45 Times A Casual Conversation Took A Dark Turn When Someone Admitted Something Truly Disturbing

One night, when I was about 18 or 19, my cousin called me and wanted to talk. It sounded like he must have been really drunk, so I figured that's why he'd called me of all people when we weren't close at all. He'd joined the air force and of course I was worried about him. I didn't actually know where he'd been sent, since we weren't super close… Well he proceeded to tell these absolute horror stories of stuff he'd been through in the middle east. He was crying and sobbing, and I had no idea what to do or say, but I tried my best to help him. That haunted me for years and years, and I'd never told anyone about it for a really long time because I felt it wasn't my place… but eventually I found out that NONE OF THAT HAPPENED. He'd just called me, practically still a kid, and told me in horrible detail about what he did and how he felt shattered and broken by it, and he'd just made it all up. That's horrifying, why would you do that to someone? Apparently he'd never even made it to the middle east, he'd been stationed in the US as a paper pusher the whole time because he injured his knee PLAYING BASKETBALL. I've never talked to him since except at my mom's funeral a few months ago, and I just will never be able to ask him why he did that to me.