeting together, I would introduce her and then we would coordinate so that I never went to meetings where she was. I wanted to do that because I wanted her first few meetings to be about healing and I didn't want our own history to be intertwined or mixed in with that.
After that, we left both feeling content and, while not necesarily happy, at peace if you will. Later on, I contacted Stephanie who was one of the "pillars" of the support group (that's how we met) to ask her if it was okay for me to bring in a new member to the group. She said sure. She asked if it was anyone she knew. I told her she would have to meet her at the meeting if she decides to come.
We were having a meeting the following day. I called Maryse, told her the time and place, and she said she would be there. She came to the group meeting and was shocked to see Stephanie there but Stephanie kinda guessed that it was Maryse I was referring to.
I introduce her, we start sharing stories, talking about how we're feeling, etc. The meeting was good and Maryse liked the vibe. So for the first six months after that, I never saw Maryse and we planned which meeting we would be attending to ensure we didn't cross paths. She started feeling much better.
After maybe 2 and a half years, she finally felt ready and she started dating again. She met someone and she fell for him. They were together for about six months, she looked happy. Unfortunately after about six months, she caught him cheating on her. We tried supporting her, being good friends, cursing his name, doing all the things we could to make sure she didn't relapse. But on April 5th 2014, she ODed on heroin. She was hospitalized for 2 weeks after that.
Hannah took her in and she set up a room for Maryse. She was still in a fragile state, so a group of her friends and I started taking turns watching over Maryse, making sure there was always at least one person there with her to keep her company.
Despite our vigilance, on May 14th 2014, when Hannah was out running a quick errand, she was gone maybe 15 minutes tops, Maryse found a way to cut her wrists and she died. We found a note saying that "the OD was not an accident, and neither was that. Thanks for everything you did for me. I love you all, but I can't do this anymore."
It feels good to write that story (I'll just ignore the fat tears rolling down my face!). Thanks for reading this far and sorry for the long story, I just started writing and couldn't stop. I apologize if it was a bit of a bummer.

Howdy y'all. I haven't posted for awhile so I thought I'd give another short story a try. This takes place during Chapter 2 after Kris, Susie and Ralsei split temporarily leaving Kris alone. Hope you enjoy.
An Honest Conversation
Kris, Susie and Ralsei came up to a split in the road in Cyber City, Ralsei noting the occasion by walking up in front of the group and looking towards Kris and Susie as they wondered what he had to say.
"Seems we've come to a split in the road. We should split up--Kris, who do you want to go with?" Ralsei looked to the human, slightly annoying Susie.
"Why does Kris get to pick all the time?!" Susie walked up towards Ralsei, grabbing him by the shirt. "You're coming with me."
With that, a blank faced Kris was left behind as Susie took off down the northern alley leaving the human behind to fend for himself.
"SUSIE!!" Ralsei shouted.
"WHAT?!"Susie responded.
"you can put me down." The goat Darkner whispered in slight annoyance.
"...oh." Susie gently stopped running, putting the hairy goat Darkner down. "Sorry."
"Why'd you leave Kris behind like that?" Ralsei asked, wiping off his green robes.
"He'll be fine." Susie sighed. "Sides...I was kinda nervous he'd choose me."
"Why?" Ralsei inquired.
"We just became friends yesterday, ya doofus." Susie explained, sitting down against the alley wall. "I'm not ready for that conversation...yet."
"That conversation?" Ralsei raised an eyelid.
"What, are you a million questions Ralsei today?"
"I'm sorry, I'm kinda new to this whole friends thing myself." Ralsei looked down.
Susie sighed, remembering that very fact herself.
"Yeah, kinda hard just having a Ralsei statue as company I suppose." Susie mused, wiping her snout. "The thing is...me and Kris have always been on the opposite end of the spectrum. Kris...he's had security his whole life. Me, I've had shitty parents and no guarantee of a good meal or warm bed. It sucks. I treated him like dirt for the longest time Ralsei. One time, I came pretty damn close to really hurting him. If I didn't stop myself right then I would've done it. I was mad at him...he was so socially awkward, never talked to anyone, kept to himself. Despite everything I did, Kris risked his life for mine. For the first time in my life, I was scared to lose someone. I saw the King holding Kris in his disgusting hands, using the very same words I muttered earlier..."QUIET PEOPLE PISS ME OFF" he uttered his tongue out. It hit me what I had to do."
"Susie, I think it's clear to me that Kris would listen and not judge you given his actions." Ralsei sat down, playing with his fur.
"You think?" Susie asked. "I hardly know the kid. All I know for sure is that he has the greatest Mom ever and that his hair smells annoyingly of apples. You don't know what willpower it took for me NOT to take a bite outta that kid's head."
"I'm sure he'd get you an apple if you asked." Ralsei snickered at the thought.
"His Mom makes good pies...I'll have to pester Kris to have his Mom make us some of her cinnamon-butterscotch pies she's known for." Susie drooled at the thought. "You should come to the Light World sometime, Ralsei. You'd enjoy it."
"I'll...keep that in mind." Ralsei looked away, dodging the question as nimbly as he could.
"I mean it! We three and Lancer would be invincible!" Susie grinned, just thinking of it. "You could be Ms. Alphy's teacher's pet and Lancer could dig all the holes in town he wanted. There's enough pot holes already as it is...a few more wouldn't hurt I suppose."
"I'm sure it would be wonderful, Susie." Ralsei acknowledged.
"Well, just think about it." Susie let end it there, seeing the troubled look on Ralsei's face. There was something he obviously wasn't telling her but it could wait. She didn't want to ruin this. "Look, the real reason I dragged you into this path was--I want to ask you about Kris."
"Kris? What about?" Ralsei asked.
"Don't tell Kris I said any of what I'm about to tell you. And I mean NONE of it Ralsei." Susie narrowed her eyes.
"My lips are zipped." Ralsei meekly responded.
"Good." Susie sighed. "After we left the Dark World yesterday, I felt things I hadn't felt ever...I wasn't sure what happened was real. All I knew was that I felt them and that I didn't want to lose them...most of all, I didn't want to lose Kris. Kris...the kid I hated for my all time in Hometown I now couldn't stand to be without. I thought of em' the whole night. I didn't get any sleep Ralsei and trust me, that bed you presented earlier was VERY tempting...you bastard."
"S-Sorry."
"It's ok...I'm just venting here. Anyway...I guess what I'm saying is that I don't know how I should go about this whole thing."
"When did you plan to have...the conversation?"
"Sometime in the Dark World, when it was just me and Kris."
"Why don't you talk to him when you guys are done with this adventure? You could walk him home." Ralsei suggested.
"Say Kris, why don't I walk ya home and we can talk serious junk...yeah Rals, that'll go down real well."
"R-Rals?"
"What, no one ever called you a nickname?" Susie raised an eyebrow.
"Well, insults like toothpaste boy not withstanding...Rals isn't bad." Ralsei blushed.
"Geez, I'm gonna have to teach you a LOT." Susie moaned, slapping the side of her snout. "Don't expect these lessons to be free either, toothpaste boy. You're gonna have to make a lot of cakes."
"S-Sure." Ralsei sweat. "I mean it though...don't make a big deal, just...offer to walk him home and just bring it up when you two are nice and relaxed."
"Like, when we're sitting down or something? Like now?"
"Yeah! We're talking, having a serious conversation aren't we?" Ralsei nodded in glee.
"No, we're talking about rainbows." Susie rolled her eyes.
"W-We are?" Ralsei second guessed himself.
"NO...that was SARCASM." Susie sighed once again. "I swear with this guy..."
"Sarcasm?"
"I swear I'm gonna call you Million Questions Ralsei forever if you don't stop." Susie crossed her arms. "It's when you want to express annoyance but do it indirectly."
"Huh. I'll have to try that..."
"Can we focus?" Susie snapped.
"O-Oh, sorry--so Kris, what do you want to ask him?"
"I try asking him if we'd still be friends if I opened that supply closet door and you guys weren't there but I chickened out at the last second. I didn't want to think about the possibility of that not being a thing."
Ralsei went silent, looking at Susie as she looked to the ground thinking of Kris in that moment.
"Susie, I didn't realize that Kris meant that much to you." Ralsei rubbed the back of his head. "Am I the one you should really be asking for advice on this? I mean, after all I'm...just learning how to be a friend. And you've done all the teaching thus far."
"Kris and I just became friends. The thought of losing that just scares me...scares me to my very core. The little I did sleep I had a nightmare. It was me and him in front of that bunker door in the woods. He was shaking the whole time, scared of something--I asked him what was wrong. He wouldn't tell me, backing away each time I walked towards the door. Suddenly, the door opened and a look of terror that I've never seen on him erupted on Kris' face. He looked at me, reached out to me but was sucked in and I had to watch as the doors closed on him. I couldn't save him, Ralsei! Kris almost died trying to save me yesterday Ralsei...I don't want to lose him." Susie began to break down. "All this time, I've treated that kid LIKE SHIT and despite everything, he still stuck his neck out for me. What do you say to that!? What do you do with that?! Jesus..."
Susie stood up, sniffling and wanting to begin walking again.
"H-Hey...Susie."Ralsei got up, gently putting a hand on Susie's arm, Susie growing stiff at the contact, Ralsei quickly pulling his hand away.
"Y-Yeah?" Susie turned around, trying to regain her composure.
"My offer still stands. I could teach you some healing spells, if you're up for it. Of course, the lessons would be payment for your advice from earlier." Ralsei offered. "This could help you protect Kris."
"They're hiding something Ralsei, I know it." Susie said. "It troubles Kris, even before we came to the Dark World. If there's something Kris knows and is trying to solve, I want to be prepared for the worst case scenario. I want to protect him."
"Then we'll start with the basics and on the way, refine your approach to conversation starters, all right?" Ralsei smirked.
"R-Rals?"
"Yes, Susie?"
"You're not half bad." Susie smirked, putting an arm around him.
"T-Thanks." Ralsei blushed. "I don't suppose that would translate to hugging..."
"DO NOT PUSH YOUR LUCK."

