plaintiff: philip from boaz, alabama. philip is a short and stout teapot in a cozy cream colored sweater over a blue dress shirt and black slacks, his dirty blonde hair tidily combed for his appearance in court today. you know i love a man in a warm, fuzzy sweater, and this man is no exception! he looks like a plump little accountant who makes his own pasta and listens to classical music that he actually knows the name of. i’m smitten! he’s adorable!!
defendant: cory from boaz, alabama. cory is kinda cute in a bmx-rider-who-has-to-go-to-church kinda way??? he’s wearing a fitted grey shirt with an indiscernible pattern on it, a black tie, and fitted khakis. he’s got shaggy hair and a nicely defined jaw, and how do these two incongruous people know each other??? maybe it’s time for another revamp of the odd couple. someone call hollywood!
the complaint: philip is suing his “good friend” cory for utility bills and emotional distress.
what does he want: $610, almost not enough to be bothered!!!
how it went down: philip says he met cory in 2018 and were good friends at first, but after a few months cory did a 180-degree turn (thank you philip, for getting this phrase right!) and started taking advantage of him. he would lend cory his car so he could take his girlfriend out, and philip says cory would leave him stranded for five or six hours at a time while never answering his phone or returning his messages. philip said cory would take his car while leaving his own at philip’s house, but philip couldn’t drive cory’s car because it was a stickshift. (i am so overwhelmed with love and sadness for this little teddy bear that if we weren’t in a pandemic i would go to alabama and teach him how to drive stick myself, he so painfully cute) greg says, “why would you do let him use your car when he has one???” and philip shrugs and greg says, “i get it. you’re a nice guy.” *sobs*
cory says that’s not all true. he says the truth of it is that he did borrow philip’s car occasionally to take his girlfriend out to eat or they would sit in the car and talk or go to the park and walk around (at philip’s expense) like a normal couple, and he wouldn’t respond to philip because he never had his phone with him. sometimes it would be as far as 25 feet away. i’m sorry, WHAT. what does this mean, that cory would leave his phone on the front seat to go get on the swings with his woman and that’s why he couldn’t tell philip when he’d be bringing his car back to him??? i sincerely hope that they just edited something out here and this is not his actual excuse, because my mind is boggled!
philip says that at the end of june 2019 he moved into cory’s mom’s trailer. his rental agreement was with cory’s mother, but apparently cory had been living in the trailer until right before philip moved in??? he is not wording this in a way that makes sense to me. the gist: there is a trailer, cory’s mom owns it, both cory and philip have lived in it. (we might have to shift the homemade pasta and classical music fantasy to the right a little bit but don’t worry we’ll figure all that out later.) okay so i think cory moved out, philip moved in, but it turns out cory never took the water and power bills out of his name in addition to leaving an outstanding balance on the account so philip was screwed.
the water and power in the trailer got shut off. but philip didn’t have anyplace else to go so he stayed in the trailer for three weeks without lights and running water because he just needed someplace to lay his head at night. cory, on the other hand, had made arrangements to stay someplace else and clearly had no intention of paying the overdue balance on these bills so philip could get the power reinstated. man, what an asshole! you’re driving this man’s car, eating mcdonald’s with your hot girlfriend while ignoring his texts and you can’t even pay the old light bill so he can watch tv while waiting for five hours for your ass to return so he can go somewhere? electric chair!
philip says that he doesn’t have many friends and doesn’t really socialize with people (MY HEART, IT HURTS SO BAD) so he didn’t have anywhere to escape to, but eventually he went to stay with his new partner (<3 <3 <3) while waiting for cory to take care of the utility bills. okay wait i missed something here, either philip didn’t tell the story right or i need to go get my hearing checked, because cory says that they were roommates in the trailer and that philip never paid his half of the bills while they lived together, so when cory moved out and philip took over the trailer lease with cory’s mom he let everything get shut off to teach philip a lesson. okay, that is shitty and it sucks but at least now this story kind of makes sense!
the ruling: greg wants to see some evidence, and from his accordion of truth™ philip pulls a bunch of printouts from the power and water companies showing that he indeed paid the bills to get everything reinstated and cory has brought nothing, not even a scrap of a napkin with IOU scribbled on the back, so judgment (and hopefully a lifetime of happiness and super-bright incandescent lights) for my man philip.
did uncle greg say anything fucked up to anyone: “sir, you don’t think they were out there getting high or something??? that’s what you needed to look into!”
*bangs gavel*