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Perhaps it’s a symptom of my mental afflictions, but I find it impossible not to tell the truth. My Aquarian heart demands me to pursue truth and justice at all costs, but where do we draw the line between being honest and being an a*****e? I’ve fumbled across this high wire act through all my adult friendships and romantic dynamics. Upon reflection, surely my honesty must of rubbed people the wrong way in my youth. Only in recent years have I possessed the self-awareness to clock the seismic shift in the air when I compulsively say what everyone else is thinking. In the past my erosion of what was deemed socially acceptable would have gone right over my head. I constantly hear eclectic variations of the same words from all the women in my life: “Tell me the truth.” “Just be honest with me.” “Give it to me straight.” “Do you think I’m being crazy or?” We all plead for an honest take we can trust, knowing that when asked to do the same, we often pad the cell walls of our true thoughts. “Yes, you’ve lost your f*****g mind, but I still love you.” becomes “I can see why you feel that way, but…” We all claim to want the truth from our closest circle, but what happens when we actually receive it and it’s not what we wanted to hear? We have all become human flesh with the artificial politeness of ChatGPT. Finding ways to never create friction with the soul looking back at us. Analyzing what they want to hear and reflecting it back to them. Everyone seems to do this so effortlessly. It’s impressive social surgery to see how people manage to dance around the truth with such precision and ease. I feel like a prepubescent boy when I’m asked to perform in the same way, incapable of doing the dance that all my female counterparts have memorized into muscle memory. As women, we are purebred to be people pleasers, and I feel this deep in my bones, except when it comes to telling the truth. My internal dialogue taunts me like a b****y teenage girl until the words come out messy and disjointed from their intentions. I was reflecting on a falling out I had with one of my closest girlfriends, weighing everything I had submitted into evidence about how I was right and she was wrong. I felt like a discarded puppy in a Walmart parking lot when our friendship came to a close. I was being punished for pissing on the carpet when I did nothing but sit patiently on the grass. I had been deeply concerned about her health for quite some time. Ignoring the elephant in the room whenever we were together. Opening the door of my home as a place to hide out, sitting for hours as a nonjudgmental ear and a loyal subject to the keeping of all her outrages secrets. While everyone in her life talked s**t behind her back about her mental health and body, I tried to soft launch my genuine concern through strategic but direct support. Gentle parenting her into what I hoped would be a better direction. I loved her like a sister, and as the months went on, my concern for her grew deeper and deeper. I had recurring anxiety dreams about waking up to find out her heart had given out. My OCD delusions gaslighting me into the belief that these nightmares were premonitions. I did mental gymnastics going over the pros and cons of what to do, what to say, and what not to say. On some level, I knew that telling the truth would create a void larger than the ocean between us. But I knew with every fiber of my soul that if something happened to her and I had said and done nothing, I would never be able to forgive myself. I spent hours crafting a text to her husband expressing my aching concerns and offering up resources for the best treatment in the country to help her navigate an internal demon only she could choose to face. I declared earnestly that I was there to do anything and everything in my power to help them navigate this. I told him how scared I was for my friend and that I wasn’t naive to the fact that under any other circumstances, reaching out to him would feel like crossing a line, but I truly felt that this was a matter of life and death, that left me no other choice. Like a rear-end collision, I didn’t see her coming, or I suppose leaving. I was politely told to mind my business by her husband, and she proceeded to ghost me, block me across social media, and create what I can only assume was a smear campaign narrative that painted me as a horrible person to the rest of her friends. I was silently socially excommunicated by the acquaintances I had met over the years at her social gatherings. I could have kept my mouth shut, awkwardly shrugging with disinterest when our mutuals insisted on gossiping about the pitfalls of her life, but I chose to operate with what I value most in friendships… honesty. In the weeks that followed, we both participated in passive-aggressive jabs at each other like two publicly feuding celebrities, but the truth is I never stopped loving her, hoping that she would eventually come to realize that I had been the only one with the balls to confront the situation head-on. Had I cared about her less, I would have done nothing at all, like everybody else. The game of telephone has only recently stopped ringing. I’m proud that I was a party pooper from day