Normally, I would never even think to actually sit down and document a bad situation that has happened in my life. Normally, I would not care to tell my side of a story to the world of the internet. Normally, I would never put anyone's information out there like that on blast. However, this situation… this situation just isn't normal. I feel that this story must be told so that others can learn from my mistake, one of my biggest mistakes, so that they can take what I told them and apply it to their lives, their relationships, and give more thought to the situations around them.

I was always told in life that trust looks different to everyone and is received differently by everyone. Trust is often times immediately given and only ever earned once it has been broken. The lessons we learn about trust start from an early age and the opinions on it differ depending on who you are talking to about it. Now, before I get into it, let me start by saying I truly have sat on this decision to make a video of myself, giving my personal recollections of this situation, way before I started recording just a couple minutes ago. It wasn't easy for me to come forward and talk about something that hurt me so deeply, especially something that had happened a few years back, but now, more than ever, people need to stay aware of what is going on out there. For the sake of the other person involved, I have changed his name for the intentions of this story. Everything else I say in this video are as true to my own knowledge as they can be. Some details are hazy, because it has been so long, so I will not talk about something I am un-sure of or can't exactly remember. You might ask yourself when listening, "why is she telling me this?" I promise, everything I am saying will come back full circle in the end. Bear with me as this is the first video "blog" I have ever done. Well… here goes nothing…

I want to start this story back in the year 2016, when it all began. It was my first day of ninth grade at Jenson High School, around twenty-five years ago, and, as I'm sure you all can recall from your first day of high school, I was extremely nervous. I was in my second period class sitting next to a very cute-looking boy who did not nearly seem as nervous as I was. In fact, rather the opposite. He looked very comfortable and confident in himself and seemed like he knew exactly what he was doing. The class hadn't started yet, when he looked over at me and introduced himself as Cody. We chatted for a little and I discovered that he was actually a sophomore but was re-taking this course for credit. In just the three short minutes that I was able to talk with him, it was very apparent how nice he was, and his encouragement really helped calm my nerves. After the bell rang, he asked to exchange numbers and told me to text him if there's any questions I had about high school. That night, I reached out to him and we chatted for hours long; sending lengthy messages back and forth to each other. He was so helpful and kind and, in our exchange, we started to get to know each other more. I knew a few upperclassmen at the time and started asking around about him to see what his deal was. Everyone I talked to had nothing but good things to say about Cody and apparently, he was well-known and popular in his grade. In particular, my friend Ashley told me she had been close with him since the start of middle school, so at that time they had been friends for about five years, and that he was from the Czech Republic and came from a good family here in town. I was pretty excited, if I do say so myself, that the first friend I made in high school was a cute and popular upper-classman boy. That whole entire year we sat next to each other in class, constantly making jokes and relying on each other to help pass. Second period math quickly became my most entertaining period; especially when Cody would get going on stories about his life. We hung out many times that year: going out to football games together, hanging with friends outside of school, eating lunch on campus together, going to the beach; you name it, we did it. Cody was a really good friend, we had so much in common and he always had my back and knew exactly what to say to pick me up if I was down.

Cody traveled to the Czech Republic every other summer to visit with family. His grandma, who he was very close with, lived there full-time. During his "off" summers, he, his mom, dad, and little sister would usually vacation to Europe for a couple weeks traveling around to as many places as they could. Cody's life reminded me a lot like mine, especially the traveling aspect. My family would travel too every other summer to go see my grandma, except she was in Greece not the Czech Republic. Him and I always loved to share pictures with each other from our travels and even would sometimes compete for whose were better, prettier, more cultured, etc. The summer after my freshman year, Cody's family went to Italy for a few weeks and he never failed to keep me, or social media, updated with constant photos. The day he came back from his trip, me and a few other of our friends all went out to dinner to welcome him back. It had been like three weeks since we had seen him and it was like nothing changed, the gang was back together. After dinner Cody invited us all back to his house, which never happened. Usually, we would hang out at other people's places because his parents, who were both E.R. surgeons, didn't like people at the house when they were on call or resting. As we were pulling up, he got a call from his mom and by the tone of his voice I could tell something was up. I had no idea what was said on the call because he was speaking to his mom in Czech. Often-time when he would speak with his parents or grandma on the phone, it was in Czech, so we were kind of used to it. After he hung up, he told us his mom was tired from travel and didn't want anyone over. Understandable. So, my friend dropped him off and we left. Cody lived in a huge house and I was always dying to see the inside of it. I could tell by his parents' occupation, his life stories, and his travel that he came from a wealthy family.

