We all have secrets we keep close to our chests, whether it’s a guilty pleasure or a deep-seated fear. But what happens when someone close to us thinks they’re keeping a secret from us, when in fact, we already know? It’s a strange feeling like you’re in on a private joke that no one else is aware of. You become the silent observer, watching as they go about their lives, believing they’re the only ones who know the truth. It can be a strange and sometimes uncomfortable position to be in, but it can also be an opportunity for empathy and understanding. In this article, we’ll share stories of the silent observers, those who knew a secret all along, including cute surprises and heartwarming moments, and how they navigated this unique position. So sit back, grab a cup of coffee, and join us on this journey of secrets and self-discovery.
My current SO told my best friends (and mutual friends of us both) that she was planning on kicking me out of our apartment because she wants to live with one of them and that she also wants to start dating the other one when she kicked me out. Thankfully they warned me months back and so I’ve been stashing money and preparing to move out myself along with their help.
On his nights off, he sneaks into our daughter’s room to watch her sleep and sings her back to sleep during a bad dream. He doesn’t get to see her much between working 6 days a week and my stepson running him ragged on weekends. He misses a lot of her activities because of his sleep schedule for work and feels like he’s an awful parent because he feels like he’s missing everything.
He’s such a good daddy. She adores him. I don’t tell him but I know sometimes she sneaks into our room during her naps and snuggles up with him. He lets her sleep for a bit then tries to be sneaky and carries her back to her room.
My girlfriend claims she doesn’t fart. In the 3 years we’ve been together she has never farted in front of me. I can admire the commitment to trying to keep up with the claim. However, she probably thinks I can’t hear the thunder that reverberates from the toilet bowl when she’s on it, which makes me forcibly push air out of my nose when I hear it… but, she will never know that I know and hear it every.. single.. day.
Not a bad thing IMO, but I know my girlfriend had a relatively serious eating disorder when she was younger, causing her to (temporarily) drop out of college and go to rehab a few states away.
The weird this is, she’s completely open about the fact that she went to rehab, she just claims she was there for hard drug abuse, like heroin, coke, etc.
I don’t claim to know whether drug abuse is “worse” than an eating disorder or vice-versa; in fact, I don’t really know much about the latter at all. Still, it’s a weird-if-harmless explanation, so I’ll let her come out with it on her own terms if she chooses.
My wife sneaks exactly one cookie at a time from the tin of “special” cookies that she always refuses when offered to her. She won’t take any of the last few cookies in a layer because it would be too conspicuous, so I never leave only a few in a layer. She doesn’t treat herself often enough and if this is how she’s able to do it, fine.
He vapes; I quit smoking when we got together and he’s never smoked, but all of his friends are on this hipster vaping trend and I found bottles of the flavour for it (all his favourite flavours) while I was putting away his laundry.
I’m pretty sure he’s keeping it a secret from me because the one time he bought a vape home I didn’t let him use it in the house, but as I explained to him repeatedly I only vetoed it because him doing it in the living room triggered my cigarette cravings. I told him I had no dramas at all with him doing it outside!
It doesn’t bother me, I just think it’s kinda sweet that he’s kept it a secret!
My bf loves to look up shoes for good deals and I always browse with him. When it was my birth month he would ask for my size and such and be all “curious” but would say he was just wondering what the prices are. A box came to my front office and he told me to pick it up since he didn’t want the office to be closed before he got home. He ALWAYS lets me open his packages and so I did with this and saw a pair of shoes in my size haha I taped it up so fast and he came home without a clue. I looked completely surprised the day of my birthday and he was super happy about it so I just never bring it up. He tells me everything so this is about as saucy as it gets.
My now fiancé had my engagement ring hidden for almost 3 years. We picked it out together and he wasn’t good at hiding that he bought it. He also wasn’t good at hiding it because, during one of our moves, he hid it in one of my boxes… I told him I knew he had it once he proposed and he was so upset but it was really cute. He tried so hard to hide it but he really can’t keep a secret.
Not me but my best friend’s boyfriend (now ex) had hidden cameras that were made to look like USB adaptors all over their house. In the bathroom, bedroom, kitchen, etc. She knew about them for a few months before HE broke up with HER.
