When I first moved out of my parents' house into my own apartment, I bought myself a decent queen-sized bedroom set. Wooden bed frame with headboard, dresser, two night stands, a storage ottoman, a vanity table, and a bookcase. I bought decent quality stuff so that it would last, and it has. When I moved in with my now husband, we had to get a larger bed anyway and he wanted "fresh" stuff, so there was the question of what to do with my furniture.
My daughter was turning 4 and was starting to grow out of her crib/toddler bed anyway, so I arranged it in what would be her room, and moved her out of her crib to that. There was only one room aside from the master that would fit the set, so she ended up with the larger of the two other upstairs bedrooms. My husband's two older daughters would be sharing a room, and the even smaller bedroom off of the finished basement would be a guestroom/office.
Since the 3rd upstairs room is smaller, we have bunkbeds in there to save space. The girls have now seen that my daughter not only has a bigger room but has "grown-up" furniture and they and their mother are launching accusations of favoritism. This just isn't true.
They are adamant that we should at the very least be putting her in a twin sized bed instead of having one child be a "literal queen" with a larger bed or even throw out an entire set of furniture to move her into the smaller room and have the two older girls share the larger room. That's so expensive and wasteful, and I just don't see the point.

They're only here 50% of the time. I don't see the point of dedicating the larger bedroom or two separate bedrooms to kids who are only here half of the time.
This furniture wasn't bought specifically for her, and this is the only bedroom it would fit in with space to walk around. It literally has to go in this room or be thrown away.
While it is more "adult" she will be able to grow into it instead of us constantly having to update furniture as she grows out of it. The furniture is also less than 7 years old, so throwing it away would be wasteful.

Am I just seeing this wrong? My daughter's father (the only other person IRL this has been discussed with yet) and I were both only children, but even still throwing away perfectly fine furniture because of perception would just not happen. It's just a bedroom set.

I was about thirteen years old when my family went to stay at a resort called The Plastic Flower for the summer. From the very start, it was a bizarre experience. I remember like it was a dream, waking up to my mum saying; “time to go, dear.”
Out the window of our city apartment, I could see a taxi parked on the street. It looked old-fashioned, like a drawing of a taxi in an Addams Family comic strip, all pointy and black. My family were the type to always take us kids on weird extravagant adventures with no warning. I was used to being woken up in the middle of the night for a sudden trip to the Bahamas, or taken out of school to go to a fashion show in Paris. I already had a small travel bag for occasions such as this.
My family walked out of the apartment to the waiting taxi. The windows were blacked out so we couldn’t see the driver. I looked around at us all. My mother, Yasmine and her brothers Abe and Casper along with my twin brother Darius were all walking out the front door with their suitcases. I felt the usual exasperation in my chest.
“Where’s Old Mother?” I said. This was our name for our grandmother.
“She didn’t want to come,” said Uncle Abe as he knocked on the driver’s window. The boot lifted open and Uncle Casper helped stack our luggage inside. Then we all piled into the back seat, squashed up together. There was a screen that blocked the view of the driver.
“Where are we going?” Darius asked. Our mother smiled gleefully, placing a hand to her heart.
“Oh a lovely resort in the countryside,” she said. “I got a pamphlet in the mail and it reminded me of Mallory Towers, this beautiful old house by the beach. Just gorgeous. It’s called The Plastic Flower. They’ll be other children for you to play with too my dears.”
My mum often talked to us like we were toddlers instead of teenagers. The last thing I remembered before I fell asleep again was the vehicle driving through the archway at the end of our street and suddenly realizing the driver was following another identical black taxi.
*
Old Mother, a bespectacled woman with her black hair always in a bun had made a fortune developing a world renowned fashion house, the most elite of society clamoring to wear her clothes. After Old Father died she turned away from the spotlight and locked herself up in her apartment with her triplets and grandchildren. My Uncle Abe, a small man with slicked back hair who wore loud gold suits, had taken over most of the duties of the fashion house as Old Mother was getting on in years. My Uncle Casper, who was large and muscular, was a drag queen known as Cassandra and my mother, petite and doe-eyed ran the nightclub he performed in. My mum didn’t know who our father was, telling Darius and I when we were ten that we were conceived during an orgy. Darius, was lanky, had his hair dyed fire engine red and liked to wear Goth make-up and clothes, while I was stockier and tended to present myself in a more casual style of hoodies and shorts.
I woke in the taxi, feeling cramped and stiff. My family was waking up around me. We were driving down a dirt road through a forest, lush, green with wildflowers dotting the roadside. We were approaching a house on a grassy hill, only one story with white walls and a terracotta roof. At the bottom of the hill was the seaside, the waves lapping serenely at the white sand.
I was a bit surprised. This place seemed a bit too ordinary for my family’s tastes. But I immediately preferred it to the grand hotels and resorts we usually stayed in. It was very cozy looking.
The taxi pulled up to an area of gravel in front of the front door. We all got out as the boot of the car cracked open. Uncle Casper got all the bags as Mum and Uncle Abe walked ahead towards the house. Darius and I helped Uncle Casper with the luggage before we made our way inside.
When we walked in, Darius and I immediately stopped, looking around with complete bemusement. We were in a foyer, the ceiling stretching above us, all latticed and intricately detailed. There was an arched door made of oak in front of us and we could hear faint laughter and chattering behind it. On either side of the oak door were two circular holes covered with black vinyl flaps and a set of gold tracks that connected them. To our left and right were long corridors, the floors all decoratively tiled, the windows letting in light.
“It’s too big,” said Darius. The foyer alone looked larger than the whole building from the outside. The adults ignored us, smiling around at the place as Uncle Casper put down the bags.
“Oh looks just divine doesn’t it?” said Uncle Abe. There was movement at the corridor to the left and Darius and I looked around.
Another girl was there. She was squat and sulky looking and was around our age but dressed much younger in a pinafore dress, white stockings, Mary Jane shoes and a bow in her bobbed black hair. I noticed the dress was from my family’s fashion label. She must have been rich.
We were both a bit too shy to introduce ourselves, so we just awkwardly ignored each other. Ahead of us, the triplets had found an old fashioned television up against the wall. It turned itself on at their approach.
“It’s so retro!” Uncle Casper said delightedly. “Total vintage vibes!”
“I know, isn’t it just the cutest?” my mother replied.
“Hush,” said Uncle Abe, flapping his hand at his siblings. “We’re going to miss what its saying.”
We watched as a rainbow grew across the black static filled screen and swirled around like a snake’s tail. Then a woman grew from the end of the rainbow in a long dark pink dress with heavy sleeves. She had strawberry blonde hair and an alarming smile on her paper white face, mouth fixed, lips stretched and teeth shining. A sliver of unease went through me. Something must have been wrong with the television. Her eyes looked like silver coins engraved with two crosses.
“Welcome!” the lady in the rainbow said in a soft, sweet and smooth voice that reminded me of strawberry ice-cream.
“Here at The Plastic Flower you can do whatever your heart desires. My associates and I will always be around to help you with whatever you need.”
In a glitter of rainbow light, two men appeared on either side of her. They looked similar to each other with thick red frowning mouths, paper white skin and the same silver crossed eyes as the lady in the rainbow. The one on the left was tall, thin with a wild black cloud of hair, wearing a top hat and a ruffled black suit. The one on the right was short and overweight with three tufts of blond hair on his head, wearing dirty shorts and a singlet with his beer gut hanging out.
“Just give us a call and we’ll be there,” said the lady in the rainbow. “Feel free to swim in our lovely beach, explore our forests or shop til you drop in our shopping center. Enjoy you’re stay! You’ll never want to leave.”
The TV flickered and the woman shrunk back into a rainbow, reversing over the black screen, the two men disappearing with a sparkle. Darius and I exchanged confused looks. A shopping center? How could a shopping center fit in this place?
“Oh lovely,” my mother said to us. “You’ve made a little friend already.”
She smiled at the strange girl beside us.
“What’s your name dear?”
“Lucy Moon,” the girl replied and the triplet’s faces brightened.
“Any relation to Moon Jewelry?” asked Uncle Abe and Lucy nodded.
“Tell your parents hello when you see them,” said Uncle Abe. “We always have our models in their products. Absolutely divine!”
Lucy’s face shifted as she looked between my mother and uncles, slowly recognizing who we were.
“Well, have fun!” said mum. “We’re going to go check out the shopping center. You can amuse yourselves, dears.”
The triplets walked for the oak door, disappearing into the darkness behind it. They’d left their bags behind for us to look after. Lucy looked us up and down. Darius was silent but I decided to try to be friendly and sent her a little wave
“Hi,” I said to her. “This is my twin Darius and my name is Salome, but everyone calls me Sally.”
Lucy stared at us with shrewd narrow eyes.
“If you’re parents are so rich and famous, why do they let you look like that?” she asked and then pointed to Darius. “You look like a Tim Burton drawing of a raccoon. And you, you’ve got a bowl-cut and a five dollar outfit.”
We just stared at her, shocked into silence by her rudeness. Old Mother believed in teaching her grand-kids the value of money. She said she’d been too hands-off with the triplets, throwing nannies and gifts at them and now they were shallow and materialistic. We did chores to earn pocket money, were hounded to get jobs after school and always bought our own stuff, including clothes. I wasn’t very interested in fashion and just got whatever was in the clearance rack. The triplets disapproved of all this and their spontaneous holidays where Old Mother wasn’t invited was their childish rebellion against her.
“My parents wouldn’t let me out of the house looking like you two,” Lucy said. “They’ve got pride. But I guess that’s because we’re not nouveau riche like you’re trashy family.”
With that she walked off on us. I wanted to point out that at least I was dressed my age and not like an overgrown toddler. But she was already off around the corner.
“Charming,” said Darius and I bit back a smile. I could see down the corridor, tags hanging off the door handles, each one displaying the names of our family. I went over and picked up my tag, turning it around to see a door pass attached. I opened up my door to see a cozy room with a plush bed covered in colorful cushions and a large wardrobe to hang my clothes.
Darius and I started hefting the bags over to each of our family’s rooms. Then we just stood around the corridor trying to think of what to do to entertain ourselves. A door opened somewhere around the corner and Lucy came skulking out, carrying a towel and dressed in a swimsuit no doubt heading for the beach. She sneered at us and we ignored her.
“I dunno what to do,” said Darius. “Maybe I’ll just take a nap or something.”
Suddenly there was a magnified sound that filled up the corridor like it was coming through an intercom, making us all jump. It was a horrible slobbering as though someone was choking on their own spit. Then there was angry muffled murmuring and the clunk of someone grabbing at the speaker.
“What do you like?” an awful high-pitched voice shouted. “What do you like? Answer! Answer!”
Again there was a knocking sound and a commotion of huffing and snarling as the speaker was wrestled free.
“So sorry,” the familiar voice of the lady in the rainbow said. “Please tell us what activity you’d like to participate in and we’d happily oblige you.”
We three kids just exchanged looks. What the hell was all that other noise about? I could feel the unease that had just been a seed in my chest when I first got here start to blossom larger, spreading its poison tendrils through my body.
“Uhhh…” said Darius finally. “I could watch a movie?”
A door at the end of the corridor opened and the smell of buttered popcorn wafted over to us from the darkness.
“Anything you want,” the woman said. Darius hesitated then moved for the door.
“I want to go swimming at the beach,” said Lucy at once.
“Of course, there’s a path out the back of this building that will lead the way,” said the voice. Behind us in the foyer, the front doors creaked open, a sea breeze blowing down the corridor. Lucy ran off.
“And last but certainly not least, what is it that you desire?” said the voice to me.
“I guess I’m a bit hungry,” I murmured under my breath, her soothing voice not doing anything for my nerves.
“What is your most favorite of food?” she asked me. “It shall be provided to you.”
My mind instantly jumped to having tea in Old Mother’s parlor. She made delicious scones with jam and cream, little sandwiches, sugar biscuits and the nicest tea I’d ever had.
“Tea and scones with sugar biscuits please,” I said.
“As you wish,” said the strawberry ice-cream voice. A door down the other end of the corridor opened. I walked towards it. Inside I took a seat at a table with a three-tiered platter and a chintz tea set. Through a big bay window overlooking the beach I could see Lucy running gleefully across the sand, splashing in the water.
I poured myself a cup of tea and picked up a scone, along with the little saucers of cream and jam. Taking a bite, I watched the waves crashing on the sand outside the window. The tea and finger food was delicious, made to perfection. Not as nice as Old Mother’s obviously but of course we all tend to prefer the food we grew up on.
I remembered being in the parlor in our city apartment in comfortable armchairs, Old Mother refilling our cups with piping hot tea.
“When I was your age,” she’d say as we sipped from our cups. “My mother had me running around at the tea-shop, serving the customers. I was supposed to run the place when she died, be a nice plump woman in an apron and hairnet with flour on my nose. I horrified her when I got into “that whorish fashion,” instead.”
I enjoyed listening to her stories. I’m not much good at anything else but listening to people. I like hearing people talk about themselves, especially Old Mother. I didn’t get to spend much alone time with the adults in my family, the triplets just took us on expensive holidays. I think we were more like handbag Chihuahuas to them, cute accessories to take around, show off and coo at but not emotionally connect with.
Lucy had stopped running around and was now standing stock still, staring at something in the distance. I looked over and saw one of the men from the welcome video, the shorter, fatter one, over by the path that led to the beach. He was boggling at Lucy, slack jawed, drool running down his chin. There hadn’t been a problem with the television. His eyes were silver coins with cross engravings.
Lucy walked backwards into the ocean, swimming further and further out, not taking her eyes off the man. He was completely still for a few moments and then turned around. I felt a jolt of terror in my chest. Could he see me through the window?
The man didn’t spot me. He just wandered off down the beach path towards the forest, arms dangling loosely by his sides.
My heart was still thumping, my skin cold and clammy. What was that? Was he some kind of pervert? I looked out at the ocean, Lucy’s dark head bobbing in the water. She swam back towards the shore, picked up her towel and bolted for the house again. When she made it inside I heard her cry out in a frightened voice; “Mum? Dad?”
She ran down the corridor, disappearing away into the depths of the house.
The whole experience had put me of the food. I got up and hurried out. I peered up and down the corridor, feeling my stomach shake. When I saw the coast was clear I bolted for my room. I pulled out my old stuffed toy crocodile that I’d had since I was a toddler. Inside the toy’s head hidden among the fluff was a switchblade. Old Mother had gifted us the weapons to me and Darius at a young age.
“The celebrity world is full of rich perverts who get away with all kinds of depravity,” she said. “You can’t depend on your mother or uncles to protect you. Anyone tries anything, you go straight for the eyes.”
After a while of watching the door, I found myself growing tired. Still carrying my plush crocodile, I climbed into my pajamas and dressing gown, sitting on my bed. I didn’t want to fall asleep but my eyelids were heavy, my body fighting against me. I’d take a quick nap and by the time I woke up the triplets were sure to be back. Gripping my secret weapon I dropped off to sleep.
I dreamed of a black void with a pink light glowing in the distance.
There was a creaking sound. My eyes flew open, my stomach dropping and my skin going cold. Moonlight was shining through the window, illuminating a figure bent over at the foot of my bed.
The tall thin man with the black hair in the ruffled suit and top hat was going through my bag. He pulled out my brush and untangled some of the hair from the bristles. He spotted me and his silver coin eyes glinted.
“My brother eat the hair,” he said in the high-pitched voice that I’d heard over the intercom earlier. “I not eat hair. Disgusting.”
He shoved the black hair into his pocket.
“I prefer the special blood,” he said. “Do you bleed yet? Put the cotton thingies in the bin so I can have them. Nice to chew on.”
I screamed, making the man jump and shrink back.
“Mum!” I wailed with terror. The man’s face furrowed with confusion, putting his hands up to his ears.
“Why you screaming?” he said. “I just make conversation?”
I jumped out of bed and ran for the door, still wailing at the top of my lungs, tears pouring down my face. I bolted down the corridor towards the foyer.
Sitting by the big oak door was Darius and Lucy, both in their pajamas too. They looked up at me as I ran over.
“M-m-man in my room…” I gasped out, fear and adrenaline coursing through my body.
“This place is fucked,” said Darius, eyes flickering around. “I was in the cinema and I felt something picking at my head. I turned around and it was that fat guy. He was putting my hair in his mouth.”
I shivered as I sat down beside him. It was night time and the adults hadn’t returned. Through the big arched door, we could hear faint laughter and chattering.
“I bet it’s like the end of Society happening in there,” said Darius.
“What are you talking about?” I asked. Darius sent me a condescending smile.
“Oh it’s a really underground film, barely anyone knows about it,” he replied and I rolled my eyes. Darius was fine most of the time but he had a pretentious, hipster side of him that annoyed the crap out of me. Lucy was eyeing the toy crocodile I was carrying with a look of contempt on her face.
“You still have stuffed animals?” she said. “That’s so babyish.”
I couldn’t believe she’d make fun of something so trivial when we were all being terrorized by creepy men in a strange house with all of our parents missing. Her priorities were completely warped.
“Have you seen Mum or the Uncles at all?” I asked Darius who shook his head.
“My parents will be back soon,” Lucy said, looking down her nose at us. “Maybe yours don’t care about you but mine do.”
We ignored her.
I felt a sick jolt go through me, my heart panging painfully in my throat. Something was moving out of the vinyl flaps to the right of us and onto the wall. For a moment I had no idea what it was as we moved back all at once. It looked like a shadow of a humongous creature.
We heard a clanking, clattering sound coming from the same direction. The vinyl flaps were pushed open as a cart with a man inside came rattling across the tracks towards us. The man, old and frail with wild grey hair, dark wrinkled skin and black sunglasses, peered at us for a moment as if he was struggling to make us out.
“Where’s the dragon?” he yelled. “Where’d the dragon go?”
We looked up at the shadow on the wall. I realized it was a painting of a curling, writhing traditional Japanese dragon with a gaping maw and huge mane. It was moving towards the other vinyl entrance to the left.
The old man gestured at us with a gnarled hand.
“Get in the trolley quick!” he said. “This is a dangerous place. I can get you back home again!”
We stared at him, more frightened than ever. Stranger danger blared in my mind. I felt completely unsafe at this resort and wanted to go home but I’d be the dumbest kid around to just jump in this man’s trolley.
“Quickly!” said the old man as the cart traveled across the tracks towards the second set of vinyl flaps. The dragon had disappeared inside it.
“My parents told me to never go anywhere with strangers!” said Lucy. “They’ll be back any second now and they’ll call the police on you for being a creep!”
There was a rough coughing sound from behind us and we jumped around. In the doorway was the overweight, blond man with coins for eyes. He was making a gagging, choking sound, slobber dribbling down his chin. Sticking his fingers clumsily into his mouth, he started pulling out clumps of matted saliva soaked hair, black and fire engine red from the depths of his throat with horrible heaving gasps.
“Ughhh!” screamed Darius in horror as I staggered back and Lucy let out a cry.
“C’mon already!” cried the old man, his cart beginning to slide through the vinyl flaps. Between the two, I knew who seemed more terrifying. We all ran to clamber inside the cart. As we rolled across the tracks, I watched the gagging man in the doorway, our combined hair oozing down his front as he watched us leave.
Part Two

