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To Being Ghosted, Guilty, and Going Back to the Gym

How Getting Ghosted Jumpstarted My Villain Arc

So, I got ghosted this week. Kind of. Like I did, but then I didn’t? Just allow me to take you guys on the rollercoaster of a week I had.

Dec 1st, 2025

To not completely dox the guy I am going to be talking about, we are going to refer to him as “Devil”. (yes, him)

Devil and I had been on and off for two years until this September when we started talking again (Count one, guilty). Everything was going well between us—consistent. So much so that in November we decided to be exclusive. My mom even knows about him.

“Are you going to see Devil?” she would always ask whenever I came to her house. He became a household name.

“Are you going to invite Devil to Thanksgiving?” my stepdad, Perry, asked one time. I didn’t, of course. I didn’t feel comfortable bringing any man home until I was officially their girlfriend. I’m glad I stood firm on that belief because it would’ve been awkward trying to tell my parents that the guy they just met on Thanksgiving ghosted me not even a week later.

—————-

The night before, I had asked Devil to tell me all the things he liked about me. I’m a girl who loves to hear why you enjoy my presence. My words of affirmation girls can understand.

I liked Devil, a lot.
He was funny, adventurous, and interesting. I enjoyed our dates, the sex was good, and sometimes I felt like he just gets me.

His Kryptonite? Emotionally unavailable. My seven-year-old nephew is better at expressing himself.

Getting Devil to open up is like pulling teeth.

Asking him that question, I knew that whatever I wanted to hear, he wasn’t going to say (Count two, guilty).

But, nonetheless, I asked. And waited.

And waited.

I texted him again, and explained that he just wants to make sure his responses is “loaded.”

I didn’t hear from him again that whole night.

That Monday morning (Dec 1st), he texted me, “Good morning.”

Because I was upset by his lack of response, I decided not to respond right away. I was upset, and rightfully so; I didn’t care. I decided to be petty and wait a couple of hours.

When I finally did respond, I told him why I was upset and why I didn’t respond—how it made me feel rejected.

Then I waited for his response.

And waited.

And waited.

At this point, it’s been three hours. At one point, I thought he died until I saw him repost a video on TikTok.

So, I called him.

Did he answer? No.

I thought to myself, he’s probably upset because I responded late to his text. (Count three, guilty)

December 2nd, 2025

“I think I’m getting ghosted.”

It’s 3 p.m., I’m at work, and I still haven’t heard from Devil. This was the first morning in four months where I didn’t get a ‘Good Morning’ text on my phone.

I assumed he woke up mad still, but it’s almost midday and I still haven’t heard from him.

I was talking to my co-worker, Austin, who was by no means the perfect person to tell your relationship troubles to. But, I was anxious, and I needed to talk to someone, quick.

Austin kept telling me that he probably cut me off for another girl, which did not calm my nerves, so thank you again, Austin. My stomach turned into knots just at the thought of it. My gut was telling me that, that wasn’t the case. But my brain couldn’t rationalize any other reason for his disappearance.

By 3:06 PM, I texted him again.

What is your problem? Why aren’t you answering any of my calls or texts??

By 8 PM, I was home, drunk, cooking, blasting Rico Nasty, and there was still no response from Devil.

I was angry, hurt, and confused.

Three glasses of wine later, (that I spiked with Patron) I decided that he will hear from me, one way or another.

I called him four times, one of which I called using *67.

Still, no response.

He was definitely ignoring me. It wasn’t like he was dead or anything (even though a small part of me hoped he was).

I reread our last conversation over and over.

Did I really miss something? What could I possibly have said to provoke such an extreme reaction? The last time we hung out was November 29th. I was at his house, just finishing wrestling (if you know, you know), and we were playing those games on YouTube where you guess the theme song of a TV show.

Literally my dream date.

My mind couldn’t grasp that he was ghosting me. It just didn’t make sense.

After all this time, did I mean nothing to him?

