#we may have to call this website Seddit

[elfqueen006]

Ooooi. Man, even fiction is solidifying my stance on Reddit posting your personal problems. Getting advice is one thing but more often than not you'll barely find that amongst judgement or enabling. That's shown as much with what happened with Ian. And man, I knooow those comments tore his ass up.

astheyshould (COUGH)

And damn, the way you wrote the affair partner, I wanna find that chick and just get to swinging, for Alice's sake. Like, girl, what do you know about Alice?

I feel like if Ian made a post like this regarding May, it'd be a mixed bag of comments saying to leave her or condemning him for his mistake. Because there are moments where he points out her controlling and stubborn behavior that makes a lot of the user's side with him.

It'd probably go something like this.

I cheated on my girlfriend with a fellow student at school I dont know what to do.

---

Just call me Orange for now, I'm a cis male (24) at an acting school and I had a one night stand with my friend from class. She's really nice and supportive but the problem is I have a cis fem girlfriend, Lavender (24), who i love more than the world but she'll no doubt be pissed if I tell her. Thing is Lavender supports my dreams but she is not the nicest. She's very blunt and kind of just expects me to do well with little encouragement. It's hard to get any emotional comfort from her these days since she started working straight out of college to support us. I want to give her everything and tell her she doesn't need to work so much but she's very stubborn when it comes to needing help. She pretty much shoved me out the door to get me to school and rarely calls because she sleeps in a lot. It's been hard the past year without her support. In my second year I started hanging out with another student and she's so nice. She's like a modern Avril Lavigne or something, we'll just call her Blue (23). Blue told me she was attracted to me one time and I told her I was in a relationship but we still kept hanging out. I probably should have cut her off but I had never had any other friends before Lavender.

Sometime after that we got drunk and slept together, it felt bad but I was kind of glad I got to experience her. Lavender was always who i went to when my mom was getting to be too much and she was popular from a well off family so she spent a lot of money so we could do fun stuff together. I always kind of felt like she was better than me but thought I should be grateful for her anyway. She's been stingy with money or gifts recently and is thinking about doing freelance work in the meantime but we haven't seen much progress. She's put on some weight, becoming pudgy in her stomach and is just not really the shiny girl I knew in high school. And I know people change but she can get pretty mean at times, and it feels more like we're roommates. Blue sort of feels like .... in a weird way, the friend I was *meant* to have. Someone more my speed. It's like I skipped a genki girl route and got the himedere instead, if you'd forgive the weeb like comparison. And now I get to do it over. She's sweet, supportive, blunt in the right ways. She also is nice enough to cancel her plans with other people or tell off guys who downplay me in order to hang out with her. Lavender seems smug when she's with me, like I'm being showed off. I guess I should feel prideful? I didn't look like much before we met, and she gave me all of her skin care tips, but she often looks at me very critically. TLDR; I cheated on my kind of mesn girlfriend with a really nice girl. I know it isn't right, but I've been feeling neglected and lonely, what should I do?

Imagine if instead of calling MC during post-nut clarity, Ian went to reddit to ask for advice? (Well, the bland-name legally-distinct version of reddit in this universe.)

Of course the comments would rip him apart and there'd be more crying, but it's kind of interesting to imagine the post he might've wrote.

For example, imagine the way Ian would describe MC in the post to other people. Would he try to justify what he did because the relationship was rocky, or would he be mostly bemoaning that he has no idea why he did it? Would he talk up MC's good qualities or slip in a lot of things that bugged him that he never brought up? What little unspoken biases would come out during the post?

I think the tone of the post would be mostly focused on how much Ian is hurting, as it is him venting to a bunch of internet strangers. He focuses on how terrible a person he feels he is, and how much he fears what's going to happen when MC finds out and how this might destroy their relationship. He just can't lose them! He can't!

I like to think Ian would have the state of mind to at least use a throwaway account and aliases for himself and others he mentions in the post. However, if MC is the type to visit those forums often, maybe even introduced Ian to them in the first place or vice-versa, it's possible MC recognizes enough details to realizes it's about them. Maybe it could even go viral and they find out about the post listening to a reading on podcast or video site.

Using my MC Alice as an example, I can imagine Ian talking about her weight and how he totally loves her in spite of how overweight she is, and she's so cute and kind. But the affair partner looked like she stepped out of a porn ecchi manga - big boobs, big butt, tiny waist, long trim legs, and incredibly flirtatious and sexually charged.