THERE ARE SPOILERS SO FOR ANYONE WHO HAS NOT FINISHED THE ANIME CLICK OFF NOW ( unless you want spoilers then go ahead)
I wish they made a season two because I feel like that. I have created a good first episode that I would like to see it’s an episode that I came up with in my head so basically the episode starts a day after graduation. Ryuji is making breakfast for his mother and taiga then taiga says how much she missed his cooking and Ryuji appreciate that as always. He then asks her what he’s been doing for a couple of months
(I say months because at the end of the last episode, it shows a time jump that seem to last months)
Then the episode would show a flashback of what taiga was doing it would show her at a nearby hotel
(she did not take her passport with her at the last episode so it could be possible that she stayed in town)
And went around town so that she wasn’t bored. While she runs into town she runs into Kitamura Minori and Kawashima on different days. They then tell her that Ryuji has been missing her a lot and Taiga tell them that she plans to come back graduation day but to not tell Ryuji because she wants to surprise him
(the reason why I had this part in the last episode when Ryuji running into the school they all smile like they know who he’s running to)
So they all agree, not to tell him and then it shows Ryuji and Taiga talking as they walk out the school then the flashback ends and that would be half the episode. It then cuts back to present day where Ryuji is surprised that Taiga was nearby the whole time. So then Taiga ask the same question then Ryuji tells her how the past couple months has been and then it would show another flashback to where Ryuji is upset at first, but then he quickly gets cheered up by Kitamura, Minorin and Kawashima by showing them what they have been doing after school. Which is softball with Minorin, modeling with Kawashima and hanging out at Kitamura’s house and we also get some insight on Kihara and Noto relationship being fixed after Noto and Haruta ask for Ryuji’s help on fixing it and then the flashback would end bringing us back to present day with Taiga eating very fast and saying how much she loved the story then she asked for more food and it ends with all of them eating together like a family :)

I have two reddit accounts, so if these stories are familiar, that's why. Someone commented that one of these sounds like abuse from my Christian parent to me. So I've compiled all most of them here. (Most of them are to do with Christianity, the hypocrisy of Christianity, or the consequences of my choice to leave it.) Please be honest but also recognize that this isn't all the times sometimes these are amazing people and I love these people but for my sake I need to know if it's really that bad.
"I'm rather young. My mom (42F) and my dad (41M) both grew up in the church. My grandfather is the pastor of his own church and my mother was raised by her grandmother who played piano in the church. Growing up I'd say I was the perfect little Christian girl. I liked praying and went to church, I wanted to help the world, and I wanted to be baptized before I even started kindergarten. I remember that vividly. I was sitting in the kitchen in one of our folding chairs because we couldn't afford real ones and I was begging my mom to let me get baptized.
My family and I are African American. The church I went to when I was little was a black church. My mother was the praise dance choreographer so of course I did praise dancing. I'd go to Sunday school, I wore the big puffy dresses, and I knew all the songs. Of course I had the common experience of being assaulted in a sexual manor by someone I went to church with. But we were both the same age and I just knew I was uncomfortable and she just knew that's how people bigger than us touched each other. All that came of me telling my mom and me not having to go to her house anymore. I was always told that I was intelligent and I believed everything I was told without question. Then my sister was born and we moved. At first everything stayed the same. We ended up having to switch churches as the previous one was an hour away from our new home. We found a new church. A church were you can wear your hoodie and jeans like it's a Tuesday. I made friends and played sports and nothing really changed until I was eight. When I was eight there was a girl on my softball team I'll call E. E is Jewish and at the time I thought everyone was Christian. As in Christianity was the default and only option. But my friend E's church wasn't called a church but a synagogue, and she couldn't eat specific foods together. E also talked about BaBat Mitzvah's. When I brought that up to my mom she said my friend was Jewish and that being Jewish is like being Christian but they read from the old testament exclusively but they don't believe in Jesus.
Which a while later caused me to spend all night crying because I put the two and two together of: Believing in resurrection Sunday and that Jesus was gods son is what got us into heaven and I cried worrying one of my closest, sweetest friend and her nice family would go to hell. Then school, which had always been easy, became hard. Which made me feel dumb. Especially since my self worth was put into how smart I was and I wouldn't dare get below an A or high B because I was scared I'd get punished. Like the time I slammed my fingers a metal door on accident and spent the next fifteen minutes in tears and my mom told me if I kept crying she'd take me to the hospital to have them cut off my fingers. Because of moments like that disappointing my parent or having to big of an emotional reaction was not okay and it made me scared and uncomfortable. They knew I was struggling, they were the ones who stayed up till four something in the morning with me trying to explain the concept. But with every minor and major struggle I felt like my worth was slipping away. But the better I did in school the more my outstanding grades became the expectation which resulted in acknowledgement for my academic achievements disappearing. I felt like I was falling apart so I'd spend hours pray and begging god for help. To take the feeling of being worthless away. I developed an eating disorder sometime before ten. Specifically binge eating. My parents would find the trash, not understand that it was more than just "the sin of gluttony" and yell which made me feel threatened and eat more food.
And then I'd pray on my knees on the hard wood outside my room door with nails and splinters in it and hurt myself because not only was I a dumb glutton but I also apparently wasn't good enough for god to save or help. It made me think if he wants a relationship with me so bad why does he ignore me? I'd hold a knife to my wrist when I'd wash dishes to see if I felt him then. I questions if I'd even go to heaven. For all my problems the answer was to pray but the problem was I'm doing that but my prayers aren't being answered. I was having thought of death no twelve year old should have. On my birthday I was like a puppet simply going through the motions. Then I started questioning my sexuality. Not to mention, I'm now cut off from the world because this is all during covid, on the bright side they gave me my door back. Now I'm older and I have questions like. How was Adam able to name all the animals and understand god not wanting him to eat from the tree and their need to stay in the garden, but not comprehend his nakedness? How was Eve able to be tempted and not understand her nakedness? Why did they and apparently god think being naked was wrong? How are we not all messed up from tons of inbreeding and how do animals still exist after the inbreeding the would've occurred after Noah's ark if he only saved one male and female of each species? Why did god want to flood the Earth and purge it of it's evil humans if he was the one who decided free will would be a good idea? Since he is perfect and all knowing their shouldn't have been a moment of let me make something I'll destroy, wait nvm. My parents have changed a lot since I was little and have let me go to therapy. Of course I have a Christian therapist. Which I wouldn't mind if it wasn't for the fact that every time I bring up trauma that's linked to religion or need advice in terms of how to change a bad behavior or over come anxiety the advice is to pray. And at times I feel like I'm in a moment of doubt she feel she should try and pull me back in. But they also said I have to volunteer in the childern ministry at church.
I used to work with children ages three to five. Now I'm in one to three. And it feels like I'm spreading propaganda. They tell me what to say and what the goal is for the kids to believe by the end of the month. After I can't help but feel dirty. I'm at the point in my journey were I don't believe. But I have to keep working in the childern ministry, I have to go to church every Sunday, my parents are both devotional authors with published books. I'm the only one in my family who doesn't believe both extended and intermediate. I just wanna know I'm not crazy. I feel like I'm being brainwashed or something. Like drink the blood and eat the body of Jesus!? It's all too much. And now that my parents know they're trying to make me go back to believing. And I listen to them talk and it's like I can't have a conversations with you. You put your faith above all else. You believe whole heartedly, my point of view is automatically wrong to you because faith trumps logic so why would I share it with you? But at the same time it's majority of the music they play, it's all their advice, I go every Sunday, my classmates and friends are majority Christian and yet I even though I see the flaws and hypocrisy, I still can't help but wonder, am I the crazy one?"
"My grandma would grab me and call me "big booty Judy." And my butt was grabbed, spanked, and frequently talked about. Sometimes she'd just sit there tapping it while she talked. It started when I was around three or four and just continued. Though now I'm in my teens and rarely see her. But my breast were also a topic for a while. Comments like "where'd you get those from?", "she's bigger than you.", and "her sisters the tall one but she's the curvy one." They felt icky but I didn't dwell on them. But she's also an alcoholic along with many other things. She dated my mom's friends when she was in college, gets shit faced in at events like birthdays and funerals. Shakes her ass on family members and frequently offered us alcohol. But I always took pride in being her favorite grandchild. Which she constantly reminded me I was. She also has a serious spending problem. But the funny thing is. She goes to a church church. She's in the choir and used frequently as a look example. She hosts church events and potlucks. She even remarried in the church. Never mind the things I just said that'd be considered sins. She's the perfect Christian woman."
"How do you cope with the level of disrespect? I'm not eighteen yet, but I'm still able to be disrespected. My main problem is the disrespect from my parents. My parents who wish to be respected in their beliefs and don't want their minds to change. But at the same time, my dad has sent my scriptures and stuff for the past couple of months since it came out. I don't believe in God or Jesus. They force me to serve and volunteer at church and attend every Sunday. They paired me with a not so ethical Christian therapist. Then both gang up on me about it and take my silence as defeat when I'm just respecting their beliefs. I'm literally the only non Christian in my family. I also have mental problems from staying with them and just in general, but they won't test me because I don't behave in such a stereotypical manner. I want to say they love me, but does someone who blatantly disrespects you love you? I'm having a hard time with seeing if I should do something as drastic as no contact after I reach a certain age.
But at the same time their those awful parents who don't just blatantly suck but also have messed me up quite a bit, resulting in me not feeling like I have a right to be upset. I've told them about how Christianity mixed with their parenting drove me to suicidal thoughts, almost going through with it, and an eating disorder I'm still battling. I also can't just leave and close the door behind me. I'm the oldest, and their are two more kids just like me, and if I turned my back on them, I'd never forgive myself. They're my siblings, but they're also what stopped me from going through with the bad thoughts I was having. They need someone who will be honest, say the weird things, and answer the ignored questions. So, how can I deal with the blatant disrespect so that I'm around for them? What skill for stress management can I use? How do I block out the constant religious gaslighting that happens in church? Because I have over two more years of this."
"My dad said if people don't wanna have a baby, they shouldn't have sex even if they're married. But sir, you had three babies while financially unstable because you couldn't keep your damn hands off my mom. You were planning me, but your job fell through, and when my mom went to get back on birth control, it was too late, so I'll give you a pass with me. But my siblings were both surprises. So, quit judging and practice what you preach. But that's not what pissed me off the most. He said women will put all their time into work and not their husbands, and that's why some men cheat, but the way he said it, it was like he was justifying it. But my dad, he'd go to hooters alone, and when I needed tights, he got them from a woman their and it made me think what if. And I know it's stupid, but that what if. It is so loud.
And it's not even the first time he's said something along the lines of justifying it and almost blaming the woman who gets cheated on. But then he likes to be all up in arms about how his friend married a woman who cheated on him multiple times. My dad's like, I wanna pour into my kids but then makes no effort, and when we spent time with him, we had to initiate it. He doesn't do the hey you wanna . . . stuff. But he has his own company, and they can't get any work right now, so he spends most of his time at home. And then says I'm just to tired to spend time with ya'll.
My mom was sick to the point of being half passed out in a drive-thru after taking my brother to karate and having to pick up dinner. I would've offered to drive him if I could. I'm still leaning, and I'm bad at staying in one lane. But my dad was really busy on his PS5 with his made-up football team. So busy he couldn't take my brother to karate nor could he pause his game to get dinner. I'm kinda starting to hate him. He's also done a couple of other things, but that's what recently has made me mad. But I don't feel like I have a right to be mad because he's here and a lot of my friends dad aren't, and he's not physically abusive like my best friends dad is. I just don't know how I should feel. Is everyone's dad like this?
Edit: It's mothers day and he couldn't be bothered to get the food, pick up the groceries, nothing. #1Dad guys."
​
So is it truly a horrible go no contact at eighteen situation, a be watchful situation, or is it fine? I know some of this stuff is a lot but some of it was also in a moment of extreme emotion. Remember like I said in the beginning they're not always like this.