A couple weeks later school started back up again and, sadly enough, I didn't have any classes with Cody that year. That really didn't change much when it came to our friendship though and we still hung out just as much, if not more, than before. He even started teaching me some basic Czech in exchange for some basic Greek and encouraged me to become more fluent myself. About three months into the school year, Cody got into a really bad car accident. Long story short, his car basically blew up on him while he was driving and he somehow managed to come out of it with only a blown ear drum. He was so lucky to not have had other serious injuries from what happened. The photos of his car were so scary and upsetting that I instantly started crying after I saw them. He was such a good sport about everything that happened and in true Cody fashion, even posted a picture of his hospital band with a witty caption that was along the lines of, "didn't even get asked for an ID before I got banded." I remember that post like it was yesterday, it stood out to me as a reminder that there is always room for light in a dark situation. He was only out of school for a couple days before he was back in action. He could barely hear out of his right ear but never let that get him down. Upon his return, they even announced over the school's intercom how happy they were to have him back safely. Not even two months later, Cody tells us that his sister has a bad heart and that she hasn't been doing too well lately. I felt like he couldn't catch a break and it was devastating to see him so worried about the health of his little sister. I would constantly send him uplifting messages to encourage him that she will be okay. She got better towards the end of the school year and things finally were back to normal in Cody's life.

As his normal started back up again, my normal started to change. The summer of my sophomore year I got a boyfriend and my relationship with Cody was still good, but we weren't as close as before. I texted him towards the end of summer, while he was in Czech visiting his grandma, that I missed him and sent him a picture of my upcoming class schedule. I was now going to be a junior and Cody was about to start his senior year. To our surprise, we both had AP (advanced placement) Psychology together. School kicked back up and it was nice to have a class with Cody again, especially knowing it was going to be his last year here. Our AP Psychology class was taught by one of my good friends' mom, who I had known for a long time. We had a great relationship, so I was really looking forward to having her as my teacher. Since it was an AP class, we already had an exam on the third week of school. The day of the exam, I was doing some last-minute studying outside the classroom when I could hear Cody walking up on the phone talking very loudly in Czech. He seemed super upset. He quickly got off the phone and told me that his grandma had just told him that his sister is going into open heart surgery in about twenty minutes. He was freaking out because apparently she was still in the Czech Republic and had no one up there with her. He asked me if I could go grab our teacher, Mrs. Wilson, from the classroom and bring her out here to talk to him. I ran and got her and when I came back, he was on the phone again, but this time crying. I felt horrible and she instantly told him that they would handle the test another day and to go home. I was pretty confused because Cody never mentioned to me that his sister was sick again or that she didn't come home with them from their vacation, but I didn't think too much about it because we hadn't kept up with each other as much. I texted him all that night, trying to make him laugh and lift up his spirits. The next three days he didn't come to school and said his parents got on a flight to the Czech Republic to be with his sister. On the third day from the exam, Mrs. Wilson pulled me aside and asked if we could talk during her planning period. She seemed super concerned, even slightly mad, and I had no idea why. That day I met with her, everything changed.