December 3rd, 2025

Waking up that morning, I felt empty.

Last night, on my fourth glass of wine and a smoke session with my sister, everything that I was trying not to feel wrapped me in a hug.

Getting ready for work felt like getting ready for World War II.

My sister was getting ready for the day, and I questioned if I should tell her what’s been going on between Devil and me.

A part of me didn’t want to say anything last night during our smoke session for the small chance that he’ll text me and say that it was a misunderstanding. After sitting on it for a minute, I realized that I needed to say something, or I’m going to feed and encourage the delusion.

“Devil ghosted me,” I said softly to Maleah.

Her eyes widened, and she immediately came to my side, “What happened?” she asked.

I told her how I hadn’t heard from him and that he’s alive and well, just ignoring me.

I knew telling Maleah meant there was no point of return for Devil and me. Maleah was all about revenge.

“Fuck him, want to get his page deleted?” She suggested.

I wanted to tell her I would much rather she find a way for him to text me. Instead, all I said was “yes.”

Our friend and roommate Kay, who also got into an argument with her boyfriend— it was a stupid argument, but it was enough for her to join me in my bundle of emotions: rage, confusion, and hurt.

In the end, we agreed that evil women need to be on the rise.

“We entered a flow state of hating niggas” Kay expressed as she was pacing back and forth.

At work, I couldn’t focus on anything.

Devil ghosted me.

I had Maleah and Kay report devils instagram page from both their main and spam accounts. I needed to do something. Something that would disrupt his peace, as he did mine.

At work, I did absolutely nothing.

Instead, I put his number under every spam notification he could receive from anywhere.

Scientology, the Navy, healthcare quotes, car quotes, the military.

I even made a request for Jehovah’s Witnesses to make a visit to his house that Saturday afternoon.

He obviously didn’t have any morals.

He wanted to ignore my texts and calls? Fine.

Now he’d have to ignore the calls/texts from 60 different sites I found.

December 4th, 2025

That day, I finally decided to get out of my funk. I told myself I was going back to the gym to do a full reset. Before doing that, I was curious to understand why people ghost.

I asked my friend Daija if she had ever been ghosted or if she had ever ghosted anyone.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been ghosted, and if I did, then I didn’t like them enough.”

She explained that she has ghosted a lot of people.

“When I end up ghosting someone, it’s because I know it won’t go anywhere or they’re really weird, and I’d rather not have that conversation with them and then they start bashing me, like Blake.”

Blake was a guy Daija dated for maybe for a week or two. By that second week, we found out that he had also dated a friend of mine.

“Or your gay friend Cole,” she said.

Cole was not gay, and his name was Collin.

Was ghosting now the norm? The safe option when wanting to end things was someone else’s worst nightmare.

“I low key ghosted Braden also, but he ghosted me first.”

Braden was the first evil light skin to be created, I am sure of it.

He would essentially do the push-pull method. One minute he was all about Daija, showing and giving affectionate and then the next minute, he’d ghost her.

She showed me a screenshot of one of the last things she sent to him.

“On your life, I hate you”

Men really know how to strike a nerve and get you to do and say the most evil things.

I decided to ask my other friend—let’s call her Zee—the same question.

She ghosted many people because of bad hangouts, boredom, or until she felt like they weren’t convenient to her anymore. She wanted to make it known that for the people she ghosted, there was no emotional connection between her and those who were ghosted.

“Have you been ghosted before?” I asked her.

She said “Yes.” When she got ghosted, she was in denial.

“They can’t be ghosting me,” she said.

The first stage of being ghosted? Being in denial.

I asked her why she thinks people in our age group always resort to ghosting, rather than communicating that they are now uninterested.

“I think it’s convenient. There are too many steps to commitment. The structure of dating has made it so efficient to disappear. Because there are no labels, you can feel better walking away because that wasn’t your boyfriend.”

“Do you think we will ever get to that point in our generation, where ghosting someone will become taboo?” I asked.

