So, last week, on the night of the 19th, I forgot to set my alarm(s). Unfortunately, everyone else went to bed early. No one woke me up.
I finally woke up at 11:30pm. This is about 45 minutes after I was supposed to be at work. I panicked and called my boss, then threw my phone on my bed while I ran to get dressed.
When I was ready to leave, I couldn’t find my phone. I wasn’t too worried about it. I have a brand new car and only work a mile away. What’s the chance that I’ll break down and need my phone?
Well, apparently, right after I left the house, my 13 year old nephew (A), woke up. He went into my room (first mistake). He says he wanted to play with my bunny (second mistake - big one). He says he saw my phone on my bed (lie - I searched all over my bed for it and couldn’t find it). He says he didn’t use it for anything, other than sending ONE text.
But, I’m getting ahead of myself here. I didn’t find this stuff out until later.
Anyway, the morning of the 20th, I got home and found my phone. For some strange reason, it was right at the head of my bed, where I would have left it before going to sleep (it’s my alarm clock). I know I didn’t leave it there, since I used it after I got up, and since I checked there.
I wanted to send a text to my ex-boyfriend. I couldn’t find his name in my contacts. “That’s odd”, I said to myself. He should be the first one.
That’s when I noticed something even stranger. I had 3 contacts I had never seen before. They were e-mail type contacts. I started scrolling through my contacts list and found more insanity. The only contacts left were: Me (my photobucket e-mail), my sister, and her boyfriend. Even my Verizon default contacts were gone. All my friends. My whole family, other than my sister. My work. All gone.
I started getting concerned.
I started to call the local Verizon store to see if the Juke is known for having contact erasing bugs. That’s when I noticed that my dial font had changed from boring white on black. To rainbow.
As I continued to search through my phone, I noticed other strange changes.
My entire call history was gone.
My entire text history was gone.
My entire (almost) contact list was gone.
I had new contacts added.
I had 4 new ringtones. Prior to this, the only ringtone I had was Massachusetts - used for my ex-boyfriend and to combat homesickness (it’s not working). These new ringtones were songs I didn’t recognize.
I didn’t find anything else at that point. Granted, I don’t use much else on my phone so I didn’t know where to look.
Fast forward to the night of the 21st. It’s 6PM and I’m trying to sleep. It’s not working. I get a text message. I read it. It says, “Who are you?”
I recognize the area code as being this area. So, I assumed it was someone I know and that they lost their contact list too. So, being a smartass, I asked, “Do you always randomly text strangers? LOL.” Then, I told them who I was. And asked who they were.
I got back:
“If you don’t know who I am, you shouldn’t be F@cking texting me, saying b*tch.”
Needless to say, I was shocked. This is not something I would ever, ever do. I am 28 years old and fairly responsible. I am not some teenybopper with my first cellphone. So, I told them that.
The person called me.
It was an adult female. I explained to her that something odd was going on with my phone. I told her that I was getting worried about what had happened to it and that I didn’t know any texts had been sent since my whole call history had been deleted.
She asked if I had kids.
I said no. But I do live with kids.
She asked if they were middle or high school aged.
I said yes, one of each.
I asked if she had any kids that age.
She said yes, one in middle school.
I asked, does your daughter go to ****** Middle School?
Why, yes, she does, she said.
Does your daughter know A?
She knows OF him. But doesn’t know him personally.
Does she know T (my niece - high school).
Sure, she knows her, they’re friends.
- my niece spent the vacation week at my cousin’s house so I know she didn’t do it.
I told her that it never even occurred to me that my nephew would do something like this to me, or to anyone for that matter.
Anyway, I found out what her daughter’s name was. Even I recognized the name, and I try to avoid getting involved in my nephew’s life.
Luckily for me, this nice lady was very understanding and even laughed by the end of the call.
Things were not so jovial at my house.
I started getting worried. I knew now, that the little shit had downloaded at least 4 things. I also knew that I had strange contacts. I called Verizon. I was hoping they’d be able to tell me everything he had done. Unfortunately, they couldn’t. It wasn’t the end of my billing cycle yet.
What he could tell me though, was that starting at about 11:50, the night of the 19th, and continuing until almost 4am, HUGE amounts of downloads were charged to my phone.
So, the nice Verizon guy helped me to find the downloads. I had wallpaper, games, songs, and even something having to do with the weather. Most of them were subscription downloads.
He couldn’t tell me how much this was going to cost me.
I explained what had happened and said that under no circumstances did I allow anyone to use my phone. I explained that my nephew knows he’s not allowed in my room and that all the cell phones in the house were off limits. He put a note about that in my records.
Today, my bill became available.
$275.
$195 of that was my nephew’s doing.
Now, because I told them, as soon as I knew, that my phone had been out of my possession, and that no one else had permission to use it, they actually counted that as being “stolen”. They were able to credit back 35% of the fees.
And $12.49 was a 10 credit purchase to Sony Musicbox. I will actually use that at some point. So, I’m not going to make my sister pay that back either. But, the total still came to $115.
My sister was, obviously, furious. She doesn’t have that kind of money lying around. I make more money and have fewer bills, and have a huge amount of overtime coming to me next week. So, I was actually willing to take it in $5 increments each week but she didn’t want to do that. I currently owe her $130 from last week (I made a massively stupid mistake and got myself a huge overdraft charge). She insisted on paying the phone bill back out of what I owed her. I don’t need the money though. I wish she’d agree to pay it back one week at a time. I know she can’t afford it.
My nephew still insists he didn’t do anything wrong.
He doesn’t seem to realize the severity of what he’s done.
His first major mistake was going in my room. I actually share this room with his sister. Since I work nights and she’s at school during the day, we’re never in there at the same time. But, it’s still both of ours. We have personal stuff in there. I have some important papers in there. He’s not allowed in there, at all - unless I specifically tell him to go in there.
His second major mistake was admitting that he was going to play with my bunny. I have told all the children in this house to stay the hell away from my bunny. He’s 7 years old and very skittish. He had never been around children until just recently. He’s used to a very quiet home, with two sedate adults. I don’t want my bunny being manhandled by irresponsible children who can’t even eat a simple meal without getting food all over themselves, the floor, the table, and the person sitting across from them.
His third major mistake was admitting that my 9 year old nephew never woke up. Well, dumbass, you just implicated yourself right there. You say you were in my room. You say you were the only one up. Your sister was 3 miles away. You admit that you knew my phone was there. The phone bill details the times that each download happened. The one text which was sent, was sent to a classmate’s phone number - a girl you’ve been lusting after for over a year. The only contacts in my list which WEREN’T deleted, were me, and your parents. The only contacts YOU recognize. If my other nephew had done this, he would have kept my ex-boyfriend too. (The younger one is my actual nephew. He knows my ex and considers him an uncle. The one who did this is my sister’s boyfriend’s kid and has never met my ex.)
He honestly seems to be confused as to why he’s in so much trouble right now.
So, what did I learn from all of this?
Set my friggen alarm before I go to bed. 
Actually, when I called Verizon again today, I had the nice lady teach me how to use the lock function on my phone.
I’ve said this before and I’m sure I’ll say it again.
Children are evil, disease infested Satan-spawn and they should all be locked up until they’re at least 25.
For some reason, I’m actually not really mad about most of what happened. I’m irritated about my contacts being deleted. I’m mad - for my sister’s sake, about the charges. But all in all, I’m ok with this. I hate children but I still realize that they’re not perfect and that learning from their mistakes is the best way to earn right from wrong.
What pisses me off is that he didn’t learn a damn thing. He just doesn’t care at all.
And he touched my bunny.