He finally admitted he had cameras placed around the house when she and I were getting her clothes and some necessary stuff out of the house after he kicked her out. We found some male enhancement pills of his and were laughing about it. 5 minutes later she gets a text message from him telling her not to go through his stuff and admitting that he can see everything we are doing… which we already knew.
My mother had been making my father a particular dish for years, believing it is his favorite. The truth is, he doesn’t care for it at all but happily eats it every time because he loves my mother.
She has guns and MREs buried in the forest, and in a couple of locations in the US including Yellowstone. Every five years, she takes a road trip with the ‘girls’. She also has a false shelf in her apt with a shotgun hidden inside.
I learned about this because I was watching one of those youtube videos about secret rooms and hidden furniture and it clicked when I saw the shelves. I checked it and when I opened it, there it was. Then I checked her computer and found nothing. But after snooping around enough, I found a go bag, with a revolver, ammo, MREs, medical supplies, a medical stapler, other things, a few paper maps, and marking locations. One of those places was nearby enough, 30 miles, so I decided to check it myself. It was a buried hard case about four feet deep, that had a revolver, Ammo, and what seems like a bucket of rations, about 400 dollars. Plus ten 1oz silver coins. Everything was vacuum sealed, and I think all the locations have the exact same stuff.
Hard to imagine, but all in all there are 7 locations marked. I’ve never brought it up, but now every once in a while I notice that she has things hidden all over her apt. Like I was going to change a light switch that was sort of not working properly. And I find a key in a thin plastic container. I googled around and it’s a safety deposit box key for a bank in the middle of nowhere Michigan.
Like what am I supposed to say to her? Are you James bond’s daughter? Jason born’s sister? Is Skynet hunting you?
My mom has no idea that I know her first husband cheated on her with her sister. My dad is the one who told me that and got her to reconcile with my aunt. I don’t think my mom ever wanted me to know that. And I’m definitely never gonna bring that up.
She said Girl Scout S’more cookies were sold out, but she actually hid them behind the baking supplies because they’re on a top shelf in a low cabinet because I’m tall and can’t easily see there unless I’m digging for baking supplies (rare).
It’s ok, though, because I secretly bought several boxes, too, and put them on top of the kitchen cabinets since she’s short and can’t see/reach.
My mum thinks that I don’t know about how much she suffered with my dad.
My dad had kept a lot of my mum’s all diaries I was told to throw them out but instead kept them and read them when I discovered that not a single one of us children that she had with my dad was from consent…
And that every night that we would have been conceived was the worst one… My other siblings have absolutely no clue but thanks to reading diaries, I know a lot of what she suffered but she strongly believes that she’s hiding everything from me so that ask kids didn’t have to see her as weak or as a bad mum.
But after reading everything she’s gone through and she’s still a loving person who would do anything for her children I could never think of her as weak or as a bad mum.
My wife of 15 years (together for 19) has a ‘secret’ savings account. Her family has some bad luck with marriage, and she was really slow to marry me because she didn’t want to be ‘trapped’.
So she saved up several months’ worth of living expenses. She hasn’t really touched it since and has never mentioned it to me. It’s the only account with statements emailed directly to her, rather than an email we both access.
It’s absolutely there so that she could if needed, leave. It’s not a fortune by any means but could keep her afloat for 3-4 months. I tried to gently bring it up once, as a hypothetical, and she flat out denied it (in a ‘doth protest too much’ kind of way). I told her it would be ok with me either way.
Truth is, I really don’t mind. It makes her feel better, and we’ve built a fantastic life together. I know she views it more as an insurance policy than anything else, and figure if we ever really do need the money we’ll cross that bridge then.
Plus I suppose she’s still married to me because she wants to be, not because she has to be.
My brother-in-law, apparently has a whole second family in another country, they are in a complicated legal situation for the moment, they are trying to keep this a secret but I know every single juicy detail, and I pretend to not know anything.
I have a friend from high school whose mother is my older sister. I lived with my mom growing up and when I would see baby pictures of me, most of them were with an older girl. I asked my mom who was she and she never answered that. I asked my dad and he told me that was my older sister who moved with him until she was 19. She was a teen parent at 15 and my mom forced her to leave but my dad divorced my mother to take care of my older sister until she got herself together.