one, refusing to talk badly about her to our mutual friends despite our falling out. I never said a word or dared to mention her name as they informed me that she obsessively brought me up like I was a deadbeat ex. I’m grateful for this growth experience. Though I stand by my actions in this case, my constant temptation to place blame on myself is hard to override. But with time it has evolved into a new type of self-awareness and an understanding that there have been many times where honesty was the cruel choice to make, but I made it nonetheless, to soothe the compulsive needs of my own anxiety and internal dialogue. My relentless quest for honesty and justice doesn’t make me a better person if the motives behind it are to create safety and reassurance for myself. It’s not our job to fix or save everyone in our lives, and sometimes the best thing we can do is sit back and allow them to fail and learn from the only person they actually can… themselves. Until Next Time, AME The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

From the moment I entered the scene on January 26th, 1996, I knew that I was destined for greatness and that unwavering delusion has carried me through every high and low of my life. As a 10 year old, I loved going to the grocery store with my dad. My black pleather boots clicked dramatically with each step as I walked through the frosty air of a Canadian winter in an oversized fur coat. My head hung low as we walked because I needed to block out the flashes of the relentless paparazzi. Of course, I wasn’t bestowed with the gluttonous joys of nepotism. The paparazzi were a figment of my imagination, and I lived for the hypothetical attention. I was certain that despite the lack of their physical presence, the people around me could feel the star quality that radiated from my tiny body. In the 2008 classic “4 Minutes” by Madonna featuring Justin Timberlake and Timbaland she rhythmically chants: “If you want it, you already got it. If you thought it,It better be what you want. If you feel it, It must be real. Just Say the word, I’m a give you what you want.“ At the ripe old age of 12 I really took this to heart and viewed it as a promise between not only me and Madonna but me and the universe. Never was this more true than when I landed myself in a circular board room at CAA, arguably the biggest and best acting agency in the world, with absolutely no acting experience. I was 17 and naive, the meeting was unmistakably taken as a favor to someone and when asked why they should want to work with me I said “I don’t know, I have no experience, BUT I have a good feeling about ME.” They laughed and by some miracle decided to send me on a couple auditions that week. Walking into the 3rd one I said out loud: “I’m going to get this one.” A week later the part was mine, and the rest is history. As I got older my fantasies became a little more humble and rooted in reality, but if I’m honest with myself, and you, they have never and will never go away. I’m not ashamed to admit that I am confident about the inevitability of my success in everything I do. I believe, therefore I am. Words of affirmation are modern day spells and as someone who believes that our thoughts and words shape shift our reality, I religiously put them around my apartment as constant reminders to train my brain into the blind belief of all my dreams. In the 1980’s Russian physiologist Ivan Pavlov conducted a foundational study on dogs learning to associate a neutral trigger or cue with treats and food this study became known as classical conditioning. He paired a neutral stimulus like the ticking of a metronome a light or a bell with the presentation of meat or food. After repeated pairings, the dogs learned to associate the neutral sound with the incoming food reward, causing them to salivate at the trigger alone, even when no food was present. This proved that animals acquire new behavioral reflexes through learned associations. I found this to be true even for the animal within me. Every time I read the encouraging notes a chemical reaction took place in my brain and sure as s**t something magical would happen during the day. Perhaps the release of dopamine simply made me more present to the good things naturally happening around me, or maybe the universe orgasmed with delight giving me what I wanted with each energetic release of belief in who I was, what I wanted and where I was meant to be. Either way, I didn’t care… it was working and it continues to work to this day. Everything I want comes to me easily and in the most unique unexpected ways possible. Every time I’ve thought: “F**k I’m a cat and this must be my ninth life.” The universe steps in and flips things in my favor, I always land on my feet. Even my biggest failures have lead to my greatest success. I don’t know why I was born with this level of confidence and trust; though there are plenty of other things wrong with me, I know this headspace is unique and a true gift. After exiting a decade-long relationship, I experienced my first lap in this confidence and inner knowing. I had been dismantled so deeply, that who I knew myself to be felt as if it had been amputated from my physical being. I assumed it was drifting out in the ethers