My family is from what I would say is a middle-ish class background from the north of England. Both my dad and uncle went through comprehensive school education during the 1960s and 1970s. My uncle proved to have a talent in science through secondary school and so later applied for multiple universities around the country, including Oxford.
Oxford University is well known as one of the top-notch elite universities and so quite well-to-do and posh, actually snobby. Oxford University turned him down. They considered comprehensive school education as not good enough. It was not grammar or private school education, and they were pretty explicit about it at the time.
Roll on to the 1990s. My uncle is now one of the foremost experts in his field and is a highly respected scientist. At the time he was working for a research establishment over in the USA, and it is now 1993 or 1994. He receives a letter from, wouldnāt you know, Oxford University.
This time, instead of dismissing his comprehensive school education, they are offering for him to come over for a job interview. He accepts but points out that heās in America, so the prestigious university offered to fly him over on Concorde. They roll out the red carpet to really butter him up.
My dad picks him up from the airport, and to my dadās horror my uncle is in his best Iām-relaxed gear. A shirt that is dirty, shorts, and flip-flops, rocking his usual scruffy beard. Really no job interview worthy at all. My dad thought that because heās going for this high-end Oxford University job interview he would at least put on his best suit.
After all, the university was trying to poach him back to the UK, not looking like he just walked off a beach in the Gulf of Mexico to grab a drink at the bar. So my dad drops my uncle off and waits in the car park. One hour later my uncle reappears, gets in the car, and asks to be taken to the airport.
My dad asks him how it went, expecting to have been there longer in the car park waiting for him. āThey offered me the job but I turned it down. I told them that I wasnāt good enough for you when I was 18 and they are not good enough for me now.ā The university was also paying for his Concorde flight home again.
Iām a 30-year-old man and have a sister who is two years older than me. My relationship with my family is quite strained, mostly because during my birth my mother had a lot of complications that led to her almost dying. I was also a weak baby, which meant my parents had to spend a lot of money on me to make sure that I survived.
While in most families this would mean that the kid would grow up spoiled and loved, for me it meant that I would grow up always being told how I almost killed my own mother and how because my parents spent so much money on me my sister could not go to a good school. I would not say that my parents directly abused me. They mostly treated me as a burden though.
When I was young and used to make demands for toys and treats like any other kid in the world, my mom would start screaming about how I have not had enough of sucking them dry. At first I didnāt understand what she meant, but it always hurt to hear it. As I grew up I slowly understood her words and stopped making any demands.
My dad would also never stop my mom, not because he agreed with her or anything. Maybe he did, but he never said anything outright. No, it was because my parentsā relationship also got strained after my birth because my mom was told to not have any sexual intercourse for a long time, which led to my father cheating on her.
Be it because she blamed me for not being able to go to an expensive school or be it because our parents could not spoil her after my birth, whatever the reason was, she has never shown me any kind of sibling love or affection. As I said earlier, then she told me about our parentsā internal matters.
I want to also add that she told me all this when I was 12. I remember that I had asked for a birthday party because all my classmates had one and I went to many of their birthday parties too. It turned out one of the parents was the one my dad had an affair with, and when she arrived it made everything super tense.
I had no idea about any of this and was just happy to have a birthday party, but my sister pulled me aside just before I could cut my cake and told me quite rudely that, and I quote, āYouāre the reason Mom and Dad could not f*** after you were born and Dad went to sleep with that w****. Hope youāre happy.ā
I cut that cake barely holding in my tears and never asked for a party ever again. Hell, I never even celebrated my birthday until much later when I was in college and surrounded by friends who actually cared for me. That night was the first time my mom threw a vase at my head that missed by a few inches, but it was enough to scare me.
My dad also cursed at me and blamed me for his infidelity, saying how I made my mom useless. My sister on the other hand seemed to be enjoying all of this, because when I was crying alone in a corner in the bathroom she came over and told me that now I feel how she had felt when all the attention was on me and not on her.
All this, the trauma of being told something like this about your parents on your birthday, being almost physically hurt by your mom, being verbally abused by your father, all this happened because my older sister was jealous of the attention a weak baby got for barely a year. I made myself scars after that, only concentrated on getting my education and going through community college.
Before I met people who genuinely liked me I barely came home then, opting to instead stay at my friendās house whose parents treated me more like their son than my parents ever had. Of course my parents never even noticed that I was gone for days on end, and they were more concentrated on matching my sister with a wealthy man so she can live the life she was meant to and that I ruined.
As college came to an end my friends helped me move out. None of my parents even cared. Obviously my sister was the only one screaming how I also get everything on a silver platter. Apparently the wealthy man she was going on a date with broke up with her, and now as always she was blaming me for what went wrong in her life.