Thank you to everyone who participated in this year's contest! There were a lot of great books released last year and I think all of them were nominated in our Best of 2020 contest. Here are the winners for the Best Books of 2020!
Just a quick note regarding the voting. We've locked the individual voting threads but that doesn't stop people from upvoting/downvoting so if you check them the upvotes won't necessarily match up with these winners depending on when you look. But, the results announced here do match what the results were at the time the threads were locked.

Best Debut of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	My Dark Vanessa	Kate Elizabeth Russell	Exploring the psychological dynamics of the relationship between a precocious yet naïve teenage girl and her magnetic and manipulative teacher. Alternating between Vanessa’s present and her past, My Dark Vanessa juxtaposes memory and trauma with the breathless excitement of a teenage girl discovering the power her own body can wield. Thought-provoking and impossible to put down, this is a masterful portrayal of troubled adolescence and its repercussions that raises vital questions about agency, consent, complicity, and victimhood.	warpedlucy
1st Runner-Up	Shuggie Bain	Douglas Stuart	Shuggie Bain is the unforgettable story of young Hugh "Shuggie" Bain, a sweet and lonely boy who spends his 1980s childhood in run-down public housing in Glasgow, Scotland. Thatcher's policies have put husbands and sons out of work, and the city's notorious drugs epidemic is waiting in the wings. Shuggie's mother Agnes walks a wayward path: she is Shuggie's guiding light but a burden for him and his siblings. A heartbreaking story of addiction, sexuality, and love, Shuggie Bain is an epic portrayal of a working-class family that is rarely seen in fiction.	nursingasmallmadhope
2nd Runner-Up	Luster	Raven Leilani	Luster sees a young black woman figuring her way into life as an artist and into love in this darkly comic novel. She meets Eric, a digital archivist with a family in New Jersey, including an autopsist wife who has agreed to an open marriage. In this world of contemporary sexual manners and racial politics, Edie finds herself unemployed and living with Eric. She becomes hesitant friend to his wife and a de facto role model to his adopted daughter. Edie is the only black woman young Akila may know.	lentixular

Best Literary Fiction of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	The Vanishing Half	Brit Bennett	The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it's not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it's everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Many years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other secretly passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters' storylines intersect? Weaving together multiple strands and generations of this family, from the Deep South to California, from the 1950s to the 1990s, Brit Bennett produces a story that is at once a riveting, emotional family story and a brilliant exploration of the American history of passing.	candlesandpretense
1st Runner-Up	Piranesi	Susanna Clarke	Piranesi's house is no ordinary building: its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house. There is one other person in the house—a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.	dampdrizzlynovember
2nd Runner-Up	Transcendent Kingdom	Yaa Gyasi	Gifty is a fifth-year candidate in neuroscience at Stanford School of Medicine studying reward-seeking behavior in mice and the neural circuits of depression and addiction. Her brother, Nana, was a gifted high school athlete who died of a heroin overdose after a knee injury left him hooked on OxyContin. Her suicidal mother is living in her bed. Gifty is determined to discover the scientific basis for the suffering she sees all around her. But even as she turns to the hard sciences to unlock the mystery of her family's loss, she finds herself hungering for her childhood faith and grappling with the evangelical church in which she was raised, whose promise of salvation remains as tantalizing as it is elusive.	warpedlucy

Best Romance of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	Beach Read	Emily Henry	Augustus Everett is an acclaimed author of literary fiction. January Andrews writes bestselling romance. When she pens a happily ever after, he kills off his entire cast. They're polar opposites. In fact, the only thing they have in common is that for the next three months, they're living in neighboring beach houses, broke, and bogged down with writer's block. Until, one hazy evening, one thing leads to another and they strike a deal designed to force them out of their creative ruts: Augustus will spend the summer writing something happy, and January will pen the next Great American Novel. She'll take him on field trips worthy of any rom-com montage, and he'll take her to interview surviving members of a backwoods death cult (obviously). Everyone will finish a book and no one will fall in love. Really.	assholeinwonderland
1st Runner-Up	Take a Hint, Dani Brown	Talia Hilbert	Danika Brown knows what she wants: professional success, academic renown, and an occasional roll in the hay to relieve all that career-driven tension. But romance? Been there, done that, burned the T-shirt. Romantic partners, whatever their gender, are a distraction at best and a drain at worst. So Dani asks the universe for the perfect friend-with-benefits—someone who knows the score and knows their way around the bedroom. When brooding security guard Zafir Ansari rescues Dani from a workplace fire drill gone wrong, it’s an obvious sign: PhD student Dani and ex-rugby player Zaf are destined to sleep together. But before she can explain that fact, a video of the heroic rescue goes viral. Now half the internet is shipping #DrRugbae—and Zaf is begging Dani to play along. Turns out, his sports charity for kids could really use the publicity. Lying to help children? Who on earth would refuse? Dani’s plan is simple: fake a relationship in public, seduce Zaf behind the scenes. The trouble is, grumpy Zaf’s secretly a hopeless romantic—and he’s determined to corrupt Dani’s stone-cold realism. Before long, he’s tackling her fears into the dirt. But the former sports star has issues of his own, and the walls around his heart are as thick as his... um, thighs.	Klutzy_While_3950
2nd Runnder-Up	You Had Me at Hola	Alexis Daria	After a messy public breakup, soap opera darling Jasmine Lin Rodriguez finds her face splashed across the tabloids. When she returns to her hometown of New York City to film the starring role in a bilingual romantic comedy for the number one streaming service in the country, Jasmine figures her new “Leading Lady Plan” should be easy enough to follow. After his last telenovela character was killed off, Ashton is worried his career is dead as well. Joining this new cast as a last-minute addition will give him the chance to show off his acting chops to American audiences and ping the radar of Hollywood casting agents. With their careers on the line, Jasmine and Ashton agree to rehearse in private. But rehearsal leads to kissing, and kissing leads to a behind-the-scenes romance worthy of a soap opera. While their on-screen performance improves, the media spotlight on Jasmine soon threatens to destroy her new image and expose Ashton’s most closely guarded secret.	chchchcher

Best Mystery or Thriller of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner TIED	Mexican Gothic	Silvia Moreno-Garcia	After receiving a frantic letter from her newly-wed cousin begging for someone to save her from a mysterious doom, Noemí Taboada heads to High Place, a distant house in the Mexican countryside. She’s not sure what she will find—her cousin’s husband, a handsome Englishman, is a stranger, and Noemí knows little about the region. Her only ally in this inhospitable abode is the family’s youngest son. Shy and gentle, he seems to want to help Noemí, but might also be hiding dark knowledge of his family’s past. For there are many secrets behind the walls of High Place. The family’s once colossal wealth and faded mining empire kept them from prying eyes, but as Noemí digs deeper she unearths stories of violence and madness. And Noemí, mesmerized by the terrifying yet seductive world of High Place, may soon find it impossible to ever leave this enigmatic house behind.	CrazyCatLadyForLife
Winner TIED	The Guest List	Lucy Foley	On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favors, the boutique whiskey. The cell phone service may be spotty and the waves may be rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed. But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped and the festivities begin, resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes. The groomsmen begin the drinking game from their school days. The bridesmaid not-so-accidentally ruins her dress. The bride’s oldest (male) friend gives an uncomfortably caring toast. And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why?	book0saurus
1st Runner-Up	The Thursday Murder Club	Richard Osman	In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely friends meet weekly in the Jigsaw Room to discuss unsolved crimes; together they call themselves The Thursday Murder Club. Elizabeth, Joyce, Ibrahim and Ron might be pushing eighty but they still have a few tricks up their sleeves. When a local developer is found dead with a mysterious photograph left next to the body, the Thursday Murder Club suddenly find themselves in the middle of their first live case. As the bodies begin to pile up, can our unorthodox but brilliant gang catch the killer, before it’s too late?	anchgu739

Best Short Story Collection of 2020

Place	Title	Editors	Description	Nominated
Winner	The Fight of the Century	Michael Chabon and Ayelet Walden	The American Civil Liberties Union began as a small group of idealists and visionaries, including Helen Keller and Jane Addams. A century after its founding, the ACLU remains the nation’s premier defender of the rights and freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. In collaboration with the ACLU, prize-winning authors Michael Chabon and Ayelet Waldman have curated an anthology of essays about landmark cases in the ACLU’s 100-year history. In Fight of the Century, bestselling and award-winning authors present unique literary takes on historic decisions like Brown v. Board of Education, the Scopes trial, Roe v. Wade, and more. Contributors include Geraldine Brooks, Michael Cunningham, Jennifer Egan, Dave Eggers, Louise Erdrich, Neil Gaiman, Lauren Groff, Marlon James, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Morgan Parker, Ann Patchett, Salman Rushdie, George Saunders, Elizabeth Strout, Jesmyn Ward, Meg Wolitzer, and more.	sbonkers

Best Graphic Novel of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	Solutions and Other Problems	Allie Brosch	Solutions and Other Problems includes humorous stories from Allie Brosh’s childhood; the adventures of her very bad animals; merciless dissection of her own character flaws; incisive essays on grief, loneliness, and powerlessness; as well as reflections on the absurdity of modern life.	lydiardbell
1st Runner-Up	The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist	Adrian Tomine	What happens when a childhood hobby turns into a lifelong career? The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Cartoonist, Adrian Tomine's funniest and most revealing foray into autobiography, offers an array of unexpected answers. When a sudden medical incident lands Tomine in the emergency room, he begins to question if it was really all worthwhile: despite the accolades, awards, and opportunities of a seemingly charmed career, it's the gaffes, humiliations, slights, and insults he's experienced (or caused) within the industry that loom largest in his memory. But as those memories are delineated in excruciatingly hilarious detail, a different, parallel narrative plays out in the background. In between chaotic book tours, disastrous interviews, and difficult interactions with other artists, life happens: Tomine fumbles his way into marriage, parenthood, and an indisputably fulfilling existence. While mining his conflicted relationship with comics and comics culture, Tomine illustrates the amusing absurdities of life and how we choose to spend our time.	Groodfeets

Best YA of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	A Deadly Education	Naomi Novak	There are no teachers, no holidays, and no friendships, save strategic ones. Survival is more important than any letter grade, for the school won’t allow its students to leave until they graduate… or die! The rules are deceptively simple: Don’t walk the halls alone. And beware of the monsters who lurk everywhere. El is uniquely prepared for the school’s dangers. She may be without allies, but she possesses a dark power strong enough to level mountains and wipe out millions. It would be easy enough for El to defeat the monsters that prowl the school. The problem? Her powerful dark magic might also kill all the other students.	book0saurus
1st Runner-Up	The House in the Cerulean Sea	TJ Klune	Linus Baker leads a quiet, solitary life. At forty, he lives in a tiny house with a devious cat and his old records. As a Case Worker at the Department in Charge Of Magical Youth, he spends his days overseeing the well-being of children in government-sanctioned orphanages. When Linus is unexpectedly summoned by Extremely Upper Management he's given a curious and highly classified assignment: travel to Marsyas Island Orphanage, where six dangerous children reside: a gnome, a sprite, a wyvern, an unidentifiable green blob, a were-Pomeranian, and the Antichrist. Linus must set aside his fears and determine whether or not they’re likely to bring about the end of days. But the children aren’t the only secret the island keeps. Their caretaker is the charming and enigmatic Arthur Parnassus, who will do anything to keep his wards safe. As Arthur and Linus grow closer, long-held secrets are exposed, and Linus must make a choice: destroy a home or watch the world burn.	DunderMifflinthisisD
2nd Runner-Up	Cemetery Boys	Aiden Thomas	When his traditional Latinx family has problems accepting his true gender, Yadriel becomes determined to prove himself a real brujo. With the help of his cousin and best friend Maritza, he performs the ritual himself, and then sets out to find the ghost of his murdered cousin and set it free. However, the ghost he summons is actually Julian Diaz, the school's resident bad boy, and Julian is not about to go quietly into death. He's determined to find out what happened and tie off some loose ends before he leaves. Left with no choice, Yadriel agrees to help Julian, so that they can both get what they want. But the longer Yadriel spends with Julian, the less he wants to let him leave.	wenises3

