plaintiff: vernon from boxford, massachusetts. vernon looks like an assuming small-town dentist in a dark grey off-the-rack suit, blue dress shirt, and paisley tie. i’m not kidding, this might be the same guy who did my last root canal. he is a plain, mild mannered-seeming man with thinning hair who looks like he files his taxes at 12:01am on january 1st, what in the world is he doing on this show?
defendant: wait a second, how in the fuck do these people know each other?? danielle from wakefield, massachusetts has been crafted in some kind of kardashian-adjacent fantasy lab: long, glossy dark hair, slightly orange unnatural tan, stark white nails. she’s wearing a blush-colored blouse beneath a black blazer and is clutching an accordion of truth™ along with a loose sheet of paper, and that is very intriguing to me. why not just stick it into the accordion? is that an extra special sheet of paper or just, like, directions to the courthouse you forgot to throw away?
the complaint: vernon met danielle at a gentleman’s club (ohhhh, okay) where she worked as a waitress, and he’s suing her for an unpaid loan. i am fully braced to hear the most uncomfortable shit i have ever heard because there is no fucking way these people are here for something normal.
what does he want: $1525 for an unpaid loan. countersuit, be still my fucking heart. danielle would like $5000, from her “former friend,” for being harassed!
how it went down: vernon says that he met “the young lady” (lmao what) while she was waitressing one night at the gentleman’s club he frequents and he invited her out for coffee. strike one, vern. there’s no way i’m watching you shove $10 bills between the liberally oiled asscheeks of a gyrating dancer all night before agreeing to let you take me to a new location for a macchiato or whatever. nah, fuck that. vernon says danielle’s answer made him laugh (i’m dying to know what she said) and then a few days later he took her out for dinner and drinks (now we’re cooking with gas!) and he became smitten. i love this naked vulnerability and take back my snark about him being a cheap ass! vernon says danielle was funny and they got along well and there got to be “a lot of flirtation and sexual innuendo and promises” but nothing happened. uh oh!
okay so greg asks vernon if there was mutual attraction and listen not to judge a book by its men’s wearhouse suit but I’M CURIOUS, TOO. vernon says “yes” and greg is like “prove it to me” and vernon starts digging through the many sheets of printed out texts™ and reads aloud a conversation in which someone wrote, “think ‘porn sex,’ nasty, filthy porn sex” and greg screeches, “that’s from her???” and vernon is like “no, it was from me.” listen i’m a pig and i love gross shit but never in life do i ever want to hear someone’s potentially humiliating text messages, i don’t even want to be cc’d on an email with other people because it feels like a gross violation, so my skin is already crawling at the prospect of hearing what my man is about to say next. vernon texted “with or without and audience” and danielle apparently texted back “i want someone to watch” and it’s been a while since i’ve sexted on the regular and now i know i never will ever again because listening to this is murdering me from the inside!
danielle begins by saying “first of all, this man has ruined my life” and you know what? i believe her. we all would like to think it’s gonna be a hot man that takes us down (personally, i would sign up for jon bernthal to destroy both my credit and my sanity on the same fucking day but that is a conversation for another time) but because life is a fucking joke it’s always gonna be some branch manager down at the local bank who undoes your whole shit. it’s never a smoldering sex god! anyway danielle says that the other girls at the club warned her that vernon was a real creep but she decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. she says that he became obsessed with her and started texting her nonstop.
danielle says that one day they were texting and she mentioned she was behind on rent and bills so vernon offered to lend her some money. greg interrupts to say “we call that ‘dry begging’” and when will this man stop using pimp lingo in the courtroom?? (the definition, according to the judge: “dry begging” is when you talk about all your problems without asking the person you’re talking to for money.) danielle says that vernon offered to help pay her rent and then he held the rent payment over her head, and for a split second i pictured him holding a bag of money over her actual head while she gyrated at the bar and yo i should probably go the fuck to bed. am i losing it? she says that in exchange for the rent payment vernon wanted “sexual favors” from her but she wasn’t into it.
greg starts to read the text messages back to danielle and lord please take me now. she concedes that sure, she typed that shit, but she didn’t mean it! she then continues, saying that vernon wanted her to use a strap-on on him and humiliate him, and i gotta say that for a person who is actively being kink-shamed vernon is surprisingly calm. good-humored, even?? i mean, he’s chuckling while she’s airing his shit out! what a chill guy. danielle says she never engaged in any of these activities, she just led him to believe that she would until she could get her rent paid and whatnot. i might be editorializing a little bit but is that not what’s happening here???
the ruling: vernon says he loves the term “dry begging” and greg tells him to get used to it because he’s clearly a simp. jesus christ what a burn. vernon presents some printed out texts™ evidence in which danielle said “they’re going to kick me out, if you could help me with a rent check i’ll forever be yours” and wait a minute, ARE WE IN SERF COURT HOW THE FUCK CAN THE JUDGE ENFORCE THAT. hahahaha jk. danielle’s friend stands up to testify that he heard vernon tell danielle “you don’t have to pay back a gift” when she expressed doubts that she could come up with the money, and we all know that vernon was expecting sex as a payment but he can’t legally sue for that so what the hell are we doing here today?
greg tells vernon to unearth, out of the many many papers he has shoved into his accordion of truth™, proof that danielle was indeed to pay this money back with actual money, and [drumroll] quel surprise! vernon has a bounced check danielle wrote him in his possession! as far as the harassment is concerned, danielle says that vernon has called the landlord so many times that now the landlord is evicting her. that sounds illegal, but ok? the judge asks what the landlord says vernon said to them that has forced this eviction but danielle doesn’t know, to which greg says “then that’s not harassment!” i wish people could just run each other over with a car or whatever because this whole thing is embarrassing. dude is mad because he didn’t get sex, homegirl is mad because dude is annoying, and i’m mad because i started this and now i have to see the shit through. impotent rage all around!
speaking of, the good judge has had enough. vernon keeps handing the bailiff page after page of printed out texts™ proof in which danielle says she’s going to pay him back, offers to put herself on a payment plan, and bargains with ol’ vern about the vagina tax he’s expecting to collect; just sheet after sheet of kinko’s finest laserprint paper cementing danielle’s guilty fate, and it’s exhausting. greg is done and mercifully ends this nightmare: verdict for the plaintiff!
did uncle greg say anything fucked up to anyone: i’m sure he did but after the judge left danielle’s friend tells vernon he better get an ass pillow for the plane ride home since he likes paying women to peg him and vernon, my dear sweet vernon, says, “why? she never came through with the peg!” god bless america!!!!!!!!!!!
*bangs gavel*