waiting for me to magnetize my essence back into my soul. So I decided to put a note to self on the inside of my front door. Knowing or rather hoping every single time I walked outside I would be actively rewiring my brain into believing that I was still in a constant state of abundance. Today these notes are all over my apartment. Hidden inside cabinets, on my fridge, next to my desk. On the back side of my computer is a note that says “Avra Kehdabra” which means “I will create as I speak” in Hebrew. In some capacity whether through the notes around my home, journaling, or the thoughts jotted down in my phone I have written about everything that has ever happened to me before it became a reality and that is manifestation in its purest form. So with that, here are a few notes to self you can use to enter into the same reality of luck and abundance that I have found myself in since exiting the womb. If I’m being honest, some of my notes hide only where I will see them, because there is sometimes underlying shame about admitting what we desire most in life. There is a fear that we will look silly for dreaming big and believing in ourselves. I want to share these notes because they are honest in a way that I hope will get other people to be honest with themselves. Naming what you want is the hardest and first step of manifesting your dream life. You and the universe can’t make things happen if you don’t know what you want. Until next time, AME The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

What the f**k is that smell? I’m three dates in with a guy who’s not my type, the ultimate compliment because my type has historically been the love child of Ted Bundy and Randall Boggs from Monsters, Inc. - the creepy purple guy for those of you who aren’t as intimately familiar with this cinematic masterpiece. I digress. He’s funny, charming, and easy to talk to. His style is elevated without being preformative. He has a great job and drives a nice car. There is just one little problem punching me in the face like a runaway freight train… WHAT THE F**K IS THAT SMELL? It’s not a rhetorical question. I have the nose of Toucan Sam. I can smell anything and everything from a mile away, but I’m unable to identify the source of this sensorial assault. I attempt to discreetly sniff in a 360 around his black leather car. Is it him? Is it the car? For the love of God, it can’t be me?! He must have gym clothes in his back seat? Maybe a dead body in the trunk? I could get past that, but I can’t get past this smell. I acknowledge that I run the risk of being labeled a stone-cold b***h by writing this. I am definitely the problem, but what’s a girl supposed to do when Prince Charming smells bad? The question swirled around in my head as he drove us to an overpriced dinner at an east side hot spot. Like an episode of Jeopardy I fantasized about freezing time to phone a friend, perhaps they could arrive at my side to confirm or deny if we could get past this. I’m not writing all of this to shame or humiliate this sweet soul but to pose the question: what do we do when there is a catch that can’t be overlooked when we meet a great guy? I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt and assumed that this had to be, as Malcolm Gladwell so eloquently waxed poetic about - an outlier experience. There was no way a man could make it well into his 30s without ANYONE telling him that there was something seriously disturbing about his aroma. Despite all of this, I have always lacked the ability to leave any stone unturned so I agreed to see him again. The next time we got together, instead of holding my breath as butterflies wreaked havoc on my insides, I held my nose, bracing for impact. Though social norms wouldn’t allow me to hold tight to my literal nostrils as if I were jumping into a murky pool, I tapped into my inner neuroscientist and harnessed selective attention and cognitive reframing to protect myself from the possible impending stench. I had pleaded with the tarot gods and promised to cash in some karma coins with the universe, the worst still prevailed. Out of his car and within the crisp fresh air of dusk, it became clear that this scent could only have one source. Not even the prospect of future nerve adaptation could save us from this. According to science, your brain naturally blocks out constant background odors over time, a phenomenon often referred to as going “nose blind.” Your brain downregulates the signal once it decides the smell isn’t a threat, but I couldn’t picture a world where my sensitive sensory system didn’t find this “unique” combination of pheromones and body odor to be a very serious threat. The kind of threat that affects national security. How had TSA not warned him that his lack of antiperspirant or a signature cologne compromised the safety of the crew and all 8.3 billion souls on board this spinning rock? The biggest issue wasn’t the smell but my inability to address it. The mission was quickly deemed impossible, and I was certain that Ethan Hunt would agree. How are you supposed to tell someone, let alone a grown man that you barely know, that they smell bad? It sounds childish and insane, but it didn’t feel like my job or place. A damned-if-you-do and dead-if-you-don’t