It hurt of course, but I was used to it. I got into an apartment that I shared with two of my other friends and rarely reached out to my parents anymore. When they made no effort to contact me I also stopped trying to do the same. I got an internship at a rather good place, and Iāve always had a knack for socializing.
It helped me build connections and talk to important people, and two years after leaving college I got promoted to assistant manager. It was a rather well-paying position at a reputed business. I still lived with my friends because we all wanted to save money, but after three more years of working we finally decided to get our own place.
It was surreal for me. I have not had contact with my parents for almost four years, and these were the best four years of my life. We went hunting for a nice, comfortable but also affordable house, driving my friendās car and making jokes about how we were finally adults making adult decisions.
Iāve never been so nervous, excited, and happy in my life than I was in those days of searching for a house. I eventually found one, and so did my friends. Mine was in the corner of the city but it was close to my place of work. The rent here was cheaper and the markets were further away, but it was peaceful and had amazing scenery.
It was a three-bedroom manufactured home that had most of the necessary furniture. It was not huge by any means, but I did not need anything big either. I was not in contact with my parents or my sister, so I could tell this to anyone, but one day I came across one of my cousins.
She was visiting the city and we had not met in a decade, so we went for a coffee and discussed about our lives. Nothing in depth, but I think she got the gist because my parents have never been shy in showing how much they donāt like me, and my sister had always been very vocal in telling everyone how much of a curse I was.
Anyway, I thought it was nice to catch up with at least one of my relatives until I suddenly got a call from my father. And instead of being happy or excited about it, I was full of dread. It was not a coincidence that I told my cousin about my house three days ago and now my father was calling me.
So I did not pick up the call, and after I dropped off I called my cousin. She said she had not told anyone but her parents, her parents who were notorious for gossiping about others. She apologized for her mistake, so I told her what was done was done but to please not tell any of our other family members anything about me.
Days following that I got many calls from my father, two from my mom, but nothing from my sister. I ignored every one of them until I decided to change my number. My work number was a different one, so there was no issue in changing my current number. I informed only my close friends about my number change and why I did it.
All of them offered to come and stay with me if I was feeling unsafe. They had already done so much for me that I didnāt want to bother them again. I told them that I already had their contacts on the SOS of my phone, so if something actually happened to me I would send the signal.
It got quiet for some time until I suddenly saw my father hanging around my place of work. I slipped into the building quietly and asked the guard how long my father had been there. He replied about an hour, and I requested him to please tell me if he entered the building.
The guard understood my request and told me that I was safe as long as I was in the building, but I could not be in the building all day. So when I left I tried to do so very sneakily, but still somehow my father spotted me. Not wanting to have him follow me home, I made my way to a small pub whose owner I knew quite well and who was also somewhat aware of my family situation.
I knew it would be the safest place for me. As expected though, my father followed me to the pub, and after waiting for half an hour he approached me. I pretended to be surprised and asked what he was doing there, to which he rather angrily replied that he was there because I was not picking up my phone.
I told him it was because I had lost my phone and got a new one. I did get a new one, but it was a gift from my friends. He told me to give him his number, to which I asked him why he needed it. It was not like he ever called. He started to get angry again, but the owner of the pub had come over to make sure I was okay and he gave my father a nasty glare.
It made him grit his teeth, and he lowly said that he needed to talk to me. I said we could talk right here, seeing how I had no intention of moving from this pub. My father told me that my sister was pregnant. I was shocked by the news because I thought she could find the wealthy man of her dreams.
He then told me that she was pregnant with her second child, which again shocked me. I congratulated him, but instead of being happy his face soured and he murmured something about bastard children. I asked again why he was here, and to that he said that my sister needed a place to raise her children and their house was just not big enough for that.
I pointed out that it was big enough after I left, which made my father glare at me. While I was still not a completely healed person from my experiences, I had at least learned to not show panic or fear on my face even when I felt it. So I held his glare and told him that if it was not big enough she could move in with her childrenās father.
He then snapped and told me that they did not know who the fathers were. Now that was the most surprising piece of information, and while I wanted to know more I did not want to step into that kind of mud. So I told him that there were many places they could check out and buy.
My father then looked at me offended and said why should they check out any other place when I already had one. And there was the reason he sought me out after four years of no contact and two decades of neglect. Having had enough of him and my other so-called family members, I put my phone on record and told him clearly that my house was my own and I was not going to give it to anyone.
He stood up and got up in my space, to which I warned him that people in this pub care more for me than he ever did, and if he tried anything they would not hesitate to throw him out at best or beat him up at worst. This made him look around and sit back on his chair.