My friend is 2 years younger than me and one day introduced me to his mother when I was 18. I saw pictures on their dinner table that were the exact same ones I had and I said to my friend “Hey! That looks very similar to me.” his mom looked at me and asked my name. I said my name and she broke down into tears. It was an awkward day but I found out that I’m an uncle to a 16-year-old (now he’s 17) although I and my wife (when we are just boyfriend and girlfriend) weren’t even 20. I hang out with both my older sister and my nephew a lot. Never told my mother about this and I don’t plan to for a while.
A long-time friend was cheating on her husband. she was telling me ‘he doesn’t pay attention to me,’ and ‘he’s too busy with school’ as a justification for leaving him. when I asked if there was another dude, she said no, and seemed appalled that I’d suggest it. but you don’t leave your husband after nine years and a kid for no reason, so it was clear to me there was another dude. Sh*t doesn’t happen in a vacuum.
during this time, I called her on her cell one day and she told me she was grocery shopping and would call me back; she ‘hung up,’ but (apparently) had a burner connected to her Bluetooth in the car, so after she ‘hung up,’ i was treated to hearing her cajole him into meeting her for some tasty boning because “my husband is out of town”. clearly, she was talking to a dude on Bluetooth, and since I’d called her actual number, there was no question a burner was connected.
I eavesdropped for a few minutes then disconnected in disgust. the next day, it was “so, anything to tell me?”
“What are you talking about?”
it’s been eight years and she still hasn’t figured out that I heard her. (she is divorced and married to the dude she denied existed, ftr.) she legit still tries to pretend she met the dude post-divorce.
My dad was an alcoholic who started doing crack with a guy from work when I was nine then left us after telling my mom out of the blue that he didn’t love her anymore. I’ve always known this. My mom told me. A few years ago though, I found out my mom had drunkenly cheated on him at a party before that and he knew. And that she had also had some flirtation going on with the neighbour, which he also knew about. All of this had happened within a year.
She doesn’t know I know. It doesn’t excuse his absence or his becoming an addict but it does add an element to the story that she willfully held back while happily telling me her sob story of him leaving her out of nowhere.
I know that he beats himself up constantly for the things he can’t give us. Tonight is our anniversary and we can’t do anything because we’re broke. He’s had our kids all day so I can do homework and has been eating himself alive about the whole situation. What he doesn’t know is that I don’t care. I’m just happy he’s mine. He’s a great dad and a great husband. For better or worse, richer or poorer, till death do us part.
She backed my truck out of the garage and smashed the mirror on the door frame. She said someone must have hit it at the grocery store.
She backed her car out of the garage and smashed the mirror on the door frame. She said someone passing her got too close and bot just her breaking it.
I found impact marks and glass on the floor both times. She still denies she hit them on the garage doors.
One of my parents used to be married before divorcing and marrying my current parent. That’s kinda all I know about it tho. I don’t know the name, or the details or whatever happened, but the fact I’m 26 and it has never once been mentioned by anyone ever except my cousin told me recently… Yeah, I guess it’s a pretty secretive thing that doesn’t get talked about.
When my oldest was experimenting with smoking, I found a pack of cigarettes in her pants when I was doing laundry. I took them out, washed and dried her clothes and then put them back in to see if she would wonder how her smokes were still dry and then know that I knew.
After five years, I still catch her touching up her make-up as she’s parked outside before she comes in and she’s never mentioned that she does this. Makes me feel bad when I’m already in shorts and a t-shirt.
My older brother recently dropped out of college after going to school first nearly 8-9 years (I stopped counting a while ago). My parents tell people that he “finished his classes” but in reality, he finally got the boot after having to nonstop change majors and retake courses due to poor grades. He and my parents tell people it took so long because he couldn’t find out what he wanted to do so he kept changing majors, but in reality, he just kept f*cking up all of his classes.
Looking back at this makes me laugh my *ss off when I think about how I had to move out of my parent’s house a while back since they didn’t approve of my business major. I’m 2 semesters away from getting a bachelor’s (4 yrs) and have already been accepted into my school’s master’s program. Not only that, but I already have a very well paying with great benefits position guaranteed for me once I graduate with my bachelor’s.
I absolutely adore my mother. She’s a single mother who got a master’s in education while taking care of three of us all the way up to working being head of a department in the DOE. I’ve never seen her drink, shout, act immature, act out in any unbecoming way etc. My whole life the one thing people commented on was how “classy” my mother is.