situation. I told myself addressing it was sure to create a life long complex. I was being selfless, maybe even brave by saying nothing at all. I would know, once after devouring a garlic-loaded pesto sauce, a date unexpectedly kissed me and then asked if I hadn’t brushed my teeth yet today. We were doomed from that moment forward. Though I knew this unfortunate mishap was the cause of over 15 cloves of freshly chopped garlic, I was never able to move past the fear of him thinking my breath actually smelled like that. I started pecking him on the lips like a conservative grandma and brushing my teeth five to six times a day when we were together. I couldn’t condemn this man to that same never-ending spiral of scent sensitivity. Instead I would leave him in ignorant bliss. “If you can’t address a minor offense like smell, how will you ever be able to address the stuff that really matters within partnerships?” said the angel on my shoulder. “You’re a smart, successful, funny, cute girl. Should you really have to settle for a guy that literally stinks?” said the devil on my other. Getting the ick was unavoidable, despite my best efforts to soldier on. Thirty seasons into the Truman Show of my life, I’m trying to trust that rejection is protection in all its forms. Not because I’ve become enlightened, but because every time I’ve ignored a warning sign, it has eventually returned wearing a larger and much scarier costume. Perhaps if he were the one for me, my nose would have detected sweet notes of vanilla bean where I smelled the unmistakable undertones of whatever liquid drips from an overstuffed garbage bag full of last week’s leftovers. Our bodies often know something long before our minds are willing to admit it. Learning to trust those instincts feels like learning a new language late in life -hard to do but obnoxiously impressive once you become fluent. Do you feel calm? Does your blood pressure spike? Are you unsettled or at ease? Does he smell like the peony section at Trader Joe’s or like that dude who sat too close to you on the subway during a New York heatwave? I’m learning to trust my body and, more importantly, question the stories my mind has spent years rehearsing. The ones that insist I should be grateful for any affection that comes my way. The ones that tell me I am difficult to love and therefore have no business being selective about who I let into my life. The problem wasn’t that “prince charming”smelled bad. The problem was that with every unignorable incompatibility I consistently attempt to convince myself that it doesn’t matter and that I should settle for something that doesn’t feel right in my bones. Maybe growing up is realizing that compatibility isn’t something you negotiate yourself into. Maybe it’s learning to trust the voice that says no before you’ve gathered enough evidence to defend why. And maybe the right person won’t require me to hold my breath. On the off chance that the sweet boy with kind eyes has recognized himself in this essay, please know I am sending you nothing but love, luck, and a short list of products that may very well alter the trajectory of your life. Your future wife will thank me. Frankly, so will everyone else. * Lume Acidified Odor Control Body Wash * Harry’s Extra-Strength Odor Sweat Control Antiperspirant * Dude Wipes * CYKLAR Crescent Perfume Oil * CYKLAR Glycolic Acid Exfoliating Body Spray Till next time, AME The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

Recently, I have been examining my own subconscious blockers. The fear of my own success seems to come up a lot for me. What happens when I get the thing I want? I’m like a dog with a bone. The pursuit of what I desire drives me into unbridled insanity, but once I arrive at the desired destination, I don’t know what to do with myself. My dreams are so big, I feel as if I’m not allowed to have them. I’ve seen what happens to successful women. Everybody loves an ingénue, but the one thing they love even more is taking a promising young woman and dismembering her down to the bone once she reaches the top of the mountain. You are not allowed to look out at the view for too long because, when the light hits your face, it illuminates your every flaw, and society will always make you pay for being something other than what they thought you were. I look at the systematic takedown of successful women over the past decade. Often, their greatest crime seems to be that they dared to be more than just one thing. You are not allowed to be pretty and smart, or young and successful, or strong and kind. You can’t like fashion and sports. You can’t be funny and complex, or gentle and brave. Taylor Swift, Megan Fox, Serena Williams, Jennifer Lawrence, Anne Hathaway, Sydney Sweeney, Kim Kardashian, Amber Heard, Blake Lively, Kamala Harris, Lena Dunham, Greta Thunberg, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Alex Cooper. The list goes on and on, but the story is always the same. The women who get the harshest scrutiny all share traits society claims to value: beauty, ambition, sexuality, confidence, visibility, intelligence, and success. But like the curated box of chocolates that sits on your grandma’s 1970s coffee table, you are only allowed to have as much as they deem