I kept a poker face as I told him to never contact me ever again, and if any of my family members ever tried to visit my house I would call the police on them. I left after that and made sure my father was not following me before going back to my home. I told my friends about this encounter, and they all told me to report the incident to the police.
But there was not anything to report for now, so I told them that I would wait and see. In the meantime I had CCTV cameras installed for added security and even had voice recorders placed on the entrance. One week went by without much happening until on the weekend someone knocked on my door.
I looked through the viewer to see my very pregnant sister standing there with my mother, who was continuously knocking on my door. I made sure the device was recording before loudly asking them to go away and never bother me again. At this my mother laughed and said that how she wished that she could have taught me this when I was born.
I was kind of shocked by her insensitivity but quickly came back to my senses when my sister banged loudly at the door and threatened that she would break it down if I did not open it. I called the police in a low voice and told them what was happening. I also called my friend and told him the same.
My mother started kicking the door, and I asked if my father had not told them what would happen if anyone tried to visit me. My sister laughed and screamed how I owed them for my life and I should stop being a little b**** and finally pay them back. I told her that she could take her payment from the fathers of her children.
This angered her and she started loudly banging on the door again. My mom told her to stop because it might harm the child and shouted at me that I was a leech and she should have never birthed me. I said that if she hated me so much why was she here now, to which my sister said that I owed her and my nephews a place for growing because I am the reason that she could not find a good rich husband.
Feeling irked by her constant blame, I told her it was not me who opened her legs for anonymous men, just like how it was not me who made our father screw another woman. This made both of them scream curses at me while practically throwing themselves at the door, but thankfully I heard the police sirens coming closer and told them I would make sure they were put behind bars for pulling this off.
My mom shouted how I was not fulfilling my duty as a brother and an uncle and how my sister deserved this house more because she actually had a family unlike me who was without one and would be without one if I continued to be such a jerk. I told her that Iāve never had a sister or a mother or a father and that my non-existent family was much better than a cheating father, an abusive mother, and a toxic good-for-nothing sister.
In that moment I was so angry by everything these people have done to me, and I felt so safe because of the police that I blurted out every hateful thing Iāve ever thought, and damn did it feel good to do that. Before they could retort, police came up to the door and pulled them aside.
Only when they asked me to come out did I unlock the door and found the two arguing with the police officers. I also saw my father standing on the road next to his car, but he made no attempt to talk to me or them. The police then questioned me, and I told them I had everything on the cameras and recorder, which made my mother pale.
But my sister was still acting like a brat and telling the officer how they had no right to interfere in a personal matter. She then tried to reach for me, and when a female officer pulled her my sister started screaming how the officers were beating her up and trying to kill her child.
The female officer was not bothered by this childish display at all and cuffed my sister, who then stopped screaming and instead started threatening the officers that she would have their licenses revoked. She was detained along with my mother, and after I presented my evidence and my side of the story I was free to go.
Long story short, they were in massive trouble and my sister gave birth in custody. I heard that my mother and my sister moved into my maternal grandparentsā house in another city later on, but my father did not go with them. Last I heard from my cousin he had filed for a divorce.
I never heard about them or tried to investigate about them after that. Iām still living alone in my house though Iām seeing someone as of recent, and I hope to never cross paths with them ever again.
Iām a middle-aged woman living in Malaysia with my husband and our teenage son. We have always lived here as both of us were born and raised in a small town where we met and fell in love. We got married after being together for nearly ten years, and it was one of the best days of my life besides the day my son was born, of course.
My husband Ahad does coding for a web development company, and I got to be honest when I say I donāt entirely understand what he does, just that he enjoys it. I am a stay-at-home mom, but now that our son Amir is older Iāve started helping out in the community more and volunteering when I can to keep busy.
Amir works some days after school at a convenience store near our house in order to save up some money to use when he goes off to school in a few years. When we moved into our house all those years ago we had been so happy to find a comfortable place that was close to everything we might need.
We were new to living on our own and not in a cramped apartment that we shared with a couple of other people, so there were some aspects that felt completely new to us, like tending to the property and keeping the appliances up to date. Many of our neighbors were friendly and helped us learn the ropes, making sure to tell us the best businesses in the area for anything we might need in the future.
One of the hardest things about moving is having to find new favorite restaurants or which plumbers and mechanics are the best. We had moved when Amir was nine, so we were grateful to hear about different parks and after-school activities in the area for him to participate in.
The house we moved into was beautiful and perfect for us. It was just enough space for each of us to do our own thing, but there was not so much that rooms did not get used at all. We had a nice little yard that I had planted flowers throughout, and none of the houses in the neighborhood had fences.