Best Sci-Fi of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	Axiom's End	Lindsay Ellis	A well-timed leak has revealed that the US government might have engaged in first contact. Cora Sabino is doing everything she can to avoid the whole mess, since the force driving the controversy is her whistleblower father. Even though Cora hasn’t spoken to him in years, his celebrity has caught the attention of the press, the Internet, the paparazzi, and the government—and with him in hiding, that attention is on her. She neither knows nor cares whether her father’s leaks are a hoax, and wants nothing to do with him—until she learns just how deeply entrenched her family is in the cover-up, and that an extraterrestrial presence has been on Earth for decades. Realizing the extent to which both she and the public have been lied to, she sets out to gather as much information as she can, and finds that the best way for her to uncover the truth is not as a whistleblower, but as an intermediary. The alien presence has been completely uncommunicative until she convinces one of them that she can act as their interpreter, becoming the first and only human vessel of communication. Their otherworldly connection will change everything she thought she knew about being human—and could unleash a force more sinister than she ever imagined.	newenglandredshirt
1st Runner-Up	Network Effect	Martha Wells	You know that feeling when you’re at work, and you’ve had enough of people, and then the boss walks in with yet another job that needs to be done right this second or the world will end, but all you want to do is go home and binge your favorite shows? And you're a sentient murder machine programmed for destruction? Congratulations, you're Murderbot. Come for the pew-pew space battles, stay for the most relatable A.I. you’ll read this century.	pennydrdful
2nd Runnder-Up	The Space Between Worlds	Michaiah Johnson	Multiverse travel is finally possible, but there’s just one catch: No one can visit a world where their counterpart is still alive. Enter Cara, whose parallel selves happen to be exceptionally good at dying—from disease, turf wars, or vendettas they couldn’t outrun. Cara’s life has been cut short on 372 worlds in total. On this Earth, however, Cara has survived. Identified as an outlier and therefore a perfect candidate for multiverse travel, Cara is plucked from the dirt of the wastelands. She works—and shamelessly flirts—with her enticing yet aloof handler, Dell, as the two women collect off-world data for the Eldridge Institute. So long as she can keep her head down and avoid trouble, Cara is on a sure path to citizenship and security. But trouble finds Cara when one of her eight remaining doppelgängers dies under mysterious circumstances, plunging her into a new world with an old secret. What she discovers will connect her past and her future in ways she could have never imagined—and reveal her own role in a plot that endangers not just her world, but the entire multiverse.	OliviaPresteign

Best Fantasy of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	Rhythm of War	Brandon Sanderson	After forming a coalition of human resistance against the enemy invasion, Dalinar Kholin and his Knights Radiant have spent a year fighting a protracted, brutal war. Neither side has gained an advantage, and the threat of a betrayal by Dalinar's crafty ally Taravangian looms over every strategic move. Now, as new technological discoveries by Navani Kholin's scholars begin to change the face of the war, the enemy prepares a bold and dangerous operation. The arms race that follows will challenge the very core of the Radiant ideals, and potentially reveal the secrets of the ancient tower that was once the heart of their strength. At the same time that Kaladin Stormblessed must come to grips with his changing role within the Knights Radiant, his Windrunners face their own problem: As more and more deadly enemy Fused awaken to wage war, no more honorspren are willing to bond with humans to increase the number of Radiants. Adolin and Shallan must lead the coalition’s envoy to the honorspren stronghold of Lasting Integrity and either convince the spren to join the cause against the evil god Odium, or personally face the storm of failure.	Pepe_Silviaa
1st Runner-Up	Piranesi	Susanna Clarke	Piranesi's house is no ordinary building: its rooms are infinite, its corridors endless, its walls are lined with thousands upon thousands of statues, each one different from all the others. Within the labyrinth of halls an ocean is imprisoned; waves thunder up staircases, rooms are flooded in an instant. But Piranesi is not afraid; he understands the tides as he understands the pattern of the labyrinth itself. He lives to explore the house. There is one other person in the house—a man called The Other, who visits Piranesi twice a week and asks for help with research into A Great and Secret Knowledge. But as Piranesi explores, evidence emerges of another person, and a terrible truth begins to unravel, revealing a world beyond the one Piranesi has always known.	warpedlucy
2nd Runnder-Up	The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue	V. E. Schwab	France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world. But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.	OliviaPresteign

Best Nonfiction of 2020

Place	Title	Author	Description	Nominated
Winner	Promised Land	Barack Obama	In the stirring, highly anticipated first volume of his presidential memoirs, Barack Obama tells the story of his improbable odyssey from young man searching for his identity to leader of the free world, describing in strikingly personal detail both his political education and the landmark moments of the first term of his historic presidency—a time of dramatic transformation and turmoil. A Promised Land is extraordinarily intimate and introspective—the story of one man’s bet with history, the faith of a community organizer tested on the world stage. Obama is candid about the balancing act of running for office as a Black American, bearing the expectations of a generation buoyed by messages of “hope and change,” and meeting the moral challenges of high-stakes decision-making. This beautifully written and powerful book captures Barack Obama’s conviction that democracy is not a gift from on high but something founded on empathy and common understanding and built together, day by day.	pineapplesf
1st Runner-Up	The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz	Erik Larson	On Winston Churchill's first day as prime minister, Adolf Hitler invaded Holland and Belgium. Poland and Czechoslovakia had already fallen, and the Dunkirk evacuation was just two weeks away. For the next twelve months, Hitler would wage a relentless bombing campaign, killing 45,000 Britons. It was up to Churchill to hold his country together and persuade President Franklin Roosevelt that Britain was a worthy ally--and willing to fight to the end. Erik Larson shows how Churchill taught the British people "the art of being fearless." It is a story of political brinkmanship, but it's also an intimate domestic drama, set against the backdrop of Churchill's prime-ministerial country home, Chequers; his wartime retreat, Ditchley, where he and his entourage go when the moon is brightest and the bombing threat is highest; and of course 10 Downing Street in London.	candlesandpretense
2nd Runner-Up	Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents	Isabel Wilkerson	Beyond race, class, or other factors, there is a powerful caste system that influences people’s lives and behavior and the nation’s fate. Linking the caste systems of America, India, and Nazi Germany, Wilkerson explores eight pillars that underlie caste systems across civilizations, including divine will, bloodlines, stigma, and more. Using riveting stories about people—including Martin Luther King, Jr., baseball’s Satchel Paige, a single father and his toddler son, Wilkerson herself, and many others—she shows the ways that the insidious undertow of caste is experienced every day. She documents how the Nazis studied the racial systems in America to plan their out-cast of the Jews; she discusses why the cruel logic of caste requires that there be a bottom rung for those in the middle to measure themselves against; she writes about the surprising health costs of caste, in depression and life expectancy, and the effects of this hierarchy on our culture and politics. Finally, she points forward to ways America can move beyond the artificial and destructive separations of human divisions, toward hope in our common humanity.	mleftpeel

Thank you for everyone who participated in this year's contest and especially thank you for bringing so many great books to our attention so we can add them to our reading lists! If you'd like to see more of the best books of 2020 here are the links to the individual contests:

If you'd like to see our previous contests, you can find them in the suggested reading section of our wiki.

If you didn't read about last year's tragic weight loss contest, you may want to click here and check it out. It's worth the read, and it's important that you have the back story to fully understand why we did what we did this year. Otherwise you’ll just think we’re aspiring murderers.
I know what you’re thinking.
“Andrea, the last time you did this everything went to hell. Why on Earth would you risk everything again?
It’s simple. Vengeance for Peggy.
In the weeks following the events that led to Peggy’s extreme weight loss and untimely demise at the hands of Sharon Woodson, Kim and I shirked our respective corporate responsibilities and spent all our time plotting revenge.
I mean…to be perfectly honest, we weren’t all that torn up about Peggy’s death on a personal level. Neither of us knew her that well, and we really didn’t enjoy what time we had spent around her to begin with.
And she DID cheat in our contest--which is indeed a shitty thing to do--but she certainly didn’t deserve to die for doing so. Obviously Kim and I could never get Sharon arrested for what the police would most assuredly consider an absurd and nonsensical story, but we damned sure were going to find a way to punish her on our own.
After a tremendous amount of energy spent fantasizing about how to make Sharon miserable, we looped right back around to the source of it all.
Vanity.
Vanity is what drove us to have a weight loss contest to begin with. Our abundance of food and lack of employment requiring anything more than keystrokes and walks to the bathroom has pushed us into not only an unhealthy state, but also an addictive jealousy of the hips, butts and tummies of other women. It’s the modern equivalent of quiet seething in 1850 over the sturdiness of that bitch Martha Mullins’ hips, cranking out all those children…and if that wasn’t enough, she was rocking an infant mortality rate of 0%.
Damn you Martha, with your thriving farm and Cholera-free water supply.
Anyway…last year’s contest was never about the money. It was vanity, pure and simple that drove us to cut the pounds. So it didn’t take too awfully long for us to realize something.
Sharon is EXCEPTIONALLY vain.
Fit, tan, and completely full of herself--and as we established in the original story, she’s a complete moron. Literally all she has is her looks, so knowing what was MOST important to her, we knew just what to do.
We were gonna fatten that bitch up.
Here’s the simple version of the plan. We would call the mystic and get a trinket for weight GAIN, then use it to cause Sharon to very slowly pack on the pounds. We would do it just enough to freak her out, then back off and watch her fight to lose the weight over and over again…forever.
Also, once we had tortured her for a while, we would be extra evil and organize a new weight loss contest where we would bitch slap what remained of her ego by dropping all the pounds we wanted using our own trinkets.
Step 1 was to find the mystic.
After some research on the dark web, I was able to track down contact information for the mystic and arrange an appointment to get what I needed to execute “Operation Peggy’s Revenge.”
His name is Timbo and he’s a descendent of Romanian gypsies. His day job is in the computer department at a big box electronics retailer, where he created a side hustle by placing curses on some of the newly purchased laptops to boost the computer repair business he runs out of his grandmother’s house. Honestly, as shady as his scheme is, I gotta give him some credit for making a modern buck using granny’s ancient spells.
Then, of course, there’s the trinkets.
Love curses, love connections, bad luck, good fortune, and a host of other desires can be obtained via the pimple faced 20 year old…along with a killer pork goulash recipe.
I contacted Timbo via email and made arrangements to deal.
MOST of the spells Timbo casts are temporary. Want to purchase some bad luck for the bitch that seems to have it all? It would only last a week or two, depending on how much you wanted to pay for it…but no longer than that. He wasn’t down with letting people completely destroy others’ lives. And much like handgun purchases in California, there was a “cooling off” period between payment and trinket delivery. It gave the buyer a chance to change their mind before doing something potentially catastrophic, and Timbo didn’t feel quite as much like an asshole for facilitating such actions.
Now, I DID say “most” of his spells are temporary. The body change spells, though? Before Peggy, they lasted indefinitely. It had never crossed Timbo’s mind that a customer would use that type of spell to hurt someone. Naïve? Maybe--but still an honest mistake.

I sent payment for a pack of weight loss trinkets for myself and Kim, and a couple months’ worth of weight GAIN trinkets for Sharon. For body change spell requests, the newly implemented cooling off period was three weeks before delivery. So, what did Kim and I plan to do in the meantime?
Eat.
And eat.
And eat.
Why the hell not? The trinkets were coming.

Just for fun, I did some journaling during the eating period.
****\*

Day 1
What a beautiful feeling it is to be able to eat without stress and guilt. I have no words to describe it. I think today, instead of a salad that is so overloaded with meat and toppings that it’s as high in calories as a steak and fries, I’ll actually GET steak and fries. Yay! This is how I’ll do it. I know the trinket will bring my weight back down, but there’s no need to go to extremes. The feeling of eating what I want without the self-loathing that comes along with it is more than satisfying enough. In addition to my stomach and emotions, it’s sustenance for my very soul.
I think Kim may be hitting it a little harder than I am, but hey…why not? And she agrees, she’s never felt so happy in her life.
Day 2
Do you know how amazing it is to indulge with a little pack of Oreos and cappuccino from the convenience store for breakfast? I’m sure I’ll have a bit of a sugar crash in a couple hours, but that’s ok—and I’ll probably not overdo it at lunch anyway. I want this period before the trinkets arrive to be a positive experience. I want to change my relationship with food. I’m in this for life now. I’ll never regain the weight once I lose it. I won’t need a trinket again.
Day 6
Ok, so I’ve gone off the rails a bit these past few days. I mean…it just feels SO GOOD to eat whatever I want and experience nothing but joy afterward. I saw a cake on facebook yesterday and immediately left my cubicle for a trip across town to get one. I felt butterflies of excitement in my tummy, much like when I see a cute guy on Plentyoffish that has a job AND a car! <3
Kim seems to have ramped it up a bit more. I let the Chinese delivery guy in yesterday and the huge bag of goodies in his arms looked destined for the conference room. But just before hitting the hallway door he stopped at Kim’s cubicle, walking away empty handed a few seconds later.
After about 20 minutes of hearing nothing but chewing and moans of pleasure from her cubicle, Kim finally came up for air and said “Hey Andie (I hate that nickname and she knows it), you want a Rangoon? I got the 10 pack.” I declined because they gross me out. They’re like little starfishes that take a crap in your mouth. No thanks.
A few seconds later I heard the lid pop off the foil container and Kim said “Well hello, my beauties.”
Day 9
Well…I’ve tried by best to pace myself a bit, but god there’s so much AMAZING food out there. It’s cool though. The trinket will be here in 12 days. I can maintain some control from here on out. I’m sure of it.
Ok, my shift is over and I need to stop and get some sweatpants. Kim and I are meeting for dinner at The Cheesecake Factory.
Days 10 through 14
I haven’t journaled for a while. I’ve just been so busy with eating, and I’ve had a lot of trouble typing because of all the crumbs in my keyboard.
On day 11, Kim stepped into the main work area and screamed across the room.
“Did you know about Most Stuff Oreos? I didn’t know they existed until I bumped my head into the shelf trying to reach a bag of Chewy Sweet Tarts!
Now…you know how I feel about Oreos. We established that during Contest #1.
A few years ago during a mascara smeared run to the liquor store after a bad breakup, I discovered the MEGA Stuff Oreo. We’re talking triple the icing here. It was amazing, and I was eating five at a time for weeks after that dickbag left me and took my new TV. I really should stop using the FREE online dating apps.
But, Most Stuff Oreos? Could this even be a real thing? I mean…who even needs that much icing??
Kim dropped 6 mini packs of them on my desk. I opened one with all the excitement of Charlie with his golden ticket winning chocolate bar.
Holy shitballs. It was MAGNIFICENT. The original, delicious cookie was lovingly hugging a glob of perfectly shaped icing a half inch thick. It looked like one of those Big Wheel ice cream sandwiches which, coincidentally, I have stashed in the breakroom freezer for later.
Kim looked at me with a huge grin.
“Go for it Andie.”
I gave her that “quit calling me Andie look,” then refocused my attention on the cookie as I pulled off one of those bookends stabilizing that white, creamy patty of joy. Kim reached over and held my hair back as I held the icing side cookie vertically and bit into it. With my eyes closed and lips in a satisfied smile, I savored the sugary goodness as Kim giggled and wiped a bit of icing off my nose.
She backed away slowly, saying “I’ll just leave the two of you alone now.”
\*****

