Miss C has done something very terrible

I have done a terrible, terrible thing. 3 years ago I started vicious gossip about my next door neighbor.

The night before last, I heard my neighbor and his new girlfriend of about 2 months, screaming at each other in the cottage next door. He has never done anything of the kind before so I was extremely surprised by the commotion. It sounded like she was breaking down his house and he was trying to get her out of it.

Then they came outside and I looked out the window to see her pummeling and beating on him even though he is twice her size. He was begging her to leave, as by this time most of the neighbors had come outside. The lesbians living across from him of course were thinking that he was abusing his girlfriend. I opened my door as he was screaming at his girlfriend, telling her he "didn't need people like her in his life and that this was where he lived and she couldn't do this here."

I was very depressed to hear this as they seemed to have been very happy til this point. As she finally left our communal walkway he then walked up to me and screamed at me "Don't fucking talk about me at the beauty shop any more you fucking bitch!"

"Oh, God," I said, in horror, realizing that they had been fighting about something I had said to my hairdresser, about him, 3 years ago! I had no defense.

"I am so sorry, I kept repeating. I am so sorry!"

"Fuck you! he screamed. Fuck you!"

I could see he was crying and completely devastated by the incident. He went back in the house to lick his wounds.

Afterward one of the lesbians came over to ask if I was all right and I had to explain that everything was actually my fault. All of it! The poor guy has been doubly humiliated, by what I said about him and then by the public attack by his girlfriend in our cottage complex.

3 years ago, not long after he had moved in, I was getting my hair cut. My hairdresser had been thinking of buying the cottage he eventually bought so she asked me who had moved in next to me. I told her and added a bit of unnecessary nastiness about him. There was a girl sitting next to me and she asked if it was --------? and she said his name. "I used to go out with him," she said.

I realized, too late, what a monumental mistake I had made right then. I forgot my hairdresser does all the high school students' hair and knows everybody. She also enjoys gossip.

"Please don't repeat this information," I begged both of them. I felt cold all over.

"It's ok, my hairdresser said, she doesn't talk to him anymore, anyway."

That's when I knew my new neighbor and I were both fucked! I just gave a juicy tidbit of information to a woman bearing a grudge and a notorious gossip monger. I was in a panic.

When I got home I told my other neighbor that I had just grossly violated our new neighbor's privacy in a terrible way. She said she felt sure that nothing would come of it, but I have been living in fear for 3 years. I knew it was inevitable that he would hear about my stupid remark. I had no idea that someone would be cruel enough to tell his new girlfriend.

I don't know if my hairdresser told her or if my neighbor's ex told her. I haven't been going to that hairdresser for a year and right-wing co-worker told her I was a Republican. She may have been out to get me or just wanted to hurt the girl by telling her a secret about her new boyfriend. I just don't know. But whoever told fucked up three people by doing it. But ultimately, I am responsible for it.

I am in bad shape and can barely function for the incredible guilt I am feeling. I am crying all the time. I also have been avoiding the neighbor. I peek out to make sure he's not outside before leaving the house. I could not blame him if he went off on me again.

I wrote him a letter explaining that I did not do it to be malicious, it was just stupidity on my part, but I don't expect him to forgive me. I do not deserve forgiveness for this. I deserve to live with what I've done.