plaintiff: ruykia from tonawanda, new york. ruykia looks like a dream come true, just positively gleaming and gilded for the gods! i wish i could pull of the ~dewy~ look without looking like the fattiest piece of bacon left to congeal in the grease in the bottom of the pan but, alas, i cannot. ruykia is wearing a black tank with a kind of sheer kimono over it? her braids are in a bun on top of her head, and i am not kidding when i say her skin is absolutely glowing. she’s so sparkly!
defendant: victoria from washington, dc. okay so victoria is wearing your standard-issue cozy mom cardigan over a black top, her hair similarly braided and bunned like ruykia’s which is hilarious because apparently she is her mother. my mom is dead so i can’t really know but if i brought her to small claims court after her many hours in labor and many years of hormonal teenage moodiness??? she would run over me with a car!
the complaint: ruykia claims that her mother is withholding property of hers and she wants the money for it.
what does she want: $2000 for unreturned property, for which i’m sure her mom is gonna reply “you’re my child, so whatever you got? i got!” countersuit oh nooooo: victoria would like $1921 for the balance due on a car and emotional distress.
how it went down: ruykia says that her mother was always abusive and as a child she would beat her with a water hose. uhhh i’m a little nervous about this because i don’t know if greg is gonna be like “GOOD, KIDS NEED DISCIPLINE” or if he’s gonna chastise victoria for how she raised her child and neither of these seems like a very good option? also, i don’t know a single thing about child-rearing but man doesn’t going all the way outside to get the dirty, unwieldy hose seem like a lot of fucking work?? how is that preferable to just issuing a time out or whatever??? the kid fucks up and instead of taking their allowance or having a long, punishing talk you gotta put your shoes on, get out of your comfy chair, go all the way outside, detangle that filthy, disgusting hose, then figure out how to grip it so that you don’t mess up your hand while you’re doing child abuse????? just give them some extra chores, damn!
okay, phew: greg talks about perpetuating the cycle of child abuse just because your parents used to do it to you in the olden days is bad. thank goodness! ruykia says victoria used to beat her up for things like misbehaving and not doing the laundry. her dad passed away when she was young, so ruykia and her sister anita grew up alone with their mother. anita is in court today with victoria, and ruykia says that her mom always played favorites with her sister. man we all really are just little kids cosplaying at adulthood, huh. imagine going to court as an adult to litigate your childhood emotional shit?? ladies, try therapy!
victoria says that yes, she beat ruykia when she was young, but that beating didn’t do any good. not to be dramatic but i think my heart actually stopped? the entire courtroom gasped! damn, this is bad and i hope there’s a social worker in the green room waiting for them. victoria says that ruykia is disrespectful and vindictive, always has been, and that when ruykia was fifteen she assaulted her. which came first, the chicken or the egg that smacked the chicken?
ruykia was living in a duplex with her grandmother that her grandmother owned. in 2013 her grandmother passed away, and victoria and her aunt inherited the house. victoria threatened to evict ruykia and turned off the hot water because she said ruykia was behind on rent. the house also had a serious rat problem that victoria refused to deal with, so ruykia ended up moving out. this is a little weird because it’s not clear whether ruykia is alleging that her mother forced her out by refusing to pay the gas bill and get rid of the rodents, or if ruykia moved out because she was behind on rent anyway and no longer wanted to deal with her mom. honestly somebody should’ve brought iyanla in here to help them work their issues out or sever ties completely because this case is clearly about hurt feelings and sibling rivalry with a little bit of property damage thrown in and it is so uncomfortable to watch.
okay so ruykia moved but she didn’t take all her stuff with her, and despite having this extremely contentious relationship with her mother and sister she somehow trusted that they would just...not touch her stuff? ruykia says she didn’t get her stuff because she couldn’t afford movers and that her mother never asked her to come get her stuff. ruykia says she moved in january of 2019 and greg says that if it’s been this long, without an arrangement, that’s considered abandonment!
the ruling: victoria says that ruykia is lying and hands greg a sheet of paper from her accordion of truth™ to prove it. it’s a printed out text sheet™ in which victoria clearly asks ruykia, in march of 2019, when she’s going to come get her things. “read it and weep” says greg, sending doyle with the printout over to the plaintiff stand. “judgment to the defendant, for perjury.” and family counseling for everyone, for the sake of the children.
did uncle greg say anything fucked up to anyone: “she let you stay there after you’d smacked her? if that was me you would’ve been homeless!”
*bangs gavel*