Story Hour: Enforced Conclusion?

Dear readers; due to some unforseen circumstances, I am no longer authorised to continue this narrative to its ultimate conclusion. However, after several conversations with H__, he has agreed to allow me to at least bring the current section to a semi-proper ending. Whilst this may raise the ire of the readers out there, I do apologise for this abrupt change in course, but please trust that I will bring any other parts that I can publish to light as time goes by. Here then, is the last part of Mr H__'s misadventures, condensed and edited for clarity.

"When I got into the office the next day, I got a harried IM from K__ who seemed to be all upset about something. In between getting some actual work done I'd managed to get her to calm down and tell me what was wrong, which led to me spending almost an hour listening to her rant about some kind of rut her life was in, and then trying to calm her down. Yeah, I was still way in apologetic mode," H_ grunted, noticing my incredulous expression.

"Anyway, long story short, I felt kinda bad for her so I promised I'd take her along to some functions I was supposed to go to. You know, so she can mix and maybe get some new friends. It so happened that I had some things scheduled for the next few weeks, so I said she could tag along with the rest of my friends. Big mistake."

"She seemed to be able to mix in kinda well at parties and stuff, which I thought was a good thing. I did get some of my friends asking where I found her since they thought she seemed a bit weird and contradictory, but generally she was sociable, and to me that was that."

"It wasn't until much later that I actually found out what my friends meant, and even then it was accident. I got an IM from one of my buddies asking me if I'd given his email address to anyone recently, to which I said no, I hadn't. He called me up later and told me someone had been emailing him asking some questions about him and me. The person seemed to know me well, and he got a little spooked out by it. I wondered about it for awhile, but since the questions were harmless I let it slide. And then at my uncle's birthday I saw my cousin, and K__ was there. My cousin, being the smart girl that she is, decided to intro K__ to my mum, and apparently they hit it off or something, I never really found out."

H__ blew out another cloud of smoke and grinned. "Man, was MY mum impressed. She actually went on and on about K__, and how nice she was, etcetera etcetera that I got a little worried. She even asked me to take her out more, and my mum NEVER does that. Since I did have some company functions to go to anyway, I decided to entertain her and asked K__ to come with me."

"I picked her up from her parents' place that evening, and we split up at the dinner, since I had some people I needed to see. When it was time to send her back she had this sly look on her face, as if she'd done something really clever."

"Her parents weren't home, and I somehow got the message that she'd like me to come in, so I did and just as I was starting to pick up the courage and think of what moves I should make, all of a sudden she turned cold on me and accused me of trying to take advantage of her. Before I knew it she'd kicked me out of the house, and I spent the drive home trying to nurse my ego. And no, I didn't even try anything!"

He seemed a bit upset, obviously realising I thought he'd gotten up to no good.

"Things took an even stranger turn. My cousin got all upset at me the next day because K__ told her I was behaving really inappropriately and was only interested in getting into her pants. What made it worse was that my mum found out as well, and she gave me a stern scolding. I thought that was the end of it, and a few nights later as I was talking about this to my mates a couple of them mentioned that she'd been talking to them as well, asking questions not only about me, but of a whole lot of other people as well. At first they just put it off as harmless, but some of the questions got really personal, and she was telling one guy one thing, while turning around and telling another person something else altogether! The only reason they didn't tell me was she told them I was actually considering getting engaged to her, and she wanted to keep it all hush hush."

My eyes were wide open by now. H__ didn't seem like stopping, though.

"It doesn't end there. I started avoiding her, you know, because I didn't know what to make of it all, and a couple days later my cousin was scolding me again for apparently promising K__ one thing and then blowing her off. K__'d been calling up not only her but also some of their mutual friends, trying to find out about me, my family, how much we earn, that kind of thing."

"You have to realise this took place through months, and it got so bad that when I tried to explain to my family no one believed me. I -" At this point, H__'s phone rang. He picked it up, made a face, and spoke very tersely into it. When he finished, he lit another cigarette and took a long drag.

"The point of the matter is, Ash, is that it's not over. She's been digging up stuff on my family, and then bitching about it to other people, not realising most of these people are my friends. I have to sort her out. One way or another."

H__ stretched, and got up. "Look Ash, maybe you can write about this. There's some more I wish I could tell you, but it'll have to wait. All I can say to finish is this - there are some really weird people out there, and you won't notice them till it's too late. I have your number, be prepared for me to call you so we can continue this, yeah? Thanks a lot, dude. I'll be reading your blog to see how it goes."

And with that, we shook hands, and he left. I stood there, partly choking on his leftover cigarette smoke, and scratching my head. It was intriguing, and I could only foresee what else went on as being even stranger. As I walked back to my car, I wondered who called him, and why he had to leave.

There are some things, we have to wait to find out.