acceptable. The truth is that women are encouraged to pursue all of these things right up until they become “too much”. Too powerful, too outspoken, too sexual, too ambitious, too emotional, too visible, or too difficult to control. So we box up our egos and put them away in our cedar-lined closets like an old winter coat. The cure-all remedy to the threatening shadow that our success seems to cast on the world is to never allow anyone to know just how smart we are. Turns out you have to be pretty smart to act dumb. When we act like a broken baby bird or a clueless bimbo, our success is suddenly something that has happened in spite of who we are and not because of it, and this seems to be one of the few ways to remain palatable to society. We quickly learn that being underestimated can sometimes be more useful than being recognized. Paris Hilton is a pioneer of this perspective. Her self-control and unwavering suppression of any need for credit is a master class that should be studied. For over a decade, she altered the sound of her own voice and allowed herself to be the butt of every late-night joke while silently building a $400 million empire. Society allowed her to succeed because they had no idea she was succeeding. There is still something socially uncomfortable about a woman who openly wants a lot. Women are encouraged to be successful, but often only if that success appears accidental. We celebrate ambition in theory but tend to prefer women who stumble into greatness rather than pursue it relentlessly. Every time I see a woman make her way to the top of her respective field, I begin to hold my breath, wondering if they are doing the same. How long will the world allow her to be there, before she falls from grace? Why do we build people up just to kick them back down? Humans are masochistic cannibals, hell-bent on destruction. These thoughts seem to be woven meticulously through my fears. My fear of failing and my fear of not being loved are at constant odds. In order to succeed, you must be okay with failing. Once you succeed, you must be okay with not being loved. How can my anxiety-prone skeleton come to terms with this f****d-up nightmare? Society is my sleep paralysis demon, so I sit and bed rot into the wee hours of the night, refusing to come face-to-face with my fears. “If people knew how smart you are, they would be very afraid of you.” One of the kindest things an ex has ever said to me, though in retrospect I’m not sure it was a compliment… I discussed this very sentiment with my dad over a fried chicken sandwich last week as we talked about the impending venture capital meeting I had for a project I’m working on. He asked if I would ever acknowledge this work publicly, and I said most likely not because it felt dangerous to be seen in this light. “I don’t think society will ever allow a woman to be pretty and smart. I’d rather just live a double life where people see me as one thing, and I know myself to be something very different and infinitely more complex.” He didn’t pause for even a moment before saying; “I think that’s pretty smart.” Even a 60-year-old man knows that beauty opens doors while simultaneously creating assumptions about what should be behind them. Successful women always become cultural projection screens, where the conversation shifts from their work to their likability, bodies, ambition, sexuality, or perceived flaws, and I don’t know if my skin will ever become thick and weathered enough to take this. I pretend to be brave with unwavering confidence, but on the inside I am a gentle glass doll, one wrong move away from shattering at all times. So what the hell are we supposed to do about it? I wish I had a profound answer. I wish I could tell you that after years of introspection, therapy, meditation, journaling, and aggressively overthinking in the shower, I have arrived at some enlightened conclusion. However I’m writing this piece because I’m hoping that one of YOU will have the answer. Unfortunately, for now, all I’ve got is this: Society doesn’t actually need to drag every woman back down the mountain because most of us start climbing with a parachute strapped to our backs. Ready to jump and make ourselves small as soon as we sense we have overstayed our welcome. We learn to soften our opinions, disguise our ambition, and laugh off our accomplishments, before anyone asks us to because we’ve seen what happens to the women who don’t. I’ve spent so much time worrying about whether the world will allow me to be pretty and smart that I’ve never stopped to consider whether I’m willing to allow it myself. That’s the cost of being fully seen, not everyone will like what they find. Perhaps the women I’ve spent years studying aren’t fearless at all, they are just willing to be misunderstood. I don’t know if I’ve reached that point yet and I’m not sure how you get there. I still find myself stuffing pieces of my personality into neat little boxes and praying nobody notices what’s missing. Maybe the goal isn’t to convince the world that women can be beautiful and intelligent. Maybe the goal is to stop pretending we’re not. Till next time, AME The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

