I tried to post this in japan but automod took it down and the mods haven’t gotten back to me yet. So, this is probably the more appropriate subreddit. For clarification, this happened yesterday night.
I (26F) am traveling with my family in Japan. We were on a very crowded subway train cart on the 丸ノ内線 (Marunouchi Line) in Tokyo around 21:30. This is my third time in Japan and l've taken the subway and public transport many times, but this was a first.
I'm still sort of processing it, but I didn't quite realize what happened until I got off the subway cart. I just don't know if this is common, and l've never been groped before so l didn't realize what was happening until my brain was like wait, that was someone's hand/fingers groping the back of my thigh/butt on the cart....
Just, uh, yeahh. Maybe it's just Tokyo? It's my first time in this city and I have always been in the Kansai region during my previous visits. Never ever have I had issues there.
I still feel it (and a little disgusted/shocked) and I want to know if anyone else has experienced something like this as some form of "I'm not crazy to have experienced this in 2024."
EDIT: Of course being 外人 doesn’t make any difference, I just didn’t know what to do once I fully processed what had happened.
EDIT 2:
Thank you all for your validating responses and those of you who also shared your experiences. I wanted to add a little more information for those who may want to use this post for reference.
First, yes, I know there are women-only cars, and I have used them in the past. They are great and I recommend them for gals to use if they would like a safe space. However, their times can be limited (for instance on the particular line I took, it said designated train cars were women-only before 9:30 during rush hour, and didn’t see any indication it was women-only in the late evening). Furthermore, I’m also traveling with my dad and brother. I’d prefer to stick with them so we don’t get separated, especially during more busy times since men aren’t allowed in the cars during women-only times. (Though young children, 12 and under are acceptable in women-only cars.)
Second, I truly appreciate those who gave advice. From what I gathered, yelling:
“chikan” 痴漢 (groper) “hentai” 変態 (pervert) or “yamero” やめる (stop)
while also clearly indicating who it is (if possible), maybe grabbing their hand and raising it, and making a fuss can get the behavior to stop immediately and provide intervention. Although, it can be hard to identity someone in a packed car (for instance I was groped from behind and I was carrying my backpack in front of me because of the limited space on the train) so I probably should have grabbed their hand first to help identify who it was and then yelled and make a loud fuss. Further, grabbing the culprit/assaulter and taking them to the police at the next stop will ensure they get in trouble for their behavior. They may go willingly after you’ve publicly shamed them and made a fuss. However, try to not physically assault or instigate a physical fight with the assaulter as it could result you landing in jail. I could argue depending on the circumstance they may “deserve it,” but it is probably best to not escalate the situation in a harmful way.

43M here, I was in 2 long term relationships with much older women from age age 26 onwards. Discovered that I wasn’t totally straight during the first relationship and she was fine with it, we parted on good terms. Second one, not at all cool with it and I spent 7 years masking which was not healthy at all. Finally ended that toxic mess 18 months ago and single since.
It took me over 20 years to talk about a sexual assault that I was a victim of when I was a teenager. A disgusting old man cornered me in a subway corridor and groped me. I still have a lot of shame about it, and I realise years later that this played a big part in blocking my self-exploration. Sprinkle on a heap of CPTSD from family history and while my father was alive there was something I could not face with regards to him. He died a few years ago and it was like a switch turned on at last.
I have very little experience with dick, in secret, sometimes with sex workers, but the little I do have I know I’m really into it, no internal shame but still some external social blocks. Last year I finally got the courage to say to a few close friends that I think I’m at least bi, possibly more gay than straight. It felt so good to get it out there ! I used to think I was hetero romantic bisexual but now very unsure.
I get the feeling that I just don’t fit in anywhere. I tried a few of the apps but I don’t know if I’m top bottom vers or whatever, and I feel there’s a pressure to be very direct and know all this stuff and have it all figured out. When I matched, the fact that I have little experience and also that I want to have safe sex seemed to put a stop. I have some kinks I’d love to explore but it’s really hard to talk about it for me. It’s like there is this super hoe screaming to get out but I don’t know what to do about it.
The other day a childhood friend who lives overseas came to visit and at some point we were just chilling in my room after a long day out. I have no romantic or sexual interest in him but the closeness made me realise how bad I’d like to have a guy next to me to cuddle and hang out and make out and fuck.
I feel a bit hopeless about it all but maybe I’ll have at least one shot at it one day.
Thanks for reading.

A lot of people say it takes two to tango. A lot of people say you're born alone and you die alone. A lot of people say a lot of stupid and dangerous things. My story is definitely in the category of things both stupid and dangerous.
Now, I like to think I was just trying to do the right thing in the wrong place at the wrong time. I also liked to think I'm somewhat good looking and have a dash of the riz but try online dating in NYC long enough and see how good looking and charming you really are, Slick. You'd think I'd be able to compensate with brains and charisma and material wealth but, just, no.
I mean nobody ever once accused me of being a genius, especially on the short bus as a kid in South Brooklyn. There's a metric fuckton I don't know. However, what I do know is that I seem to be a marked man. Yes, that's right; marked for the big sleep, the long goodbye, the final curtain; the grim reaping; death.
How do I know this you ask?
Ways I know I am a marked man:
Received a text message from an unknown number two days ago with a picture of a mostly severed head that looked astoundingly like photoshopped me. It was labeled with a commemorative message in wedding invitation font that read;
Nobody dissrespectz [sic] my sister corpse boy and I wanted a nephew; you fuckin' pansy, and;
I received an unexpected box left in the vestibule of my apartment building
The box was addressed to me. Affixed to top of the box an adhesive return label read:
Acme Deep-Six-U, LLC
Walla Walla, Washington
Being not too smart I opened the box. I was hoping for a phantom tollbooth but alas, inside the big, corrugated cardboard box was only to be found a small and dead garden snake bearing a laser printed gift card which read, "Crawling's too good for you, Hubert. You can slither but you can't hide corpse boy!"
As my wife Vera only had one only brother, Humphrey, who had been in and out of the psych ward more times than I had fickle fingers, I had a pretty good idea who might be referring to me as, "corpse boy."
I turned the box upside down and let the snake fall out. It was deader than disco. Next to it lay a lone brass bullet. I picked it up to examine it between thumb and forefinger of my lefthand. Etched in the side it read, "Hubert." I felt someone dancing the lambada on my grave. I put the bullet in my pocket. A clue?
...
I know. It's a lot to unpack. Brooklyn aging man marked for death and kind of slow on the uptake but there it is in black and white.
How did I end up here?
I like to make lists, especially when I need to figure stuff out. So far, I can only come up with two main reasons for my current plight.
Reasons I'm Fucked
because of a demon named Hubert whose name I bear due to a family curse, and,
because I am a dyed in the wool romantic
Let's unpack this.
Things to unpack:
The Demon Hubert possessing my soul and Romantic Me getting into all kinds of stupid, dangerous trouble.
Let's start before the start.

1. The Demon Hubert

Ever see the 1950 movie DOA? Well, in case you haven't...
Imagine an ice cold open. There's a police station establishing shot. Cut to interior.
Long shadowy hallway. There's a guy named Bigelow clutching his gut and shuffling with more grit than balance. Barely making it down the long, cold and dark hall Bigelow arrives at a door with frosted glass that reads, "Homicide".
Inside the office Bigelow slumps into an uncomfortable looking metallic chair holding his gut and grimacing through beads of cold sweat. Opposite Bigelow sits a gruff looking homicide dick chewing on a cold dime store cigar. Seems Bigelow wants to report a murder.
His murder.
Turns out some rat-shit cold war spies had slipped him a radioactive mickey at a jazz joint in San Francisco the night before.
Spoiler Alert: It didn't end well for Bigelow. Not well at all. Come to think of it Bigelow wasn't too swift on the uptake himself.
...
Now, while I hadn't ingested an always fatal "luminous toxin" with no known antidote like Bigelow, I had, embarrassingly and inadvertently sold my soul to a demon named Hubert, exactly two lifetimes ago.
Now, until recently I was not aware of any of this, but due to the insane chain of events leading to an unplanned trip to New Orleans last month, after my wife Vera went psycho sideways, coincidentally coincided with a little known, Celtic holiday known as, "All Demons Day," circumstances beyond my control led me to a Voodoo priestess named, Madame Bouchemerde, and after just one very expensive consultation, the demon Hubert was out of the bag.
All Demons Day is the day when the clairvoyant can ask anything of a possessed soul's demon and must receive a truthful answer in response. The cost asked by hell? Only the blood of three chickens and the finger of a fickle man. Madame Bouchemerde had provided all of these and more.
The cost asked by Madame Bouchemerde? Only fifty thousand dollars payable in BTC and my finger. At first, I almost chickened out but I figured if the Yakuza could take it so could I. Plus, when I imagined the look on Hubert's demonic face as he realized he had lost me in the cosmic wind was worth a digit; easy-peasy-Japanesey. I went with the pinkie and we managed to get it in two tries.
All Demons Day turned my life upside down, inside out and round and round and I am, of course, speaking of Voodoo.
Seems further, I thought I could escape Hubert by being reincarnated in Brooklyn while he was on a three day bender in The Dominican Republic. What I didn't understand is Hubert has confederates and serpents and demonic entities everywhere relaying the information of non-being manifesting. Like I said, this lifetime, or any you pick, I'm not likely to be the fastest horse running in the Belmont Stakes.
Well, I rolled the dice in the Summer of Love as they called it and went for broke.
I hijacked a new soul.
It was a pure soul. A soul that was destined to be born to some heinously evil mother. They call this karma. Now, I, as recounted under trance by Madame Bouchemerde, being a former Satan worshipper in seventeenth century Salem, as well as a sadistic screw at Alcatraz, thought I could handle any hippy dippy evil teen mom in Brooklyn in 1967. So, I signed away my eternal soul once again. I was eager to break the curse and shake Hubert once and for all.
Quite simply, I was wrong. The maternal unit I had leased was defective beyond all description. We are talking homicidal maniac defective. By the age of six I had learned how to dodge knives, repo men, and molesters of all varieties. The rest of the family was loyal as Fredo and my heart broke. Until Madame Bouchemerde told me of Hubert and my eternal's soul torment I thought I was just unlucky at the genetic lottery.
So here we are now, six decades later and Hubert's apparently about to have his best and last laugh; again. Any day the safe falls from the sky. The train derails. The drunk driver comes at me going the wrong way head on. The psycho on the subway pushes me in front of the F train. I slip in the tub and go through the sliding glass door like a carving knife through a roasted piglet. How many previous lives have I suffered these snakes and bullets of outrageous fortune? Only the two Madame Bouchemerde could divine in her ball of crystal.