It was a pretty friendly area to live in and was known for being a safe place to live. Amir biked to school most days and sometimes stayed out with his friends until later in the evening, but we did not worry about him getting into trouble as he always came right home and went out with friends whenever possible.
We moved in and quickly found that the people in the house next door were less than friendly. It was mostly the woman that lived there. She was around my age and seemed to have an issue with everything that we did, while her husband and daughter did not seem to pay us any mind.
I will call her Karen since she always found a way to act like one. She saw us moving in and stood while crossing her arms instead of greeting us the way a normal person would. We said hello to her, and she mumbled something about boys being disruptive, quietly enough that she probably thought I did not hear her.
I ignored her because I knew my son was polite and respectful, so I did not need to worry about her thoughts on how boys tend to act. Clearly our relationship did not get off to a good start, and itās definitely not my fault. They got a puppy at one point, and I love dogs, but they did very little in the way of training him.
They let him wander around freely outside, something that is irresponsible and dangerous in my opinion, which meant that he often wandered into our yard where he would poop on our property and dig up my flowers. Karen never picked up after him, so I was always cleaning up dog poop myself, and I had many plants die because they were destroyed by him.
I complained a few times, but she never made an effort to stop him, so I eventually dropped it because I realized that nothing I said was going to get her to make her take responsibility. Whenever the daughter took him out I saw that she cleaned up after him, so I had to believe it was only Karen who was so irresponsible.
She hated it when we left our cars in the driveway instead of in the garage because she says it looks bad. Iāve never been able to get her to elaborate any more than that, and I started parking more in the driveway just to spite her. She loved to complain about my son leaving his bike out as well, which is pointless since he kept it on our property and he would lean it up against the side of the house where it cannot be easily seen.
I was cleaning up one morning and Amir came in looking distressed. I asked him what was wrong, and he told me that he couldnāt find his bike anywhere. He had left it in his usual spot but it wasnāt there, so he looked in the garage and different parts of the house but still found no sign of it.
I eventually drove him to school because he had no other way to get around, and I returned home to finish up my chores. Amir texted me to say he was getting a ride with a friend, so I didnāt need to pick him up, and soon after that I heard a knock on the door.
I opened it to find Karenās daughter Nadia standing on the other side with my sonās bike next to her. She explained that she had come home from school and found it in their garage. She was not sure how it got there, but she thought it would be best to return it, which she did.
I thanked her and let her go home while I stood confused before ultimately realizing that Karen had stolen it after growing tired of it sitting around outside. I decided not to confront her about it and instead told my son to start storing it in the garage to avoid future problems.
A lot of our lives in the neighborhood revolved around doing things to make Karen more comfortable, which proved to be an impossible task. She was always complaining about my husband leaving for work early or my son arriving home late at night. She had convinced herself that Amir was doing drugs or was involved in some sort of gang, even though there was no evidence that would point to that.
When he was outside kicking a ball around or playing with some of his friends she could often be seen staring out her window or standing in her yard with her arms crossed. There was more than one occasion where she approached them and demanded to know what they were up to. Usually they were playing some type of sport or sharing funny videos with each other the way most teenagers do, but Karen was always convinced that they were up to something.
Some of his friends would stay over into the evening and have dinner with us, and Karen was known to come to the door and demand that they go home because she could not believe that some teenage boys could hang out without causing trouble. She clearly had a lot of issues.
Amir and Nadia actually became friends at one point because they ended up having some classes together and found it convenient to study with each other when they lived right next door. I was happy that they were getting close because she is an intelligent and kind girl, and having a friend so close by was fun for him.
He assured me on more than one occasion that they were just friends and had no interest in each other romantically. I didnāt really care either way, but I knew that Karen would throw a fit if she heard that my son and her daughter were dating. As it stood she hated that they were merely friends, and she was convinced that Amir was a bad influence on her precious little angel.
That pissed me off because I love my son and I know he is a good kid. She always found a way to belittle my family for no good reason just because she did not like us. There were a few times when Amir and Nadia would be studying in the living room and Karen would knock on the door and demand to know where her daughter was.
She probably thought they were getting up to something in his room and seemed surprised when I led her to the living room where they had textbooks and paper spread out over the couch. She wasnāt a type to admit her mistake and instead convinced Nadia to come home with her even though they were not even finished studying.
I think Karen was jealous of our house, but Iām not sure why since it was not much different than hers. Amir told us one time that Nadia had been complaining about how dirty their house was, especially compared to our place. She mentioned that her mother had a habit of not cleaning up, so the only tidy place in the house was her own room.