OK, so I stopped journaling after day 14. Although I had bought a new keyboard after my best efforts to clean the first one failed, my fingers were usually just too greasy to type anyway.
The last week of the cooling off period was filled with epic, savage-level eating. Without the trinkets to melt off the pounds we couldn’t keep up the pace Peggy had set, but damned if we didn’t try.
Changing my relationship with food turned into a complete, ravishing love affair with Oreos and a downward spiral into the heavenly abyss of Ritz crackers. Fresh stacks? Sure. I’ll take all of them. Just because they’re individually packaged doesn’t mean you can’t eat them a box at a time.
Kim’s vice was nut butters. I must say, I also enjoyed them quite a bit with my crackers and the occasional (ok...not occasional..haha) Chips A-hoy cookie.
It was all so much fun. We called ourselves “The Nutella Twins,” and I think Kim’s mouth was permanently stained chocolate brown by the time the trinkets arrived.
Finally, the trinkets were in hand and it was time to execute Operation Peggy’s Revenge. The timing was perfect, because I was about a week away from having to replace my entire wardrobe.
We were ready to get this thing rolling, but we had one MINOR detail to take care of.
We needed blood.
Timbo had a new security feature on his trinkets. In the past, all that was required was a bit of saliva to bind them to the owner and activate the process for which they were designed. However after the incident with Peggy, Timbo upped the security to require blood. And as an additional security feature, the effective range was only 10 feet instead of the original distance of 100 yards.
So we needed to find a way to get some blood from Sharon, which was no easy task. Here are a few of the brilliant ideas we came up with.
- Hire a hitman to mug her.
- Put thorns in her shoe.
- Trick her into thinking she may be diabetic and prick her with a blood sugar monitor.
- Punch her in the nose.
I never realized how completely stupid these were until just now. Haha. L
So after a few days we were nearly in a panic. We had gone ahead and activated our weight loss trinkets, but had never given the slightest consideration as to how hard it would be to get Sharon’s blood.
Then…complete, utter dumb luck (or possibly Peggy intervening from the great beyond) struck…literally.
Kim and I were still bingeing on whatever we could get our hands on, and we had gotten those hands on a wheel of Swiss cheese. Yes, I said a wheel. Loading up on Ritz, we found a good sharp knife and served up slice after slice of Wisconsin’s best until we were both ready to pop. After quite some time, Kim was too stuffed to walk the cheese back to the refrigerator in my cubicle, so she decided to just throw it to me.
Originally 10 inches in diameter, the wheel had been whittled down to a chunk about the size of a baseball. In a tragic, yet delightfully fortuitous moment of distraction courtesy of the beautiful T.J. from the sales department walking his handsome ass past Kim’s cubicle, she tossed the cheese just a LITTLE BIT low.
The chunk of perforated, off-white goodness hit Sharon’s cubicle wall and struck her right in the nose. Within a split second, Kim shot up out of her seat and had a perfect view of the blood that came pouring out and all over Sharon’s desk. She frantically looked for tissues and came up empty.
“Kim! Tissues! My nose is bleeding!”
“Oh no, Sharon! I’m so sorry! That looks awful. Let me help you to the bathroom…”
While barely concealing the huge grin on her face. Kim grabbed Sharon by the elbow and began to shuffle her off across the office while giving me the signal to get some blood. I waddled my overstuffed body to Sharon’s cubicle as fast as I could and scraped a few precious drops of it off the desk and into a sandwich bag.
Holy crap. We had done it. Let the show begin…
*****

A day later, we had Sharon’s weight gain trinket activated and cleverly stashed in her purse. It was one of those little woodpeckers that pecked nonstop while under light. It reminded me one my grandparents had on their dining room table. It would dip its forked beak into a stack of toothpicks and bring one back up to me. This one, however, was stabbing its beak into a little plastic cake.
Kim stashed it out of sight of Sharon, but well within the required 10 feet.
The weight gain started slowly, but after just a few days it escalated…QUICKLY. As it turns out, actually EATING wasn’t even a requirement for the thing to work.
Sharon noticed her newfound girth within two days and panicked. I suppose when a person is so exceptionally vain that they’re hitting the scale and checking the mirror multiple times daily, the fat has no chance of sneaking up on them.
Sharon went into battle mode. She exercised daily in our company’s gym anyway, but by the end of the first week we were also seeing her in there before work and during lunch. She was already going hard, and we were beyond excited to see our plan shaping up so fast.
Within a few more days, she was barely eating. While typically a protein bar and salad type, she quickly cut her intake back considerably. Kim and I shared a high five every time I walked past her cubicle.
Then the mumbling began.
Softly emanating from Sharon’s mouth, it started out with the occasional “what-the-hell is-going-on-here?” and gradually increased in frequency to things like “thyroid…it’s gotta be my thyroid” or “omg, my belly is hanging over my pants.”
We could see it in her face, and when the trinket’s two weeks of mojo was finished it was clear she had gained a solid 15lbs. And on a woman her size that was VERY noticeable. Kim even caught a glimpse of an empty pregnancy test box in Sharon’s open gym bag. This little project had turned out to be a lot more fun than we had expected.
We waited for about a week to activate another of the woodpeckers. It was just enough time for Sharon to catch her breath when she saw the scale stop moving up.
Then, back at it again.
And again.
And again.
After watching her yo-yo back and forth for weeks, we told her we had started another weight loss contest. We hadn’t, of course, but we put on our best show as we hit the scale, day after day. She joined us eagerly, and her motivation to lose the weight was stronger than ever.
We ran her ragged. She gained and lost the same 5lbs over and over again for months. It was freaking amazing torturing her like that, and she was spiraling into insanity before our very eyes.
Sharon refused to accept that she couldn’t get control of her weight. She hammered out workout after workout, visited doctors who told her she was perfectly healthy, and cut her eating back to nothing more than a can of tuna twice a day…and still the madness continued. With every trinket we activated, we worked it so she would hold onto a few more pounds after the constant up and down.
At around 40lbs gained, she began to break.
She stopped the fancy clothing. Her hair went from fabulous, to a pony tail, to a greasy mess that looked like a toddler tried to give her a senior prom up-do. Trendy skirts and skin tight jeans gave way to baggy sweats and vertical stripes.
Sharon was a shell of her former self.
Sadly, all good things must come to an end. We ran out of trinkets, and due to the high cost of another batch Kim and I decided the cost was too much to continue this round of torture. So after the last trinket lost its efficacy we decided to end Operation Peggy’s Revenge. But on a positive note, Kim and I lost all the weight we had gained plus a bit more.
So, the plan from that point on was to think of more ways to screw with Sharon’s life while watching her fight to lose all that weight.
However, this was not to be.
As the next few weeks passed, Sharon’s weight gain didn’t stop. In-fact, it increased DRAMATICALLY. We were certain all the trinkets had not only expired at the two week mark, but were also removed from the office entirely.
We were perplexed, and despite our previous desire to see the crazy bitch dead, we actually began to feel a bit guilty. Without a doubt, Sharon deserved what she was getting, but to actually be responsible for what was happening to her didn’t feel as good as I had once fantasized.
As the days continued, Sharon’s weight gain began to get even more out of control. She was expanding faster than her skin could stretch. Day by day, and seemingly hour by hour and minute by minute, she looked less and less like herself. Her brow began to protrude. Her cheeks grew outward and her neck was so thick it looked like a movie prosthetic.
Kim even swore she was seeing the wrinkles on Sharon’s brow stretching away in real time.
Sharon stopped mumbling to herself. The panic went away. Trips to the scale became less and less frequent, and eventually stopped altogether. Day after day she waddled into the office, barely able to see over her rapidly expanding cheeks, and sat in silence. She continued to expand at a pace that defied physiology even in its most extreme examples.
“My 600lb Life” had become “My 600lb Month.”
Cracks in the skin began to develop-- first on her elbows…then the webbing of the fingers. Soft cries began to emanate from her cubicle as she would try to type and the skin of her knuckles split.
Sharon eventually stopped coming to work. She continued to seek medical treatment but the doctors were no help. Test after test after test, and still nothing was found that could be the source of her out-of-control gaining. The rapid increase in weight also caused tremendous swelling in her legs as fluid in the body was pushed out by the ever increasing number of fat cells looking for a place to party. Her body was strategically lanced and drained but it came right back. Pushing from inside out, the foul smelling liquid began to weep from her pores. Even pain medications had stopped working, providing no reprieve from the agonizing body re-composition.
The rapidly expanding fat and subsequent swelling was brutal and endless.
I sat in the office like a zombie, wracked with guilt and shame at what I had been a part of. Sharon was a piece of shit, but I wasn’t judge, jury, and executioner. It wasn’t my job to punish her. I felt awful, visiting her in the hospital during the day and crying myself to sleep at night. I even bought weight loss trinkets and activated them two and three at a time using the blood that constantly seeped from her skin.
It was a fruitless endeavor. Nothing could stop the fat. Nothing could quell the assault happening inside that once perfect body.
“Perfect.” What a joke. I haven’t looked in a mirror in months. I refuse to participate any longer in the twisted pursuit of perfection that consumes too many of us these days. Fuck that.
16 weeks to the day after that ill-fated Swiss cheese to the nose, Sharon’s life ended in that hospital bed as her legs finally could take no more. One last ounce of fluid pushed toward the surface and the straw broke the proverbial camel’s back as her legs simultaneously split open like hotdogs left too long in a microwave. Spraying an absurd amount of blood and pus onto the pristine white sheets, her sudden spasm caused one last groan of protest from the oversized hospital bed that had supported her tremendous weight for the last few weeks as it buckled and collapsed.

*****
I don’t know what she weighed by the time she expired, but rumors are saying the official number on the autopsy is 762lbs. Allegedly it took 12 pall bearers to get her casket from the hearse to the gravesite, and a logging winch to lower it down into her final resting place.
Kim and I did not attend the funeral. While the rest of the office was seeing Sharon into the afterlife, we sat together in her cubicle in stunned silence after discussing the events of the past few months in detail. We were completely at a loss about what could have happened…but in the end we just felt like murderers.
Without warning, a pretty young woman rolled backward in an office chair through the cubicle’s open doorway like a child trying to entertain herself while stuck at work with a parent. As the wheels made their last few revolutions she smoothly rotated around to face us.
“Well, that happened a lot faster than I expected!”
Both our eyebrow shot up, and Kim spoke.
“Who are you, and what happened faster than you expected?”
“I’m Kinsey, and I SAID…the trinkets worked faster than I expected. I really wanted her to hang on a lot longer than that. I’m actually kinda disappointed.”
I stood bolt upright, wild eyed and furious.
“IT WAS YOU?? YOU WERE CAUSING THE WEIGHT GAIN AFTER WE SHUT IT DOWN??”
She laughed.
“Well duuuuh. Oh my god…wait…were you the reason she started packing on the pounds to begin with? You evil bitches! Seeing her fatten up is what gave me the idea to get some Timbo trinkets. I started swapping out her can opener with enchanted ones when I saw how much tuna she was eating. She took that thing everywhere with her. The bitch was holding the instrument of her demise every single day!”
Our jaws hit the floor as she continued.
“I heard you two talking about the hula girl incident a few months ago and decided I wasn’t gonna let that bitch get away with killing my best friend in the world. And holy shit, those trinkets are as expensive as hell. You I.T. people must make a killing over here.”
Slowly returning to my seat, I was a perfect mixture of shock and relief. I wasn’t a murderer. I mean…I supposed I wasn’t without some blame, but AT BEST I was an unknowing accomplice. I could live with that.
Kim flopped back in her chair dramatically, letting a satisfied exhale whoosh out like she was blowing out one of those trick birthday candles my asshole cousin Mark loves to sneak onto my cake every year.
Something needed cleared up, though.
“Wait…how did you get her blood? If it hadn’t been for an accident we’d probably have never even got the process started.”
She looked at us like we were complete idiots. Shaking her head, she turned and began to walk away. Reaching into her purse, she produced a gallon size clear zipper bag and nonchalantly tossed it backward over her shoulder.
As Kinsey disappeared around the corner the bag landed perfectly in my lap. I snatched it up for inspection, holding it level with my narrowing eyelids. After a few seconds trying to identify the small items swimming around in what appeared to be goopy black slime, I felt bile begin to rise in my throat.
There in my hands, just inches from my face, was the answer.

I was holding a bag of used tampons.