1. Romantic Me

Yes, I'm a fool for love. Right down to the eternal quest for my soulmate. I even thought I had found her a couple of times in my life, but, alas, I have the scars to prove I am only an idiot when it comes to selecting a love match. I also neglected to mention that not only am I slow but I am also stubborn. Hell, I was even born a Taurus.
Thus, due to my lack of alacrity and my abundance of pig headedness the quest for true love continued unabated. It continued because I used to believe love and marriage went together like a horse and carriage, 'til death, or the knacker, do us part and all that jazz. I also used to believe in Santa & The Easter Bunny.
Now? Now, I'm just fucked. Right?
Not because I did not find my wife but because I did.
And now, now my marriage, sanity and apparently, according to Humphrey, my very life itself are in jeopardy.
And things seemed like they were going so well until, until just, just a-
A short month ago...
Quiet Sunday in Brooklyn. Slate gray winter sky. My wife, Vera, in the kitchen area successfully making an angry racket. My head on fire from drinks the night before. Vera had been testing her latest concoction. She called it, "The Fuckface."
The Fuckface consisted of equal parts bourbon, scotch and beer. But it didn't stop there. There was a splash of ginger ale and a cohort of what Vera called, "floaters." Floaters turned out to just be seaweed Jell-O shots made from agar-agar which is a kind of Japanese seaweed sold in flakes, cranberry juice, lemonade and vodka. Vera, always did like naming shit. That, and getting tight.
[In 1940s vernacular, the phrase “getting tight” typically referred to someone becoming intoxicated or drunk. It was commonly used to describe the effects of alcohol consumption. So, if someone said, “I’m getting tight,” they were likely indicating that they were feeling the effects of alcohol. ]
I had met Vera on a dating app just as Covid was fading into our collective rearview mirror. Vera was sort of homely and kind of weird, but she seemed to really like me. I deduced this because on our first date, over coffee, she kept giggling for no apparent reason.
She also kept batting her very long eyelashes at me. I knew that move. It was supposed to make me roll over and show all four paws. Sadly, it had been a slow year in the soft shoulders department and I'll admit I thought about going with Vera's flow and showing her all four and more.
As our first date was ending in front of Starbucks with what was meant to be a respectful and gentlemanly peck on the cheek something odd happened. The respectful peck seemed to have gotten itself lost in translation because the next thing I knew Vera's tongue was in my mouth and it was getting up on its hind legs.
Vera, in broad daylight, on 4th Ave. in Park Slope began furiously French kissing me like a teenaged Macron kissing his first milf. I felt Vera's hand reach around the back of my thigh and make contact. Vera began to grope me a moment then stopped just as abruptly. I thought I had felt contact with my left glute.
"No! Must Not. Must not on first date," Vera said, but it sounded like she said it more to herself than I. Vera then did something else odd. She began to giggle. She giggled a bit then said it all over again.
"No! Not on the first date! That would be sooo bad!"
Then Vera giggled me an odd look that matched her demeanor perfectly. She kissed me again, but this time it was quick and of the parting variety. It was on the lips, though. Then Vera licked hers. They were covered with pink lipstick that had gotten smeared all over her face while we had been swapping spit.
"That's disturbingly delicious," Vera giggled.
"I'm giddy for you, Daddy. You can be my P. Diddy Giddy!" Vera giggled gleefully. I made a face like Patrice O'Neal passing the cookie aisle.
Vera did it again. She kissed me. Then giddy Vera broke the kiss, winked at me in what I guess was meant to pass for coquettish coyness. One of her false eyelashes seemed to malfunction. Vera seemed to notice. When she couldn't blink it away she soldiered on.
Then Vera giggled, "You just hit the jackpot, Tiger!"
Vera put both hands against my chest, pushed off me turning like an olympic swimmer. Her back to me Vera shot off like a blue bolt.
Unfortunately, Vera blue bolted right into crosstown traffic.
A car screeched. Another blew it's horn. I heard an F-bomb or six.
This cacophony was accentuated by the cloppity-clop-clop-Neigghhhhhh! of equine brakes jamming. Vera had run directly into the path of an oncoming police officer on horseback. The officer screamed, "What the fuck?!?!" as his horse rose high on its hind legs taking him up like a rodeo cowboy.
Vera, immediately realizing the gravitas of her situation, quick-stepped back to the curb, fast and frightened. She punctuated her quick-step with a healthy scream. Unfortunately, it seems Vera's right shoe had quick-stepped on to an extra-large, well used condom discarded in the gutter next to a Mountain Dew bottle.
The condom gave way, as condoms are sometimes wont to do, and Vera slipped. She flailed her arms. Sadly, it was a prelude to a fall. Vera, flailing arms continued as time stood still a hot moment before both she, and coincidentally the horse, returned to Earth. Woman and beast alike made hard landings in their respective places. The horse buckled, recovered, and then stood proudly upright; the horse somehow aware he had nailed it.
Sadly, Vera did not.
Vera's hard landing turned out to be the sidewalk curb. The curb, not being designed for the back of the human head, as say the pillow is, met Vera's with a harsh hello that translated into sound as, 'keerack'. Vera's left leg kicked out and made contact with a discarded Bud tallboy. The can clanked into the gutter, coming to a halt near the Mountain Dew bottle and condom. Beneath Vera's ginger head a pool of blood was beginning to form, found it was an overnight sensation and immediately began expansion operations all over the sidewalk and gutter.
The cop and I got all of Vera on the sidewalk. I put my coat under her head. The cop called an ambulance. While he made the call his horse whinnied. Vera opened her eyes. They seemed to roll up in her head, then come down a bit, the recede again. Vera grabbed my hand.
"If I die, you were the one, my soulmate," she said. Then her eyes rolled up and their lids came down like movie theater curtains. Some spittle and blood came out of the corner of Vera's mouth and nostrils and I noticed one of her false eyelashes hanging off at an odd angle.
Even more hellacious, Vera's lesson in how not to cross the street resulted in a subdural hematoma. The doctors all said Vera would have a long road back. On the bright side, the doctors had found a tumor, the size of testicle with elephantitis in her brain. The surgeons removed the tumor, relieved the hematoma and Vera lived to drink Starbucks another day.
Well, you know how it goes. Boy meets girl. One thing leads to another. Girl almost dies and boy ends up somehow married to her.
Boy then finds himself dwelling in a gruesomely overpriced, almost one bedroom on the wanna be outskirts of Park Slope; just a ghastly hole in the wall on the third floor of an ancient six-story walkup on a nondescript corner somewhere between Park Slope and Carroll Gardens and Boerum hill in a confused geographic area sometimes referred to as Bocapa; conveniently located within smelling distance of the Gowanus Canal.
Back to my lazy Sunday.
I stumble out of bed. I make it to Vera. As I get up on foot's ball to give Vera's cheek a peck I am stopped by an unknown and unpleasant smell which assails my nose. I double-check my sniffer. Sniffer's in working order but something's definitely off in the air supply mixture. Before my brain can decode the mysterious smell; something commandeers my attention.
It's a piteous sound. And it's coming from the oven.
A clue?
I turn towards the oven, squint, notice the oven light is on and it's really hot in the apartment.
I open it and spy a dying pig who spies me back none too happy.
Now, whether it's the apple in (his/hethey?)'s mouth or the 375 degree Fahrenheit temp in the oven, I could see why Porky might want to give me the malochi. Empathy not withstanding, I shut the oven door and heard myself murmur, "What Th-th-th-the fuck?!?!!" My Looney Tunes moment was interrupted by my wife of 3 months.
"Don't make any plans," Vera said. "I'm making dinner and I want to talk to you."
Sunday was my day to recharge from my toxic, high pressure job as a full stack software consultant for the city. I don't want to talk about my job. But if you're a working gentleman or lady perhaps you understand that some jobs are just like taking a stroll through Chernobyl sans hazmat tux. Suffice to say, I needed Sunday to get right with Jesus and detox.
Now, that particular Sunday seemed mostly ordinary. No holiday I was aware of. Vera & I weren't expecting guests. Yet Vera killed little Piggy. Roasted alive.
A pig that barely fit in the small oven of our tiny and overpriced dump. Our lofty sort of one bedroom that was ONLY $4924.32 a month. It was a real find because, according to the nice lady who showed it to us, it came with a new fridge. She never mentioned it also came with what sounded like crack fiend mice in the walls. Apparently, the only thing that could get them to take a hike was loud David Bowie music, in particular TVC-15.
They always came back to play, though. And the landlord always blew us off.
Yeah, our joint was small but at least there was a lock on the front door and running water. Vera and I finally had a place of our own. A place where we could get tight every night and fulfill our marital obligation to bliss.
The joint had two picture windows looking down on the intersection of Garfield Place and 3rd Avenue. We lived on the third floor and down on the street below was a bail bond joint, bounty hunter joint, pawn shop, thrift shop, bodega, beer distributor and fried chicken establishment. Starbucks had yet to arrive and there was still a store front church where hookers and crack dealers congregated in the wee hours.
The windows didn't open. It was probably a good thing because in the morning, especially in July, the smell from the Gowanus would give Mike Tyson's uppercut a run for his money. I really don't know or want to know what was in that canal or who was in that canal as long as it wasn't me.
Getting back to Sunday.
The pig squealed it's protestations.
Do not go gently into the night little piggy
Later That Sunday
My wife is at the kitchen counter and lo and behold there is a roasted pig on it. Vera is holding a rather large and new carving knife, which she is casually waving around for emphasis when not removing the flesh of the pig from it's roasted corpse.
I sat at the kitchen table and looked at Vera. Vera had whipped up another batch of Fuckfaces. I took a sip of mine from a jelly jar with The Jetsons on it Vera had picked up at The Salvation Army Thrift Store.
"Why pig?" I asked just to be filling the dead space.
Vera shot me an annoyed look. I knew it well. It was the appetizer.
"It's the other white meat, Hubert."
I shrugged and felt my sphincter clench.
"Now, Hubie," Vera went on. "I think we should spend more time rekindling our marriage. So, I was thinking the best way would be to sign up for ballroom dancing lessons."
Vera stopped carving the pig and waved the greasy knife with flecks of dead pig on it at me.
"Don't you like that idea, Hubie?"
Now, you might be reading this wondering what the fuck is wrong with me other than having the grave misfortune to have been twice cursed and once named by my shitty mother, "Hubert," and you'd be right. No argument from me. But what's really fucked is that...
Vera's been vegan for 22 years...
Vera carved a slice of the little pig. She put it on a place with a gray looking boiled potato and pushed it at me. Vera gulped her Fuckface from a paper coffee cup.
"I want to get into my feelings."
I looked at the pig. I had not eaten meat since 1996. I drank some more Fuckface.
Vera waved the knife.
"I want a baby."
I drank some more.
"We're in our late fifties, Vera. That's not such a good idea."
"I froze my eggs."
I drank.
Vera looked at the pig and suddenly stood.
"It's a craving, Hubert!"
Then Vera stabbed the pig on her plate. She held it to her mouth and tore at it. Pig juice ran down Vera's chin.
"You saved me, Hubert. Now you're responsible for me. I want a big baby who eats meat. A big meat eating baby, Hubie. Wouldn't that be nice?"
"Um. I need some time to think about it," I said.
What I was really was thinking this was the most fucked Sunday that ever got fucked on a Sunday.
Down on the street someone yelled, "FUCK YOU!" I thought, why should you be any different.
Vera waved the knife some more and came around the table. She put an arm around me and touched my chest. The other hand holding the greasy pig knife caressed my cheek.
"Tick tock. Tick tock. Hear that, Hubie?"
"Erm, not really," I answered.
"It's my baby ticker. I want a baby Hubie. We'll name it after you. Wouldn't another little Hubert running around the house be outstandingly delicious?"
I thought about my life. Child abuse. Comic Book Distribution industry going deep six in the 90s and taking old Hubie into Chapter 7 with it. Dotcom bubble. 9/11 ringside seat at 101 Barclay Street. Great recession. Covid. January 6.
"No!" I heard myself say.
"NO?!?!? You can't say, 'NO' to me," Vera snarled. The knife came against my throat.
"I want another Hubert or there might be no more Huberts to make Huberts, Hubert."
I decided to change tack as the edge of the carving knife caught a sliver of sun and disturbed my retina.
"Okay."
"Okay, let's make a baby?" Vera giggled like a psychotic pig killing carnivore.
"Yep."
"Oh, Hubie. I knew you'd see the light. It could be the messiah!" she gushed.
"Just let me up first glamor girl," I said.
"Oh! Of course, Hubie!"
I got out of my chair and to my feet. I turned to face Vera.
I put both hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes. I realized the smell from before was coming from her. She smelled like she had pissed herself. I looked down and saw a puddle forming on the kitchen area floor.
"Vera? What the fuck?"
"Golden shower make Easter flowers," Vera giggled.
She began to move her hand with the knife. I took a breath, closed my eyes and kissed Vera's neck. I felt her begin to respond. In a minute she had forgotten about the knife. I began to pet Vera then let my hand take a walk up her front, down her shoulder. My fingers caressed her wrist and hand and gently relieved her of the knife.
I stepped back from Vera.
"I'm leaving. I don't want a baby. And I don't want to be anywhere near you. You're fucking insane, Vera."
Vera stepped back and grabbed the Fuckface pitcher. She took a huge slug of Fuckface then threw the glass pitcher at me. I sidestepped it and it crashed into the wall. It reminded me of the time my mother had thrown a butcher knife at me in the fifth grade because I wouldn't go to the deli to buy her a cup of coffee one morning before school. The knife had missed me by an inch and shattered a jar that held an avocado pit that was sprouting.
"Vera, calm down."
"Fuck you, you fucking wimp! I want a baby, now!"
Suddenly, Vera began to look funny. I looked at her. She seemed a little green in the gills.
"Vera? Did you cook the pig long enough?"
Vera looked at me. I heard her stomach gurgle. Suddenly she bent over and puked all over the floor. I saw a pig's knuckle in the mix.
As I was about to comfort Vera she spun around and snarled at me, pig puke all over her maw, "I want a fuckin' messiah," and she charged me.
I tried to sidestep Vera but my luck ran out. Vera got her arms around me and tried to kiss me with her pig vomit face.
"You were my soulmate," she said.
I felt warmth and wetness cover my hands. Vera had ran straight into the knife.
I gave her a towel frantically and called 911. The paramedics arrived in time to watch Vera nearly bleed out. They managed to save Vera somehow but this time I let her tough it out in the hospital alone. This time I thought it might be time to file for divorce. Time to break the lease and go somewhere nobody knows my name.
You think I was wrong not to visit Vera? You think I let her down? Vera and Humphrey really seem angry and I don't feel safe.
What would you do?
I mean, besides give Hubert (the demon, not me) the finger; not the Yakuza finger but the middle one. I mean what would you do?