To say I remember what happened almost twenty-one years ago down to the exact detail, may sound a little outlandish, but I will never forget what was said that day when I met with Mrs. Wilson. This was the first time in my life I had experienced full-body chills that simply would not go away. When I walked in, I had no idea what she was going to talk to me about and when I walked out, my whole life changed. I sat down on the chair in front of her desk and could tell by her facial expressions that something serious was going on. For the next five minutes, I just sat and listened in complete dis-belief. She told me that she had emailed Cody's mom the day of the test to let her know she sent Cody home to collect himself. She mentioned that he had to re-take the exam within a week and offered her condolences to the family about his sister. To which his mom replied that Cody's sister was doing just fine and that she had no idea what Mrs. Wilson was referring to. They exchanged numbers and talked for about three hours on the phone. During that phone call Cody's mom told Mrs. Wilson that they are not from the Czech Republic, that Cody had never been out of the country and doesn't even own a passport, that her and her husband are managers of a Publix grocery store, and that his sister has never had any heart problems. She explained to Mrs. Wilson that Cody suffers from depression and will stay in the house for days or weeks at a time because of it. He had never been medicated for this depression but would regularly see a therapist for it. So many thoughts were running through my mind and I had so many questions, but I just kept listening. Apparently, she had no idea Cody could somehow speak Czech or where he could have learned the language from. She said that he was never in a car accident, but that his dad took away his car after a fight they had all gotten into one night. Mrs. Wilson explained that for the next hour or so on the phone, she revealed to his mom everything she knew about Cody and nothing matched up to what his mom knew about him. After she got done telling me all of this, she asked me to pull up the dates Cody was traveling to the Czech or Europe. I figured out the dates and they matched with the dates his mom gave Mrs. Wilson, saying he was in the house refusing to leave because of his depression during those periods. All while at the same time, he had been posting pictures and texting us like he was out of the country. Mrs. Wilson and I then started reverse searching some of the pictures he sent or posted of his trips and even the one of his car accident. Sure enough, they all came up on google. I had no idea what to do at this point, what to say, what to think. I had known this guy for three years now and some of our friends have known him even longer than that, and he was living a complete lie. She asked me that day not to talk about it with anyone until she spoke with Cody first. That night I was sick to my stomach for hours. Three years. Three whole years of a friendship that not one thing was true from. Oh, and his grandma? Yeah, she died years back. I couldn't wait until Mrs. Wilson spoke with him the next day because then I could confront him.

At school the day after, Cody finally returned. Like usual, he tried coming up to me in the hallway and I barely gave him the time of day. I know he could tell something was up because he was persistently asking me if I was okay and wouldn't let it go. We had about an hour left of school when I was called into the guidance counselors office. As I walked in, I could instantly see Cody sitting there with Mrs. Wilson, his mom who I had seen before from photos, and the counselor. I sat down and took a deep breath because I knew the conversation that was about to happen was going to be a super tough one.

When I turned to look at Cody, he, to put it bluntly, looked like he was about to shit his pants. He had terrified and guilty written all over his face. I sat down and instantly could tell that they all had been in there for a while before I came. The counselor asked if I knew why I was in there, to which I replied yes, and she looked over at Cody and said, "I will let you have the floor." He looked me in the face and stumbled out the words "I'm sorry," and I could hear in his voice that he was holding back tears. He admitted everything to me exactly how I knew it to be from my conversation the day prior with Mrs. Wilson. Before I could even ask why, he told me he just wanted to fit in. I didn't understand how being Czech, with doctor parents, was fitting in but how could I understand the mind and decisions of someone who was living a lie. I had two main questions for him, as I would rather talk everything else out in private and not in front of teachers and parents. I asked him if anyone in his life knew the real him. He said no. I asked how he learned Czech, as I had heard him hundreds of times before speaking it. He told me he would just memorize passages online. No words. I had no words. I asked if I could be excused and they said yes, but before they let me go, they told Cody, in front of me, that he had to come clean to everyone. I walked out after that.

You know that saying, "the devil is in the details?" Well, isn't that the damn truth. I am not going to bore you with a long story about the aftermath of this all because I know for him that is extremely personal. However, I will tell you that after our friends found out, we all started sharing stories about Cody and nothing added up. Almost like it was in front of our faces this whole time but not, at the same time? Now, I sit here, with a lump in my throat because to this day it still upsets me. We spoke only a handful of times after that day and he did end up admitting to some people about his lies. He didn't return to school for the remainder of his senior year and I haven't heard much about him since.

You never know in this life if someone is lying to you, because for some, they believe the lies they tell so much that it truly does become their story. For Cody, that was exactly what happened. It didn't take much effort on his end to keep up these lies for over eight years because he had been living them every single day. A reality he created and used to deceive. It was his normal, but never normal.

Well, I am not sure exactly how to finish up this video, because like I said I have never made one before. I guess I just want to say that if you're watching this and know someone who is lying, know someone who could be lying, or have lied about yourself before to others, please understand that it effects so many and is simply put, just plain wrong. Keep your eyes open and question everything. Live by the mantra that trust is earned, never given and always have your own back.