Timbo trinkets for everyone

I was about thirteen years old when my family went to stay at a resort called The Plastic Flower for the summer. From the very start, it was a bizarre experience. I remember like it was a dream, waking up to my mum saying; “time to go, dear.”
Out the window of our city apartment, I could see a taxi parked on the street. It looked old-fashioned, like a drawing of a taxi in an Addams Family comic strip, all pointy and black. My family were the type to always take us kids on weird extravagant adventures with no warning. I was used to being woken up in the middle of the night for a sudden trip to the Bahamas, or taken out of school to go to a fashion show in Paris. I already had a small travel bag for occasions such as this.
My family walked out of the apartment to the waiting taxi. The windows were blacked out so we couldn’t see the driver. I looked around at us all. My mother, Yasmine and her brothers Abe and Casper along with my twin brother Darius were all walking out the front door with their suitcases. I felt the usual exasperation in my chest.
“Where’s Old Mother?” I said. This was our name for our grandmother.
“She didn’t want to come,” said Uncle Abe as he knocked on the driver’s window. The boot lifted open and Uncle Casper helped stack our luggage inside. Then we all piled into the back seat, squashed up together. There was a screen that blocked the view of the driver.
“Where are we going?” Darius asked. Our mother smiled gleefully, placing a hand to her heart.
“Oh a lovely resort in the countryside,” she said. “I got a pamphlet in the mail and it reminded me of Mallory Towers, this beautiful old house by the beach. Just gorgeous. It’s called The Plastic Flower. They’ll be other children for you to play with too my dears.”
My mum often talked to us like we were toddlers instead of teenagers. The last thing I remembered before I fell asleep again was the vehicle driving through the archway at the end of our street and suddenly realizing the driver was following another identical black taxi.
*
Old Mother, a bespectacled woman with her black hair always in a bun had made a fortune developing a world renowned fashion house, the most elite of society clamoring to wear her clothes. After Old Father died she turned away from the spotlight and locked herself up in her apartment with her triplets and grandchildren. My Uncle Abe, a small man with slicked back hair who wore loud gold suits, had taken over most of the duties of the fashion house as Old Mother was getting on in years. My Uncle Casper, who was large and muscular, was a drag queen known as Cassandra and my mother, petite and doe-eyed ran the nightclub he performed in. My mum didn’t know who our father was, telling Darius and I when we were ten that we were conceived during an orgy. Darius, was lanky, had his hair dyed fire engine red and liked to wear Goth make-up and clothes, while I was stockier and tended to present myself in a more casual style of hoodies and shorts.
I woke in the taxi, feeling cramped and stiff. My family was waking up around me. We were driving down a dirt road through a forest, lush, green with wildflowers dotting the roadside. We were approaching a house on a grassy hill, only one story with white walls and a terracotta roof. At the bottom of the hill was the seaside, the waves lapping serenely at the white sand.
I was a bit surprised. This place seemed a bit too ordinary for my family’s tastes. But I immediately preferred it to the grand hotels and resorts we usually stayed in. It was very cozy looking.
The taxi pulled up to an area of gravel in front of the front door. We all got out as the boot of the car cracked open. Uncle Casper got all the bags as Mum and Uncle Abe walked ahead towards the house. Darius and I helped Uncle Casper with the luggage before we made our way inside.
When we walked in, Darius and I immediately stopped, looking around with complete bemusement. We were in a foyer, the ceiling stretching above us, all latticed and intricately detailed. There was an arched door made of oak in front of us and we could hear faint laughter and chattering behind it. On either side of the oak door were two circular holes covered with black vinyl flaps and a set of gold tracks that connected them. To our left and right were long corridors, the floors all decoratively tiled, the windows letting in light.
“It’s too big,” said Darius. The foyer alone looked larger than the whole building from the outside. The adults ignored us, smiling around at the place as Uncle Casper put down the bags.
“Oh looks just divine doesn’t it?” said Uncle Abe. There was movement at the corridor to the left and Darius and I looked around.
Another girl was there. She was squat and sulky looking and was around our age but dressed much younger in a pinafore dress, white stockings, Mary Jane shoes and a bow in her bobbed black hair. I noticed the dress was from my family’s fashion label. She must have been rich.
We were both a bit too shy to introduce ourselves, so we just awkwardly ignored each other. Ahead of us, the triplets had found an old fashioned television up against the wall. It turned itself on at their approach.
“It’s so retro!” Uncle Casper said delightedly. “Total vintage vibes!”
“I know, isn’t it just the cutest?” my mother replied.
“Hush,” said Uncle Abe, flapping his hand at his siblings. “We’re going to miss what its saying.”
We watched as a rainbow grew across the black static filled screen and swirled around like a snake’s tail. Then a woman grew from the end of the rainbow in a long dark pink dress with heavy sleeves. She had strawberry blonde hair and an alarming smile on her paper white face, mouth fixed, lips stretched and teeth shining. A sliver of unease went through me. Something must have been wrong with the television. Her eyes looked like silver coins engraved with two crosses.
“Welcome!” the lady in the rainbow said in a soft, sweet and smooth voice that reminded me of strawberry ice-cream.
“Here at The Plastic Flower you can do whatever your heart desires. My associates and I will always be around to help you with whatever you need.”
In a glitter of rainbow light, two men appeared on either side of her. They looked similar to each other with thick red frowning mouths, paper white skin and the same silver crossed eyes as the lady in the rainbow. The one on the left was tall, thin with a wild black cloud of hair, wearing a top hat and a ruffled black suit. The one on the right was short and overweight with three tufts of blond hair on his head, wearing dirty shorts and a singlet with his beer gut hanging out.
“Just give us a call and we’ll be there,” said the lady in the rainbow. “Feel free to swim in our lovely beach, explore our forests or shop til you drop in our shopping center. Enjoy you’re stay! You’ll never want to leave.”
The TV flickered and the woman shrunk back into a rainbow, reversing over the black screen, the two men disappearing with a sparkle. Darius and I exchanged confused looks. A shopping center? How could a shopping center fit in this place?
“Oh lovely,” my mother said to us. “You’ve made a little friend already.”
She smiled at the strange girl beside us.
“What’s your name dear?”
“Lucy Moon,” the girl replied and the triplet’s faces brightened.
“Any relation to Moon Jewelry?” asked Uncle Abe and Lucy nodded.
“Tell your parents hello when you see them,” said Uncle Abe. “We always have our models in their products. Absolutely divine!”
Lucy’s face shifted as she looked between my mother and uncles, slowly recognizing who we were.
“Well, have fun!” said mum. “We’re going to go check out the shopping center. You can amuse yourselves, dears.”
The triplets walked for the oak door, disappearing into the darkness behind it. They’d left their bags behind for us to look after. Lucy looked us up and down. Darius was silent but I decided to try to be friendly and sent her a little wave
“Hi,” I said to her. “This is my twin Darius and my name is Salome, but everyone calls me Sally.”
Lucy stared at us with shrewd narrow eyes.
“If you’re parents are so rich and famous, why do they let you look like that?” she asked and then pointed to Darius. “You look like a Tim Burton drawing of a raccoon. And you, you’ve got a bowl-cut and a five dollar outfit.”
We just stared at her, shocked into silence by her rudeness. Old Mother believed in teaching her grand-kids the value of money. She said she’d been too hands-off with the triplets, throwing nannies and gifts at them and now they were shallow and materialistic. We did chores to earn pocket money, were hounded to get jobs after school and always bought our own stuff, including clothes. I wasn’t very interested in fashion and just got whatever was in the clearance rack. The triplets disapproved of all this and their spontaneous holidays where Old Mother wasn’t invited was their childish rebellion against her.
“My parents wouldn’t let me out of the house looking like you two,” Lucy said. “They’ve got pride. But I guess that’s because we’re not nouveau riche like you’re trashy family.”
With that she walked off on us. I wanted to point out that at least I was dressed my age and not like an overgrown toddler. But she was already off around the corner.
“Charming,” said Darius and I bit back a smile. I could see down the corridor, tags hanging off the door handles, each one displaying the names of our family. I went over and picked up my tag, turning it around to see a door pass attached. I opened up my door to see a cozy room with a plush bed covered in colorful cushions and a large wardrobe to hang my clothes.
Darius and I started hefting the bags over to each of our family’s rooms. Then we just stood around the corridor trying to think of what to do to entertain ourselves. A door opened somewhere around the corner and Lucy came skulking out, carrying a towel and dressed in a swimsuit no doubt heading for the beach. She sneered at us and we ignored her.
“I dunno what to do,” said Darius. “Maybe I’ll just take a nap or something.”
Suddenly there was a magnified sound that filled up the corridor like it was coming through an intercom, making us all jump. It was a horrible slobbering as though someone was choking on their own spit. Then there was angry muffled murmuring and the clunk of someone grabbing at the speaker.
“What do you like?” an awful high-pitched voice shouted. “What do you like? Answer! Answer!”
Again there was a knocking sound and a commotion of huffing and snarling as the speaker was wrestled free.
“So sorry,” the familiar voice of the lady in the rainbow said. “Please tell us what activity you’d like to participate in and we’d happily oblige you.”
We three kids just exchanged looks. What the hell was all that other noise about? I could feel the unease that had just been a seed in my chest when I first got here start to blossom larger, spreading its poison tendrils through my body.
“Uhhh…” said Darius finally. “I could watch a movie?”
A door at the end of the corridor opened and the smell of buttered popcorn wafted over to us from the darkness.
“Anything you want,” the woman said. Darius hesitated then moved for the door.
“I want to go swimming at the beach,” said Lucy at once.
“Of course, there’s a path out the back of this building that will lead the way,” said the voice. Behind us in the foyer, the front doors creaked open, a sea breeze blowing down the corridor. Lucy ran off.
“And last but certainly not least, what is it that you desire?” said the voice to me.
“I guess I’m a bit hungry,” I murmured under my breath, her soothing voice not doing anything for my nerves.
“What is your most favorite of food?” she asked me. “It shall be provided to you.”
My mind instantly jumped to having tea in Old Mother’s parlor. She made delicious scones with jam and cream, little sandwiches, sugar biscuits and the nicest tea I’d ever had.
“Tea and scones with sugar biscuits please,” I said.
“As you wish,” said the strawberry ice-cream voice. A door down the other end of the corridor opened. I walked towards it. Inside I took a seat at a table with a three-tiered platter and a chintz tea set. Through a big bay window overlooking the beach I could see Lucy running gleefully across the sand, splashing in the water.
I poured myself a cup of tea and picked up a scone, along with the little saucers of cream and jam. Taking a bite, I watched the waves crashing on the sand outside the window. The tea and finger food was delicious, made to perfection. Not as nice as Old Mother’s obviously but of course we all tend to prefer the food we grew up on.
I remembered being in the parlor in our city apartment in comfortable armchairs, Old Mother refilling our cups with piping hot tea.
“When I was your age,” she’d say as we sipped from our cups. “My mother had me running around at the tea-shop, serving the customers. I was supposed to run the place when she died, be a nice plump woman in an apron and hairnet with flour on my nose. I horrified her when I got into “that whorish fashion,” instead.”
I enjoyed listening to her stories. I’m not much good at anything else but listening to people. I like hearing people talk about themselves, especially Old Mother. I didn’t get to spend much alone time with the adults in my family, the triplets just took us on expensive holidays. I think we were more like handbag Chihuahuas to them, cute accessories to take around, show off and coo at but not emotionally connect with.
Lucy had stopped running around and was now standing stock still, staring at something in the distance. I looked over and saw one of the men from the welcome video, the shorter, fatter one, over by the path that led to the beach. He was boggling at Lucy, slack jawed, drool running down his chin. There hadn’t been a problem with the television. His eyes were silver coins with cross engravings.
Lucy walked backwards into the ocean, swimming further and further out, not taking her eyes off the man. He was completely still for a few moments and then turned around. I felt a jolt of terror in my chest. Could he see me through the window?
The man didn’t spot me. He just wandered off down the beach path towards the forest, arms dangling loosely by his sides.
My heart was still thumping, my skin cold and clammy. What was that? Was he some kind of pervert? I looked out at the ocean, Lucy’s dark head bobbing in the water. She swam back towards the shore, picked up her towel and bolted for the house again. When she made it inside I heard her cry out in a frightened voice; “Mum? Dad?”
She ran down the corridor, disappearing away into the depths of the house.
The whole experience had put me of the food. I got up and hurried out. I peered up and down the corridor, feeling my stomach shake. When I saw the coast was clear I bolted for my room. I pulled out my old stuffed toy crocodile that I’d had since I was a toddler. Inside the toy’s head hidden among the fluff was a switchblade. Old Mother had gifted us the weapons to me and Darius at a young age.
“The celebrity world is full of rich perverts who get away with all kinds of depravity,” she said. “You can’t depend on your mother or uncles to protect you. Anyone tries anything, you go straight for the eyes.”
After a while of watching the door, I found myself growing tired. Still carrying my plush crocodile, I climbed into my pajamas and dressing gown, sitting on my bed. I didn’t want to fall asleep but my eyelids were heavy, my body fighting against me. I’d take a quick nap and by the time I woke up the triplets were sure to be back. Gripping my secret weapon I dropped off to sleep.
I dreamed of a black void with a pink light glowing in the distance.
There was a creaking sound. My eyes flew open, my stomach dropping and my skin going cold. Moonlight was shining through the window, illuminating a figure bent over at the foot of my bed.
The tall thin man with the black hair in the ruffled suit and top hat was going through my bag. He pulled out my brush and untangled some of the hair from the bristles. He spotted me and his silver coin eyes glinted.
“My brother eat the hair,” he said in the high-pitched voice that I’d heard over the intercom earlier. “I not eat hair. Disgusting.”
He shoved the black hair into his pocket.
“I prefer the special blood,” he said. “Do you bleed yet? Put the cotton thingies in the bin so I can have them. Nice to chew on.”
I screamed, making the man jump and shrink back.
“Mum!” I wailed with terror. The man’s face furrowed with confusion, putting his hands up to his ears.
“Why you screaming?” he said. “I just make conversation?”
I jumped out of bed and ran for the door, still wailing at the top of my lungs, tears pouring down my face. I bolted down the corridor towards the foyer.
Sitting by the big oak door was Darius and Lucy, both in their pajamas too. They looked up at me as I ran over.
“M-m-man in my room…” I gasped out, fear and adrenaline coursing through my body.
“This place is fucked,” said Darius, eyes flickering around. “I was in the cinema and I felt something picking at my head. I turned around and it was that fat guy. He was putting my hair in his mouth.”
I shivered as I sat down beside him. It was night time and the adults hadn’t returned. Through the big arched door, we could hear faint laughter and chattering.
“I bet it’s like the end of Society happening in there,” said Darius.
“What are you talking about?” I asked. Darius sent me a condescending smile.
“Oh it’s a really underground film, barely anyone knows about it,” he replied and I rolled my eyes. Darius was fine most of the time but he had a pretentious, hipster side of him that annoyed the crap out of me. Lucy was eyeing the toy crocodile I was carrying with a look of contempt on her face.
“You still have stuffed animals?” she said. “That’s so babyish.”
I couldn’t believe she’d make fun of something so trivial when we were all being terrorized by creepy men in a strange house with all of our parents missing. Her priorities were completely warped.
“Have you seen Mum or the Uncles at all?” I asked Darius who shook his head.
“My parents will be back soon,” Lucy said, looking down her nose at us. “Maybe yours don’t care about you but mine do.”
We ignored her.
I felt a sick jolt go through me, my heart panging painfully in my throat. Something was moving out of the vinyl flaps to the right of us and onto the wall. For a moment I had no idea what it was as we moved back all at once. It looked like a shadow of a humongous creature.
We heard a clanking, clattering sound coming from the same direction. The vinyl flaps were pushed open as a cart with a man inside came rattling across the tracks towards us. The man, old and frail with wild grey hair, dark wrinkled skin and black sunglasses, peered at us for a moment as if he was struggling to make us out.
“Where’s the dragon?” he yelled. “Where’d the dragon go?”
We looked up at the shadow on the wall. I realized it was a painting of a curling, writhing traditional Japanese dragon with a gaping maw and huge mane. It was moving towards the other vinyl entrance to the left.
The old man gestured at us with a gnarled hand.
“Get in the trolley quick!” he said. “This is a dangerous place. I can get you back home again!”
We stared at him, more frightened than ever. Stranger danger blared in my mind. I felt completely unsafe at this resort and wanted to go home but I’d be the dumbest kid around to just jump in this man’s trolley.
“Quickly!” said the old man as the cart traveled across the tracks towards the second set of vinyl flaps. The dragon had disappeared inside it.
“My parents told me to never go anywhere with strangers!” said Lucy. “They’ll be back any second now and they’ll call the police on you for being a creep!”
There was a rough coughing sound from behind us and we jumped around. In the doorway was the overweight, blond man with coins for eyes. He was making a gagging, choking sound, slobber dribbling down his chin. Sticking his fingers clumsily into his mouth, he started pulling out clumps of matted saliva soaked hair, black and fire engine red from the depths of his throat with horrible heaving gasps.
“Ughhh!” screamed Darius in horror as I staggered back and Lucy let out a cry.
“C’mon already!” cried the old man, his cart beginning to slide through the vinyl flaps. Between the two, I knew who seemed more terrifying. We all ran to clamber inside the cart. As we rolled across the tracks, I watched the gagging man in the doorway, our combined hair oozing down his front as he watched us leave.
Part Two

I am a single mom to twin girls (3 yrs old). Twin B is by and large good at bedtime and is pretty happy to lay in bed with a book and a cup of milk and pass out pretty quickly. Twin A turns into a monster.
They are each allowed up to 2 books in bed. We brush our teeth, I read all 4, and then we sing a song and head to bed. This is where the trouble starts. 8/10 times Twin A will make repeated requests to change her book. If I give in, it turns into repeated requests to read the new books. If I don’t allow her to get new books, it’s a full blown meltdown. If we get past the book stage, it is a back and forth of “I need this blanket/no I don’t want that blanket/put this blanket here/no I didn’t want it there”. I can’t leave the room, have to have a specific melody playing on the iPad (twinkle twinkle little star, which sometimes can also spur trouble if she starts flip flopping on the song), can’t lay down, have to sit straight up with my eyes directly ahead... it’s exhausting at this point. Any time I try to set boundaries, she completely loses her cool which I have trouble sitting through because she ends up working up her sister and then I have 2 screaming toddlers. I’ve listened to a bunch of Janet Lansbury who has suggested letting her feel out the emotions but, again, this upsets her sister and then it becomes this cycle where I am managing to calm one down just in time for the other to reach her limit, and back and forth it goes.
What can I do?! I feel like the answer is obvious and maybe I just don’t have the cojones to get through it. Has anyone else come out the other side or have some helpful suggestions to make this more workable?
ETA: Bedtime routine starts at 6:30 PM (stuffed animals in the crib, teeth brushed, books picked and read), they are typically in bed ready for the song a little before 7:30 PM, and we go through these requests until, usually, 9:00 PM.