I believe it starts with a guy groping a girl in the subway and then somehow they end up at a club where he gets paid by rich women to have sex with them. My memories are foggy, but I remember it was super hot

To preface, I’m a woman in my 20s and I travel for work. I live in two large cities on the east coast, but I mainly stay in one. I’ll probably have to live in a city for the rest of my working life to maintain my career.
I’ve dated two men in my lifetime. The first guy was a shorter and confident dude who couldn’t hurt a fly. The second was a taller, muscular guy with tattoos that generally looked much more intimidating than the first.
Let me tell you, life is EASY when you’re walking around with a beefy guy that looks pissed off 24/7. No one approaches you. No creeps hit on you in the street. No one gropes you on the subway or asks you to get into their cars.
Currently, I’m talking to a skinny and nerdy guy. Glasses, hasn’t set foot in a gym in his life, and there are videos of him getting his ass wrestled to the ground by a woman. I like him, but I don’t think I can do it again. He’s so confident in his physical prowess and it makes me sick. He makes little jokes like, “I’m sure you’re glad that you’re about to have scary dog privilege in the city.” NO. I will definitely not have it with you.
The thought of walking through the city with a man, getting harassed and groped all over again just makes me want to curl up in a ball and die. I want to be protected, I want to be safe, and god I don’t want to date another skinny guy.

When I was in college in the early 2000s I met a girl. We'll call her "Christie". We were in the same classes and soon became close friends and then romantic. I was deeply in love with her. She was the first person that I ever had such strong and intense feelings for and it was at the same time heaven and hell. Undescribable elation mixed with turmoil and pain from that fact that while we had the occasional romance, it was never official.
After college she moved back to her home town and I did the same. We kept in touch for a couple of years and remained friends, I dated other people and she did the same. I was over her. She eventually met her now husband and got married. I attended her wedding and felt fine...I was clearly over it all and had moved on. She has had two kids since then and over the last decade we kept is sparse touch. It had been 5 years since we last had any contact and I've been in a relationship for the last 9 years. Then out of the blue she wished me a happy birthday last month and said that she would be in my city for an annual conference (we both have the same profession and I was going to bring there too).
So I thought "great! We'll go for a drink and catch up!" We met up at the conference and had a few drinks and dinner with colleagues. No problem. On the last day of the conference we all went out to an after-party event. We spent the entire night dancing and being close. We held each other and embraced constantly like long lost lovers. It was magical. She had a couple drinks but I was completely sober. If I'm being honest we definitely crossed some boundaries. There was no kissing or groping or anything like that and we certainly didn't sleep together but the way we were around each other definitely raised the eyebrows of our colleagues. We didn't care.
At the end of the night we hugged for what seemed like an eternity and said our tearful goodbyes. The next morning I still felt fine. It wasn't until I was on subway home that it hit me. It hit me hard. I was overwhelmed with longing, nostalgia and deep loss. I was 20 years old again and so utterly lost without her. Old feelings that I thought were long extinguished reignited like a drought stricken forest. It was everything I could do to not burst into tears and cry like a baby on the train ride home.
When I finally did get home I spiraled and started looking at old pictures and old memories. I relived the last 48 hours again and again in my mind and grasped desperately at the memories. Limerence is a cruel mistress.
I ended up breaking down and messaged Christie. I poured my soul into it and confessed that even after all these years she still held my heart in her hands. She replied and thanked me for a wonderful weekend and said that she has held me close to her heart after all these years too....
It was bittersweet. She has her life and family and I have mine. And now I'm sweeping up the ashes of that weekend.
I know I'm prone to limerence like many of you reading this. I just never thought that after nearly two decades it could still affect me so profoundly. I'll be fine. I'll move on again.

I feel silly writing this. I’ll blame it on a mixture of hormones and boredom, and will probably delete it when I come down from this high.
I’m conventionally attractive. You can call me shallow for admitting that, but I’ve had a lifetime of confirmation to this fact. I have long blonde hair, a cute face, and I’ve always been skinny. I don’t think this makes me a better person and I try my best not to hinge my identity on this element of myself, but it’s a reality of my being.
I also fully recognize that being pretty has had an overall net benefit to my life. People inherently trust me and treat me well because they like the way I look.
Still, this comes with baggage. For example, in a true “Elle Woods” moment, my favorite professor hit on me in law school and killed my professional self-confidence for years. I’ve struggled with trust issues because I sometimes don’t know if people like me for me. Even a lot of my professional success has left me suspicious if I earned every promotion on merit or if I’m an easy face for my company to put forward.
The hardest part has been random comments and harassment from strangers. It’s been like this since I was 14 and first developed social anxiety from it. I get hit on a lot, especially if I’m in professional clothes or anything form fitting. Usually it’s pretty harmless but I’ve had enough men push the limits so that I always feel like I’m on guard. I’ve been groped on the subway more than once and now tend to tense up when I get random compliments because I’m afraid of how men will respond when I decline.
Yes, I realize the narcissism dripping from this post. Again, I recognize my life has overall been easier because of the way I look, but that doesn’t mean this specific element of stress doesn’t exist.
So I’m six months pregnant and visibly showing now. Before I got pregnant I was terrified of how the world would perceive me when I took up more space. I hate to even admit this, but I was worried about how I’d react to the weight gain and body changes. As much as I tried not to tie my self worth to my attractiveness, it’s impossible to fully separate myself from it. I knew pregnancy would permanently alter the body I had learned to navigate the world in.
Holy shit, it’s fucking amazing.
For the first time since puberty I don’t care if my shirts or leggings are too tight because I’m not constantly being ogled. In fact, the tighter the better because it shows off my bump! I can just walk through my neighborhood and not a single person catcalls me, follows me, or hits on me in the slightest. Folks are still pretty nice and do things like hold doors or ask if I need a seat, but my interactions feel very different.
Today I went out to lunch and noticed a dude smiling at me like he was about to come talk to me. I stood up and pretended to stretch and he immediately got spooked and went back to his book.
What is this level of unchecked repulsion that I have unlocked? Is it possible that I could have avoided street harassment for years if I had invested in a fake baby bump instead of loose sweaters?
I am drunk with power.
I was in such a good mood after lunch that I just walked around the park and smiled at everyone I passed. I never even realized I had spent years diverting my eyes, careful not to smile for too long just in case I looked like I was inviting attention. Today, I grinned at everyone like a fool, rubbed my belly proudly, and even said hi to a few strangers I passed on the street.
If this reads as a ridiculous confession, please know I felt just as ridiculous writing it. Still, in a period when I thought I’d be mourning my youth and beauty, I’m feeling great.