I’m not very creative when it comes to usernames. I’ve tried looking for inspiration by scrolling through artists on IG and TikTok, but all the usernames I’ve found are just a bunch of random letters and numbers and words that don’t make sense.
I’m not entirely sure what kind of username that I want but I definitely want it to be creative and readable.
I don’t really wanna use my name or nickname, but maybe a shortened version of my nickname, Pip.
I want the username to just be two or three words and not too long.
Just so you get the idea of the kind of username I’m looking for, here are some good examples: AnElderlyMeme, Cheesiiee, CreativeSinning, etc (those are the only good examples that I can find)
Basically all words, no random letters or numbers.
The words I’m thinking of using are: Ghost, Honey, Cloud, Feather, water, rain, moon, etc
And art related words like: Art, Paint/ed, Brush, Canvas, etc
I want to use the username to make a good picture watermark as well.
:)

The message below is copy-pasta'd from Burrito Boarder's Facebook post.

Good morning Tallahassee,
Other than losing a family member, this is the hardest thing I have ever done so please bear with me. First, we hope you all are safe and secure following last week’s storms.
At BB we have always prided ourselves on operating with integrity and honesty. Right now, the honest truth is that we are finding a path forward to be elusive at best. This last season has been particularly rough for businesses on our side of town. Spending has been way down, the challenges that have arisen due to the rising homeless epidemic have increased and the financial burdens of the rising cost of goods, insurance, labor and utilities has been overwhelming.
The storm could not have come at a worse time for us and now we have to figure out what to do.
We set out twelve years ago to create a space filled with fun, fresh food and drinks with an atmosphere that is inclusive to all. We have built relationships with the colleges (special shout out to our friends at the FSU Campus Rec department, FSU Softball & of course the amazing Noles football team) and so many regular guests (Kurt, Ian, Doug, RC, & John S. just to name a few). We have teamed up with with some amazing entrepreneurs over the years (Tiffany, RJ the Creator & Anthony, You all rock!) and we have aligned our self with some great organizations over the years, many with the help and support of our good friend Brandy Vance. WE LOVE YOU ALL!
We are going to be closed over the next few days to try and figure out what the next step is and as soon as we have some idea what it is, we will let you all know.
David Turknett, Owner

I don't work at Burrito Boarder, but it's been my favorite place to eat since it opened in 2012. It certainly has its own charm and character as a unique Tallahassee restaurant. Dave and his crew have transformed that corner from a rundown service station to a colorful local attraction known for their food and game nights.
If you feel the same, please share your memories and support on the Facebook post.