(It's more of a thick-headed person story than an entitled person story but I don't know where else to put it. Sorry if i'm wrong)

So, me and my mum just got done talking about going on holiday and I got reminded of this story from about 1.5 years ago (so before CV19). Bear in mind I was not technically present for this story so I will have to fill in some gaps.
To set the scene, me and mum + the family dog were on holiday and we took my best friend with us. We were staying in a holiday home with four bedrooms, there was a house to the side of ours that was lived in by a woman her toddler, and I assume her partner (it was a reasonably big house). They also had a very big dog; I think it was a rottie?
Me = Me, B = Bestie, M = Mum, OD = Our dog, TL = Thick-headed lady
One night, about mid-way through our stay, I got woken up by someone coming into my room. It was B, accompanied by M. I drowsily wondered why she was in here, then I noticed the sound. There was a blaring alarm coming from the other side of the house. M noticed I had woken up as she tucked B into bed. (I was sleeping in a twin bedroom – the other bed went unused).
M: Sorry I woke you sweetheart.
Me: Why is B in my room?
M: The burglar alarm has gone off, but there’s nobody here. Your room is the furthest from the noise.
I looked at my phone, it was about 1 in the morning.
Me: Well, will it turn off?
M: I’ve called the owner of the house, they should be on their way, but it’s really late so it might take her a while.
I could hear OD shuffling around in the hallway, she doesn’t like loud noises. M went out of the room and I assume OD followed her.
I tried to get comfortable, knowing that when the alarm turned off I would need to get back to sleep. B was just laying there. She didn’t seem all that awake to begin with, after all she was and still is a rather heavy sleeper.
I don’t know how long it was, but after a while I heard a heavy knock at the door. I assumed it was the owner and I began to look forward to slipping back into premature death, but to my dismay, it was not.
I only heard parts of this conversation, cause, ya know, blaring alarm. But I can take from context and fill in the gaps.
TL: Oh hi, I’m your neighbour TL, can you turn that alarm off please?
M: Hello, I’ve called the owner of the property, they’re coming to turn it off.
TL: Can you turn it off?
M: I’ve tried, but no luck.
TL: Can you try again?
I can tell M got a little annoyed at this, cause her voice got louder. She’s usually a very sweet woman, but you should never cross her when she’s tired.
M: (Louder and firmer) It’s not our alarm. I don’t know how to turn it off.
TL: But it needs to get turned off.
M: I know. Which is why I called the owner who does know how to turn it off. It will be sorted.
With that TL left, and I thought it was over. Nope. About half an hour later, the owner had not arrived, and the alarm was still blaring. Me and B had given up on sleeping and were both on our phones in bed. I could listen closer this time around. There was another knock at the door, it was TL again.
TL: You really need to turn that blinkin alarm off.
M: I told you. I can’t.
TL: Well where is the owner?
M: Not here yet.
TL: Why not!?
M: Lady. It is one in the morning. I cannot make her come any faster.
TL: But my little girl is being kept awake! She needs her sleep, she’s only three!
M: And I have two girls who are also being kept awake! It is keeping me awake! It is keeping OD awake! Listen. I cannot turn off the alarm. I am just a visitor. This is not my house. If I could turn it off I would. You know who can turn it off? The owner, who is on her way as we speak. You telling me to turn it off is helping nothing. Now please go back home. It will be sorted.
TL finally left. About ten minutes later the owner arrived and was very apologetic. She turned off the alarm then went back home. I could finally get back to sleep. Let’s just say we were all rather grumpy in the morning though.
So… who in their right mind hears a burglar alarm, something that usually indicates a possibly armed/dangerous person is nearby, and knocks on the door of said house that is potentially being robbed? I just hope her daughter grows up to have a little more common sense than her mother.

Boundary Stomps 24

Summary

This started as an exercise to detect patterns that JustNO's have. It is not meant to be diagnostic, nor it is meant to detail every single boundary stomp there is. There are just too many. New ones are added all the time, usually when I see a couple of posts on the same vein. There are in fact so many that I may forget and identify and put them in the document more than once. It happens. Enjoy.

Disclaimer

I guess In need to put this disclaimer in here. I get no posting Karma from this and it is not published anywhere outside of Reddit that I am aware of. I do make links into posts, so often those posts are taken down. Additionally I add short excerpts from posts that may or may not exist any longer.
If I have linked to one of your posts that you don't want to have in these I will be happy to remove it. I usually provide a short excerpt which has little or no identifying information, so if you take down the original post, there isn't really much of a breadcrumb left here, but I will be glad to remove it if you wish, just PM me.

On with the show.

Boundaries and Consequences Checklist

Index
First post
Second Post, more boundary stomps
Third Post, more boundary stomps
Fourth Post, even more boundary stomps
Fifth set of boundary stomps
Sixth set, wow.
Seventh set, oh my
Eighth set. when will it end
Ninth set. Baby Rabies and Reproductive choices
Nine "A" set of boundary stomps
Nine "B" set of boundary stomps
Nine "C" set of boundary stomps
Nine "D" set of boundary stomps
Tenth Set
Eleventh Set
Twelfth set
Thirteenth set - The Bank
Thirteenth - A - The Bank continued
Thirteenth - B - The Bank continued
Fourteenth Set, a continuation
Fifteenth Set, Boundary stomps
Sixteenth Set, Boundary Stomps
Seventeenth Set, Bounday Stomps
Eighteenth Set, Boundary Stomps
Nineteenth Set, Boundary Stomps
Twentieth Set, Moving in with MIL, MIL moving in
Twenty-first Set
Twenty-Second Set - all about manipulation
Twenty-Third Set
Twenty-Fourth Set
Twenty-Fifth Set - Unwanted

You may be interested in types of boundaries as well

Late to everything

Clearly a power play, this JustNO tactic is to make everyone wait for her to make her grand entrance. Dinner at 7:00PM? She shows up at 8:00PM and is livid that everyone, including children, did not wait for her to arrive.
Meet for an outing, like the zoo, that requires a significant time to drive, she will arrive two hours late, ensuring that you are there during the peak visiting hours in the direct sun during the baby's nap time. Movie starts at 8:25, she shows up at 9:30, and you have the tickets so someone has to miss part of the beginning to accommodate her.
She needs constant reassurance that she is the most important one of anyone. She will become belligerent if you insist that you want to leave on time. This is actually a loyalty test, and if you are upset that you missed some important (to you) event, then it means that the event was more important than her feelings and she is not as important as what you want to do. This means that she must make you understand that the consequences of failing the loyalty test are so horrible that you won't make that mistake again.

Late and last minute to everything. That’s all on MIL. Arrange every get together, outing, scheduled event, dinner reservation with her inability to be on time in mind. Do not let MIL be gatekeeper for anything, don’t share a car, let her buy your tickets, or anything else that could delay your enjoyment of the event at hand. Let her know “dinner reservations are at 7, we will see you there, if you are late we won’t wait.” Reference

More to the point, if she arrives late and then gets upset that you didn't wait, displaying her histrionics, crying, screaming, laying on the floor and kicking like a toddler. You just pick up and leave. She can enjoy the spotlight by herself. If she was to ride with you and then is late, she can drive herself and meet you there (if she can find you.) Absolutely stop playing into her hand and give absolutely zero slack in the time. In fact if the time has arrived, and you see her driving down the block, leave, she may be able to catch up to follow you. But if you wait, she will spend the next hour making sure you pay for hurting her feelings by almost leaving.
If you are in the position where she is at the location, say you were at her house early and the time has come to depart, but she starts getting huffy and throwing a fit, head to the door and leave without her. She knows what time she is supposed to leave, and she is controlling you to ensure that you give her adequate attention, and ensure that you also worship her vs. the fact that you are going to be late to the event.
Everything has to be on MIL time
Here is an example of a JustNO that has been dealt with:

My mother was chronically late for every visit. We used to hold holiday dinner for hours until she showed. Until one day, we had been out at a marathon that morning and were just too damn hungry to wait. So I cooked, we ate, I packed it all up. She rocked up 4 hours late. It was a record. She walked in full of excuses and then stopped, shocked, because the table was empty and the kitchen clean. She actually thought I hadn't cooked yet. I told her I had and we had already eaten, but if she wanted a plate, she was welcome to go fix it herself. She kept apologizing in that guilting way: Well, I'm SO SORRY, but I had to do this, that, and the other. I'd just smile and nod and say it was okay and that she didn't hold us up. She got more agitated and doing the same apology and I would respond the same way. Finally, the truth slid out. She actually said she thought we would wait for her. I laughed and was blunt and told her directly that we would no longer wait for her. Her nonsense was no longer going to impact us and that if she couldn't be bothered to show up on time, then this is how her holiday meals would always be in the future.
Then she started cancelling on the day of the holiday. Which worked for me because then I didn't have to deal with her at all. :) win!

I loathe being late and people who are late. Even typing this is making me vibrate inside. I feel like being late is disrespectful to the person/people you are meeting and it indicates you don't feel they or their time are valuable.
Why is this Naggy Nancy's fault? Well among the many selfish things she would do when we needed to go somewhere was to ride us to get out of the house, so we would all (JYD included) be waiting in the car and then out of nowhere would think if held a dozen things that couldn't possibly wait. Some were important, like turning lights off or turning on music for the dog. Most not so much, like dusting that shelf, or washing the single cup in the sink or loading/unloading the dishwasher, or changing her clothes. And then we would show up late 10, 15, 20 minutes. We showed up late to my aunt's wedding where my JYD was supposed to being doing a reading (fortunately, my aunt was having a minor wardrobe malfunction so we were able to sneak in. And if she was called on it...? You guessed it, us kids were always blamed. Link

I have a brother who is always 2 hours late and a father who disappears at any event that isn't about him. We stopped calling and texting years ago. With my dad, we don't chase him up or ask where he's been. I have no expectations of them. I just don't care any more. Link

This is quite intentional on their part and they don’t want to change because they enjoy the control, so you need to just go ahead with your life. Believe me, if you ever decide to have kids this thing that seems irritating now will become a huge major aggravation. There’s nothing worse than getting a child ready to go, then having to wait on people to show up for so long that the child becomes cranky and fussy and you have to cancel the outing altogether. I had a friend who used to do this. She would always want to do things together with the kids, but she was always late and I got sick and tired of having to wait so long for her to show up. After that we would just tell her we would meet her wherever we were going, so we didn’t waste half the day waiting for her to show up.
You don’t have to wait for people. You just don’t. Link

Oh my sister used to pull this, late for everything. One time we just sat down and ate when dinner was ready and I said to show up. She comes in 45 minutes late got all upset that we didn't wait for her. I replied that dinner was at 2, the food was ready and it would have been rude to make everyone else wait for her. Link

Canceling plans at last minute (malicious compliance)

Sometimes people are not just inconsiderate, they show up late or cancel at the last minute and make you reschedule something because they are intentionally making you bend over backwards to accommodate their wishes and fuss over them. Like most JustNO activities, this takes a special kind of asshole to take something nice that you are doing for them and turn it around as a weapon to inconvenience and get attention through a power and control move.

FIL was always extremely upset by DH doing well in life. I think he felt emasculated by it or something. FIL resented DH (even though he was the Golden Child) for being financially responsible. FIL could never properly express pride in his son and poor DH always wanted their approval and love so much. I have a theory about why sometimes fathers often resent their male Golden Child but this isn't the place for that.
Anyway, I find out today that MIL was feeling the same way on some level or enabling it in FIL. (I suspected as much but she stood to benefit from it so I think she was more careful than FIL to disguise her resentment) Apparently, one of the reasons they would cancel on us last minute is to basically waste our money on purpose. After we spent a ton on getting everything ready for them to attend a special event (like buying a lot of food because we thought we'd have a huge crowd) they'd cancel right before so that we'd have to figure out what to do with a ton of food that would spoil before we'd be able to eat it and things like that. (usually ended up giving it away to neighbors or taking it to work to share as a buffet lunch)
Same for changing the date on things... It's the same story I've seen on this board several times. At the last minute MIL calls and asks to reschedule something that can't be rescheduled without a lot of fuss, simply because they want someone to fuss over their arrival. Same with my MIL. Desperate for attention, even negative. Link

The worst was when I threw a huge birthday party for DH and he thought they were coming and they cancelled at the last minute. so when they wanted to visit for Father’s Day we said no, (mostly because they didn’t ask they just told us that’s when they planned on showing up) so they took it out on DD by telling us they would come to her birthday and saying they were bringing the whole family and we thought it would be a huge crowd, so we got a bounce house and catering and all sorts of birthday stuff for about 25-30 people and they didn’t show up. We didn’t know until it was too late. It never crossed our minds that they would take out their anger with us on DD. Link

She was dropping by my house to pick up some stuff she left behind last week. The time she said she would be there passed. Half an hour went. Then 40 minutes. She finally showed up and just sort of weakly apologized and said "I don't do time." I almost murdered her. If there is one thing I cannot stand it is people who waste my time, or treat my time with anything but respect. It's just so RUDE. If people show up at more door late (like, more than ten minutes) I expect a valid excuse like "traffic" or "dog escaped" or something. She just makes it blatantly obvious she cannot be arsed to show up when I want. And then she has the GOD DAMN AUDACITY to make passive aggressive comments about how people need to "make an appointment" to come and see me. Link

Stealing Easter Eggs from Children

On Easter Sunday morning, my three kids were unleashed into the back yard to pick up eggs. MIL kept pointing out the eggs to the kids. My husband told her to stop, because all we have is time these days! Let the kids enjoy! So she moves over to the other side of the yard. When I look over, she is stuffing eggs into her pockets. MIL didn't notice that I saw her. The kids said, "We can't find anymore!" So I said, "Great! Did you each find 25? That is how many were out there for each of you." So I told them to keep looking! MIL realizes what she has done, but won't own up to it. She walks up to my preschooler and says, "NAME! I have an egg just for you!" Makes this huge deal out of presenting it to him. Link

Destroying your Non-Stick Pans

You talk to your JustNO about how much you like your non-stick pans. She decides to clean your kitchen, and scratch all your pans so they are now unusable. Link

Fishing for compliments - manipulation - reduction to absurdity - self deprecation

Reductio ad absurdum is the art of using something so extreme that it must be discounted on it's face otherwise it would lead to an absurd, ridiculous or even comical conclusion.
Your JustNO offers a non-stop torrent of self-putdowns:
"I am an awful MotheGrandmother"
"You must hate me."
"I am old/ugly/a burden/bad cook/bad housekeepe"
On and on. You are then put in a position of agreeing (bad idea, because they will then turn it around to you have said these things, or denying these things. "Oh no, you were the most bestest mother of all and all my friends say so.")
Thing is they may have been a bad mothefathegrandparent/aunt/uncle/cousin/sistebrother, etc.
But you are now in a position where you have to give them enough compliments to overcome their statements of how awful they are, they must get their num-num compliments.