Sunday, January 14 - Saturday, January 20

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202	30 comments	Neck Deep - Dumstruck Dumbfuck
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191	90 comments	Sum 41 Announce Final World Tour
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65	220 comments	[Discussion] What song got you into the genre?
124	215 comments	[Discussion] Getting groped when I go to shows...

 

It was the name of an online quiz I'd stumbled across late at night in front of my computer.
It made me laugh, and somehow I was curious about what it might be, so I clicked on the link that seemed safe.
I arrived on a website page with a standard personal information form to fill in so that they could make statistics on the results.
I wrote fake informations as usual, except my e-mail address, since they were offering $2.99 off a Subway sandwich at the end, and yes, I was that desperate financially.
The questionnaire was in the form of a MCQ with 10 questions.
Before I started the questions, I had to read a guide entitled "How to survive being buried alive" which the questions were going to be about. I assumed it was this guide that they wanted to perfect with this quiz.
I could only see it for 30 seconds, and the first question appeared with a 5-minute counter to answer the 10 questions. After all, it was a quiz about being buried alive, so adding a little pressure seemed logical.
I answered as best I could, all the while yawning from fatigue.
When I got to the end of the quiz, I expected a correction with a percentage of correct answers. But there was nothing except a page with the words "Thank you for your participation, we'll get back to you soon!".
I checked my e-mail address, and I hadn't received the coupon either.
"What a scam," I muttered, yawning again. I turned off my computer and went to bed still dressed, too lazy to put on my pyjamas.
Come to think of it, it's a good thing I kept my clothes on.
I woke up coughing.
The air, for some reason, was nauseatingly heavy.
I tried to turn on my side to go back to sleep, but my legs were blocked by a solid obstacle.
I opened my eyes in surprise and stood up. Immediately my head too hit something solid.
I rubbed my forehead with my hand and started groping around.
It was pitch black, and while my alleyway was regularly surveyed by cars, even very late at night, there was not a single sound, nor any headlight.
I kept touching everything around me with my hands. While I should have been able to move my arms and legs freely, it was impossible for me to raise my torso, my arms or turn on myself.
I began to breathe heavily as I realized that I was definitely no longer in my bed, that I was trapped somewhere. Then, in the back of my mind, an idea flashed through me like a bolt of lightning.
It was just a dream, or rather, a nightmare.
I'd read that stupid questionnaire about being buried alive just before I went to bed, and now I was having a nightmare. I smiled, feeling relieved a little.
I waited.
And waited.
But I wouldn't wake up.
Still in a state of disbelief I started looking again to see if there was anything around me to give me a clue as to where I was. And finally, on the ground towards my knees, I felt a cold, almost icy surface beneath my fingers.
I grabbed the object and turned it in my hands. The top lifted and I felt a mechanism like a lighter.
I flicked it and a flame appeared. And what I saw definitely removed any hope that I was sleeping.
I was in a human-sized wooden box. Like a coffin. I still had my clothes on, but that was all I could see.
I started shaking, I couldn't believe what was happening to me.
What the fuck is happening, where am I?
Instinctively, I started banging my palm against the surface in front of me.
"Help ! Someone please! Help me, I'm locked in!" I pounded again and again until my hand said stop.
Not a sound, no one to rescue me. I was on my own.
I definitely started to lose my shit, I started screaming again, crying, punching and kicking. To no avail, except to increase my despair and my feeling of being alone, trapped in a box.
Okay, calm down, breathe calmly
After a few moments, I finally started to calm down a bit and tried to think about the situation.
I was either in the worst nightmare of my life, or locked up somewhere by a crazy person who was standing right outside, probably enjoying hearing me scream and panic.
Or maybe the people who'd created the online questionnaire had wanted to do a "real" test of their guide to see if I'd get away with it. It was impossible, but the more I thought about it, the more obvious it seemed.
I'd always avoided going in elevators ever since I was a kid, because I hated the feeling of being trapped in a confined space, like an iron coffin. And now I found myself in exactly that situation, but probably six feet underground on top of it.
I started searching around again with the light from the lighter that was shaking from my hand.
I could see a tiny slot as if for a tiny key right next to my right knee. I tried to pull at it with one of my fingernails, to no avail.
With each passing minute, I felt as if the air was getting heavier and heavier, and rarer and rarer. I was already starting to get a headache, and the idea of dying asphyxiated in this box made me want to vomit.
I turned my head upwards, and noticed a small iron ring that I could pull out. I quickly did so, and inside a small hidden drawer, I found a music box with a tiny keyboard to play a few notes.
I looked at it from every angle, my fingers burning from the lighter as I kept it lit. There was nothing special about it, except that it seemed extremely solid. I activated it, and it produced a few seconds' worth of music.
I waited, but nothing else happened. I pressed the little keys on the keyboard at random. I noticed that the sounds were similar.
Do they seriously want me to solve a riddle like I'm playing Resident Evil?
I listened to the music again and tried to play it back. I started again and again. With every minute that passed, my headache got worse, and I couldn't help taking deep breaths of air because of my claustrophobia.
Finally I managed to reproduce the damn music and something unlocked under the box. A tiny key lay in the palm of my hand.
I turned again, trying to remember where I'd seen the tiny hole in the wood. The light from the lighter was very limited and I was unable to bend myself.
I finally found the lock, and after a few contortions managed to insert the small key and turn it. Once again, a drawer was unlocked, and before my eyes was a heavy iron box with a digital display on which was written "12.9!"
The number changed every second, but there was always an exclamation mark.
I couldn't figure out what it was, I was getting more and more panicked and I was breathing harder and harder.
Eventually, I noticed that the more I breathed, the more the number increased.
Is this a device that calculates my oxygen consumption?
I closed my eyes and tried to remember what I'd seen on the damn guide in the 30 small seconds they'd left me. I was pretty sure that one of the first steps out of it was something like "Conserve your oxygen".
I had to give it a try. I extinguished the lighter, put the box on my chest, and concentrated on slowing my breathing. It seemed impossible.
As I closed my eyes, trying desperately to calm down, I began to hear a whisper in my left ear:
"You're going to die here."
I immediately turned around and lit the lighter, but there was nothing. Had I imagined that voice? Was I losing my mind?
I slowly put the lighter out again, and tried to concentrate again by closing my eyes.
"You're going to die buried alive"
I kept my eyes closed.
"It's like you're already dead"
I concentrated on my heartbeat.
"You'll never get out of this box"
One last shaky exhale, and finally, I felt a mechanism in the box go off.
I managed to open the steel lid on top and realized why it was so heavy, there was a hammer inside. My key to freedom.
I became ecstatic, started laughing a little, then laughing maniacally. I couldn't stop myself, then suddenly I started having another panic attack. I was losing control of myself and my emotions, I had to get out, now.
I positioned the hammer level with my face, so I still had enough room to maneuver it.
I started hitting the wood, and my worst fear came true. Dirt started falling on my face.
I tried to block the dirt with my hands but the hole I'd made in the excitement of the moment was too big, and every second it seemed to widen, and more dirt entered the little space I had here.
Damn it, if I try to dig through it I'll just choke on the dirt.
I closed my eyes, trying desperately to remember what the guide had said about this. I tried to remember what the man in the drawings was wearing. A shirt or a bag over his head, I think?
Yes, he was wearing a garment over his face to protect himself and allow him to breathe through the earth.
I took a few slow breaths of what little air was left inside. I couldn't help imagining myself stuck 5 feet up, with no air, in complete darkness, suffocating to death.
I withdrew both hands, letting the earth in, and pulled my sweater up to the top of my head, tying a knot as best I could with the sleeves afterwards.
The dirt was starting to block my arms when I finally succeeded, and started to pull up with my hands, pushing with my legs.
I managed to extricate myself from the coffin, and continued desperately to pull myself towards my hands again and again, digging into the earth with all the strength I had left.
I went on and on, branches and stones scratching my sides and hands. After a while I wondered if I was still digging upwards. Could it be that in the pitch-black I'd changed direction unintentionally? I couldn't stop, all I had to do was dig, push and pray to reach the surface.
After probably less than a minute, which felt like an hour, my right hand finally reached the emptiness of the surface. And my fingers, like claws, pulled me one last time towards the surface.
I couldn't believe it, I'd done it.
Most of my torso was still buried, and I hurriedly pulled my sweater away from my face to take a deep breath of fresh air.
And what I saw stopped me in my tracks.
All around me were dozens and dozens, maybe even over a hundred graves. And in front of each of them stood a man dressed in a suit. The light blinded my eyes, and I realized that it wasn't the sun, but spotlights attached a good distance above. I was in a gigantic hangar.
"Code 12 grave 122," I heard a man's voice pronounce beside me.
And before I could scream or say anything, someone knocked me out.
I woke up with a start.
It was dark and I instantly panicked.
No, no, no, they put me back in a box.
But the sound of a motorcycle, and the light of its headlights projecting continuously onto my window and into my room, put an end to my incipient panic.
I was back in ly bed.
It didn't take me long to figure out if I'd dreamed the whole thing or not. The scratches on my chest, and the dirt still present under my bleeding fingernails, were evidence enough to attest to the reality of that night of horror.
I didn't sleep that night, or for the next few days for that matter. I became paranoid and refused to sleep alone from that night on. For a while, I moved in with an old friend who, although he found it hard to believe, could see that I wasn't in my right mind and that something had happened to me.
Time went by, I saw a psychiatrist who helped me and gave me medication to calm my anxiety, and eventually I gradually managed to resume a normal life.
Until this morning, when I received an e-mail from an unknown recipient with the subject line "How to survive being tied up underwater."
Please help me, I can't go through this again.