Part 5
Gerard, God
Somewhere in time and space
He watched the passers-by as they moved about, following their daily routines, unaware of the fate that would shortly befall them. This was the time that fascinated Him the most. The moments before they finally understood that The Threat was here.
It was a sort of last hurrah, He thought. They didn't know it, but Gerard could nonetheless sense a sort of joi de vivre, a liveliness that simply didn't exist in prior times, and couldn't possibly exist in future ones. He watched mothers dote lovingly over their children, watched children hurl themselves into play with abandon, watched addicts take in their drugs like a drowning man would gulp for air. They might not known that there was no tomorrow for most of them, but they nonetheless seemed to put just a little bit of extra effort into everything.
Eventually, it came to an end, of course. It always did, no matter how many times He watched it. He saw happiness and mundanity give way to pain and suffering. Laughter was replaced by the screams of the dying. Life was replaced by death. The world replaced by destruction.
He sighed, leaving this timeline. He never watched the arrival of The Threat twice in the same timeline. There was nothing for Him to learn that way. His power was immense and total. He only had to witness The Threat once in each timeline to understand it.
Worst of all was the knowledge. The knowledge that He would only be able to save a single timeline. That all others would fall into ruin, destroyed and left to rot away. Only one could survive; the one that He chose. He could stop The Threat only once, for doing so would require Him to remain. Ever vigilant, ever ready to stop any recurrence.
He had to choose which timeline. That task was less than He feared, for now he knew that there were an infinite number of them. He could choose one with the right qualities, one whose nature would aid Him in His work. He realized then that He would, once He had chosen the proper timeline, finally watch The Threat come twice. Once, when He reviewed that timeline prior to choosing. And again, when He would stop it.
And stop it, He would. No other outcome was acceptable. He had already sacrificed too much. His mortality, His life, His happiness, His very soul itself. He had wrought Himself into a weapon, to strike down The Threat, and He would fulfill that purpose, no matter what.
----
Jerry Williams, Godslayer
Nibiru
We were sharks, swimming and darting among a school of fish. Gods and devas fled, screaming in terror as we flew through the swirling, chaotic energies that should have driven us -or at least my wife and daughter- mad within seconds. They had thought that their realm protected them.
Little did they know, we were already mad.
Inanna and I flanked a group of fleeing gods, preventing them from leaving this world, extending their essence into manifested bodies somewhere in one of the countless material worlds, or simply crossing the energy that was the core of their beings into the Spirit World. Here, in Nibiru, our divinities and demi-divinities gave us access to unlimited power. We seized it and wove nets with which to entrap those minor gods who could not find escape elsewhere, and had huddled here in fear of our coming.
As the group fled, we sped up, curving our course, which caused them to curve theirs, fearful of drawing too close to either of us. We moved slowly, carefully, angling them where we wanted them to go.
It wasn't long before the gaping maw of the Grandfather of the Gods came into view. Ixlublotl, the primordial god, the originator of divinity. The gods we herded realized their peril and turned to flee back the opposite direction, but there they found Aaina, burning towards them, screaming in rage and bristling with offensive energies.
Trapped, they had no choice. They attacked us. Emotions and thoughts, energy and matter, all of it flew at us in an orgy of sudden violence that churned the substrate of this world into a screaming chaos. All three of us linked our magics into a shield; a half-sphere of anti-magic that absorbed their attacks, sending the energy of which they were made back into into the swirling chaos around us.
They threw everything they had at us, a desperate last stand, driven by necessity and panic. All of it crashed against our defenses, the resulting streamers of magic filling the space around us with an all but impenetrable cloud. Hidden by that cloud, Ixy closed in.
By the time they realized that it was too late, it was over.
Ixy's physical body, that cloud-wrapped cacophony of maw-stalks, eye-stalks, spider-like legs and whipping tentacles, currently the size of a skyscraper, swept in, mouths snapping up the energies that were the cores of our quarry.
We came together when it was done. Inanna created a haven for us, allowing us to release the magic that held our bodies in stasis and protected us from the wild magic all around. It was a copy of our house, something she'd come up with a while back and shown to me with great pride. I had loved it, of course.
I sank into the loveseat with Inanna next to me as Aaina took the recliner.
"That's most of them," Aaina said.
"About thirty more," I replied. "And then we can start the next phase."
"Do either of you have any doubts about what we're doing?" she asked. I could see the indecision in her eyes. She was so young, and such a good girl. My heart broke at having dragged her into such dirty business.
"No," Inanna answered, her voice hard and confident.
"Yes," I added. "But at the end of the day, this is what needs doing."
Aaina looked back and forth between us, then nodded. None of us smiled.
----
Emily Windham, Wizard, Artificer
Fremont, Nebraska, at the corner of E 4th Ave and N Main St
Emily turned just in time to see the massive troll hit Jim Carmichael with a shoulder, sending the trooper flying before angling at her with no change in speed.
Acting on pure instinct, she conjured a wall of force between them. The troll slammed into it, shattering the magics that held it together with raw force, but the wall did its job, stopping the warrior in his tracks.
Emily snatched the rune-engraved knife off her belt and surged forward, jumping at the last second to put her in range of the troll's huge neck. The blade plunged in, and she released a quick burst of magic that made her legs and off hand sticky, allowing her to cling to the thing, too close for it to use its battleaxe on her.
She ripped the knife out and plunged it in again and again as the barbarian roared in pain and indignation at being hurt so badly by a foe so tiny. Emily grabbed his beard, yanking hard to bring his eyes to hers as she slammed the knife in and twisted, the magic in the blade telling her when it found his windpipe and carotid artery.
Blood sprayed, coating her face and shoulders. The troll's roars were cut off in a gurgling, breathy hiss. He stumbled, then fell. Emily rode him down, her eyes locked onto his, watching all hopes of victory, or even survival, fade from them. She lost herself in those eyes, in the mystery that was this troll's life, ending right before her. She saw the regrets, the crushed hopes, the shame of defeat and wondered at the context.
The impact as they hit the ground broke the spell.
Emily released the magic and stood up, instincts trained into her by the security troops and war wizards making her search for more threats before she could even process what had just happened. But there were no more threats. That had been the last one.
Greg Ramirez walked towards her, his rifle barrel pointed down, hanging from the sling in front of his armor and all the various attachments that he and the security troops referred to as their 'battle rattle'.
"Nice work," he said, eyeing the troll, who continued to gasp for air, the sound of his labored breaths reminding Emily of a pig squealing. She looked down, searching for that orgasmic feeling her bio-dad had so desperately wanted her to share with him, but not finding it. All she found was a sense of satisfaction, yet even that was too much.
Years of therapy, of telling her story to trained clinicians and listening to and internalizing their advice. All of it had helped her make friends and move among the normal people, but it had never erased that feeling of satisfaction. This was the fourth time she'd killed a sentient being, and each time, she felt the exact same way. It was a victory.
Her maudlin thoughts were interrupted by the bark of Greg's rifle. The troll's head jerked and deformed, a splattering of blood coming out as a .277 fury round drilled a hole straight through his temples. She glanced up to find Greg still eyeing her.
"You did good," he said, his expression showing some concern.
"I liked it," she said quietly, her eyes turning back.
"You liked killing him?" Greg asked. Emily nodded, wondering if she'd always be fucked up.
"I killed him," Greg said. "And I damn sure liked it."
Emily turned back, eyeing him with some interest. Greg was, in many ways, the opposite of her. Cool, confident, charming and just all-around well-adjusted. She hadn't ever imagined that he wound enjoy something like this.
"It means I won," he explained. "It means that big, badass motherfucker showed up here trying to bully us, and take whatever he wanted from us, and little old me stood up and said 'no', and when he tried to force the issue, I took his life away. It feels like justice. It feels like one less motherfucker trying to kill me and my friends. Damn straight I liked it."
Emily smiled. She didn't realized she had smiled until Greg smiled back.
"I read your psych eval," he went on. "I know you think you're fucked in the head, but I'm gonna tell you right now, you're not. You're a warrior, that's it. Bloodlust isn't a bad thing, if it can be controlled. Enjoying killing isn't a bad thing, if you're killing the people that need killing. Give yourself a break, girl."
He clapped her on the shoulder, then took the back of her head with his free hand and pressed her forehead to his.
"I'm gonna recommend you be allowed to join the war wizard roster. You're all trained up, you're prepared for it, and from what I've seen today, you're a fucking natural."
Without waiting for a response, he let her go and turned away, grabbing the radio fob on his armor and squeezing it.
"Black Lead, this is Black-Two Actual. All raiders at the target site are neutralized. We're commencing a sweep now, will report back in thirty mikes."
Emily smiled at his back as he walked away. A part of her reflected that he was a natural leader, knowing exactly what to say to her in that moment. Another part didn't care, because it worked. She glanced down at the troll again, and didn't see a victim.
She saw a victory.
----
Kathy Evenson, Professional
Somewhere in the ruins of an ancient city in the Seventh World
Kells shifted nervously as Kathy continued to cut chits from the electrical panel lid with the magical laser emerging from her fingertip. He held his machete, really a short sword, in one hand, and his dagger in the other.
"We really shouldn't be much longer, Kath," he said. Kathy had explained to him the difference between Kath and Kathy, and even hinted at the things she'd done while possessed by Pissface and calling herself 'Kath', and even gone into some detail about how much she hated the nickname. Kells hadn't cared. He simply agreed with her, then continued to call her 'Kath'.
And the truth was, she really didn't mind that much.
She wasn't quite sure why, though she could hazard a guess. The man was disarming to a great degree. He presented himself as a dirty wanderer, a simple, violent man who shouldn't be trusted as far as you could throw him. But within just a few minutes of meeting him, she'd seen the intelligence in his eyes and words. She had seen the integrity in his negotiations with her, and the ethics that had turned him protective when the Searchers had appeared.
And despite that protectiveness, he still managed to avoid being patronizing. When she'd told him how she planned to get his chits, he had warned her of the dangers, then agreed to come along without hesitation when she didn't change her mind. Kells was a good man, she thought, and if a good man wanted to call her Kath, she supposed she could let him reclaim the name from the hell it had once represented.
"It won't be much longer," she said. She already had over seven hundred, and this plate would bring her to eight hundred. She only needed five or six more. This deep in the ruins, there was an untouched electrical box on almost every building. Some had been corroded, but most were surprisingly intact.
As she cut the final strip into chits, a roar sounded. It was a gurgling, rasping roar, unlike anything she had ever heard before. Or rather, the first one had been unlike anything she had ever heard before. This was the third time she'd heard it, and it sounded closer than the last two.
"That's no good sign, right thur," Kells said.
Kathy finished, dumping the little squares of galvanized steel into her bag and standing up.
"Come on," she said. "We'll go a couple blocks away from whatever that was before I cut the next one."
"Aye," Kells agreed, his head swiveling on his shoulders as he followed her down the alley. Kathy took note of how spooked he was. He seemed more nervous here than he had with the Searchers right in front of him. She supposed that might have something to do with the nature of the threats. The Searchers were, regardless of power and reputation, mere humans. Whereas whatever was making that roar was clearly some sort of monster.
She led him six blocks in a direction away from the roar before she stopped to examine the buildings. They had moved into a downtown area, which was one of the reasons she had stopped. The buildings here were closer together, which should make the rest of her task quicker. She found a good cover and ripped the little padlock off, then pulled it open and off its hinges.
A mass of spiders rushed out of the electrical box. She jerked her hand away, but they ignored her, scurrying down the wall and vanishing into the cracks between the bricks, safe once again in enclosed darkness.
She began to cut as Kells again stood watch.
She hadn't even made it halfway through the panel when another roar sounded, even closer than the last, and from a different direction.
"Call it," Kells said. "Call it now, Kath. Better ye collect some more later on than deal with the beast makin' them sounds."
"What kind of beast?" Kathy asked. She kept cutting, but glanced up and around, not seeing anything but filthy, dilapidated alleys.
"Walkers, they call 'em," Kells said. "Like great spiders, but rottin' away, with bones stickin' out an' flesh hangin' off th'legs."
"Great spiders?" Kathy asked. "How big?"
"Bigger'n a building."
"You've seen them yourself?" Kathy asked.
"Only once," Kells said, his voice growing quieter. He seemed to be done speaking for a moment, staring around. But after a few seconds, he continued.
"Friend o'mine, name o' Gil. We used t'work together, he an' I. I were real new to runnin' a caravan crew back then, about ten years back. Gil were an old hand at it, though. Took me under 'is wing and taught me th'roads, as it were.
"Anyways, we'd taken a pair o' contracts. Rough ones, with a tight timetable. Merchants needed t'get to Freeman's Port post-haste. One faster'n th'other. Gil took that one, left me with the easier one, though that weren't t'say it were an easy job.
"We was in Craster's Holdfast at th'time, an smack in between there an' Freeman's Port were an ancient ruin. Big one, 'bout the size o' this'un, in fact. Normally, it took about a week t'travel between the two places, but if one were brave or foolhardy enough, they could cut through th'ruins an' make it in five days.
"Well, old Gil had that in mind. We left together, an' at th'place where ye normally would turn north t'go around the ruins, he led his caravan on straight. I prayed fer their safety that night, but never really believed anything would happen. Gil were an experienced caravaner, an' tougher'n anyone else I'd ever met.
"Two days later, we was walkin' this ridgeline north o'the ruins when somethin' called out t'me. Not sure what, exactly. I started lookin' south, scannin' the ruins, an' sure enough, I found Gil's caravan, walking down a wide road between th'largest buildings. They was movin' at quite a clip, I hav'ta say.
"I were tickled pink, at first. Because we'd made near as good a time as they had, despite movin' almost a day's north to skirt th'ruins. But as I watched, I realized that they weren't just travelin', they was runnin'."
Kells sighed, his eyes distant and full of old regrets.
"That's when I saw one. A great Walker, striding out o' th'deepest part o' th'ruins. The way it moved were like nothin' I ever seen before. It crawled along th'sides o' the ruins themselves, like a spider almost, but always with two or three feet on th'ground.
"It came fer th'caravan, and fell on 'em in a slaughter. I watched it breathe fire down on 'em, stompin' men flat with its feet an' scooping 'em up with its great claws."
He sighed again, then looked down. He tucked his sword under his armpit and used his hand to rub his eyes for a moment, before taking the blade up again.
"Killed 'em all, it did. Erry single one, as I live an' breath. An' when it were done, it went around, stompin' th'bodies flat. Never ate one, jes did all it could t'make sure that not a single survivor lived t'tell the tale. I were shook something fierce, I tell ya. Took me own caravan down off the ridge, t'avoid bein' spotted. We ended up arriving a day late, but to this day, I thank me lucky stars we made it at all."
Another sigh came, and Kathy heard the cracks in his voice as he continued on.
"Not Gil, though. Nor any o'them what worked for him, or th'merchant what hired him. A few years later, I worked up th'courage t'take a couple o'men into the ruins, t'find the bodies. I found bones dressed in Gil's clothes. I took his sword, which had survived, an' is th'one I carry to this day. I think Gil'd be pleased to know his blade had saved me life, quite a few times since."
Kathy finished cutting the cover up and stood to put her hands on Kells' shoulder.
"Thank you for telling me that," she said, her voice gentle. "I can tell it's an important story to you."
Kells nodded and sniffed once, then jerked his head in the direction away from the most recent roar. "I still think we should get out o' here, Kath," he said. "I'll face down the Searchers an' be happy o' a good death, should they take me. But them Walkers... They ain't warriors ye can face an' die with honor. One o'them things finds us, there ain't no fightin' it. We jes' die screaming, th'only consolation coming when it's all over."
Kathy weighed his words carefully. Kells knew this world far better than she did. And while she knew her own abilities far better than anyone here, she had to be mindful not to be too arrogant. Kells had told her how a single Walker had slaughtered an entire caravan of experienced fighters, led by an experienced leader.
"Okay," she said. She handed the bag to Kells. "There should be about eight hundred and fifty chits in there. You can count them out later, and I'll trust your count. After I find what I'm looking for, I'll collect the rest and we'll settle up."
"Good call," Kells said. He tied the bag off to his belt and walked to the corner of the building, peeking around. When he was satisfied, he nodded. Kathy joined him, and together, they made a beeline to the edge of the ruins.
They had made it about halfway out when another roar sounded, this one right on top of them. A rumbling crash sounded from her right, and Kathy turned to see rubble falling to the ground as something massive rose off the ground, two blocks over.
"Stars an' stones," Kells swore, then shouted "Run!"