I wondered if that had anything to do with Karenās jealousy. Maybe after seeing how nice I kept the interior she felt embarrassed and took it out on me. I have no clue if that is true because sheās not exactly open about why she dislikes us, but itās the best theory that I have.
She would ask if she could host parties at our house, and I declined as I didnāt want her on my property, especially if she would have the ability to destroy my house in any way. She moved on from that to demanding that we put our house up for sale so that she could buy it.
Even if we were to sell our house there would be no guarantee that she would be able to get it, and we were not planning on moving anytime soon. I told her that, and she just kept saying that we would be happier somewhere else, but it seemed like she was the one who wanted us gone.
We were content to stay where we were for years to come, and nothing she said would change our minds. There was one evening not too long ago when Ahad and I went to bed early because we were both ridiculously tired. Amir was still out, but it was the weekend so we were letting him stay out later than usual, and we trusted that he was being safe.
I woke up slightly at one point when I heard some yelling and banging outside, and I turned over in bed with a sigh, assuming that my son had just gotten home and was making a bit of noise outside. I made a mental note to have a talk with him in the morning and went back to sleep.
It was only a few minutes later that I heard someone yelling and sat up in bed when I recognized Amirās voice. The next thing I noticed was the heavy smell of smoke in the air and heat radiating from the first floor of the house. My husband woke up beside me, and both of us rushed downstairs toward the front door and the sound of our son.
He was standing just outside the house yelling at us with his phone in one hand, and he quickly explained that he returned home to find flames burning in the living room and called emergency services. The sound of sirens began to move closer to our house, and some of our neighbors began stepping outside to see what was going on.
Karen stood on her front lawn with a look of barely contained excitement on her face, and I couldnāt help but be a little bit suspicious of that. A fire truck and ambulance arrived, the latter parking in front of Karenās property to allow the firefighters to have better access to our house.
They immediately started putting out the fire, and I said a silent prayer that our house would not suffer too much damage from it. The paramedics came over to look us over. We had received a number of burns in our attempt to get out of the house, and the medics were worried about the amount of smoke we may have inhaled before making it outside, so they spent a good amount of time looking us over.
We were definitely in shock a little bit, and Amir was nervously pacing on the lawn. At one point I saw Nadia come outside and approach him, asking him if he was all right and generally comforting him, which drastically changed Karenās mood. The firefighters were doing pretty well in terms of putting out the fire, and I was hopeful that we wouldnāt lose too many of our belongings or need to replace any furniture, although that might have been wishful thinking.
Karen started yelling about something, and I was not really ready paying attention at first since I had other things on my mind, but I tuned in when the paramedic treating me turned around to say something back to her. She was telling them to move the ambulance and the fire truck so it was not in front of her property, saying that they did not have a legal right to park there.
Obviously she got a response that they could indeed park there because it was an emergency situation and they were not blocking the driveway. Karen did not want to back down and kept insisting that they needed to move, but she was eventually ignored as they were more focused on me and Ahad, making sure that our injuries were surface level.
She stormed back inside, and I was thankful for the silence that followed, but it only lasted a few minutes as the sound of thumping and banging came from behind us. We all got up to see what was happening and saw Karen smashing up the ambulance and fire truck with a crowbar like a maniac.
She smashed multiple windows and created huge scratches and dents in the sides of the vehicles as well as punctured the tires and made it impossible for the paramedics and firemen to leave. They yelled at her to stop, but she was not listening. Obviously these people did not know what she was capable of, so they called the police instead of approaching her further.
It did not take long for them to arrive and pull Karen away from the ambulance and fire truck as they slapped handcuffs on her and made her sit on the pavement in front of her house. At that point the firefighters had put out the fire and examined the area around our house.
They told us that one of the windows on the first floor had been smashed like something was thrown through it. They also found a burnt rag that was soaked in some kind of alcohol and that was likely the source of the fire. We were surprised because my husband and I donāt drink, so thereās no way the fire could have been started by us.
They started to ask if we had any enemies or someone who might want to hurt us, and I told them we did not get along with Karen and that she had been pressuring us to move out recently. Her husband let them look through their home, and they found a lighter sitting out as well as a website open on Karenās laptop that detailed flammable substances.
All signs pointed to her being the one who started the fire, and they tacked it onto the vandalism charge she was already facing. She is definitely looking at a couple of years of prison time at least, as well as some hefty fines. Her husband is working on filing for divorce, and I do feel bad for him and Nadia.
Karen is not going to be a problem for us again, and I donāt feel bad about that. We did have to replace some of our furniture by the way, but our insurance covered a good amount of the expenses, which was a relief. The burns we suffered were minimal and healed fairly quickly, so my family is doing well, especially now that Karen is out of the picture.