I love my mom dearly, but one habit of hers that drives me crazy is her response to any criticism with a reduction to absurdity. I'm sure you've all heard these:
"Oh, you don't want me to hug you now? Well I'm sorry I love you. I won't do that in the future."
"You think there's too much stuff in here to move around freely? Well, I just won't decorate then."
Or the classic:
"I'm sorry I was such a terrible mother. Clearly I am just a failure!"
As an adult, I recognize these tactics for what they are: an attempt to guilt me and let her escape from both a situation and having to actually examine her actions and feelings critically. I've had success in calmly sticking to my guns and pointing out that I did not say those other things and that it is possible to love someone and appreciate them while still having a nuanced opinion about what is going on. Today, while reading one of the posts in this sub, I realized a weapon that I don't think I need to use, but may help some of you (or at least be fun if you're all out of fucks to give.) When someone "apologizes" for being "so horrible," they're looking for you to back down or just start a fight. I think it would really mess with them to just say some variation of:
"Thank you for that. Your behavior has really bothered me and I appreciate that you are taking responsibility now. I'm willing to forgive you but we will need to talk about this." Link

This is the method of taking a polite request and turning it into something ridiculous. This forces you to contradict the original request and withdraw the statement.
"Oh, I talk too loud, well I will just never speak again." (I wish)
"You, you don't like me throwing away hot oil in the trash, I will just never cook again then."
"Oh, you don't like me touching your baby bump, well I guess I just can't do anything right, I will leave and never see you again, then you'll be sorry."
"I you don't like something I said or did, let me just kill myself."
These often take the form of "you called me out on something," then "I will do something ridiculous or say something over the top so that you will see how mean your asking me to have normal behavior is so crazy."

Doesn't believe in vaccines

It really doesn't matter whether they believe in vaccines, or in a certain disease that shall remain nameless, you have put a boundary in place that says that unless you are vaccinated against certain diseases, then you can't be around the newborn.

I then find out from my baby's dad when flu season rolled around that he doesn't get vaccines because his mom told him they made him sick when he was a baby. He told me his mom hasn't been vaccinated AT ALL. She doesn't believe in it and has children who attend public school, sees tons of people and their kids. I also found out she was not social distancing AT ALL. She was hanging with friends almost daily and literally attending PARTYS DURING LOCKDOWN (she was not allowed over during lockdown but STILL showed up unannounced and went right to baby didn't care what anyone had to say because "she knows best"). Link

Calling you Gay

So you aren't gay, you consider yourself straight. Your JustNO keeps calling you gay, says that they knows you are gay, and when you get defensive, they say that you only get defensive because you are gay. Not only are they demonstrating their Homophobia and lack of sensitivity, but they are seriously messed up. So since it isn't a bad thing to be gay anymore this means in most places that the person who is bullying you isn't guilty of slander. It is using a tool of reactive abuse to get you to blow up and then they point out that you are the bad guy, thus reversing the victim and the offender. When you do blow up, then they are perfectly justified in pointing out how abusive you are to them, and they were either just teasing, or making an observation. Quite the bullying tactic, and a definite no win situation. Link

Competition

"I can do anything better than you can." She is a better cook, she does laundry better, she has more money, her house is cleaner, her makeup is better, and she has nicer feet. The list just goes on. She can't stand to have your SO pay attention to you. If you are at a restaurant, she wants to sit next to SO or between you. If you mention a present, she will buy a better one first. Celebrations, she will out do anything you can come up with. Bake a birthday cake, well she always makes so their birthday cake, and it must be at her house.

This really starts to hit home when you have kids. You get a great gift for your kid for Christmas, this JustNO has to buy a bigger, better, or more expensive thing.

at Christmas and bigger baskets than us at Easter.
At Christmas this year, I told my in-laws that I’m FINALLY making my kids special bedrooms (they’ve been sleeping on Toddler mattresses on the floor until they were potty trained). I’ve worked so hard on drywall, paint, building closets and making a bunk bed for my girls. I’m nowhere near done but I’ve been so excited and worked really hard. We went to my in-laws yesterday and JNMIL starts showing my oldest all these pictures she’s saved of this amazing tree house bunk bed she’s building my kids for their house. My daughters been talking about it all day and I’m just so disappointed with the work I’ve already done on their rooms. She says “for when the kids spend the night!” even though my kids have NEVER spent the night with them. Link

Parenting Decisions

Some JustNO's just love to override parental authority. Decisions on what the child wears, what the child eats and what the children are exposed to and at what ages. Stepping on the parental alienation boundary, they plant ideas in their grandchildren's heads and set the child up for opposition. Gramma says
Maybe they don't like what you are feeding the kids. They don't like what religion you are raising them in, or what languages they speak. They don't like what you dress them in, either. You really can't do anything right.

Basically, I gave my 7yo son a sip of wine, because he asked for it and I thought it could be a teachable moment about alcohol (I knew he wouldn't like the taste, and was hoping that would keep him away from it/quell his curiosity). MIL found out, as my son told her on a facetime, and was very upset. She thinks its going to cause my son to be an alcoholic, I'm a terrible parent, I drink too much, all that jazz... call. Looking back, I made a huge mistake in telling her that, but hindsight is 20/20 unfortunately. Fast-forward, I'm done shopping, get back in the car, and open my phone to a string of texts from DH. MIL was AT THE HOUSE. during all this, with our son around?? I swear all I saw was red while I was driving home. I'm getting angry even typing this out now. I got home while she was still there and tried to keep my composure while demanding why she was at our house, to which she told me that she "needed to see what was going on around here." link

Call the police on you for kidnapping their 21 year old son

You know when someone is 21 years old, they can really go anywhere they please without having to tell you where they are or report in. So you don't drive over to their SO's house and call the police and tell them that they have kidnapped your kid. When they show up, they may be mad to find out that the "kid" is 21 and hasn't actually been kidnapped, and in fact may not even be there.

I didn't believe she actually called them until 2 cruisers showed up. The police stepped out and she started waving her arms around yelling about how her son was missing and could be anywhere, could be hidden in my house. I rolled my eyes and let her go on ranting to one of the officers while another pulled me aside to hear my story. He started writing down some details asking when was the last time I'd seen or spoken to the missing individual. I interrupted him, "Excuse me officer.. But are you aware that her son is 21 years old?"
...... He stopped writing immediately and set the pencil down, we deadpan stared at each other for a few moments. He sighed, "You're free to go ma'am." I walked away slowly to eavesdrop as he walked over and interrupted her story she was telling to ask if it was true that she called in a kidnapping on a 21 year old man. LInk

Need Just NO to do something so they start a fight and leave

You have a problem that your JustNO offers to help you solve. Something like take you to a doctor's visit. You arrange things ahead of time and ensure that she knows the particulars. Then they show up late and pick a fight and storm out, leaving you to make other arrangements to get to your appointment. This is a repeating pattern.

See the thing is with AA she doesn't like being told off even when she's in the wrong so she got up walked out the house and left in her car again. (our lovely neighbor took him but he had to walk home in crutches its 1.5hrs from the hospital) Link

Religion

Telling someone that they were going to Hell because they weren't raised in the JustNO's religion, even though they were a devout member of a different sect or a different denomination, a different religion or even agnostic or atheist. Since True religion rites are the only real rites and any other kind don't count.
Determining what religion the grandkids will participate in. Taking them to the JustNO's church without permission. Having true church rites, such as baptism, performed without the parents knowledge or permission. Link
And, of course some JustNOs never miss the opportunity to cram their religion down your throats.

“The Gospels Matthew 27 Luke 23 Mark 15 John 19 I hope each of you take the time to read one of the chapters of The Gospels today and the time to remember at 3p when Christ died.” We have told her numerous times, but she still sends us messages like this and pushes us to go to church. It makes me really angry. Link

Not Really Family

Interestingly enough, you have been married to your SO for years. Unfortunately your JustNO Inlaw doesn't actually recognize you as part of the family. Of course her child and your child are family, but you are just the incubator, and as such are completely dispensable.

Well in a conversation with DH she told him that the only people she had were DH and my son. Didn’t include me. Didn’t even mention me. Link

I just pretend to go along when people are talking, and then just do whatever I want

A passive aggressive JustNO will often just ignore what you have to say, any request you make, any boundary you set. Then they are surprised when you are upset about it. Rarely a bit of honesty shows through. They may even admit that they do this.

I say "please don't come to the hospital at 11am. I might be in the middle of having the baby. Please call before you come so I can tell you whether it's a good time or not." The next day, they showed up at 11am without calling first. I was in active labor when they showed up, and when they did, it stopped my labor cold. I just had to sit there, waiting, until 5pm when my labor finally restarted. Later, I asked her why she ignored my request to call first she said "Oh, I just pretend to go along when people are talking, and then just do whatever I want." Link

Unwanted Intimate Advice

Just ewwww, who wants advice on intimacy from their JustNO. You have never had that kind of relationship, so why now? Why me? What the flipping hell.

My FMIL just sent me a video on “how to get a WAP” which basically means a wet vag. The video talks about plants that can increase libido, s3xual performance, and vaginal dryness
I’ve never talked about my “intimate” life with her nor would I ever want to! This was out of the blue for me. Link

You can't draw too

So you have a talent. Your cousin also has a talent. Somewhere there is a JustNO that says that you both can't pursue that talent and their child is older so you have to come in second place always in this talent.
Just Crazy.

EA - “Payton This is EA. I think this is really getting out of hand. EC is really upset. I won’t tell your parents as long as you agree to not sell that drawing. You are going to ruin EC chances of becoming an artist. Please just take into consideration, she is older than you. There for she chose to be an artist before you did. You will always have to be in second place. I’m sorry, That’s just how social conducts works.”
Me - “Alright, EA. What’s sad is I know that EC actually had to have her mom text me because she doesn’t know what half of those words mean. Well. This has been a nice conversation. I shall be telling my parents about this interaction.”
Then it went quite for a bit. Then I got this last text that I.. I was not expecting
EA - “ Payton, You can not sell Your art of ANIMATED characters because that’s what EC does! HOW DARE YOU DRAW STITCH! YOU CAN NOT MAKE DRAWINGS OF EC FAVORITE DISNEY CHARACTER AND SELL IT BECAUSE IF YOU SELL IT YOU WILL HAVE TO GIVE THE MONEY TO EC!! YOU DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO TAKE BUSINESS AWAY FROM MY CHILD BECAUSE SHE DESERVES IT MORE THEN YOU!!!” Link

You can't go to gifted school, because your Cousin wasn't accepted

Yes, because you have some natural ability, you work hard and have gone above and beyond to make yourself a fit for the gifted school, you are not supposed to go because your smart, but doesn't apply themselves cousin didn't get accepted. Sorry to tell you but ruining my future doesn't really solve the problem of your child.

Well we get applications back, I got in, but my cousin got fourth quartered wait listed, which basically means almost 100 people have to drop out. My aunt was not happy with this. So what does my EA do? Well she calls me from my cousin's phone to berate me of course. Link

Photoshopping my kids for Facebook

When the JustNO decides that your kids don't quite measure up to the aesthetic that she wishes to portray on Facebook, then she feels perfectly justified in adjusting them to be what she wants them to be. Lighten their hair, and change their eyes to blue, whiten their teeth, until they don't look like themselves.

Then my twin girls they have hazel eyes and more of darker blonde hair, so I guess she Dosent find it appealing to her Facebook aesthetic, because this woman would face tune the shit out a 4 year olds like I wish I can show you guys because you guys, they no longer look like my daughters like she completely changes there eye color and brightens there hair in the photo and brighten teeth . She also does this to my two year old daughter that has blue eyes and a brunette like completely changes her hair color. Link

Stealing School Lunches, raiding the food bank

Your JustNO thinks it is really funny to go to the school and get the free lunches that are given out to feed children who are food insecure during periods where the school is shutdown. They also see no problem in driving up to the food bank and filling their trunk. Note that your JustNO has a steady income and they are not in poverty. It is just that the food bank does not have a way of checking that you don't have an income and rely on the inherent goodness of people to make things work. They will also take advantage of the free winter coat and other government handouts, all the while talking about how much the government is taking and how the really poor people are taking advantage of the system.

friend starts grabbing bags of the lunches and stuff on the table and says, "How many you need? You have five grandbabies you are picking up for right?" RECORD SCRATCH For the record, she has TWO grand children. MY two children. DS is 26, married and lives in another state with his expecting wife and DD who drives her to chemo on her days off. That's it. There are no five elementary school grand babies starving at home. She just stole 5 lunches from UNDERPRIVILEGED KIDS Link

Well, she is...thrifty. No, that’s nice. She is CHEAP and GREEDY. she knows I cannot go so she has a going to the school meal pickups every week. She came over to drop some mail off to me and she just told me she got meals for 9 kids. NINE. That she kept to herself so she doesn’t have to go to the store for breakfast, lunch or snacks. She took food away from nine children. Link

Putting your number on Craigslist

You and your JustNO are on the outs. They have exhausted their flying monkeys, they have done the unannounced visit, they have left thousands of voicemails, and dropped thousands of texts. They are blocked on all your social media, and you have moved and left no forwarding address.
Well that is unacceptable. They somehow find out your phone number, even though you really haven't shared it with anyone (cost is a couple dollars on one of the big data websites.) They decide it is a great idea to put your phone number on Craigslist advertising sex services, or other things that people call in the middle of the night. One extreme case featured on Law and Order had someone attacked because of an advertisement.

E.g. putting our number on our local Craigslist so that random people called us all through the night about something we had no earthly idea about. Link

You must be exorcised

You have a meltdown. Instead of removing you from the situation, your JustNO decides that you need to be exorcized so she basically waterboards you while screaming for the devil to come out.