“Conservative” men have embarrassingly always been my kryptonite. A fetish I keep locked inside a vault like a skeleton in my deepest darkest closet. Not the Bible-thumping, gun-toting, racist MAGA kind. But the sweater vest, hair gel, finance kind. Perhaps it’s a form of masochistic torture that my f****d up mind must condemn my liberal heart to, or maybe it’s simply because I love a project. A childhood of watching too much Fixer Upper - thanks a lot Chip and Joanna Gaines. Let’s keep all the fun parts that I love and excavate, then eradicate the parts that I don’t - the parts he surely inherited from the lack of a modern morals education. Can you be a white savior to a conservative men? God forbid a girl try to pull an Uno reverse. I try nonetheless. Hook, line, and sinker, I reel them in with Chanel ballet flats and a cardigan buttoned to the top only to pitch my pet project of making him into a modern man who understands my place is certainly not in the kitchen and, between the two of us, I’d be voted most likely to create generational wealth despite his lineage. I was fresh out of a breakup when we met, and so was he. I assumed we would have a few weeks of fun and then evaporate as quickly as we had begun. But days turned into weeks turned into months turned into half a year of the most romantic and world ending situationship. Within my own family, I felt like a housebroken animal who had been returned to the wild against my will. Within his, I was an exotic novelty, a young naïve woman who had yet to learn the foreign language of an old-money family fronting as Democratic constituents within liberal California. They used buzzwords that felt like hard-to-decipher hieroglyphics and I collected them all like fine vintage jewelry. “Common-sense politics, good old boy, family office, the club” - which club they were referring to I was never quite sure. I simply knew it was one I certainly did not belong to. One night, after having dinner with a couple he referred to only as a unit defined by their shared last name - the Smiths, the Hoffmans, the Goldmans, the list goes on - we walked the empty halls of the grandest club I had been to yet. He pointed me in the direction of the ladies’ room, which was down a short flight of stairs, explaining that “women used to only be allowed on that floor” - this was a former good old boys club. He said it as if it was a fact about his ancestry, a look into the past at the people who made him who he was. The bathroom was wallpapered in an old floral print. I wondered if it was original; perhaps the men that ran this joint had never stepped foot in here, having no idea that the old brass sink knobs and the pastel wallpaper had never been replaced. The lack of reverence you give a rarely used guest room, whose art still sits on the floor having “never gotten around to hanging that.” Despite all of this, I felt more comfortable in environments and families like this. Though wildly unintentional, I found myself constantly surrounded by the affluent circumstances of nepotism. I think people afflicted by their own good fortune are, for some unknown reason, magnetized to me. Perhaps it was because I had learned to decode the unique DNA of their youth while growing up court side to extreme wealth in Newport Beach. Though not a part of my own reality, I was not threatened by or uncomfortable with the lack of effort they had to put into “trying.” I was not impressed by their worldly possessions, nor did I desire to receive anything from them. My manifested delusions told me I was one of them, the shooting star of wealth had missed me the day I was born, but I was destined to be successful, rich, and surrounded by the nicest things that life had to offer. I did not feel that I lacked what they had, rather that it had yet to appear in my conscious reality, but it was only a matter of time until it did. My intuition labeled these relationships as crash courses on the future parenting of my own children. How would I create normalcy within the luxurious and larger-than-life reality I would inevitably provide for them? I felt protective of this clueless young man, oblivious to the fact that he had the world at his feet and every woman imaginable silently waiting in the wings to replace me. Other women would want him for his money, this I was sure of, but I desired him for his neurotic tendencies, the booming laugh that came every time I said something, even a little bit funny, and the glimmer in his eye that told me despite all the evidence I had for his lack of care and commitment to me, he was, in his own way, in love with the woman I was. Shocked by my blunt transparent candor, fascinated by my “wickedly smart mind” (his words, not mine), and on most nights dumbfounded by my body. I constantly told him he reminded me of a teenage boy, not in a creepy Woody Allen kind of way, but in the way that all boys born into money lacked any kind of meaningful responsibility outside of the unwavering dedication to protect and uphold the reputation of their kin and namesake. Life had yet to beat the life out of him. He was easily excited like a golden retriever with a ball, except I’m the one who did tricks for him. A realistic work schedule didn’t seem to exist for him. He would attend the office when it was convenient for