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Listing for the same couch—my couch—on a local resale site. The price? Four times what it was worth. The seller? The same man who had convinced me to give it to him for free.
I messaged him, pretending to be interested, and arranged to meet. When he saw it was me, his face turned white. I didn’t cause a scene, but I made sure to let him know I wasn’t fooled. He stammered an apology, saying he “needed the money.” I left without the couch, but with a lesson: not everyone’s story is what it seems.