I'm going to try to translate those top comment from Hupu for MSI, I might skip some of them as they are Chinese internet memes that I've no idea how to translate, and those comment related to Honor of Kings, a popular league like mobile game made by Tencent.
The rating is user poll generated, you can give a rating between 2 and 10, and average is used. A total of 328k people participated in this series' rating.
Hupu rating is an in APP feature so it doesn't really have a link, but here is the post match thread for the match, and on the top there is an link you can click on that get you to that page. link

MATCH 1: TES vs. G2

Top Esports

	Player Rating	Top Comment
369 K'Sante	5.3	369: You guys are are so good. : We are so good?
Tian Xin Zhao	2.6	That fight with Trist, if you just smited him, Trist would be dead, why play if you don't know the basic combo.
Creme Azir	3.1	Can't lane, but ok in team fights, had some good shuffle, their mid is just playing out of their mind today.
JackeyLove Varus	2，4	Loser Grand Slam is not been awarded by someone else, you need to earn it! (There was some drama with LPL Caster Teddy Guan joking on Sunday that JKL might become the only LPL player to ever lose against LCS, LEC and LCK in a BO5, hence the loser Grand Slam).
Meiko Nautilus	2.5	First time I saw people saying a game is not bot's foul when they got lane killed twice in 4 minutes.
Despa1r	5.3	This game is probably a lose regardless of BP, they are not playing like human.

G2 Esports

	Player Rating	Top Comment
BrokenBlade Camille	9.8	We are Suzhou University of Science and Technology, we have an opening for a guest professor, would you be available for a quick discussion? (There is a Camille one trick in China with ID：Suzhou University of Science and Technology).
Yike Ivern	9.8	Putting bushes in TES base made them think they are playing Vietnam.
Caps Tristana	9.8	TES, you are the challenger. (Sukuna jpg.)
Hans Sama Kalista	9.7	Give Uzi 50 to get a cab himself and go back home. (Ale reference, he was once trying out for RNG and told he is not needed before he played, and given 50 as Uber fee to go home).
Mikyx Leona	9.8	Dear god, how did I do today, would you come and be my AD? (Uzi reference, his nickname in China is YYDS, meaning forever God, not always a complement.)
Dylan Falco	9.8	Kept picking new stuff, I'm becoming a fan.

MATCH 2: TES vs. G2

Top Esports

	Player Rating	Top Comment
369 K'Sante	7.6	Please come back, my Kanavi, Knight, Ruler, Missing.
Tian Jarvan IV	2.8	The first tower dive is really horrible, but watching Jacky fan blaming support, mid and jungle, while he missed axes, its just too funny.
Creme Corki	3.3	The best rated TES mid, if the two prior mid played like this, they will get flamed to retire.
JackeyLove Draven	2.3	Both AD doesn't have passive, it is fair.
Meiko Renata Glasc	2.5	I know what you are think, you want to wait for Kog gets 6 items, and Hostile Takeover their entire team right?
Despa1r	2.7	The Trist one trick, don't pick Trist, who else is going to contest the Draven pick?

G2 Esports

	Player Rating	Top Comment
BrokenBlade Twisted Fate	9.3	If you win regardless of what or how you play, do we really need to blame you?
Yike Rek'Sai	9.9	Holy Crap, that 4 man knock up.
Caps Tristana	9.6	Already preparing for Sask. (Mid for Uzi's team in the Old Guy Cup, I think they are joking about a scrim between them on G2's Weibo).
Hans Sama Kog'Maw	9.9	Both AD without passive???
Mikyx Braum	9.9	Int one in the end, with FPX emote. XD.
Dylan Falco	9.6	You knows how to BP to win. The only way TES wins is from bot lane, so you 5 ban bot, first pick mid Trist.

MATCH 3: TES vs. G2

Top Esports

	Player Rating	Top Comment
369 Udyr	2.3	The reason I don't ever think you are better than Bin is because you never stood up when you team is on the brink.
Tian Rek'Sai	3.5	SSSSVIP ticket, you get to spectate in game.
Creme Corki	2.4	Hanu has gotten their Rocket Launcher, he want to defeat the evil Boss Stone.
JackeyLove Kalista	2.6	JackyLove has become the only player to ever lost to LEC, LCS, LCK in an international BO5, congratulation on your loser Grand Slam.
Meiko Camille	3.0	Dive mid and trade kill isn't really worth
Despa1r	2.5	Why do you still have a job?

G2 Esports

	Player Rating	Top Comment
BrokenBlade K'Sante	9.8	체력 4700 방어력 329 마 저201 인챔피언이 저지불가, 쉴드, 벽 넘 기는 거 있고요. 에어본 있고, 심지어 쿨타임은 데 초밖에 안되고 마나는 15들고 w는 심지어 변신 하면 쿨 초기화에다가 패시브는 고정피해가 들 어가며 그 다음에 방마저 올리면 올릴수록 스킬 가속이 생기고! q에 스킬가속이 생기고 스킬 속도가 빨라지고 그다음에 공격력 계 수가 있어가지고 W가 그 이익-으아아아악!!!
Yike Ivern	9.9	The jungle guerrilla warfare from Ivern king, Fear beyond death for TES.
Caps Tristana	9.8	With the form Caps is in, I'm starting to get worried for Sask.
Hans Sama Draven	9.8	All Hans Sama: Shoutu.
Mikyx Neeko	9.7	FPX emote every game, this G2 is on to something, they look really good.
Dylan Falco	9.7	Ok, after this game we know how you will place in LPL now.