It was the name of an online quiz I'd stumbled across late at night in front of my computer.
It made me laugh, and somehow I was curious about what it might be, so I clicked on the link that seemed safe.
I arrived on a website page with a standard personal information form to fill in so that they could make statistics on the results.
I wrote fake informations as usual, except my e-mail address, since they were offering $2.99 off a Subway sandwich at the end, and yes, I was that desperate financially.
The questionnaire was in the form of a MCQ with 10 questions.
Before I started the questions, I had to read a guide entitled "How to survive being buried alive" which the questions were going to be about. I assumed it was this guide that they wanted to perfect with this quiz.
I could only see it for 30 seconds, and the first question appeared with a 5-minute counter to answer the 10 questions. After all, it was a quiz about being buried alive, so adding a little pressure seemed logical.
I answered as best I could, all the while yawning from fatigue.
When I got to the end of the quiz, I expected a correction with a percentage of correct answers. But there was nothing except a page with the words "Thank you for your participation, we'll get back to you soon!".
I checked my e-mail address, and I hadn't received the coupon either.
"What a scam," I muttered, yawning again. I turned off my computer and went to bed still dressed, too lazy to put on my pyjamas.
Come to think of it, it's a good thing I kept my clothes on.
I woke up coughing.
The air, for some reason, was nauseatingly heavy.
I tried to turn on my side to go back to sleep, but my legs were blocked by a solid obstacle.
I opened my eyes in surprise and stood up. Immediately my head too hit something solid.
I rubbed my forehead with my hand and started groping around.
It was pitch black, and while my alleyway was regularly surveyed by cars, even very late at night, there was not a single sound, nor any headlight.
I kept touching everything around me with my hands. While I should have been able to move my arms and legs freely, it was impossible for me to raise my torso, my arms or turn on myself.
I began to breathe heavily as I realized that I was definitely no longer in my bed, that I was trapped somewhere. Then, in the back of my mind, an idea flashed through me like a bolt of lightning.
It was just a dream, or rather, a nightmare.
I'd read that stupid questionnaire about being buried alive just before I went to bed, and now I was having a nightmare. I smiled, feeling relieved a little.
I waited.
And waited.
But I wouldn't wake up.
Still in a state of disbelief I started looking again to see if there was anything around me to give me a clue as to where I was. And finally, on the ground towards my knees, I felt a cold, almost icy surface beneath my fingers.
I grabbed the object and turned it in my hands. The top lifted and I felt a mechanism like a lighter.
I flicked it and a flame appeared. And what I saw definitely removed any hope that I was sleeping.
I was in a human-sized wooden box. Like a coffin. I still had my clothes on, but that was all I could see.
I started shaking, I couldn't believe what was happening to me.
What the fuck is happening, where am I?
Instinctively, I started banging my palm against the surface in front of me.
"Help ! Someone please! Help me, I'm locked in!" I pounded again and again until my hand said stop.
Not a sound, no one to rescue me. I was on my own.
I definitely started to lose my shit, I started screaming again, crying, punching and kicking. To no avail, except to increase my despair and my feeling of being alone, trapped in a box.
Okay, calm down, breathe calmly
After a few moments, I finally started to calm down a bit and tried to think about the situation.
I was either in the worst nightmare of my life, or locked up somewhere by a crazy person who was standing right outside, probably enjoying hearing me scream and panic.
Or maybe the people who'd created the online questionnaire had wanted to do a "real" test of their guide to see if I'd get away with it. It was impossible, but the more I thought about it, the more obvious it seemed.
I'd always avoided going in elevators ever since I was a kid, because I hated the feeling of being trapped in a confined space, like an iron coffin. And now I found myself in exactly that situation, but probably six feet underground on top of it.
I started searching around again with the light from the lighter that was shaking from my hand.
I could see a tiny slot as if for a tiny key right next to my right knee. I tried to pull at it with one of my fingernails, to no avail.
With each passing minute, I felt as if the air was getting heavier and heavier, and rarer and rarer. I was already starting to get a headache, and the idea of dying asphyxiated in this box made me want to vomit.
I turned my head upwards, and noticed a small iron ring that I could pull out. I quickly did so, and inside a small hidden drawer, I found a music box with a tiny keyboard to play a few notes.
I looked at it from every angle, my fingers burning from the lighter as I kept it lit. There was nothing special about it, except that it seemed extremely solid. I activated it, and it produced a few seconds' worth of music.
I waited, but nothing else happened. I pressed the little keys on the keyboard at random. I noticed that the sounds were similar.
Do they seriously want me to solve a riddle like I'm playing Resident Evil?
I listened to the music again and tried to play it back. I started again and again. With every minute that passed, my headache got worse, and I couldn't help taking deep breaths of air because of my claustrophobia.
Finally I managed to reproduce the damn music and something unlocked under the box. A tiny key lay in the palm of my hand.
I turned again, trying to remember where I'd seen the tiny hole in the wood. The light from the lighter was very limited and I was unable to bend myself.
I finally found the lock, and after a few contortions managed to insert the small key and turn it. Once again, a drawer was unlocked, and before my eyes was a heavy iron box with a digital display on which was written "12.9!"
The number changed every second, but there was always an exclamation mark.
I couldn't figure out what it was, I was getting more and more panicked and I was breathing harder and harder.
Eventually, I noticed that the more I breathed, the more the number increased.
Is this a device that calculates my oxygen consumption?
I closed my eyes and tried to remember what I'd seen on the damn guide in the 30 small seconds they'd left me. I was pretty sure that one of the first steps out of it was something like "Conserve your oxygen".
I had to give it a try. I extinguished the lighter, put the box on my chest, and concentrated on slowing my breathing. It seemed impossible.
As I closed my eyes, trying desperately to calm down, I began to hear a whisper in my left ear:
"You're going to die here."
I immediately turned around and lit the lighter, but there was nothing. Had I imagined that voice? Was I losing my mind?
I slowly put the lighter out again, and tried to concentrate again by closing my eyes.
"You're going to die buried alive"
I kept my eyes closed.
"It's like you're already dead"
I concentrated on my heartbeat.
"You'll never get out of this box"
One last shaky exhale, and finally, I felt a mechanism in the box go off.
I managed to open the steel lid on top and realized why it was so heavy, there was a hammer inside. My key to freedom.
I became ecstatic, started laughing a little, then laughing maniacally. I couldn't stop myself, then suddenly I started having another panic attack. I was losing control of myself and my emotions, I had to get out, now.
I positioned the hammer level with my face, so I still had enough room to maneuver it.
I started hitting the wood, and my worst fear came true. Dirt started falling on my face.
I tried to block the dirt with my hands but the hole I'd made in the excitement of the moment was too big, and every second it seemed to widen, and more dirt entered the little space I had here.
Damn it, if I try to dig through it I'll just choke on the dirt.
I closed my eyes, trying desperately to remember what the guide had said about this. I tried to remember what the man in the drawings was wearing. A shirt or a bag over his head, I think?
Yes, he was wearing a garment over his face to protect himself and allow him to breathe through the earth.
I took a few slow breaths of what little air was left inside. I couldn't help imagining myself stuck 5 feet up, with no air, in complete darkness, suffocating to death.
I withdrew both hands, letting the earth in, and pulled my sweater up to the top of my head, tying a knot as best I could with the sleeves afterwards.
The dirt was starting to block my arms when I finally succeeded, and started to pull up with my hands, pushing with my legs.
I managed to extricate myself from the coffin, and continued desperately to pull myself towards my hands again and again, digging into the earth with all the strength I had left.
I went on and on, branches and stones scratching my sides and hands. After a while I wondered if I was still digging upwards. Could it be that in the pitch-black I'd changed direction unintentionally? I couldn't stop, all I had to do was dig, push and pray to reach the surface.
After probably less than a minute, which felt like an hour, my right hand finally reached the emptiness of the surface. And my fingers, like claws, pulled me one last time towards the surface.
I couldn't believe it, I'd done it.
Most of my torso was still buried, and I hurriedly pulled my sweater away from my face to take a deep breath of fresh air.
And what I saw stopped me in my tracks.
All around me were dozens and dozens, maybe even over a hundred graves. And in front of each of them stood a man dressed in a suit. The light blinded my eyes, and I realized that it wasn't the sun, but spotlights attached a good distance above. I was in a gigantic hangar.
"Code 12 grave 122," I heard a man's voice pronounce beside me.
And before I could scream or say anything, someone knocked me out.
I woke up with a start.
It was dark and I instantly panicked.
No, no, no, they put me back in a box.
But the sound of a motorcycle, and the light of its headlights projecting continuously onto my window and into my room, put an end to my incipient panic.
I was back in ly bed.
It didn't take me long to figure out if I'd dreamed the whole thing or not. The scratches on my chest, and the dirt still present under my bleeding fingernails, were evidence enough to attest to the reality of that night of horror.
I didn't sleep that night, or for the next few days for that matter. I became paranoid and refused to sleep alone from that night on. For a while, I moved in with an old friend who, although he found it hard to believe, could see that I wasn't in my right mind and that something had happened to me.
Time went by, I saw a psychiatrist who helped me and gave me medication to calm my anxiety, and eventually I gradually managed to resume a normal life.
Until this morning, when I received an e-mail from an unknown recipient with the subject line "How to survive being tied up underwater."
Please help me, I can't go through this again.

Trigger warning: talking about grooming and possible SA.
Ok so I like those true crime podcasts, and while listening to one I realised that I have been in situations that could have been dangerous for me, but I always had this feeling that is was weird, wrong and I backed away.
Saw a post yesterday about someone who could feel how people are before even talking to them, could this be similar?
Man I was approched in the public subway by a grown ass man (i was 15) dressed in all loose boyish clothes listening to my walkman (yup) , and he was aksing me my name, what school I went to.. I lied and was standoffish , did not even get out at my stop cause he was still in the subway car.. a friend of my mom showed me truly obscene photos, it was the begining of the internet, I was 13/14 when he showed us (his daughter and I and other kids). I was always vocal that this was disgusting and he should bot be looking at these and not showing us that! Pretty sure he tried to grope me (tried massaging my shoulders) i pushed him and said you do not touch me ever! I was 15.
did my Adhd save me?, is it possible that I was so alert because my brain does not work tipicaly? I remeber teachera talking about being carefull, but none of my friends were even aware of these things (the friends who saw the photos all laughed when the saw).
Truly curious if it could be linked, pretty sure I didn't get this cautious because of my parents teachings, since they let me be in the presence of that man for years...