Almost everyone I know has ghosted someone or had been ghosted. Or both.

Even as I am writing this, I have ghosted a few people before. How come everyone in their 20s believes that ghosting someone is easier than telling the person they are talking to that they want to end things? When did we let fear drive our love lives?

“No, there is too much grey area. It’s too normalized. People aren’t even in situationships; they have made it to humiliation-ships. There are too many non-relationships.”

Was she right?

Is this our generation’s future when it comes to dating?

Send the flood.

December 5th, 2025

I was at the gym when a close male friend called me.

Let’s call him Umar.

I asked him the same question I asked Zee and Daija.

“Have you ever been ghosted and/or have you ever ghosted someone?”

I wanted to get a man’s opinion on this topic. (Count four, guilty)

“A bitch ain’t never ghosted me let’s s start there!” he said. Very on brand.

“How many people have you ghosted?”

“This year?” he questioned.

Divas, we are doomed.

“Ghosting is such a weird term; if we’ve only been texting for three days, why am I explaining to you that I don’t like you at all?” he explained.

“Have you ghosted someone with whom you were emotionally invested?” I asked.

“I ghosted this girl about a month ago because we were supposed to hook up, and then she got out of the shower, bent over, and it just stunk. I got out of that situation and went home,” he said.

I didn’t know what I expected to hear, but it wasn’t that.

He went on to explain that she was very cool, but her getting out of the shower and still having a body odor was just something he couldn’t get over.

Did Umar make the right call? Was this one of the few times it was appropriate to ghost someone?

He said that was the longest he had talked to someone before ghosting them.

I asked if any of his male friends ghosted anyone.

“Yeah, a lot of times, the girls think that they are ‘the one’ after a month or two, and they start losing their marbles. They end up scaring the guy off.”

I started to wonder at what point should girls feel like they are ‘the one’ if the two-month mark is too early.

Personally, I want to tell a man I love him after going out for two weeks. Have I done it? Of course not.

How should women know if they are the one if the man doesn’t say it? Is the silence their answer?

“Why do you think ghosting is normalized in our generation?” I asked him.

“It’s so easy to get in contact with somebody. In our parents’ generation, if they didn’t want to see someone or deal with them, it was a lot easier to get rid of them. In our generation, we all have phones. It’s easier to get in contact with someone now than before. So getting rid of a woman is harder.

He then goes on to say, “Now you got FaceTime, get your homegirl to call him, she can get you on Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, she can call your momma. Friday night she can pop up at the club looking for you.”

“I also feel like we’re not the generation to talk much; we’re not into explaining ourselves. It’s too vulnerable. We don’t even dance in the club anymore. We’re not comfortable expressing ourselves. So a lot of times, if we don’t want to deal with certain things anymore, we choose to just not talk anymore,” he finally says.

I asked him if a man ghosts a woman after they have been dating for four months, what should the woman do. Was this question about me? Yes.

Sue me. I’m mourning.

“4 months? Oh, I’m not gonna lie, I might lose my play card about that one. I need to know now, that’s four months—120 days. I know you a little bit now.”

Should I just say fuck it and lose my play card? Spam call him or pop up at his house?

December 6th, 2025

That morning, my conversations with Austin, Daija, Zee, and Umar hung in the air like a black cloud.

I needed to know why.

So, I went on Instagram, unblocked Devil, and texted him. (Count five, guilty)

Me: Can you just tell me what happened?

Me: Was there another girl or something? I just want to know what made you not say ANYTHING for five days. I will not bother you anymore.

The last line was a lie, but he didn’t have to know that.

After 30 minutes, there was no response.

He is just that evil, I thought to myself.

Until, a notification from Instagram came to my phone.

It was him. He had finally said something.

He explained that he couldn’t think of more reasons to answer the question I asked him the night before he decided to turn into Casper.

Me: So you’re telling me because you couldn’t think of an answer, you decided to ignore me for five days? Not return any of my texts or calls?