him, and I do mean attend. I pictured him showing up, briefcase in hand, wearing a long trench coat as he sat on the shoulders of another little boy pretending to play grown-up. To attend is to arrive and play a part despite having nothing to really do. I came to this judgmental conclusion because he was able to take months off at a time, traveling Europe and taking naps on a yacht. He would ask to make dates at 2 o’clock in the afternoon as if everyone else also had nowhere to be and nothing to do, and I loved every minute of it. When I would arrive at a five-star restaurant, he would have a glass of red wine waiting for me. He did not wait for possibly anything but me, a novelty I’m sure he found amusing, as I showed up 10 to 15 minutes late to everything we ever did, not because I wasn’t excited or didn’t care, but because I needed to change my outfit five or six times before leaving the house, carefully planning my undergarments and making sure my top was easily removable so as to avoid any awkward silence or embarrassing movements when we got home. He was soft and gentle. He made sure I had water on the bedside table and would massage my scalp with shampoo in the shower after we had sex. On the weekends, he read the newspaper on his balcony, and I pretended to take a midmorning nap, not knowing what to do as he perused political columns and the weather section. I don’t actually know what’s in a newspaper. I’ve never read one. I loved the way people admired him when we were out - a local celebrity of sorts. Women would stare me up and down, surely wondering what I had that he wanted that they did not have. Little did they know I didn’t even have it. Sometimes, within my own narcissism, I wondered if he was gay, the only plausible explanation for him not wanting to get down on one knee and marry me the minute he met me. He had made it clear we were dating but not a “couple.” Monogamous sexually, but free to go on dates with other people if we chose to. Part of me knew that this was a one-sided arrangement. He wanted to feel that he had the freedom to do as he wished despite the fact I don’t think he actually took the time or cared to see other women. It was the mindset of freedom and a lack of responsibility to me while still remaining “a good guy.” Had he run into me on a date with another man, I am certain he would have dissolved at the seams by my betrayal. Never were the embarrassing facts of our arrangement more clear and simultaneously confusing than on a particularly gut-wrenching morning at a Beverly Hills hotel where we sat wrapped in robes in our overpriced suite. He was staying there for a conference, too successful to subject himself to the 30-minute commute back to the Westside at the end of the day. He ate oatmeal with muddled blueberries, and I ordered pancakes, bacon, breakfast potatoes, a side of hot sauce, a bowl of fruit, orange juice, and an iced coffee that I knew I would never drink. He had haphazardly brought up the impending trip - more so a one-night staycation - we had coming up to attend my grandmother’s wedding. She was 82 and starting her third marriage, something I found to be impossibly chic of her. He asked me how I would introduce him to my family. I thought it was such an odd question, my brain not truly processing what it meant. Was it a trick question? How was one supposed to answer this? I naïvely assumed he wanted to understand the closeness or formality of my family dynamic. Would it be a grand event where he could disappear into an overdressed crowd, or did I expect him to stand in a receiving line, intimately shaking hands and kissing babies with everyone I’ve ever known? My face was hot, and I didn’t know how to answer. This was something that occurred often over the six months that I was with him. I always felt like I was one misstep away from him exiting my life. A reality I desperately didn’t want to be a part of. I stared blankly, blinking with an awkward smile. suddenly as if the words coming out of my mouth were a surprise even to myself I blurted out, “Grandma, this is the man that I’m f*****g. How’s that?” He rolled his eyes and half-heartedly laughed with discomfort, sheepishly looking down at his oatmeal, pushing blueberries from one side of the bowl to the other. He said a series of words that are seared into my brain with embarrassment. “I mean, I wouldn’t say boyfriend.” The sting of rejection slapped me in the face, like frostbitten cheeks being hit with shards of icy snow and wind chill as I rocketed down a ski slope. What the

I was feeling anxious, uninspired, and stuck in a scroll loop, until I learned that my own creativity could become practical magic for breaking my addiction to my phone. This episode unpacks how screen burnout affects your creativity, mental clarity, and peace — and how to finally reset, so you can stop consuming and start creating. If your phone has become your go-to escape but somehow makes you feel worse, you're not imagining it. I dig into the loneliness that was hiding beneath my bad habits, the guilt that sometimes comes with stillness, and why doing nothing might actually be the key to doing everything. It’s not about productivity hacks — it’s about reclaiming your attention, your energy, and the quiet magic of your own creativity. Read the full essay on Substack: Practical Magic for the Chronically Online Follow @alliemarieevans on IG and TikTok for more. Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