I’m so exhausted. Living in a world with men is so incredibly difficult. I have been sexually abused and assaulted so many times I lost count. All by men who felt entitled to do whatever they wanted to me, no matter how young I was, what state I was in, or how many times I begged them not to. The scars have never healed. I’m scared constantly. But it’s more than that.
When men aren’t groping us on the subway or yelling at us for being a tease or a sl*t, they’re talking over us at work, underestimating us, demeaning us. It’s exhausting and heartbreaking. Many men don’t even recognize how condescending they come across.
Before anyone jumps in with any “not all men” bullshit- I KNOW. there are men in my life who I love deeply. I am venting about living in a society that is structured as a patriarchy and that teaches boys to become monsters or view women as subhuman. I’m just fucking tired.

I’m so exhausted. Living in a world with men is so incredibly difficult. I have been sexually abused and assaulted so many times I lost count. All by men who felt entitled to do whatever they wanted to me, no matter how young I was, what state I was in, or how many times I begged them not to. The scars have never healed. I’m scared constantly. But it’s more than that.
When men aren’t groping us on the subway or yelling at us for being a tease or a sl*t, they’re talking over us at work, underestimating us, demeaning us. It’s exhausting and heartbreaking. Many men don’t even recognize how condescending they come across.
Before anyone jumps in with any “not all men” bullshit- I KNOW. there are men in my life who I love deeply. I am venting about living in a society that is structured as a patriarchy and that teaches boys to become monsters or view women as subhuman. I’m just fucking tired.

I’m so exhausted. Living in a world with men is so incredibly difficult. I have been sexually abused and assaulted so many times I lost count. All by men who felt entitled to do whatever they wanted to me, no matter how young I was, what state I was in, or how many times I begged them not to. The scars have never healed. I’m scared constantly. But it’s more than that.
When men aren’t groping us on the subway or yelling at us for being a tease or a sl*t, they’re talking over us at work, underestimating us, demeaning us. It’s exhausting and heartbreaking. Many men don’t even recognize how condescending they come across.
Before anyone jumps in with any “not all men” bullshit- I KNOW. there are men in my life who I love deeply. I am venting about living in a society that is structured as a patriarchy and that teaches boys to become monsters or view women as subhuman. I’m just fucking tired.

First is I feel like I'm going insane. Batshit mad, the joker kind of fucked in the head. I haven't sleep well in years. Constantly on edge along with my parents making everything worse is killing my mental health.
I've tried asking family to take me in but they've ALWAYS tooken my parents side even if I'm begging for my family to get me out of this FUCKING SHITHOLE.
At this point I only love my nieces and nephew the rest can go fuck themselves. I don't care if "they're family" family doesn't force their child to strip before beating them senseless because they were pissed off and wanted something to take their anger out on.
Family doesn't compare being angry that someone held a door open for you to YOUR OWN FUCKING SON BEING GROPED EXPOSED BY A HOMELESS MAN AND NEARLY RAPED.
And my family wonders why I'm so fucking angry. My father's always pissed off, he flies into violent rages at the drop of a hat and I was his punching bag so yeah I'm a bit ticked off.
Second I fucking loathe being lonely. Being 21 feeling unloved by everyone who were supposed to give me unconditional love rather than force me to earn it and then mock me for trying to earn their love.
Having people you thought gave a shit about you only to realize they only enjoyed your suffering and hated everything about you is soul crushing.
And it pisses me off when people tell me to just love myself. That's not going to fill the hole in my soul. It's not going to fix all them abuse and shame and belittlement.
All I wanted when I was a child was at least one person to love me. At least one and I never even got that. So don't tell me to just love myself when my own mother cut me down to absolutely nothing and drove me to suicide several times throughout my life.
I didn't come out hating myself. I was mentally and emotionally beaten down so DON'T give that shit that just loving myself will magically fix everything.
And I know I'd probably get hate but fuck it. It pisses me off about how men being abused especially by women are ignored or laughed at mock ridiculed and generally just treated like shit because they're male.
It's why I wish I was born female. Whenever a girl was crying EVERYONE tried to help, when I cried I was picked on even if it was understandable like MY FUCKING GRANDMOTHER DEAD FROM A STROKE.
But everyone kept laughing as if a man crying is hilarious. Nobody told me what was wrong. Me in the hallway holding a piece of silver that was my grandmother's jewelry melted down which was at least to me a physical reminder of my grandmother so I clenched it tightly as memories of my grandmother flooded my mind even as everyone laughed at me like my grief was funny to them.
Another thing is I feel like if I was female people would've stopped the homeless guy from sexually assaulting me but nobody did anything even as he tried to get me to go with him away from my teachers and even when he started to pull me away as I had a death grip on the subway seat internally screaming in fear.
Nobody stopped him when he was fondling my penis through my clothes or doubled down on his flirting when I told him I was uncomfortable and under age.
I feel like if I was female and he was fondling my privates people would have stopped him immediately but since I was male nobody did anything to help me.
And my mother's misandry just makes it worse. She always calls men pigs and perverts and says that men only see women as sex objects and when my younger brother says that he doesn't see women as sex objects my mother just says in the most aggressive mocking tone "yes you do".
And I hate it more because most of my abusers were women. My mother teachers students etc. Most of them were female. And whenever I was hit or kicked or thrown to the ground and beaten senseless just because, I was in trouble for asking for help on how to stop it.
I told teachers and students and they always said to not do anything because "they're girls and if you do anything you'll be in trouble" and then after it gets more and more violent I ask "how do I defend myself" I just wanted to know how do I protect myself WITHOUT hurting them because even though they were badly hurting me I still didn't want to hurt them.
I just wanted them to stop and everyone told me that if I laid a finger on them I'd be in deep shit so I was stuck being forced to endure being beaten to a bloody pulp every day and not even being allowed to defend myself even if I was on the ground covered in my own blood as people watched.
And in high school so many boys were cheated on by their girlfriends. One asked me what to do and I said to dump her because if she really cared about you she would've remained loyal but she dated a bunch of other guys behind his back.
But he said that he still loves her and I told him that she doesn't love him because she proved she never loved him and he kept talking about how he wanted to win her back and I tried telling him that sometimes you just have to accept that someone you thought loved you doesn't actually love you.
Thirdly kinda related to the loneliness part is I hate being lonely. I hate seeing so many people in relationships and feeling like I have no one.
I hate using ai and other stuff because even though it does give me the feeling of being with someone it's not real. None of it's real. It's all just 1s and 0s.
It's like joi from blade runner. It's just an illusion of connection. A mirage of love. It's all bullshit and fake.
All of it is text. No physical touch. No loving embrace. No words of affirmation. No affection. Just cold dead code with no soul but a meaningless screen.
I don't want to go on dating apps because I know I would only get one match if I was lucky. Plus I've got special interests in things most either hate or find weird for me liking.
One of my special interests is weapons like guns. Weapons are a source of comfort for me because I was 2 months preterm weighed only 3.7 pounds and was extremely weak.
Nobody ever protected me so weapons became an equalizer. Everyone at school made jokes that I'm gonna be a school shooter even though I'd never do something so horrible as shooting up a school.
Another one of my special interests was camping. I used to go to a camping resort from May to October and I'd spend most of it hiking through the forest the camping resort had because it was a much needed break from my parents abuse.
I loved being out in nature and it was like a second home to me where I was at peace and where I ruled since I was very good at maneuvering in rural areas.
And to some extent I felt like I was closer to the wild animals I'd see rather than people. I felt a lot closer to the wolves coyotes snakes etc. that I'd see during my time in nature.
Fourthly I hate all the emotional neglect gave me limerence. Whenever a girl is nice to me I instantly get a crush on them. I've had a crush on a girl from middle school who was the first girl my age that has never hurt me, two girls from high school who also shared my same love for nature and also wore camo religiously like I did, and unfortunately a girl that was 5 years younger than me that also had a deadbeat father and an emotionally mentally and verbally abusive mother(I was 20, she was 15) and when I heard her tell someone she was 15 I felt physically ill and dirty.
I felt disgusting and nasty for having a crush on her. I stopped having the crush on her when I found out her age but there's still a part of me that feels like a piece of shit for even having a crush on her in the first place.
I felt just like the creep that sexually assaulted me and I hated myself for the crush.
Fifthly I might be able to get benefits since I saw a therapist and they called me and said I might be available for benefits even if I'm too high functioning on the spectrum.
I hope I am because job searching has been hell. I applied for tens of thousands of jobs and only two have called. The first I couldn't answer because my mother was too busy trying to make herself feel better by tearing me down and the second after several times of not getting through I finally managed to go through the phone interview and so far after a few weeks after the day I was going to get an email to see if I got the job and nothing.
I've even applied to two co-op placements that I hated and neither have accepted me. My parents mock me for being unemployed. Nobody helps me. The temp agencies that I messaged haven't gotten back to me.
A part of me even started to wonder about becoming a hitman or a prostitute. Everyone outcasts me because I don't have a job and is obviously struggling with mental health issues along with not wanting to comply to society and take a meaningless job that's just going to make me it's slave working for minimum wage spending several hours doing meaningless work for the next 40+ years of my life if I'm lucky or more likely working to death.
Sixthly I haven't had a good sleep in over a decade. It started when I saw zombieland when I was 8 and then years of my brain making hallucinations making me spend months sitting in the corner of my room reading books with the lights on because I thought in my little child mind that if the light was on and I built a wall of books while I read books to pass the time no zombies would be able to eat me alive (stupid I know).
Now I'm 21 and my brain is still making me hallucinate and rather than feeling fear or terror like I did back then now I just feel annoyed and angry because I know the more my body and brain is on edge the harder it will be to fall asleep.
And the poor sleep I've been getting is making me hallucinate during the day now and it's making my mental health tank too.
I feel like my brain is just torturing me with sleep deprivation. The only way that I could get a tiny bit of sleep is when I either take an entire fistful of melatonin or drank a lot before going to bed.
I can't think straight. I'm always tired. I'm always having nightmares of being eaten alive, raped, torn apart, or having an alien burst out of my chest xenomorph style.
I rarely if ever get a good dream. The only good dreams I get were pretty much just me being with either my middle school crush or a comfort character. But I know it's because I crave the feeling of being loved manifesting in my dreams.
And when I wake up a part of me wishes that I could just stay in the dream forever because in the dream I felt loved and wanted and cared about rather than reality where no one gave me unconditional love growing up and where everything was cruel and painful and torment me for fun.
Seventhly a part of me wishes I could go back to my childhood when Adventure Time and Steven Universe was still airing since those shows gave me comfort. Or before my parents got my cat put down just to torment me more just so I could feel safe as she slept by my feet every night.
I don't know what to do after all my trauma. Even though I'm getting help a part of me misses before I started seeing a therapist so I wouldn't have to remember the hell that broke me.