On that note, Content Warning for fatphobia, acephobia, and internalized religious-based shame!

Oh Ian had no idea it was flirting at first, he swears, but it felt so good. He never really felt like Alice really saw him as attractive since she's asexual, and she isn't all that enthusiastic about sex. It's another subconscious bias slipping through to justify himself and get sympathy despite the horrendous thing he did.

The sex with the affair partner was mind blowing, but once it was over Ian realized what he had done and felt just so awful. The affair partner tried to reassure him that it was only natural he found her more attractive (because people who tempt others to cheat in a relationship love to stroke their egos). No one has to know and they can keep having fun~

Naturally taking the affair partner takes snipes at Alice. She had done so in the past that Ian had called out in so much he offered feeble protests that Alice had good points too, while trying hard not to upset his new "friend." The comments usually were so innocuous he felt like he was overthinking it, but in the situation they were overt and insulting and he snapped at the affair partner in that moment.

Now Ian feels bad about that too since affair partner is telling him he overreacted. She tried to reassure him that everybody in a long distance relationships cheats. In fact, Alice was probably cheating on him right now. Anyone who says they're ace - in her opinion - are just lying to seem more "righteous" than they are and asexuality doesn't actually exist. Affair partner's comment that there must be somebody desperate enough to want to fuck a fat girl was what set Ian off.

Yes, my version of the affair partner is complete scum. I mean, people who tempt others to cheat tend to only care about making themselves feel superior to someone else.

The post online is a lot of word vomit with a token attempt to clean up spelling and grammar errors. Ian just keeps crying and is desperate for anyone online to tell him how he can make it up to Alice and save their relationship. He doesn't want to end the friendship with affair partner either since he knows it's his fault this happened, because he just couldn't control himself. All that internalized shame for his sexual urges bubbling to the surface. He knows he fucked up and he just wants to know how to atone for his sins.

Of course when describing Alice before describing the affair partner, Ian mentions their good points. Alice is so kind, even overtly so, holding him whenever he cried, always reaching out to others, being more motherly than his own mom. She's sweet and kind like that to everyone, and everyone loves her. She's everything he could ever want and she satisfied him in bed.

Man, imagine if Ian intended to write that Alice is everything he wanted in a partner, only to accidentally use the alias he made up for the affair partner instead of the one he used for Alice.

I mean, easy mistake to make, right? He's using fake names he just made up on the spot. Of course he's going to mix them up. He even insists as such when a comment calls him out for it before he can fix it in an edit. It was just a typo!

Ian admits that he felt guilty about subjecting Alice to his sexual urges. He knows sexual urges are sinful. She's asexual and doesn't really initiate sex but is always eager to please him anyway. She's always been like an angel to him and to everyone. Sex with her sometimes made him feel like a filthy sinner like he was desecrating something too pure and good for this world in the name of his shameful urges.

The affair partner though... Ian admits she's exciting, thrilling, so open in discussing sex like it's no big deal. She flaunts her body, confident in a way Alice isn't. The two of them are like night and day. When he had sex with the affair partner he didn't feel like he was defiling an angel. He admits he doesn't know what he was thinking, but it was the most intense, raw, and amazing sex he's ever had.

Which makes Ian feel even more like absolute shit for enjoying it so much.

Perhaps the allure Ian felt, aside from the physical attraction, was that he didn't feel like he was dragging someone else down. They were both filthy sinners acting like animals, only focusing on the pleasure and not thinking about consequences. He didn't think about the future, or about guilt and shame... at least not until after the post-nut clarity hits.

Even if Ian had this irrational feeling that sex with Alice was wrong, he knows it's wrong with the affair partner. In the afterglow, cuddling with Alice made him feel safe, accepted, loved, and like what they experienced wasn't as dirty and sinful as he felt. The aftercare soothed his worries and made him feel like what they had was actually pure and good and full of love.

The afterglow with the affair partner felt wretched. Ian immediately wanted to throw up. It was all wrong. He still can't understand why he got caught up in it like he did when he knows it's wrong... but in the moment it felt so good.

Another piece of advice Ian requests of the people of the forum is how to stop thinking about the sex he had with the affair partner so that he never gets tempted again. All he wants is to be happy with Alice, his partner, the woman he wanted to marry since they were kids!