If you’d told me that the visitation with my son, an event that happened only every other weekend, would be extended indefinitely, I would’ve jumped with joy. In the end, I wish the circumstances under which they unfolded had never happened.
The clouds were sightless in the clear sky the day Jasmine dropped off my boy, a perfect day to play a little catch in the yard or go fishing at the nearby stock pond. Cyrus bounced out of the car and ran joyously toward me, unaware that his old man was a perpetual fuck up that had broken up the family in the first place. Oh well.
It was a happy day, the birds sang their old nostalgic tunes of a lost Summer in my own childhood. It was warm, not too warm, and the neighborhood was buzzing with excitement as the Spring showers had come to a close. It was as close as it could get to perfect.
The evening light danced against the tree tops, turning a violet hue as dusk began to settle in. Burnt orange water reflected the dying sun as it continued sinking away to nothing. We grabbed our tackle box, the giant beige one my uncle gifted me before he was stolen by cancer, and filled it with the empty, crumpled up bits of plastic that once held bologna sandwiches. As I said, it was a perfect day, very reminiscent of my own childhood.
We’d thrown the fat bluegill back that we had caught, I hadn’t felt like messing with cleaning and cooking them. Instead, dinner would likely be mac n’ cheese with some cut up hot dogs, a staple in my household whether or not Cyrus was visiting. Hopefully I hadn’t run through Oscar Meyer supply.
Home never felt so lonely, the walls never seemed so barren of old family pictures when Cyrus wasn’t around. Sometimes, he only added to the pain. I would never tell him that, though.
Even with the faucet turned all the way up, the water dribbled out and made boiling pasta a very patient game. Cyrus was babbling about some game he was playing on my phone. ‘He’s just a kid’, I thought, and pretended to be interested in whatever the hell he was talking about.
The sun had vanished and the moon was especially bright that night, having slid nearly halfway to its crescendo before dinner was finally done. Cyrus had stolen my phone to the living room, staring at the bright characters absentmindedly as a nondescript Netflix show played in the background.
“Here, buddy, sorry about the wait”, I sat the bowl of neon yellow stuff in front of him, the pink scramble of hotdog jutting out made me feel… a little ashamed? I plopped down next to him and flipped through the various titles on Netflix, most of which I had already seen a couple of times. Cyrus tossed the phone aside and picked at the mess of ‘food’ in the bowl. I can’t remember if he took a bite or not.
“Dad!”, I jumped, reeling from the doze I had fallen in. If Jasmine was here, it would’ve been such a perfect day, such a perfect day. Instead, this is where it all fell apart.
He massaged furiously at his temples, his knees pulled tight against his heaving chest.
“What’s the matter, are you okay?”, I jumped from the couch and got on one knee, putting my hands around his shoulders. I watched helplessly as Cyrus twisted and contorted his body, trying to run away from whatever pain was in his head.
Suddenly he fell still.
I studied him for a while, nearly on the verge of tears as his body had become totally limp. Then, a noise. At first it was quiet, then it grew and grew until it filled the room with totality. It’s hard to describe that noise, almost like a wind turbine if you were up close to it.
From behind the couch, just above my sons head, it peeked at me. Its thick, black fingers ended at sharp, nailess points. Just as I met its eyes, it slithered behind the couch and that’s when Cyrus awoke in a screaming fit.
I jumped awake again, Cyrus sitting next to me as pale as a sheet. His eyes were bulging, glued to the blank TV ahead.
I couldn’t help but check behind the couch, to make sure it wasn’t still there. Then, to my son who was still staring at the nothing on the television. His mouth was hanging open, just enough to allow the continuous stream of drool to fall out.
I ran to the kitchen to grab a paper towel and cleaned the odd amount of drool from his chin. There wasn’t a thermometer in the house but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to tell that he was burning up. A fever, I thought.
I carried the boy to his bedroom, feeling as though I was being watched the entire way, and tucked him into bed. A doctors visit would soon be on the horizon. I returned to the couch in the living room, careful to keep my gaze fixed on the TV and nothing else. Truthfully, I was too afraid to look in the shadowy corners.
That night was filled with nightmares.
The next day I rang Jasmine, letting her know that Cy was sick and needed to go to the doctor. Ordinarily, this wouldn’t have been an issue, but Jas was immunocompromised (she’d been diagnosed with breast cancer a few months before we divorced) and my son would be staying with me for the foreseeable future. I couldn’t complain, I didn’t get to see him nearly enough as it was.
That day was very much the opposite of the previous, the sky was gloomy and spits of rain fell consistently from dawn to nightfall.
The doctor had said that Cyrus had a particularly severe ear infection, but nothing that some antibiotics couldn’t fix. He sent us home with a tube of the stuff, my wallet noticeably lighter.
“Apply some of this twice a day, once in the morning and once before bedtime”, the older gentleman had said. He squeezed my shoulder and smiled, though there seemed to be something else behind his wary eyes.
He stopped me again as I turned to leave.
“Sir…”, he started, though he seemed to study his words carefully, “your son kept mentioning something he called the flumes”.
I shrugged, the only time I had heard the word was in reference to a ravine on the edge of town where we’d all smoke pot in high school. Nothing struck me as odd about it at the time.
“They come from the flumes, those noises, those noises, he kept saying”, the doctor pushed closer, his eyes growing wild. I stepped backward, tugging at Cy’s hand as we left the building wordlessly.
Aside from my busy mind, the car ride home was utterly silent. I could hear my boys heavy, labored breaths all the way from the backseat. ‘Inner ear infection, my ass’, I thought.
After laying Cyrus back down for bed, I fixed him a bowl of instant chicken and noodles and decided to give Jasmine a call. The phone rang endlessly before the robotic voice indicated that the caller wasn’t available. I tried once more but gave up after it rang a few more times. Probably sleeping.
I returned to the couch, deciding to rewatch Nightmare on Elm Street for the fourth or fifth time.
After a while, I decided to put on cable, growing tired of the listless titles on Netflix. I was never too interested in the local news, but today seemed as good as any to catch up on the towns happenings. The Grantfield Gators girls softball team had advanced to sectionals and one of the townsfolk were celebrating their 100th birthday.
A ‘Breaking News’ graphic slid below the frazzled newslady on the television. Wherever she was, it sure looked familiar.
‘Wild dog shits on mayors front yard’, I laughed at my own stupid joke and surely turned as white as Cyrus had the previous night as the lady on the TV continued.
“A local woman was found tied to a tree and disemboweled at the scene. Police are saying various symbols were branded all over the womans body, and the material used to bind her to the Elm tree was ‘of unusual property’”, she continued on for a while but I hadn’t noticed, the air had fallen heavy and that familiar warbling had filled the room again.
Heavy footsteps slammed up the staircase at an otherworldly pace. Up the staircase and towards my sons room.
I ran, I swear I ran as fast as I could but I knew… I knew.
When I got to his room, he was gone, the curtains blowing aimlessly in the wind as the window had been slammed open so hard that the glass had shattered in the panes. The bowl of chicken and noodles sat on the bedside table, untouched.
I tried calling Jasmine again and again and again. Still, no answer.
I wanted to write this, to whoever may be reading, so that you know where to look if I don’t return. I know where my son is, I know where Jasmine is.
The flumes took them, or whatever might be lurking in it.

I have this friend/person I have dated off and on. I notice them being secretive at times. I ask what they did that day and I get the bare minimum vague answer and it seems to me like they are hiding some thing. Sometimes I’ll ask who was at the party and they answer very vaguely “oh a few people from softball and…” then they just trail off. I don’t want to dig too deeply in those moments because knowing myself if I ask follow up questions, my attitude will reflect my frustration. How do I deal with somebody who likes to be vague and secretive and thinks they are doing a good job of it?

Day guide
Welcome to Day 42 of WiyHat?. Today's topic is "Sumireko Usami", the "Mystic and Troublesome Female Student".
She is introduced as the main antagonist of Touhou 14.5: Urban Legend in Limbo. Despite being an ostensible "normal" human from the Outside World (^{the Kanto region}), she effectively has an assorted amount of psychic powers, or just ESP in general. She creates the Secret Sealing Club (first seen in ZUN's stories with Renko & Maribel) at her high school Higashifukami and becomes its first president because of her interest in the occult (and then Gensokyo).
Sumireko is one of those characters ZUN really made a big deal out of after her introduction: to put it plainly, she was basically everywhere back during her heyday. I'll go over all of her appearances first:
Games:
-14.5 (ULiL): Sumireko is the antagonist of the game, who instigated a plot using "Occult Balls" to bring residents of Gensokyo to the Outside World for a short time so that she can learn things about them. However, every single person who came to her fought back, much to her curiosity. Eventually, Mamizou tricks Sumireko to be the one who is brought over and trapped in Gensokyo instead.
Cue Sumireko's own story mode, which has her fight everyone else to find a way back to the Outside World. Miko eventually just tells her to use the balls whenever she wants to return, albeit technically temporarily now that she's a "resident". Sumireko eventually panics, believing she'll die at this rate, and so decides to sacrifice herself by unleashing the full power of the Occult Balls, possibly destroying the Great Hakurei Barrier.
Reimu stops her, but not before Sumireko accidentally activates a Lunar Capital Ball, which links Gensokyo to the Lunar Capital, therefore setting up TH15 and Gensokyo's potential "purification" by Sagume Kishin, if she can't deal with those attacking the Lunar Capital. ^{So, yeah, even though Sumireko was stopped in 14.5, she still inadvertently put Gensokyo in grave danger later on. She's not unlike a certain trio who created a cascade of incidents back in TH10...}
Regardless, Sumireko later apologized and befriended most of the characters after this particular incident, and her tales of the Outside World intrigue most of the residents in Gensokyo.
-15.5 (Antinomy of Common Flowers): Sumireko basically stumbles into Gensokyo at a bad time, and has to find her way out of the Dream World using Doremy's help. Although this sounds like a minor issue, her "Dream soul" was released into the Outside World as this happened, which could have had dire consequences, according to Yukari. Bizarrely, Sumireko encountered 2 versions of her Dream soul, here. Eventually, she solves the problem, with Doremy confirming she was the "real" one who prevailed in the end.
-16.5 (Violet Detector): Sumireko keeps having weird dreams were she has to fight off dream world dwellers jealous of her having a "real" body. After a while, she finds and fights the real Okina. Impressed by her resilience, Okina lends her power to fight off even stronger nightmares, with the upside that if she wins, the dreams will stop eventually.
That is, until it turns out the "Sumireko" we've been playing as was the Dream version of the real one all along! Okina rescinds the power she lent to the Dream version so that the real one (which you now play as) has a fair shot at getting her body back (since the Dream one was in control of her body). Sumireko wins, and then she wakes up not remembering anything, and the player is left complaining at ZUN for not actually creating any new patterns for this game.
Oh, yeah, she also makes outrageously "hip" descriptions of the patterns when she manages to win it definitely doesn't endear her to some people.
That's all for the game appearances, which while only 3, left her with quite a bit of presence during that era of Touhou. 16.5 is Sumireko's own solo game, by the way, in case you didn't know.
As for her Printworks appearances:
-Grimoire of Usami: Basically, this is Sumireko taking a page out of Marisa, and making a Grimoire where she explains various Danmaku attacks done during a "Fireworks festival". While there's a bit of a plot in here, it's mostly just descriptions of patterns.
-Wild and Horned Hermit: Sumireko's dream souls cause trouble again in chapter 29. She also (accidentally) summons a UFO at the Hakurei Shrine in chapter 31, much to Reimu's irritation.
-Curiosities of Lotus Asia: This was basically known as "Rinnosuke's series", except after a long hiatus, it was brought back with Sumireko taking center stage in almost every new chapter, much to the irritation of some people. Put plainly, Sumireko works part-time with Rinnosuke there, which is why she's so involved.
She also had various cameos in most of the other printworks (including further cameos in WaHH).