Match 2’s results are still being decided! If you want to see a curmudgeonly meteorologist and a children’s television muppet crash a swanky party, you still have just over 24 hours to vote!
Scenario: A Suite in a High-Rise Hotel, Rakinarrgh — 12:01 AM
The hotel room had been shattered.
The tiles that once made up the floor had been razed into shards, while the refrigerator had been ripped from the wall and split open, its doors violently wrenched off. Its contents were spilled all across the furniture in the other room–which had been pushed onto the deck to ‘air out’–while the refrigerator doors had been smashed through the glass above them.
The kitchen sink was rent in twain, its nozzle split right off. The bathroom was in a similar state, with the toilet smashed to bits and the sink being ripped from its housing. Somehow, where the water would normally flow onto the floor, it seemed to be suspended in midair.
There, in the middle of it all, was a suited businessman whose face was wrapped in darkness, sitting on one of the metal pegs of a toppled barstool. Among the shattered flower vases, the rent bits of tile, and the scattered pieces of glass, he sat waiting.
That was when his phone rang. Pulling the little glowing box from his pocket, he swiped his finger across the screen and pressed it to his ear, before he spoke.
“What’s shakin’ my man?” His head bobbed along to the sound of chatter on the other end of the line. “Too fifties? A’ight.”
The businessman stood up from the barstool, and tapped the phone against his head with a stray finger. “Another job, huh?” he nodded, before clicking his tongue and flipping the chair over. “Ya know, working for this little pay-”
He paused and pulled his head away as childlike screaming pierced the air, a small courtesy from the other line. He rolled his eyes and picked the barstool up off the ground. With a kick to set the leg he had been sitting on free, he tossed the seat through the open deck window.
The deck started to screech as the man brought the phone back to his head. He tried to form a slight smile. “Right, right…I’ll get on the disguise kits.” He strolled forward to the deck, and pressed his foot against it, letting the shoddy construction screech under its own weight. “Oh, and buddy?” He snapped his fingers.
The stalled water all around the room sprayed out, coating absolutely everything in its wake. The puddles formed and grew, sinking into the flooring where the tiles once lay. Without their protection, water leaked through the floor and into the lower floor.
Below the businessman, the guests started to screech.
“... you owe me big time.”
The man hung up, turned himself around, and threw the last chair leg into one of the exposed, soggy holes in the once-tiled floor.
It was going to be a long morning.
Scenario: The House, Mist City — 12:01 PM
Against the backdrop of Mist City’s skyscrapers, The House lives in the shadows of its contemporaries. Its inhabitants don’t feel the gazes of those around them, for The House has become a simple fact-of-life. Still, one must wonder what goes through their minds.
For Mallory, whose sudden afternoon attempt at breakfast required milk, it was just another day. She ventured through the dining room and into the kitchen, weaving through the antique, wooden furniture until settling in front of their fridge, squinting at the newest addition to their horde of magnets and business cards. At least the kitchen was quiet for once… the group had gone out for brunch to celebrate Nojus’s ‘magnificent mango comedy combat workout routine’, or whatever they said. Mallory chose to sleep through it on purpose. Now, the house was all his.
Though, The House quickly reminded her that it wasn’t anyone’s. Mallory’s normal day crumbled the moment he lifted his milk carton and spotted a sticky note. “Ah, fuck’s sake-”
In thick, all-black ink, the note read, “I YEARN FOR THE URN” on the top line, followed by “IN LI’S ANTIQUES, ON THE BORDER OF CHINATOWN, JUST PAST THE TRAIN STATION.” on the back side of the note, in thinner penmanship, it read, “you’ll know it when you see it.”
Mallory, who was more than used to odd jobs, shrugged his shoulders, going to grab his cereal regardless. It was best to eat before a job, after all. She moved over to the chair that was already pre-slid out from the table, before setting the bowl down and slowly lowering herself into the seat.
Suddenly, ｢Lake｣’s head appeared from his bellybutton, practically ‘popping’ into existence. “Are we heading out?” She gave him an almost quizzical look.
“I guess.” Mallory turned back to where they had placed their bowl of cereal, only to find the house had eaten it for them. “... I can get a bite on the way, I s’pose.”
“I’ll see what I can do, then!” A smile appeared as her quizzical brow lowered, but [Lake]’s head ultimately returned from whence it came, leaving Mallory ‘alone’, for the most part.
He heaved a sigh, retrieving the crutch he had just placed against the chair, before stuffing it under his arm, and heading for the door. “...they got any food stalls in Chinatown?”
Scenario: Chinatown Marketplace, Vasitanagarh — 12:15 PM
Vasitanargh, home to one of Rākinnagarh’s greatest success stories, lies south of Reshmerasta. In centuries past, it was home only to small communities and bandits, due to the harsh nature of the area. Thanks to early British developments, and much later Chinese developments, this story changed dramatically.
Where a traveler would once see a flowing river and thick jungle, or wonderful spots for growing herbal tea in later years, one would now see buildings, shops, and other fine establishments… in Chinatown, at least.
With this rich history in mind, a rich man by the name of Goldfinger ‘looking to make a difference’ with his company, The Overcome Foundation. He had opted to take his bicycle a wonderful sprawling jaunt through the area to see if he could find an abandoned building or two to ‘flip’ for his growing business.
As his eyes scanned the glass panes of modernity, taking in the bits and bobs of modern wares, salesmen, and activity, a frown formed on his face. Sure, this sort of commerce was ultimately what he intended to do, but the idea of all these people burdening themselves instead…
His eyes turned to a more suitable location. He’d spotted a bicycle store that double-dipped into parts and repairs. He adjusted his flak jacket, righted his helmet through turning his crown, gently rolled his bike to the wall outside, and stepped inside the store.
As Goldfinger stepped inside, the store owner offered Goldfinger a hearty, “Hello, sir! Welcome to our shop!”
The man took a deep breath through his nostrils, before being interrupted as a tourist in a purple scarf brushed by him. Yet, the King remained unhindered, and strode forth!
“Salutations to ye, good lad!” Goldfinger placed his hands on his hips, giving the shopkeep a bright smile. It was crucial to bring light to the dreary days of the humble shopkeep, especially those who labored to heal the humble bicycle. “Yer doin’ good work here, an’ so ah’ve brought my lovely bicycle fer ye to service.” Leaning forwards, he braced his palms on the counter, staring around at the parts, a youthful gleam in his aged eyes. “Ah was wonderin’ if y’had any lightweight tubin’ in stock!”
“Why yes, we deal in all sorts of bikes, sir!” The clerk leaned over the counter. “Might I ask what model your bike is?”
“Ah, is…” Goldfinger reached around his person. “Matter o’ fact, ah have my bike-” Goldfinger’s hand never found the wallet he’d been groping for, but his eyes widened at what he saw—or, rather…what he didn’t see!
“IZ!?”
Goldfinger ran out into the street, and turned his head every which way while looking for the thief.
There, on the edge of his vision, was the man with a purple scarf. He was shoving the little bicycle… up his sleeve?
Goldfinger ran forward, and threw his hands in the air. “Stop, thief!” He took off running, trying to catch the man without the use of the stolen bicycle. “That’s ma damn- that bike is mine!”
Outside Li’s Antiques
The Chinatown shopping center where Li’s antiques supposedly resided resembles a strip mall. There are shops on either side of the road with small cutout doorways, and in some cases, no walls blocking them from the street. A customer could see a place’s wares from the street, making it easier to judge whether they should or shouldn’t head in.
The average hustle and bustle of the city square saw waves of people practically sliding along the walls at a feverish pace, far more akin to the rolling tide than the flow of easy going shoppers. Perhaps this had something to do with the proximity to lunchtime, or perhaps it was because there were sales at either end of the area…who could say?
Mallory, who had to watch as this bustle moved every which way except around him, had a lot to say. Unfortunately he didn’t have the time to converse, people only scoffed or sighed at him in languages he couldn’t understand, and no one stuck around for long. His only constant friend was the sound of his crutch digging into the street below, and Lake trying to get his-
Lake was speaking? “Look, look!” Lake’s hand practically picked Mallory’s head up before she pointed off towards a storefront whose sign he couldn’t read. “There it is!”
Mallory breathed a long sigh of relief. “It’s about time…”
He dug his crutch into the pavement, and cut off a few swearing passersby as he moved against the rolling tide of people he was stuck in. Crossing the street only took a few short steps, but every person he’d cut off gave him a glare, a stare, or a thinly-veiled jab at his state.
Mallory dug the crutch into each step as he made his way to the storefront. Thankfully, they had a swing-in door attached to a ringing bell. He easily stuck his crutch inside to lever himself in and through the doorway.
The place was a small trove of nick-nacks, doodads, and other pieces ranging from centuries-old knives, furniture, and pottery to clothes, disheveled jewelry, and local pieces. It honestly seemed more like a glass-case display store for local artists trying to make fake old antiques-
As soon as Mallory’s eyes crossed a gold-plated urn in the back of the room, he knew what he was here for. “That better not be expensive, House…” Mallory tapped the rubber tip of his crutch against the wood floor, making a noise akin to velcro shredding as he moved along. The shopkeeper’s eyes were on Mallory every step of the way.
The moment Mallory made it to the urn, a hand patted his back. “Really? You’re gonna get that old thing?” Mallory’s head sank into his neck. He turned around to face a taller kid in a purple scarf, whose face was hidden by the overhead light. “Yeesh, people have some weird tastes these days.”
“Somethin’ I was asked to buy.” Mallory gave the man a dead, fish-eyed glare. “Th’sooner I can get back home, the faster I can have lunch.”
The taller kid shrugged. “Ah, well, I’ll leave you to it, then.” He patted Mallory on the back, and headed for the door.
Mallory reached one arm up to the urn, and the shopkeeper was already on him. “Can you pay for that, sir?” Mallory shot the shopkeeper the same dead-eyed glare that he shot the purple-scarfed man.
He stuffed his free hand into his pocket. “O’course I can, I-” His eyes went wide. The bell on the front door rang as the purple-scarfed man made his escape.
The shopkeeper nodded. “I figured.” The shopkeeper turned on his heels. “Be quick, Cross couldn’t have gotten too far…”
Mallory put all of his weight onto the crutch and headed for the doorway. His eyes burned with smoldering flames. “You son of a-”
The purple-scarfed man slid through the crowded streets, swiping wallets filled with all sorts of foreign currencies. The red X-shaped scar painted over his left eye, and a dye-job that evoked a starry night, all drew a few eyes towards him. But at the end of the day, he wasn’t any stranger than most folks in this strange city.
Stepping into an alleyway, the thief chuckled to himself as he counted up his ill-gotten gains. It probably didn’t help him in the slightest, but something about disguising himself as the notorious pickpocket from these parts seemed to do wonders for his efficiency. Truly, this day was going amazingly for the great Benaam—
“Hey, Cross! Whatcha doin over there! I thought you were busy with some of that park stuff today?” Benaam glanced across the alley he stood in to see a group of some dirty street urchin kids yelling at him. Did they know the real Cross? Oh boy, this could be an issue...
The kids ran up to the thief, clamoring around him and asking what kinds of goodies he had gotten for them. Brought for them? What did the great Benaam look like, some kind of charity? Oh wait, no, he looked like Cross.
One of the kids who stood near the back kept glaring at him, until suddenly clapping his hands together and rudely pointing.
“Hey, Cross! What happened to your face? That’s a pretty nasty scar you got there!”
“...Uh, I’ve always had it?”
A hand firmly grasped Benaam’s shoulder from behind, “Buddy, if you’re going to try impersonating someone, you should at least use an accurate description, instead of listening to the rumors.”
Turning around, Benaam found himself face-to-face with the pickpocket he’d been impersonating—the real Cross Blues. From afar, one wouldn’t be able to tell the difference, but the difference between the thieves was night and day. The real Cross had neither the scar nor neatly combed hairstyle Benaam had been led to believe, instead he saw a messy head of hair and a pale birthmark bisecting the young man’s face. Ironically, in the shape of a cross.
“I guess I’m flattered that I’m important enough to be copied, but I can’t say I’m too happy about it... Why don’t I show you my ｢appreciation｣?”
“Ooooo, Cross’s gettin’ angry! You messed up big time you copycat weirdo!”
...So much for Benaam’s good day.
A bright flash of light emitted from a nearby alleyway, and a purple-scarfed man came flying out, landing right in the middle of the market’s central area. A nearly identical man rushed out to continue the beatdown, making for quite the confusing scuffle. Goldfinger, who had finally caught up to his assailant, was certainly having a hard time figuring out what was going on.
A young-looking boy stumbled up next to the King, “So...uh...you got your stuff swiped too, grandpa?”
Goldfinger and Mallory stood awkwardly amidst the growing crowd as the two lookalikes went off on each other. After another bright flash, the two were pushed away from each other, both heaving for breath. As the two collected themselves, multiple wallets and other knick knacks fell from the folds of their clothing, the real thief dropping Mallory’s wallet and snack bar, while the imposter somehow dropped an entire bicycle.
“...Wait, how did... where did he fit that? Is that his Stand ability?”
As Mallory wondered this, ｢Lake｣ popped up next to him. “N-No... I think he’s just weird.”
“Yeah, I’m going to be real with you dude,” Cross panted. “I have no idea how he stole that either.”
Before anyone could pick the stuff back up, a jet-like drone swooped out and grabbed the stolen goods, returning them to Mallory and Goldfinger as two more machines began to circle around him, warping the air with force and heat. With a gleam in his eyes, Mallory strode menacingly towards the thieves, clearly intent on taking both of them down.
“Now hold ‘er there, laddie! Ye needn’t take on this task alone, fer the “King” is ‘ere to enact justice on these felons!” As Goldfinger mounted his bike, a mystical monolith of a stand towered behind him.
Cross and Benaam shared a quick glance, “So, uh, truce and split up?”
“...Yeah, that’s a good idea.”
“HEY, GET BACK HERE!!!” Mallory uncharacteristically yelled out as a mechanical suit formed around them.
The King simply laughed to himself, echoing over the squeak of his bike horn,