The comments, naturally, tear Ian apart, but some scumbags support him, insulting Alice due to his description of her and saying what he did was only to be expected. If she wanted to keep him, she should've tried harder and lost weight.

While Ian doesn't respond to every comment, he responds to many. To those raking him over the coals, you can practically see the tears spilling onto the phone screen as he types that he knows he's a piece of shit, but he came here to get advice on how to fix things! Alice is the only one he wants to be with! He never wanted this to happen!

Ian makes an edit to the post in response to the scumbags, pleading with people not to insult Alice. He tries to protect her honor, talks even more about so many good qualities about her, and how these people don't even know her or understand!

He also insists this post isn't rage bait or farming for attention.

Ian also slips in that he knows Alice would forgive him even if he told her, since she's just that kind and forgiving of a person, but she would be crushed. She's already put up with so much over the years and still loves him. He can't handle what this will do to her. He doesn't want to break her heart over something so selfish and vile. He can't believe he did something so stupid, but he just wants to know how to fix this without hurting her.

In a way, Ian irrationally fears that he's now just like these scumbags in the comments due to his cheating. The things they say about her... did he subconsciously think them? Is he really such a horrible person? The ones trying to justify what he did are so vile, and the rest are condemning him and hoping that Alice dumps him.

Ian was hoping to get advice, and he does, a little. There are some people in the comments that take a more soft approach to chastising him. In the end, their encouragement is just confess and go to couple's therapy.

Ian resisted going to therapy all this time because of hearing negative things about it, how pointless it is (mainly from his mother), but he decides that's the best shot they have. He'll do anything to fix this now.

Ultimately, the comments make him fear telling Alice all the more given how much hatred he got for his post.

Ian does post updates in the aftermath. First that he broke down and told Alice. She forgave him and they're going to try and make it work. He doesn't specify how, just that they talked a lot and many tears were shed. Though he got so much hate online, some of the advice did seem to help, so he's back to vent more and get more advice. He'll suffer the hate if it means atoning for his sins.

Oh there's also a brief mention of Alice going to the hospital for a while, but Ian mostly focuses on how awful he feels and how it must be his fault, without going into details out of respect for her privacy.

Then there'd be another update from Ian later on about how Alice ended things, and he's devastated. He was so confused by it, as if it came out of the blue. They were working on fixing things! He thought things would get better, but then she told him that she just couldn't do it anymore right now. She needs some space.

Ian goes into self-pitying mode, knowing it's his fault and he messed up, but he thought things were going to be okay. What does he do now? How does he fix things? What did he mess up after things seemed to be getting better?

Then an edit is thrown in that Ian found out Alice's friends apparently talked her into breaking up with him. She still says she needs space to think before they can try again. Ian can't blame them given all the comments roasting him, but he was trying! He really was! How can he prove that?

At this point the comments are just all telling Ian to leave Alice alone and let her move on. It's over. Even the more empathetic posters don't have advice for him this time.

Hmm... Ian might not have gone to a forum for advice right after cheating in Sunshine in Hell, but I like the idea that he sought out advice after he confessed what he did to Alice. He might've even been a regular poster to online forums for advice anonymously in the past.

Of course if Alice stumbled across the post and realized it was Ian who made it, it'd make her feel even more violated than before. She'd be the type to read way too much into how Ian talked about her and the affair partner, particularly when people in the comments called him out for how he phrased certain things.

If nothing else, it'd make Alice feel more certain that Ian wouldn't be happy in a relationship with her in the long term. It'd also tear her apart to hear in his own words just how much he's suffering.

The post would haunt Alice at the back of her mind, the hate comments and Ian's little offhand remarks in the posts picking at her insecurities.

Naturally, Alice would avoid those forums for a while, as well as anyplace else Ian might be lurking online. Even posts that seem sort of similar give her this feeling of paranoia that it might be him vague posting about her again. Finally, she decides to just take a break from the internet as much as humanly possible, including socials.

Wow, this little off the wall what if scenario grew into something much bigger than anticipated. I hope you all enjoyed this idea, as well as how I applied it to Alice and Ian's relationship. If you did, perhaps consider what sort of post Ian might make about his relationship with your MC and the fallout from that. Have fun!

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