Then two years ago when moving out, I ended up accidentally taking one of her boxes of papers from the attic thinking it was mine. It was full of court documents talking about an affair my mother had with a married colleague where she got allegedly got so upset he ended it that she started to stalk and harass him and he filed criminal charges against her as well as brought it to HR at her former job. The things he says my mother did in those documents, I can’t imagine in a hundred years. Yet I also couldn’t imagine her having an affair with this guy at all but she admits it in the paperwork. I know why she left her state job and we moved to DC- basically, there was some kind of deal made where she would leave and it would go away. And the criminal case was also pretty much dropped with the expectation and deal she would never contact him or bother him again.
My brother got arrested and went to court for multiple charges. They went out of their way to hide it from me so that they could continue to act like I was the disappointment. They pretended they were going out to breakfast without me and rubbed it in my face to cover up his court dates.
My parents could not afford an abortion when my mother got pregnant with me, so they tried half a dozen “folk remedies” to end the pregnancy. I was first told by someone who was trying to hurt me (and at the time, it did). It was later confirmed by another person who misunderstood something I said and thought I was referring to this. The two people do not know each other.
I don’t hold any ill will toward my parents since I also know the unbelievable financial pressure they were under at the time. They couldn’t afford a third child and I was surprised due to a birth control failure. It would utterly destroy them if they knew I’ve known about this most of my life. I wish I could tell them that I completely understand and I feel great empathy for the horrible position they were in, but I know it would restart years of emotional pain even if they knew how I feel.
She texts her ex all day every day, sends selfies tells him he misses him, they have movie text dates where they watch the same movie at the same time, and they fall asleep on the phone together. The worst for me is they talk sh*t about me and she refers to me as ‘number three’ as in her third boyfriend. She makes stuff up and will tell him something I did that never happened and they will call me a p*ssy and laugh. She hasn’t sent nudes yet and never agrees to meet up with him in person although he frequently tries. She will occasionally mention to me ‘oh my ex is texting me he’s so annoying,’ meanwhile she’s waiting for me to sleep so she can watch a movie with him. Sucks finding out through our kid’s tablet that is synced with her phone, I’m still not sure how or when I’m going to break it off.
My mom got breast implants. I don’t think it’s embarrassing or bad, I mean she nursed 7 kids! But she avoids the conversation and even blatantly lies about it once.
My SO of four years gave me his phone to look for some passwords on his notes app so he could log in to his school account. I found a note with my name in it and couldn’t help myself.
He wrote out this dream he had where we had a daughter and started a family together. He was so detailed and seemed so happy. I thought it was so cute that he would want to write and remember this dream. He never told me about it, but I do know he wants kids, especially a daughter. I feel like this was his “dream come true” dream. I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want to embarrass him, he’s not very emotional. (For reference I am years away from marrying him or having children lol)
My nana’s mom was originally engaged to the brother who ended up being her husband. Both brothers went off to war, and the one she was engaged to die. Then, when the other brother came home, he had a shotgun wedding with my great-grandma because she was pregnant with my great-uncle Evan. No one else knows, not even my nana.
My sister and I have the same dad, but we have never met him. My mom always told us that they had divorced right after my sister was born (we are born just over a year apart, so I don’t remember him at all).
I did some snooping one day and found out that he was some guy from California and that my mom was his sidepiece in Florida. He travelled to the area we lived in for business a lot, and my mom was almost like his second family. Once we were both born, his wife found out and he stopped coming to Florida. Paid my mom some sum of money to keep the state out of it, and that was that. He died in a car accident in the mid-90s, before I found out about him, so that’s that.
My ex-husband has an affair with a girl from his job. Probably as long as we were married. I had to laugh, because the entire time we were married, he was obsessed with me cheating on him. Except I never did.
I found out accidentally; signed into his AOL username instead of mine and saw the email. This was back in the day. I didn’t say a word to him; we were already separated at that point. It just kind of amused me for a moment, and confirmed that leaving and divorcing quietly was the right route.
My wife and mother of our 6 beautiful children sometimes go to bed early. She wants me to think she’s sleeping because I believe she feels bad for leaving me to deal with the little ones. Most of the time she actually is sleeping but sometimes I catch her playing her favorite word scramble/puzzle game on her phone. She just shifts in bed as if she was disturbed in her slumber. I have never told her I know and I don’t plan on it. She deserves the time to herself after being an amazing mom all day long. I have thought about telling her that I don’t mind at all and that she shouldn’t feel guilty but I think it’s better just to let her have the time to unwind. I think I should tell her that she should go have some time alone to do whatever she wants, more often. That way, she won’t feel guilty. Thanks for rambling typing for helping me realize this!