• Wild and Horned Hermit (34, 35)
• Forbidden Scrollery (Chapter 34)
• Visionary Fairies in Shrine (Chapters 2, 7)
• Alternative Facts in Eastern Utopia (Interviews)
• Who's Who of Humans & Youkai - Dusk Edition

So, am I done summing up Sumireko? Well, no. Because I glossed over so much, I should mention that Sumireko's good friends with Mokou because she matched her blow to blow in a duel they once had, and friends with Kasen too, even giving her (and various other people) nicknames. ^{She's friends with Reimu, Marisa, Mamizou and Rinnosuke, too, but that was already implied before.}
PHEW! Now, that's a lot of canon stuff for a single character, particularly one introduced so much later into the franchise's continuity!
You might be thinking: "What about her relation with Renko Usami? They have the same family name!" Well, the truth is, we still don't know to this day what the exact relation between the two is. We assume Sumireko is Renko's grandma or something, making her one of the few Touhou characters to (eventually) canonically have a family, but even that's not confirmed for sure, so we can only theorize about it.
More to the point...what do the fans think of Sumireko?
Well, according to the yearly popularity polls, she started off decently popular, but she's dropped hard lately, going as low as 80th last year (2023). This is partly due to her diminishing presence in the canon, presumably, but...
...it's also because, not unlike other Outside World foreigners to Gensokyo like Sanae and Mamizou, Sumireko's got a bit of a hatedom who detested how much ZUN pushed her as a "regular" of Gensokyo, despite the fact she wasn't even truly living there, and that she got off too easily for almost ending Gensokyo's very existence...twice, no less!
And then there are those who are fans of Rinnosuke who hate that he has to share the spotlight with her all the time when "his" series was brought back. Or maybe the fans of Mokou who hate that instead of ZUN further expanding on her relation with Kaguya/Keine/someone else from the Windows era, she gets stuck with a generic isekai wannabe.
Yeah, I think that's the core of the issue with Sumireko for some people: She's essentially got no real relation or story to the actual core of Gensokyo's world^\1), and thus comes across as inherently boring to them. And yet, many canon stories used to revolve around her, much to their frustration.
^\1 Sumireko technically visited Gensokyo as a kid through her dreams, so technically she does have a backstory with Gensokyo, but she never remembered her experiences there back then and it feels more like lore stuff than actual backstory to most fans.)
Of course, Sumireko still has some diehard fans, and she does provide a niche hardly many other characters have, so don't be surprised to see her in fanworks involving Outside World stuff.
But, for now, let's see what you think of Sumireko. Vote or comment below about it.
Sumireko Usami is...
View Poll

Lots of people are saying that is better, JUST because physics have improved Slightly... Look I REFUNDED The game.
Not because i dislile MotoGP, i've been a fan since 2013, and i love to see each race, but the games have been making GOOD Choices and BAD choices... and MotoGP 2024 DAMN is a failure... well at least is not disgusting like Formula 1 games... thats a point for MOTOGP
Tiime attack is the first thing i do in every new racing game, and its the only thing i needed to get disapointed.
👍THE GOODS:
Though, it is true that physics have improved, bringing improvements to leave you more room to slide the rear like in Ride5, and that is a Small step foward
The overall presentation of the game has improved, excepting the menus, and feels more... rounded.
Ai is slightly more Aware of their surroundings and it makes better racing when you are in a pack at the starts.
The wird wobble and snaps that the bike used to do, is less common so that is a clear improvement.
👎THE BADS:

• Early 2023 Bike Models on a 2024 Game (like WTF mate even there are Mods in 2023 to have late season Honda Aero... use That as a base)
  
• No more Moto E? Or apparently i can't use Moto E on Time Trial or Quick race
  
• HELLO? CUSTOM TEAMS? WTF? The revoment of the Custom teams is a clear mistake, even more since they didn't gave reasons to WHY they have done it
  
• Still No Classic Bikes, it would be a great feature now that you have removed Custom teams, but apparently they have fallen into the "F1 Game Loop" bringing new features just to remove them without reasons years later
  
• Some of the improvements of Ride5 specifically on assists for new players were not Brought to This game, IDK exactly why?
  
• The nicknames are the worst i've seen in years, and yes you can create stickers but most of the players don't want to spend the time on that... or they could bring back a good system like in 2015, YOU WRITTE IT, and You Have it... easy
  
• Still, Motorhome has not came back (bruh, 2015 is PEAK MotoGP gaming) motorhome was a very immersive and appealing feature and bringing it back would be a fresh addition
  
• Driver face models are quite horrible, they have masacred my boys, at this point i prefer to not take off helmets and just use photos on the menus.
  
• Character Creator is worse than MADDEN 23.... F*KING MADDEN 23, How can you be Worse than MADDEN 23?
  
• There is No Front Holeshot Device mechanic
  
• Since i couldn't try Moto E, i EXPECT that you can Drive Moto E, on No Moto E tracks... because the more content, the better for the player... i expect
  
• NPC animations and Driver cutscenes are the same lame ass ones as the last 5 years, but with diferent camera positions.
  
• I Don't Like the menus, needs more Glorious feeling..., maybe using more Orchestral or Epic music and abstract shots.
  

Like Bruh, at this point Moto GP 2023 with Mods is better experience, Yeah they can update the game, but that's not the correct way of doing things, it should be since Day 1
Its not a total mess, but it needs improvement and more development time.
What are your thoughts on this game guys and gals?

My last post went over surprisingly well, that said you should check out my new subreddit Talesofzippy for more content, because I'm definitely going to posting in more places around reddit and I'll be cross posting them in the tales sub for more people to enjoy!
With that, I don't remember any good stories about Zippy, but the place I work at is fucking filled with loonies, so tonight I'm going to introduce you to Katniss.
Katniss is about 63, tiny, and absolutely loved to talk about how good her guns are, even if she can't shoot or generally understand how they work. She tried to tell me that her Girsan was a high quality gun because the barrel is pinned in place.
I'm a competitive shooter, I grew up shooting and learning about guns.
When a pistol fires a round, a floating barrel will be pointed at an upward angle at the end of the stroke, while a pinned barrel doesn't. The floating barrel doesn't effect accuracy in any meaningful way because it is held in place by several seers, and doesn't begin to move until well after the bullet is out of the gun.
I tried to explain that, she didn't listen. She also can't shoot. Katniss.
She also wears boomer shirts about "snowflakes" and shares memes about the good old days when you could say whatever you want and be offensive.
This gets funny later.
Katniss and I worked together running gas pumps, and we generally got along great, in fact for a year I considered her to be a friend.
And then my dad killed himself.
I got the call at work and got a ride home as quickly as possible. Katniss was on shift with me and Yawn, who is the most chill person you can imagine.
They were incredible, Katniss broke into my apartment (at my request) and took my shotgun for safe keeping. She also took my keys and made me wait for a family friend to pick me up.
I called the night manager and told him I was going home and why, He offered me a ride.
I came into work three days later and stuck my head into my boss (Elk Daddy's) office. He simply said "how long do you need?"
"Two weeks."
"Okay."
I mention this because Anything less than this is a cancerous work environment. If a manager tries to negotiate with you when you've experienced a true tragedy, they're not a manager, they're a slave driver.
I had severe PTSD, nightmares, the whole shabang, for months I would stand at the desk and hear my mom's voice telling me my dad was dead, the first night back at work I witnessed some dumb janitorial drama (not zippy) and I started smelling the sickly sweet smell of human brain before I ran home and had my first panic attack.
(I'll tell the story of Elk Daddy, and make good on a promise I made my dad as a bonus at the end.)
Six months passed, my PTSD wasn't even beginning to heal, and she pulled me aside.
"Okay. It's time to stop now."
"Stop what?"
"This, you're in a rut, and you need to get out of it. It's high time you moved on and stopped being sad and moved on. See my sister was in a car accident and went into a coma when I was about 20, and I had a dream about her getting up and walking out of her hospital room and saying "it's about fucking time." The next day her heart gave out and she finally died. It was this freeing thing for me, because I felt like she was finally free of the broken body and the pain."
"Katniss I just don't feel like I'm... There yet. I'm still hurting, and I really don't feel like I'm ready to let him go. Things aren't that easy."
She didn't like that answer.
At the time I just felt broken, and just laid there and took it, but today I'm genuinely angry about it.
I was hurt, and now that I've rebuilt myself I realized how truly broken I was as a person.
She had no right to say anything to me about how it was time to stop. I'm still healing four years on.
That was when we stopped being friends.
Last year I was going through stickers for our local pride, the second one our community has ever had! I had come out as bi the year before, and had a side project that had grown large enough to have a booth at the local event. I was showing off some cool and funny stickers to Yawn, another cashier.
Yawn is great, he has no blood pressure, everything is just really cool and chill, and he really just wanted to be friends with everyone.
Genuinely nice person. I always get him a Christmas gift and he's always grateful, no matter what it is.
I turned around and handed a sticker to Katniss that said "be gay, so crime" with a little picture of a fabulous criminal goose on it.
She took one look at it and just went "No" rather forcefully, so I just backed off and moved on.
The next day my boss, Elk Daddy, calls me over.
"Op, you handed Katniss a sticker yesterday, and I just want to tell you. Stop talking to her. Please. For me."
"She really complained about that?"
"No, she threatened to go to HR because you "assumed her orientation" and tried to give her a sticker."
It is at this point that I'd like to add that Elk Daddy is gay. Like... Really gay. Him and his husband both donate their time and money to pride, and have been instrumental in making it happen. They are the gay uncles that stepped up to be dads for their nephews when Elk Daddy's brother couldn't.
He knows Katniss, and both of us know her HUSBAND.
So. We didn't talk outside of necessary conversations, and haven't really said anything to each other for any reason.... Until I transferred to my current department and ran out of pens.
I walked over to the cashier desk "hey Katniss, can I get a handful of pens? I ran out."
"I gave three to morning shift last night, what happened to those?"
"I don't know, and it doesn't matter, can I get some?"
Yawn walked over to the drawer where we keep the pens and opened it, while Katniss sighs and opens up her drawer and drops a pen on the counter.
"Come on Katniss, I need more than that."
"I don't have that many pens, they're not giving them to us, here, this is all I have."
She angrily throws down two more pins on the counter as Yawn retrieves an entire box of pens from the drawer and begins walking over. She sees him and motions for him to stop."
"Don't fucking bullshit me Katniss, I see Yawn with the box. Just give me some pens."
She drops six more down on the counter, I take them and walk off. "Thank you."
Ten minutes later she comes over to the deli and slams a box of pens down on the counter for me
"Don't ask me for pens again."
"Wouldn't have it any other way."
She then told the MOD that I cussed her out. I told my side, and several people in the management chain pointed out that she wore tee shirts under her uniform that said more offensive things, one of them even saying "don't fucking bullshit me."
She is no longer allowed to wear her tee shirts.
She's also had it pointed out to her that she says "don't fucking bullshit me" all the time, and management has gently reminded her that she should not swear.
A few weeks ago she very dejectedly told me that she was done trying to help people, and I had to bite back a "good, we don't need it."
And here we are... End of another post about the weird boomers I work with.
BONUS STORIES!
As for Elk Daddy.
My boss has only ever taken his husband out hunting one time. When they did, they ended up trekking across the country on deer trails and through the brush. After 12 hours of being dragged through the brush and not shooting anything, his husband said something to the effect of "I hate this. I can't keep up with you and you just disappear all the goddamn time." He took my boss's phone, logged in, and yells "in fact HEY SIRI, FROM NOW ON CALL ME ELK DADDY."
nickname earned. He has it monogramed on his wallet.
And finally, my dad, who was another Boomer, used to love taking me out camping.
He was an electrical engineer, and was most certainly on the spectrum. He was brilliant in his own way, but absolutely unhinged when it came to teaching things.
A lecture from my dad could cover cleaning the stove (with diagrams on proper wiping techniques) to the finer points of building and firing a nuclear weapon. (With math included. No mercy.)
He tried to teach me calculus when I was six. It didn't work.
Anyway, on this particular camping trip he pulled me aside and said "op, I want you to make me a fire using nothing but two sticks, your knife, a match and the chainsaw"
Now. I knew where he was coming from, he wanted me to make a fuzz stick. I knew because he had only brought up the topic of making a fuzz stick every night for the past three days of camping. He then very helpfully added "and the chainsaw is a distraction."
Uh huh. Okay dad.
I Start cutting up the wood and making a teepee fire, and I hear a little "hmph" I look up and I see the smile. The grin he used to get as he started planning one of his little lectures. He was picking out the right words, deciding if he needed to demonstrate or just use a pen and paper.
I then opened up the gas tank on the chainsaw, dumped in a tablespoon of gas, lit the match and "whoof"
Fire.
Then the argument began.
"I said you couldn't use gas!"
"You said I could use the chainsaw, that includes the gas tank!"
"The chainsaw was a distraction!"
"Still gave it to me!"
"You cheated!!!"
"How?"
Long pause.
"I won, admit it. I beat you in a way you didn't expect. You will never live this down. I'll tell this story at your funeral!"
And I did. Three years later I tore up my hastily scribbled notes and told a group of the friends, neighbors and coworkers that he knew and loved about the time I finally beat him. We laughed.
I think he'd be proud, and a little indignant.
I miss you dad.