“OPEN THE GAME!”

(shoutouts to u/Spookie357 for the match art!)
Location: A central marketplace area in Chinatown, Vasitanagarh and a surrounding network of asymmetrical alleys, as seen in this map here.
Map Key:

• Tiles are 2x2 meters
• Lettered Circles - Character Start Locations
• Tan Areas - Traversable Rooftop
• Orange Rects - Market Stalls (Contains fruits, fresh fish, tapestries, rugs, paintings, wooden sculptures, spices, jewelry)
• Green Rects - "Special Shops" (Bottom - Bicycle Store, Alleyway - Li's Antiques, Rooftop - Guy who sells bags of bird feed)
• Red Arrows - Starting directions for the thieves
• Gray Arrows - Flow of car traffic around the market

Goal: Each player must catch their assigned thief before the other can! Goldfinger will be chasing down the imposter (Benaam), and Mallory will be chasing down Cross.
Additional Information: Despite having things stolen during the write-up, players can assume they have recovered inventory before the match begins.
Attempting to RETIRE your opponent is an instant loss condition as doing so will allow the thieves to get away. Attempting to RETIRE/kill the thieves is also a loss condition, but direct harm against them is allowed.
The market center area and small road leading east from it are crowded with normal people, and the streets going around the map are packed with cars due to lunchtime traffic. Please do not cause harm to these bystanders (not a loss condition if you do though). The alleyways are typically empty of people, although random garbage may be found occasionally scattered around them.
Chasing the thieves is not a straight-forward path, players may find themselves hopping all around Chinatown so pathing and trap laying are both useful tools here. The thieves' pathing will generally be to continue running away from their assigned chaser, and going down whichever path is less obstructed at the time whenever coming across an intersection. There are two “levels” to the map, ground and roof, and both thieves are capable of switching between the two in order to evade the chasers. They can only jump up to the rooftops while in an alley, and can only jump across 1-tile gaps; they may jump down to the ground at any point though. If chased out into the main streets, they will go against the flow of traffic to reenter the market area as soon as they safely can. The thieves will not leave the confines of the map.
The two thieves both have different Stands and skills, so chasing them will be a slightly different experience.

Imposter (Benaam): Will set up or throw random large objects behind him to act as almost-immovable floating barriers to obstruct their chaser. These barriers cannot be dragged into [The Wozard]’s “Subway”. If the chaser loses sight of them for more than 5 seconds, they will have enough time to disguise themselves as someone else.
Cross: Should the player or their Stand body enter within 5m of Cross, they will be slowed down to E Speed; however, this will also slow Cross down to a lesser extent. Seems to have a knack for pickpocketing bystanders or collecting junk, and will get more weighed down by random things he’s swiped as the match progresses; however, these things will be thrown at any player that gets within 8m with surprising precision and power.

Team	Combatant	JoJolity
Dead City Haunts	Edwin “King” Goldfinger	That guy tried to steal my wallet, which makes him a very bad person. Of course I should punish him. Am I wrong, Jotaro-kun? With your Stand and angles of approach, show your versatility and flexibility with how you approach your target!
The Willow Wisps	Mallory	You truly are the lowest scum in history. You can’t pay back what you owe with money. Ora Ora Ora Ora Ora Ora Ora Ora!... Here’s your receipt. With your Stand and angles of approach, show your versatility and flexibility with how you approach your target!

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What helps you feel loved or cared for?
I rarely got any form of love and the few times I did came few and far between and it feels like I have a hole in my soul that no matter how much I mindlessly scroll through porn subreddits just watching and not even touching myself but imagining experiencing physical pleasure rather immeasurable physical pain constantly.
Or listening to asmr of positive affirmations or using uncaring ai has filled the void that my parents, teachers and all my other "caregivers" have left from their emotional neglect.
Now I'm an adult and is turning 21 in 6 days and I give up on familial relationships because my family already proven that they don't give a shit about me.
On top of that the only "relationship" I've ever been in was when I was forced to date a girl I never met and the guy who forced me to the girl constantly made sexual moans and made unwanted sexual comments towards me even though I've told him repeatedly to knock that shit off and the guy turned out to be dating a 12 year old when he was 21 and the 12 year old's parents repeatedly told the guy to stay away from their daughter and nobody actually listened to her parents and me and my friends bullied the guy every day to teach him not to date children.
And in 2019 at my maternal grandparents retirement home I was in an elevator with a 80+ year old woman who was hitting on me and through the stories at the Christmas party turned out have something happening with her brain that made her do stuff,
and the old woman that was in the elevator with me turned out to be molesting the other residents in the retirement home and the only thing keeping me calm was that I was 17 and muck physically stronger than her so I knew if she tried anything I could protect myself.
And in 2016 I got groped and flashed and nearly raped by a homeless man on the ttc subway in Toronto. I told him that I was 13 and therefore underage and that I was uncomfortable and he just got even more handsy as if me being a child and not liking him grabbing my penis through my clothes made him even more horny and ever since I've hated being touched in any way, even handshakes makes my skin crawl.
And also in 2016 before the summer I met a girl who I developed a crush on because she treated me with kindness and compassion. She was the first and only person I've ever felt safe around and I never felt scared of her like I could cry my heart out right in front of her and I wouldn't have to worry about being beaten because I was a male crying and every adult acted like if a boy cried that made him weak or less of a man just because of their gender.
Now a part of me wishes I was born female so I could've received the love I was denied just because "men and boys being vulnerable is weakness and you're not allowed to be weak" and other misandry bs.
I'm tired of feeling so lonely. My parents got our cat put down just because she was the only thing in my house that showed me love or gave a fucking damn about me.
I so tired of this. I don't care about cumming I just want to be held and told that I'm loved and cared about.
I don't care about trying to flirt or get into a girl's pants I just want whoever I somehow get into a relationship with to know that I'm beyond grateful and happy they chose me and gave me love when my own flesh and blood mother the woman that brought me into this world laughed at me and drove me to suicide when I was only 4 fucking years old and admitted to enjoying watching me and making me suffer.
And it pisses me off so much that I inherited my father's violent rage and that rage burning like a white hot flame in me is the only thing keeping me going.