Before I was born, my mother hand-raised a baby umbrella cockatoo. He was her pride and joy and he ate from her hand. Apparently during the night one night, he got into the bed, and my mother rolled onto him. Woke up and he was dead. My dad told me this when I was young, maybe six or seven, and told me not to ever talk about it because it would make her really upset. I think I had mentioned getting a pet bird and he wanted to protect my mother’s feelings. So I kept my mouth shut but had a huge childhood fear of pet birds until I was in my 20s. I was very afraid of interacting with birds because I was scared to hurt them (also didn’t wanna get bit).
Fast forward to literally this year, and I finally spill the beans to my mom that I know about Charlie. She f*ckin BUSTS out laughing and goes “I never told you about Charlie because you were scared of birds and I didn’t want to make it worse! I got over that years and years ago.” Cue the Curb Your Enthusiasm theme song.
My mom lied to a man and told him I was his son and frequently extorted money from him by telling him she needed it to raise me.
I found out when he showed up with gifts shortly after I had moved out on my own. He had hired a PI after my mom refused to give him my contact info. He apologized for not being in my life and cried while telling me he was dying of pancreatic cancer and that he didn’t want to go without meeting me.
I asked my mom about it and she told me she told him that so she could get money for drugs after she left my dad.
DNA tests confirmed he was not my dad. (tested myself against the man I was always told was my bio dad)
I only ever met him one time. I took the gifts because it was such a surreal experience I didn’t know how to tell him anything other than that I forgave him.
My mom is the only other person that knows this happened.
That my grandfather on my father’s side was not biologically related to us at all.
I was told this by my grandmother when I was in high school and was asking to not repeat it. In the 1970s, my biological grandfather was a raging alcoholic who would beat her and was mean to their sons. When said sons were 4 and 8 grandfather went drinking and driving, wrecked his car and died at the scene.
Grandmother met another man, who she married. He adopted all 3 kids without question and got a vasectomy. Changed their last name to his and the rest is history.
Father’s biodad’s side of the family tried to take the kids away from my grandmother after his death. Grandmother told them to go straight to h*ll. To this day we’ve never met any of them. I did find them after my ancestry DNA came back.
That my mother donated a significant portion of her income to homophobic charities. I found a box full of thank you letters and t-shirts while unpacking after we moved. My sister is a lesbian and they think I am (I’m actually transgender but closeted). We’ve known our mother is homophobic for a while, but we didn’t know she was donating money to charities that advocate for the end of gay marriage and sodomy laws. She has a high position in an insurance company, so it’s not a small amount of money, either.
That she is completely exhausted by having to constantly deal with my depression and anxiety issues. I can just tell that she is trying her best to hide her frustration with me but resents me more and more every day. My negativity is draining this absolutely beautiful caring soul and crushing her spirit. I am a complete burden on her and she fights every day pretending she is ok with helping me. In reality, she would be much better off if I wasn’t around at all.
Not entirely the worst, but I found out he’s trans.
He wants to transition from male to female. He has been in denial for years, and I guess he felt comfortable enough in the relationship to start looking into it.
I’ve told him I don’t know how I feel about it. I’ve tried broaching the subject that down the line if I’m not into it, we may have to look into divorce.
He’s told me he won’t change. Just his gender. He’s going to be the same person.
The problem is that he’s gone back and forth with being trans for months. Recently, I found out and he hasn’t told me he’s seriously looking at it again.
When I was in 8th grade, my family gave away my pet dog because we were not able to take care of the dog. they told me it was stolen but in reality, they gave it away to my mom’s friend who loved our dog. one day I heard my grandmother speaking of the incident where she thought I couldn’t hear her since I was wearing headphones but I could clearly hear this and that’s how I know.
I know that my friend is into those very realistic-looking baby dolls. She has never admitted this to me, but I have caught up on a few things she has said that refer to this hobby.
I’m fine with it really, whatever makes her happy. If she doesn’t want to tell me straight, I’m just going to keep pretending that I don’t know.