Him: Yes

Me: What the fuck is wrong with you?

I was so angry it felt like I couldn’t even type. I had completely forgotten that at the big age of twenty-seven, the big two seven, 27, his emotional capacity was that of a 4-year-old.

I would’ve preferred there was another girl involved. At least that would make sense.

Him: You should find someone who can fulfill what you need from a partner. I know we said we’ll take it slow, but I don’t want to weigh down your time by being indecisive.

Duh.

I mean, the absolute nerve of him. As if he hadn’t wasted the past 5 days. It was all he was good for.

I told him I didn’t understand him ghosting me and watching me reach out for communication, constantly meeting me with silence.

Him: I didn’t want to deal with whatever the aftermath of that would have been.

Me: You mean you didn’t want to deal with the consequences of your own actions?

He replied, “not yet.”

I officially lost my cool. I just couldn’t contain the anger.

I told him how he didn’t want to own up to his actions and instead of being a man and talking to me like we’re grown fucking adults, he ignored me like a child.

“We been texting and seeing each other for four months straight and you randomly ignore me? That was your solution? Because you couldn’t use your words? Or was scared of my reaction? Grow the fuck up, seriously.

I don’t know when exactly I finally hit a nerve with him; maybe it was when I questioned his masculinity or age. Regardless, I struck something because he immediately told me, “You got it, Bye Aliah,” and blocked me.

Honestly, I felt so much better. Grateful, even. I knew what he was before we started “dating,” but not to this extent. He was a man-child. Shout out to Sabrina, for real.

December 7th, 2025

This whole week felt fake. As I was going through it emotionally, physically I’ve been up. I started eating more clean, like I eat turkey bacon now??

I’ve been to the gym every day and been running on the treadmill, like don’t play.

In the beginning of the week, I was heartbroken and confused. Now that we are at the end, I feel grounded and sure. I didn’t miss out on anyone that wasn’t for me.

Devil was not my person. And that’s okay, great even. I needed him to mess up one more time for me to finally let go.

My friend Olivia told me that sometimes you have to keep going back to a man to finally let him go.

Was she right? Yes.

Will that be the theme of my love life? No.

Next year I turn 25 and there are some things that I just simply won’t allow anymore.

To my Ballads who have been ghosted or got their heart broken this year, I challenge you guys to fill your own cup. Go to the gym, make more money, spend time with your friends, and choose you.

And don’t ghost people!!!!!! Unless you want them to write about you in their Blog (Count six, guilty)

Love, Aliah 💕


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Angel Meets Devil

Edgar Allan Poe – The Imp of the Perverse:

“We stand upon the brink of a precipice. We peer into the abyss – we grow sick and dizzy. Our first impulse is to shrink from the danger. Unaccountably we remain”

“Of course I came,” he replied, meeting her gaze with unwavering eye contact, each word dripping with sincerity. In that moment, Angel felt a spark ignite between them, something she hadn’t felt in a long time. It was both thrilling and terrifying, and she couldn’t help but wonder if this was the beginning of something new or just another fleeting moment in a world full of uncertainties.

He looked at her, noticing her outfit and how she’d styled her hair.

“You look really pretty,” he said, his voice soft but sure.

Angel glanced away, feeling the warmth creep up her neck. She didn’t want Devil to know she’d probably replay that moment ten times over before going to bed tonight. She looked back at him, this time holding his gaze a little longer.

“Thank you,” she said. “You look good, too.”

Still meeting her eyes, he smiled slightly. “Thank you.”

Not wanting to let the conversation stall, Angel shifted, asking what had happened today. Now that he was here, maybe they could laugh about it. Devil explained that he honestly didn’t know how he’d forgotten and had genuinely thought tomorrow was their date. His work days had been long, and all the hours had started blurring together.

Hearing him explain, seeing the way his shoulders slumped a little in apology, made Angel feel better. She could tell he really meant it.