My last post went over surprisingly well, that said you should check out my new subreddit Talesofzippy for more content, because I'm definitely going to posting in more places around reddit and I'll be cross posting them in the tales sub for more people to enjoy!
With that, I don't remember any good stories about Zippy, but the place I work at is fucking filled with loonies, so tonight I'm going to introduce you to Katniss.
Katniss is about 63, tiny, and absolutely loved to talk about how good her guns are, even if she can't shoot or generally understand how they work. She tried to tell me that her Girsan was a high quality gun because the barrel is pinned in place.
I'm a competitive shooter, I grew up shooting and learning about guns.
When a pistol fires a round, a floating barrel will be pointed at an upward angle at the end of the stroke, while a pinned barrel doesn't. The floating barrel doesn't effect accuracy in any meaningful way because it is held in place by several seers, and doesn't begin to move until well after the bullet is out of the gun.
I tried to explain that, she didn't listen. She also can't shoot. Katniss.
She also wears boomer shirts about "snowflakes" and shares memes about the good old days when you could say whatever you want and be offensive.
This gets funny later.
Katniss and I worked together running gas pumps, and we generally got along great, in fact for a year I considered her to be a friend.
And then my dad killed himself.
I got the call at work and got a ride home as quickly as possible. Katniss was on shift with me and Yawn, who is the most chill person you can imagine.
They were incredible, Katniss broke into my apartment (at my request) and took my shotgun for safe keeping. She also took my keys and made me wait for a family friend to pick me up.
I called the night manager and told him I was going home and why, He offered me a ride.
I came into work three days later and stuck my head into my boss (Elk Daddy's) office. He simply said "how long do you need?"
"Two weeks."
"Okay."
I mention this because Anything less than this is a cancerous work environment. If a manager tries to negotiate with you when you've experienced a true tragedy, they're not a manager, they're a slave driver.
I had severe PTSD, nightmares, the whole shabang, for months I would stand at the desk and hear my mom's voice telling me my dad was dead, the first night back at work I witnessed some dumb janitorial drama (not zippy) and I started smelling the sickly sweet smell of human brain before I ran home and had my first panic attack.
(I'll tell the story of Elk Daddy, and make good on a promise I made my dad as a bonus at the end.)
Six months passed, my PTSD wasn't even beginning to heal, and she pulled me aside.
"Okay. It's time to stop now."
"Stop what?"
"This, you're in a rut, and you need to get out of it. It's high time you moved on and stopped being sad and moved on. See my sister was in a car accident and went into a coma when I was about 20, and I had a dream about her getting up and walking out of her hospital room and saying "it's about fucking time." The next day her heart gave out and she finally died. It was this freeing thing for me, because I felt like she was finally free of the broken body and the pain."
"Katniss I just don't feel like I'm... There yet. I'm still hurting, and I really don't feel like I'm ready to let him go. Things aren't that easy."
She didn't like that answer.
At the time I just felt broken, and just laid there and took it, but today I'm genuinely angry about it.
I was hurt, and now that I've rebuilt myself I realized how truly broken I was as a person.
She had no right to say anything to me about how it was time to stop. I'm still healing four years on.
That was when we stopped being friends.
Last year I was going through stickers for our local pride, the second one our community has ever had! I had come out as bi the year before, and had a side project that had grown large enough to have a booth at the local event. I was showing off some cool and funny stickers to Yawn, another cashier.
Yawn is great, he has no blood pressure, everything is just really cool and chill, and he really just wanted to be friends with everyone.
Genuinely nice person. I always get him a Christmas gift and he's always grateful, no matter what it is.
I turned around and handed a sticker to Katniss that said "be gay, do crime" with a little picture of a fabulous criminal goose on it.
She took one look at it and just went "No" rather forcefully, so I just backed off and moved on.
The next day my boss, Elk Daddy, calls me over.
"Op, you handed Katniss a sticker yesterday, and I just want to tell you. Stop talking to her. Please. For me."
"She really complained about that?"
"No, she threatened to go to HR because you "assumed her orientation" and tried to give her a sticker."
It is at this point that I'd like to add that Elk Daddy is gay. Like... Really gay. Him and his husband both donate their time and money to pride, and have been instrumental in making it happen. They are the gay uncles that stepped up to be dads for their nephews when Elk Daddy's brother couldn't.
He knows Katniss, and both of us know her HUSBAND.
So. We didn't talk outside of necessary conversations, and haven't really said anything to each other for any reason.... Until I transferred to my current department and ran out of pens.
I walked over to the cashier desk "hey Katniss, can I get a handful of pens? I ran out."
"I gave three to morning shift last night, what happened to those?"
"I don't know, and it doesn't matter, can I get some?"
Yawn walked over to the drawer where we keep the pens and opened it, while Katniss sighs and opens up her drawer and drops a pen on the counter.
"Come on Katniss, I need more than that."
"I don't have that many pens, they're not giving them to us, here, this is all I have."
She angrily throws down two more pins on the counter as Yawn retrieves an entire box of pens from the drawer and begins walking over. She sees him and motions for him to stop."
"Don't fucking bullshit me Katniss, I see Yawn with the box. Just give me some pens."
She drops six more down on the counter, I take them and walk off. "Thank you."
Ten minutes later she comes over to the deli and slams a box of pens down on the counter for me
"Don't ask me for pens again."
"Wouldn't have it any other way."
She then told the MOD that I cussed her out. I told my side, and several people in the management chain pointed out that she wore tee shirts under her uniform that said more offensive things, one of them even saying "don't fucking bullshit me."
She is no longer allowed to wear her tee shirts.
She's also had it pointed out to her that she says "don't fucking bullshit me" all the time, and management has gently reminded her that she should not swear.
A few weeks ago she very dejectedly told me that she was done trying to help people, and I had to bite back a "good, we don't need it."
And here we are... End of another post about the weird boomers I work with.
BONUS STORIES!
As for Elk Daddy.
My boss has only ever taken his husband out hunting one time. When they did, they ended up trekking across the country on deer trails and through the brush. After 12 hours of being dragged through the brush and not shooting anything, his husband said something to the effect of "I hate this. I can't keep up with you and you just disappear all the goddamn time." He took my boss's phone, logged in, and yells "in fact HEY SIRI, FROM NOW ON CALL ME ELK DADDY."
nickname earned. He has it monogramed on his wallet.
And finally, my dad, who was another Boomer, used to love taking me out camping.
He was an electrical engineer, and was most certainly on the spectrum. He was brilliant in his own way, but absolutely unhinged when it came to teaching things.
A lecture from my dad could cover cleaning the stove (with diagrams on proper wiping techniques) to the finer points of building and firing a nuclear weapon. (With math included. No mercy.)
He tried to teach me calculus when I was six. It didn't work.
Anyway, on this particular camping trip he pulled me aside and said "op, I want you to make me a fire using nothing but two sticks, your knife, a match and the chainsaw"
Now. I knew where he was coming from, he wanted me to make a fuzz stick. I knew because he had only brought up the topic of making a fuzz stick every night for the past three days of camping. He then very helpfully added "and the chainsaw is a distraction."
Uh huh. Okay dad.
I Start cutting up the wood and making a teepee fire, and I hear a little "hmph" I look up and I see the smile. The grin he used to get as he started planning one of his little lectures. He was picking out the right words, deciding if he needed to demonstrate or just use a pen and paper.
I then opened up the gas tank on the chainsaw, dumped in a tablespoon of gas, lit the match and "whoof"
Fire.
Then the argument began.
"I said you couldn't use gas!"
"You said I could use the chainsaw, that includes the gas tank!"
"The chainsaw was a distraction!"
"Still gave it to me!"
"You cheated!!!"
"How?"
Long pause.
"I won, admit it. I beat you in a way you didn't expect. You will never live this down. I'll tell this story at your funeral!"
And I did. Three years later I tore up my hastily scribbled notes and told a group of the friends, neighbors and coworkers that he knew and loved about the time I finally beat him. We laughed.
I think he'd be proud, and a little indignant.
I miss you dad.