And if she ever tells me, I will pretend that I haven’t known about it.
The moral of the story is if you have an Instagram account you don’t want your friends or family to discover by accident. Don’t connect your phone number to it.
My uncle’s death was a result of his affair with our neighbor. The husband (a cousin) found out about the affair and the two men fought. My uncle died on the way to the hospital (driven there by his sister’s then-boyfriend) and my grandmother managed to keep it quiet to save the family from embarrassment. This was rural WV in the 1970s. Grandma and my aunts tried to hide it from my dad but he found out about the affair and fight on the school bus a few days later. My aunt has always said that Joe died of some health issue and has no idea that I know. The neighbor and wife still live nearby and we (mom and I) believe that their youngest daughter is my uncle Joe’s kid.
My wife is very naive but would never cheat on me. She’s also very, very into Pokemon Go. Some 19-year-old weeb on Discord was hitting on her, even after she asked him to stop. He was pretty cringey in his technique, and really crass in his messaging. She didn’t know that I knew about her wannabe Don Juan, but he started turning up the pressure on her. She told him she was happily married, but really doesn’t know how to deal with situations like this because she always feels compelled to respond to people if they message her. So one day, I logged on to her Discord account and agreed to go Pokemon hunting with him. He was personally…encouraged… to find a new Pokemon partner. Stopped messaging her after that and completely dropped off Discord shortly after. Found out later, he was using the local Discord instance as his stalking ground, he was creeping on all the local female PoGo players, and perving out on them in person. My wife doesn’t know anything about this, just that her secret admirer just suddenly stopped one day. I asked her Pokemon Go friends who were affected by this to not mention it to her either.
I was in a long-distance relationship for a while. I knew he was having trouble dealing with the whole thing but thought nothing of it because I was coming home in a few short weeks. My friend from home, who often hangs out with him, calls me and turns out that he was having a full-blown relationship with someone else. He called a few days after I found out (I didn’t say anything because I was in such shock and 5000 miles away) and he broke up with me. He doesn’t know that I know.
My GF went to Hawaii with her mom over Father’s Day weekend. I had no phone during that time so our only communication was through email. she was being so lovey Dovey and telling me how much she misses me, how badly she wanted me to be there with her there, and how terrible she felt about being out of town during Father’s Day.
Fast forward two months. I was taking the recycling out one day and saw a torn-up sheet of paper. Grabbed it out due to curiosity. It was a sheet from her journal talking about how she cheated on me. I try to erase it from my memory but this one part stuck with me. ‘I cheated on luan_ugly in Hawaii. This is what I get for not being honest’
What the f*ck does that even mean? It sits in the back of my head sometimes or comes up during sex. It’s really f*cking with me
What makes it more exciting is that she gave me a 4-week notice about her moving to Costa Rica for 4 months, with her best friend. If she cheated on me while on vacation with her mom, imagine what she’d do with her friend.
Ex now, but had a sinking suspicion that was then confirmed that he was ashamed of me. When we’d spend time together, he’d lie to his friends that he was doing something other than on a date with me. It didn’t bother me when he lied to his roommates; they were dudes and probably would have teased him. However, his old friend gang also included his first ex, and it stung when I saw he was direct messaging her that he couldn’t make it to hang out because he was “still picking his dad up from the airport.” It stung, but I didn’t want to confront him. I was a coward about it.
It was confirmed after he broke up with me. We were at a party two days later, and I was trying to stay away from him but had to use a portapotty. I heard him nearby, completely drunk, and suddenly the topic of me came up and I received the most brutal, unfiltered tirade of why he broke up with me, that I was the most pathetic person he had met in his life, with no hope of improvement, aimless in life, haven’t even graduated yet, don’t even know how to drive, that I was hopelessly insecure and that he was just 100% done with dealing with my sh*t or having to be associated with me.
Somehow I was able to escape the portapotty without being seen and ended up bawling at the front away from everyone with a friend I confided in.
He doesn’t know that I had heard any of that, nor do I believe he even remembers what he said, and I only just recently told a couple of other friends about it, two years later. He had some anxiety issues himself and I’ve been told he was probably projecting a lot of it, or just hated my insecurities because it reminded him of his own. Still, it hurts to think that I had loved him even long after he had fallen out of love with me, let alone the fact that he held so much resentment for me.