You can’t make this stuff up… and yet, it really happened. I received an actual exorcism — from my ex. Upon reflection, this may have been a very necessary side quest, because nothing else seemed to break the chokehold he had over my heart, mind, and maybe even my spirit. If you’ve ever dated someone who made you feel like your soul was slipping out through your eyeballs… this one’s for you. From gaslighting to demons, in this episode of The Unreliable Narrator, I unpack all the wild, subtle, and terrifying ways we convince ourselves we're crazy — because it's incredible what you can justify (or even believe) when you’re not thinking clearly. We talk about: Subtle signs your partner might be draining your life force My literal late-night exorcism How stress and toxic relationships impact our physical health The blurred lines between emotional trauma and spiritual misalignment And how to finally call your energy back Think of this episode as your personal sage stick — but with sarcasm, soul, and maybe a little screaming. Share this episode with someone who needs to be saged, and drop a comment below telling me: What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever gone along with… for a man? Follow Me For More: Instagram: @AllieMarieEvans TikTok: @AllieMarieEvans Read more essays: SubStack Watch on: YouTube Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

This week, we’re peeling back the layers of friendship — the slow fades, the silent resentments, and the moments we realize we’re playing a part we no longer want. Why do we stay in friendships long after they stop fitting? Why do we feel like the bad guy for, realizing that someone else is a s****y friend? And when is it time to stop faking it altogether? Spoiler: it’s messier, sadder, and somehow more beautiful than you might think. In This Episode: The Mythical Unicorn: Realistic Expectations vs. Impossible Standards in Friendship The Ghost in the Group Chat: When to Speak Your Piece and When to Leave Quietly The Hierarchy of Heart Space: Why Not Everyone Deserves an All-Access Pass to Your Life Letting Go With Grace: How to Release Friendships Without Resentment or Drama A Quick Note on the Rebrand: Hi everyone — it’s Allie. I wanted to let you know that Always Anxious is officially: The Unreliable Narrator. I love a good rebrand almost as much as I love overthinking everything — but truly, this shift feels right. As I grow into my voice as a writer and storyteller, I wanted a name that better captures what this space has always been about: sharing life the way it’s actually felt, not perfectly remembered. Thank you for growing with me and I'm excited to be able to focus on sharing what really matters to me here. This Podcast was always meant to simply be a way to make my essays more accessible to you, so if you enjoyed listening check out my Substack for more essays like this. Find Me Here: If you’re in your feels after reading — or just need something to soundtrack your quiet exits, here’s a playlist inspired by FAKING IT WITH FRIENDS.  Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

What happens when girlhood ends before you're ready — and womanhood begins on someone else’s terms? In this deeply personal episode of Always Anxious, I unpack the invisible pressures women face to grow up at the “right” time, in the “right” way, with the “right” outcome — and how almost none of us ever do. While writing my essay The Quiet Collapse of Girlhood, I sat down with two of my close friends — Tallulah Willis and Sara Coates — for honest conversations about growing up, body image, public scrutiny, identity, and the quiet grief that often comes with leaving girlhood behind. From generational trauma to societal timelines to the aching nostalgia of innocence lost, this episode dives deep into the pain, the power, and the personal reclamation of becoming a woman on your own terms. This one is tender, emotional, and full of moments I hope remind you that you're not alone. 💌 Let’s stay connected: → Follow me on Instagram → Read the full essay on Substack → Submit your letter to Anxious Anonymous I’d love to hear your thoughts after listening. What part resonated most? What is your internal age? Drop a comment, DM me, or share your favorite quote — your input means more than you know. If this episode speaks to you, please consider following the show, sharing it, or leaving a quick review. We grow better when we grow together.  Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe

I titled this article Becoming the Unreliable Narrator: How Lying to My Journal Saved My Life and Ended My Relationship because both are true. Finding the clarity and courage to leave a toxic relationship gave me a second chance at life. Who I was born to be, who I know myself to be, and who I have yet to become all hung in the balance of the decision to walk away and never look back. Read the full article and view the referenced images on Substack Get full access to The Unreliable Narrator by Allie Evans at alliemarieevans.substack.com/subscribe