What was her response to this? "THE DEMONS FINALLY CAME!!" I vividly remember thinking "what the actual heck."when I heard that. I tried to explain that I just wanted to get in the car and relax. I was fairly non-verbal at that time so communication was not happening. This resulted in me being strapped down in the car with seat belts while my mother put a (??something idk what but it was fabric) over my mouth/nose before pouring water over my face. Basically waterboarding me while screaming out hysterical prayers to save me from the demons that were causing me to act in such "an ungodly manner". Link

Stealing your creative ideas

Mum has emailed me talking about their situation and asking me to brain storm for any creative ideas for them to make some extra cash. I responded with a couple of ideas, but the most fleshed out and best one was for them to put together boxes of ingredients for people to make their own restaurant signature meals. I was thinking people would be more comfortable preparing their own food (as Mum had said people were very worried about the safety of take away food in her area) and noted that she could theme the boxes for advertising purposes, I specifically suggested “romantic dinner for 2” or “family Sunday brunch.” I think from the title we’ve all guessed where this is going. We find a time for a video chat and spend about an hour talking last night. In that time Mum tells me all about this idea she had and basically explains my above idea back to me, right down to the romantic dinner for two specific theming idea. Link

Victoria’s Story
Everyone wants to know what it was like. How did you live? What did you do? What did you learn?
How did you escape?
The truth is I didn’t. Escape implies you got yourself out. I did no such thing. I was rescued. And before I was deprogrammed, I would’ve described it as kidnapping instead!
I don’t blame you, by the way, for wanting to know. It’s only natural to be curious about something so alien. I might as well have grown up on another planet and I was born and raised only about 1000 miles away from the spot I sit now.
I suppose the best place to start is the beginning and my beginning in Gilead was my birth. At my birth, my mother named me Victoria Faith, declaring both figuratively to all and literally to the room of gathered women that my birth was a victory of the faithful against the sinful outside world. She just loved telling me that story. I was enthralled by it as a girl. Now I’m not so sure why I ever found such joy in my birth story. Now that I know how many lies she told.
Dresses
I had two sets of dresses, sweaters, and caps, one for each half of the year. For spring and summer, soft dusty pink; for fall and winter, rich plum. On the equinox (a word which held no meaning to me until I got out and started to learn), I would finally be allowed to switch to the new dresses, though Mother would’ve instructed our Marthas to unpack the trunk of dresses and wash them up about a week before the day of.
I also had three white dresses, two in my summer set and one wool one in my winter set. They came with veils instead of just caps to cover our hair. They were our special dresses. We wore those for special outings to Prayvaganzas and Salvagings once we were old enough.
My earliest memory is of a dress. It was my fifth birthday present but looking back, I’m not sure I’d still call it a present. A present would’ve been a new doll or some new paints. Painting was one of the few things girls were allowed to learn.
No, this dress was not a present but a mandate. Mother didn’t even let me dress in my old dresses for the day. I was awoken by her and Gloria pulling my dresses out of my closet. I rightly asked what was going on but instead of answering me, Mother pulled me up out of bed and sat me down next to a large pink box sitting next to my dollhouse. I was ecstatic thinking of the dolls and furniture that could be inside. But opening the lid dashed my tiny hopes just as they were built up.
A box full of fabric. She pulled one from the top, a light pink one since I was born in the springtime, and held it up to me.
“It should fit her perfectly.”
“Indeed Ma’am, and the Aunts at Lillies leave plenty of excess in the hem so I can let it down as she grows.”
“Oh how wonderful! What brilliance! Instead of wastefully buying her an entire new wardrobe, I can just have her skirts let down! Praise be!”
I didn’t understand any of this, I was just digging in the box. Pink, pink, pink, plum, plum, plum, white, white, white.
“Mama, why did I get new dresses? These look the same as my old ones and I like those ones.”
She crouched down next to me and pet my head like I was a little pup.
“Well sweetie, as little girls become big girls, they must cover their bodies. You’re a big girl now so now you need to cover more than a little girl does. Don’t you want to be a good big girl?”
My only response was a meek “yes Mama” accompanied by a small nod. I didn’t understand though. What she said didn’t make any more sense than gibberish. But I was blinded by my childlike zeal for being considered big and mature, so I gave no further objections when I was bundled into a dress that fell to my ankles and all of my short dresses were packed away in a trunk. My big girl self even helped fold the knee dresses. And then Max hauled the trunk down to our basement. I did ask why they were going in the basement and Mama said that was because she hoped that they might give me a little sister someday and they’ll need them for her.
I foolishly declared that she didn’t need any more babies because she had me and that I didn’t want a baby sister. That just elicited chuckles and more head patting.
“All babies are a blessing and all should pray for as many babies as God sees fit to bless them with.”
Blessings
My family was quite blessed. Others would say wealthy, maybe even rich, but Papa forbade such language.
“All that we have is given to us by God. We are not wealthy, we are blessed by the Lord, Praise be.”
I started correcting my schoolmates when they called me rich. I could quote my Papa’s words verbatim. The truth is though, we were rich. We were very rich. We had things that a few of my classmates could only dream of. My Papa being a very high ranking Commander, we had a huge house with rooms to spare. We had four Marthas, three floors, two cars, and a huge tree in the backyard. There were boards nailed to its trunk in a ladder going up but to what and for what purpose I could only guess. Heaven only knows who would be climbing into that tree or why one even would do so.
But why did my fingers itch to do exactly that then?
In short, we were very rich. In every way but one. Every Handmaid that passed through our walls never bore a single child. Mama said God sent her an actual angel and that’s why we hadn’t been blessed with another baby yet. Because she had her angel and she’d been blessed well enough already. That didn’t seem to stop her from wanting another child though. Was an angel not enough?
Meanwhile my best friend Grace had two siblings! That’s three children in one household! I used to think “Commander Weber is surely blessed, Praise be. He and his wife are very lucky.” They had their oldest daughter, my best friend Grace, as well as a second daughter Modesty and a son they named Adam. Adam was a little tot and I wished to spend as much time at their house as I could because of it. I just love babies and toddlers so much and I always have. I couldn’t wait to be a mother someday! “To be a mother is so noble.” That’s what I always thought.
Grace claimed she should never have children but I thought that a silly notion. Who doesn’t want children? She didn’t want to get married either and that was just pure scandal. For a girl of our status, we had no choice whatsoever in marriage. It is not something we can avoid. At least not in most cases. Obviously she found a way because we are here instead of in Gilead. Our marriages would’ve taken place today.
Praise fucking be.
Learning
I’m often asked what I actually learned in Gilead, considering I needed to be taught to read and write at the age of 15. I learned many things, few of them useful. I learned useful things like painting, embroidery, knitting, crocheting, sewing, even more advanced skills like quilting. What was lacking in my education is obvious in retrospect but as a child I never questioned it. I just happily made the crafts I was taught.
I would knit or crochet all day long as a child. I made many tiny baby caps, both for my many beloved baby dolls and for the unfortunately few blessed babies born in Gilead. I had four dolls, most often dressed as two sets of twins one boy pair and one girl pair. Sometimes I dressed them all in dresses and pretended they were quadruplets! We learned that word in school when we were being taught how women used to be so abundantly blessed before they started turning away from God and the blessing of babies. We learnt of women able to bear as many as 8 babies from one pregnancy! Imagine that! Imagine being so pious that God would reward you so greatly! Just imagine...
The better hats and blankets were sent to the Aunts so they could be used for the babies born in Gilead. I made them in pink and blue and grey, the grey sets going to the Econo-children. Theirs was a life entirely different from my own. The Econogirls learned many more things than we did, many useful skills. For most of them, their future held a low class husband whom she would wait on like a Martha despite her status as his wife, and struggle to bear children for him on her own, with no Handmaid to bear on her behalf. That is why the Econogirls and Econowives sometimes wore striped dresses, green and blue and red and grey. These girls were always very busy but sometimes they seemed happier than us. They were allowed even a tiny sliver more freedom. Heck, they could even work, in a way.
Freedom is something I always envied of other children. Other girls may not have had as many toys but they were watched far less. I had a Martha acting as my governess and keeping her eye on me at all times.
Growing up in Gilead, I never thought this bizarre. There were Eyes and their symbol everywhere I went, everywhere I looked. So having a physical eye upon me at all times wasn’t odd or invasive. It seemed normal to me at the time.
Now I shudder whenever I remember the surveillance.
Gloria was a lovely woman, a sweet old woman easily 40 or so when I was born. She doted on me like no other and spoiled me rotten. Mother spoiled me more but she was a bit colder. Mother was an ice queen, with platinum blonde hair, bright blue eyes, and a cold heart. She did love me dearly, I’m sure of it. But she just didn’t know how to give affection to me or to anyone. I never once saw her kiss my Papa.
Beatrice was our cook and I loved spending all my time with her and Gloria in the kitchen. I wasn’t allowed to help them, admonished that hard work would ruin my hands and that I was meant to be a Wife, I don’t need to work, that’s what Marthas are for. But I could stay and enjoy the scents and their chatter. I would sit at a small table in what Mother called the breakfast nook and work on my embroidery or my knitting and the Marthas would forget that I was even there, gossiping freely despite my presence. Being quiet as a church mouse gave many benefits at times even if I felt too shy to make many friends amongst the girls who were my peers.
Beatrice was a sharp and witty woman who ran her mouth at times, talking about things I’ve never heard of. She used to ride something called a motorcycle, which she explained to me as a bike but as fast as a car. I have only seen bikes, I’ve seen boys riding them in the park while we were escorted out to get some sun during our school day. As soon as the boys saw Aunt Gertrude, they turned around and started rushing away as fast as their legs could peddle, one of them throwing a call of “Sorry Ma’am” over his shoulder as he sped after his companion.
Aunt Gertrude huffed and started ranting about boys and their bad behavior but I heard none of it because that itchy feeling was back. This time my whole legs itched and twitched and longed to stretch on those bikes.
Not that I could ride in the long dress I was wearing. My skirt came to my ankles so it would get tangled up and I would crash. My shoes probably wouldn’t work well either, being soft slippers made of dyed cotton canvas. The shoes were quite nice for twirling though. I used to love twirling about my room with my skirt billowing around me. I felt very pretty and regal, had I known of princesses I would’ve felt like one.
I wasn’t really supposed to be doing the twirling at all. Once I had done it in the park on a class walk and I was given a good swat right there in the park and then a full spanking back in the school, my skirts lifted and all. Aunt Gertrude is wretchedly cruel. She called me a tiny temptress trying to lure attention and eyes to me with my sinful dancing. I sobbed so hard I vomited a little onto her skirts which earned me an extra two blows.
But twirling about felt so lovely and relaxing that I kept doing it in spite of her, keeping it in secret instead.
Virginia
Starting in the Vidala School at age five, the same age that I lost my short skirts, the only bright spot of my very first day was meeting and being with Virginia. She was sitting in the room already and Aunt Debbie sat us next to each other. Suddenly I was wishing to run back outside and beg Mother to take me home. But our car had already pulled away and I watched it pass through the gates while Virginia chatted happily next to me. I finally snapped back to reality when she started waving her hand in my face. I apologized and she made the joke that she’s glad I didn’t go to Heaven on her, she didn’t want to lose a friend so quickly. We shared a laugh and I immediately felt at ease again.
As we spent the day learning the very basics of knitting, we were allowed to chat quietly and sit in small groups around the room. Aunt Gertrude only teaches the older girls, the youngest girls work with a different Aunt, Aunt Betty. She was an absolute peach, allowing us relax a lot more than we would be allowed when we were older. So we spent the whole day and then the whole of our first years at the Vidala School talking endlessly together.
She was a very chatty girl, often getting us a scolding for disrupting the lectures Aunt Betty would give with our laughter. I didn’t really mind much though, I was happy to be able to talk with her. She was bright and spirited in a way that I just wasn’t. Next to her I felt like a tiny dim star next to the brightest one in the sky. But she lent me her own shine and lifted my spirits greatly.
Mother wasn’t the happiest that I was friends with Dr. Dare’s daughter. She felt he was a bit low class and she disliked him and his whole family. Papa was a very high ranking Commander and she felt it was beneath me to socialize with a mere doctor’s daughter. I never understood that thought process, Dr. Dare was never anything but kind and friendly to me. And his daughter was just like him, very lovely and sweet. She was very friendly with me and every other girl in our school. Though she was known to be a bit of a wild girl, and she definitely was, but she was very kind.
She really was wild and that got her into plenty of trouble. She was curious, asking too many questions and not accepting half-answers. She was rowdy and had too much energy, never sitting still. She was sassy, talking back and making faces. She was this, she was that, she was everything it was bad for a girl to be.
I would learn when I got older that boys were allowed to be all of those things and it was perfectly fine. Just not for girls.
Virginia was my very best friend for many years, my sole companion for half of my life. I was like her other half and she was like mine. I was quiet to her loud, soft to her rough, meek to her bold, anxious to her brave. We were like two halves of a whole girl and we were attached at the hip.
And the came the day that something very strange happened in our Vidala School. Something that had never happened before in our area of Gilead.
We got a new student.
Grace
I still remember it like it was yesterday.
“Girls! I have a special announcement. We have been blessed with a new incoming student. Please make her feel welcome and help her catch up with the class. This is Grace, please welcome her girls,” Aunt Gertrude monologued to us early one spring morning.
It must’ve been early spring because I remember I had only just gotten my pink dresses out again. They still smelled very faintly of mothballs despite them being cleaned before I was allowed to switch to them. I was so happy though because I adored my pink dresses. Pink was my favorite color back then and the first day of spring was my favorite day of the year because I could finally switch to my pink dresses again.
While I was sitting in the classroom feeling a bit of sinful pride in my looks, Aunt Debbie guides in a tiny slip of a girl wearing a pink dress at least a size too big for her and staring at her feet. She looked like she hoped that the longer she stared at the floor, the more likely it was that it might decide to open and swallow her up. Under her cap was a shock of bright orange hair that I just couldn’t keep my eyes off of. While my shyness kept my feet rooted to the floor, Virginia skipped right over to her and welcomed her into the class. Aunt Debbie decided she was in capable hands and allowed Virginia to guide her back over to where we were sitting by the window. She dragged a chair over and the new girl silently sat down, chewing on her lips.
“H-hello Grace. I’m Victoria.”
“Nice to meet you...”
Virginia chatted along happily as we did our embroidery that day. Grace said almost nothing the entire day. She knew her stitching decently well, surely she had must moved here from somewhere else, from another place in Gilead and another Vidala School. I chanced to ask her about where she was from during lunch.
We were given a hearty vegetable soup and thick slices of bread with applesauce for dessert and milk, milk for every meal. It was very simple but it was quite delicious and it was one of my favorite lunches, probably part of why I even remember what we ate that day. While Virginia noisily slurped down her soup, same as always, Grace was just picking and nibbling and sipping at her meal.
Mumbling slightly for I was rather nervous, I started asking Grace more about herself.
“It’s not often that we get new girls around here. May I ask where your family moved from?”
I didn’t mean to upset her but she cringed at my question. She took a deep breath and then gave me what I now recognize as a very rehearsed response.
In almost a monotone, Grace replied, “I’ve been saved and adopted by my loving family. I’m very grateful to Commander and Mother for taking me into their family.”
Now before this, I had never heard of adoption before. I only knew that mothers had babies and that was it. So I had many questions for her after that. Virginia did too, behaving quite rudely by asking her questions despite her full mouth.
Grace absolutely refused to answer a single question, keeping her mouth shut and only repeating that she was grateful to be saved.
She never did explain what she was saved from.
Now that I know, I’m not sure if I prefer my prior ignorance or not.
Mother
Mother was a lovely woman, very beautiful in features. Though vanity was highly discouraged, nothing could really quash this innate sense of vanity we developed as we grew. I knew that Mother was a beautiful woman because she had smooth pale skin, icy blue eyes, and pale golden hair. As I became a young girl and grew conscious of my body, I found many questions about myself. Sure, I had similar pale skin to my mother, but my hair was thick and dark brown and my eyes were widow black! Starkly different from the icy, silvery blue of Mother’s eyes.
I felt those eyes on my back constantly. There were always eyes upon me, not just Mother’s. There were symbols of the Eyes everywhere around me, both within and without my home. Not just symbolically was I being watched either. Gloria was one of our Marthas who was tasked by Mother to act as my Governess. When I was not at school, I was always with her. She accompanied me to and from school, though she left me in the care of the Aunts there, and every other time I was taken anywhere in the car. She even had a bed in my room! Apparently her belongings and another bed for her were up in the room the Marthas shared in the attic but Mother wanted her to keep watch over me while I slept. This started when I was a baby and simply never ceased.
Being watched was something constant in my life. I can’t remember a single moment I was left alone that wasn’t when I was in a bathroom.

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Boundary Stomps 24

Boundary Stomps 24

Summary

Disclaimer

On with the show.

Late to everything

Canceling plans at last minute (malicious compliance)

Stealing Easter Eggs from Children

Destroying your Non-Stick Pans

Fishing for compliments - manipulation - reduction to absurdity - self deprecation

Doesn't believe in vaccines

Calling you Gay

Competition

Parenting Decisions

Call the police on you for kidnapping their 21 year old son

Need Just NO to do something so they start a fight and leave

Religion

Not Really Family

I just pretend to go along when people are talking, and then just do whatever I want

Unwanted Intimate Advice

You can't draw too

You can't go to gifted school, because your Cousin wasn't accepted

Photoshopping my kids for Facebook

Stealing School Lunches, raiding the food bank

Putting your number on Craigslist

You must be exorcised

Stealing your creative ideas

[No Spoilers] More fanfic, this time from the perspective of a born and raised Gilead Girl. Also unfinished.

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