Friday morning. Just sitting here in my office jamming out to Nirvana, as one does. Never gets old.

Hmm… where do I start today? Well, it hasn’t been the greatest week of all time. In fact, it’s kinda sucked for multiple reasons, including the fact that ANOTHER person I know just passed away. That sucks, a lot. So… that definitely threw me off quite a bit. Again, don’t really feel comfortable talking about Death or anything Death-adjacent on here because people are already hostile enough and I don’t need more of that energy in my life when dealing with such a difficult topic. So that’s that.

What’s fun and entertaining in my life? Oh, wait, I know. It’s that “100% Fictional story” I didn’t write that never happened that no one has screenshots of. Yeah, so, update on that: I decided to make that mistake a third time. You know, just to be 100% sure that it was indeed the mistake I thought it was. Yup, I was right. It was a mistake! I just like to do things in threes since it’s the perfect number and that’s how to best figure out who someone really is. First time… could be anyone, but not really sure, so let’s give them another chance! Second time… okay, maybe this person is really who I think they are. Third time: Yep. Yep. Yep. Called it. This is exactly who I thought this was. Ick. Just ick! The humiliation is real. So real. So painfully, disgustingly real.

You want to talk about flashbacks? Oh, has this story ever triggered some flashbacks. Very unpleasant ones. For example, it’s dragging up memories of my first boyfriend, who I dated when I was 16-19 and who was very, very, very, VERY bad to me. He’s so bad, he doesn’t even get to be on The Island of Lost Guys. In fact, I’m pretty sure we all collectively voted him off the Island on the first page of that story. I’ve written exactly one story about him on BetseyHorton.com, and that story involved literally torturing him before deporting him back to his country of origin and locking him up in one of their terrifying authoritarian black site prisons forever. It was very therapeutic for me to write. He’s a piece of garbage. And a rapist. And a predator. I will genuinely be surprised if he doesn’t end up on the sex offender list someday. Hates it!

Needless to say, I don’t like to think about this person ever, so having these memories come up is very upsetting. But hey, that’s what happens when you do something dumb like go home with a rando from the bar who immediately starts treating you like a disposable object with no thoughts, feelings, or life experiences of your own. It just reminds me so much of the first time I was ever treated like a disposable object whose thoughts, feelings, and experiences don’t matter! But hey, I’m the “crazy” one, right? Men can do whatever the fuck they want, but if I write it down, I’m the one who is an “unhinged psychopath.” Right. At least now we can trace our steps backwards to find the general shape of the pattern and identify how/when/why it started. What can I say? This chick therapies.

So last night I was out, following up on this mistake I made, and it got so icky so fast. I’m talking “taking shots with a huge group of 18-21 year olds (who probably shouldn’t even be in the bar in the first place) who were *literally* calling him ‘Daddy'” levels of ick. I know, so gross, right? Like, EW! This man is 55-years-old! Barf Emoji! What the fuck am I even looking at right now? What is this? What reality TV show am I watching right now? What is this town? What is this bar? What is this place? What is this bizarre parallel universe I’ve aimlessly wandered into? What the fuck is going on?

Then it got really fun, because he had to return something that I left at his house, and there was an item in the bag that belonged to another woman. He didn’t even know whose it was! I just… like… wow. I was like, “And just how many guests have you been entertaining at your house?” He says I’m “the only one” as I’m literally standing there holding another woman’s scarf in my hands. I just laughed in his face. I can’t even with these guys sometimes. Where is his second wife? She needs to come get her man. Oh wait, that’s right, she lives in a completely different state and almost never comes home! GEE, I WONDER WHY?! I can’t possibly guess why she left this guy!

Now, I have a new problem: should I actually “do the right thing” and rat him out, or should I just sit back and watch this guy get progressively messier and messier until he finally blows the whole thing up himself? I have no idea.

On the one hand, I do feel some sense of responsibility towards the other women in this situation. We all know I am a broken and damaged person with a long history of relationship trauma, so it’s very on-brand for me to find myself in a situation like this. I can’t be helped at this point. But what about his second wife? What about the woman the scarf belongs to? What about all these 20-year-olds he’s making out with in dimly lit bars? What about all the girls on Snapchat, of which I’m sure there are many? Who do I have to be the one to keep this all a secret just so this guy can keep his big fancy house and basketball court? Am I not just as terrible of a person if I sit here and do nothing?

On the other hand, I’m clearly already the bad guy in this situation because I was the one who *thought* they knew what they were doing, so whatever choice I make from this point on isn’t going to change that fact. And clearly, this guy is very unhappy with his situation, which is why he’s acting this way, so the only possible ending for him is some kind of big confrontation where these issues are finally aired out and addressed. The question for me is really… how involved in this confrontation do I want to be? Do I want to risk being the one who gets my tires slashed just because I’m the one who came forward with the truth? Or would I rather watch him dig himself deeper into this hole and stand a safe distance away so I don’t get caught in the explosion when he finally hits a landmine?

I have no idea what to do right now. Vote on it in the comments section, or something. Ya’ll hate my life choices so much, I’m letting you make one for me right now. That’s right! It’s Choose Your Own Adventure Day here at BetseyHorton.com! You tell me how you think this story should end. I might actually *listen* and take your advice for once. 🙂

You know what I do want to do right now? I want to go have a Bloody Mary, pretend all of this never happened, and re-focus my energy on my writing projects and job hunt. At the end of the day, this is just another mess I stepped into that I now feel responsible for cleaning up. What I really want is to just be normal, functional, employed, “California sober,” and financially responsible. I would also like to maybe someday meet a man who actually brings something to the table instead of just flipping it over and leaving me to clean up the mess. At this point, I truly don’t believe that will ever happen in this lifetime, or the next. Alas.

As famous rapper and serial cheater Jay-Z would say, “Onto the Next One.”