“Well, I’m glad you’re here now, so…” Angel’s voice trailed off. She never was good at telling guys how she felt, not when it mattered. Letting Devil know she was starting to care for him felt risky—like saying it out loud might somehow unravel everything.

He kept his eyes on her, as if reading her hesitation.

“Me too,” he said quietly.

​​“I knew that if I didn’t come today, I was gonna lose you,” Devil said, half-joking but with a seriousness in his eyes that made Angel pause. She laughed softly, but they both knew he was exactly right. Another thing she liked about him—he understood. He knew how much these first moments, these chances to build something real, meant to her. He didn’t want to mess it up either.

“I just… really wanted to see you, I guess.” Angel’s voice faltered as she looked down, her hands suddenly busy with nothing in particular. She wasn’t used to being this open, especially not so soon. But here she was, laying it bare.

“I know. Me too… and I’m sorry again. That won’t happen again.”

For the first time in what felt like forever, Angel believed a man.

They sat there, the moon hanging high above them, music playing low enough to let their words breathe but loud enough to fill the spaces between. All the nerves and worry Angel had about meeting Devil melted away. Their conversation flowed as easily as it had through texts. They laughed, teasing and bouncing off each other’s humor effortlessly, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

It scared her, how comfortable she felt. But it also excited her. There was no nervousness, just this strange, wonderful ease. Like they’d known each other for much longer than two weeks. Like they could finally exhale.

Angel noticed Devil had a few tattoos, and she’d always been curious about why people choose certain symbols to mark their bodies forever. She had tattoos herself, each carrying a meaning she cherished deeply. She thought this was another way to understand Devil.

“Can I see your tattoos?” Angel asked, her voice soft but curious.

“Of course.” He rolled up his right sleeve, revealing a small sword inked into his forearm and a coiled snake beside it.

She glanced up at him, pausing before asking, “Can I touch it?”

He nodded, the corner of his mouth lifting in encouragement. It was the first time they would touch, and though it was innocent, it felt loaded with significance. They’d been sitting in the car for over an hour, talking and laughing, but this—this felt intimate. Maybe it was the late hour, or maybe it was the soft hum of Frank Ocean’s Ivy playing through the speakers, or perhaps it was the way the moonlight draped over them as if wrapping them in a quiet spell.

Angel gently traced her fingers along the sword tattoo, her touch lingering. “Why did you get this one?” she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

“I…honestly don’t know,” he admitted, glancing down at his own arm. “It was my first tattoo. I just thought it was cool at the time, but now I kinda want to cover it up.”

“Oh, perfect,” Angel said with a mischievous grin, still caressing his arm. “You can cover it up with my name. Or better yet, my face.”

Devil threw his head back and laughed, and that sound sent a wave of warmth through her. She would have listened to that laugh on a loop. She’d pull a microphone out and perform a whole stand-up routine if it meant she could hear it again.

“You’re funny,” he said, a smile still lighting up his face. “Let’s see how tonight goes—maybe.”

She laughed with him, enjoying the ease between them. “So, what are you thinking of getting instead? If not my face, obviously.”

“Probably a spider,” he said, locking eyes with her again, his tone more serious this time, the playfulness fading into something quieter.

Their eye contact lingered, the atmosphere shifting. Angel’s fingers remained on his arm, moving slowly, almost thoughtfully. As Infrunami by Steve Lacy began to play, the lyrics filled the space between them: 

You’re the one I want, You’re the one I need, I’m beggin’ you, please…

She wondered if he was feeling the same pull she was, if he too was silently connecting the lyrics to this moment, to them. Will he also go back home and replay this song just to relive this moment?

Angel was the first to break eye contact, her gaze dropping to his other tattoo—a snake that coiled around his arm. Her fingers followed, tracing the serpent’s lines, her touch slow and soft, as though she were studying a piece of art.

Want More? No worries, click below for chapter 3!

https://balladsofthe20somethings.blog/?p=353