If you can't say something nice, then just come sit next to me...

I have been debating telling this story for a little while now...it's secondhand, and I rarely, if ever, talk to the participants involved. I dated the officemate of the person involved for a little while, and he'd probably be really pissed off at me for telling the story.

But I don't care. It's too funny.

I dated R. when I lived in Boston, in the spring of 2005. I was leaving Boston after my graduation in May, and we basically lost touch and ended it there. This past summer, he and his girlfriend broke up for good, I got dumped by my boyfriend, and we decided to keep in closer contact again. He came to visit me in Philly, I went to Boston for a weekend after that, and I went to an event with him at his alma mater in Massachusetts. Hung out briefly in New York in December and never saw each other again until recently when he was in Philly on business. No, we're not dating, and won't again now that I'm moving further South. But at any rate.

R. had introduced me to his officemate, S., back last summer. She's a smart girl, more attractive than not, and is very outgoing. That being said, she kinda had the "brother-sister" syndrome going on with R. I suspected that she liked him herself - really, he is by far the best-looking man I have ever met in person - but I have never been one to compete, and I knew she's not the kind of girl that R. goes for. She didn't seem to take to me when I visited, and basically kind of was a little mean to me whenever I talked to her. She'd ignore me, contradict what I'd say, blah blah blah. But overall, she was one of those "I'm one of the guys" girls. You know what I'm talking about, the one that actually wins the fantasy baseball league thing at the office, the one that could beat up half the men in the office, the one who drinks the CEO under the table. Does the crazy stuff for attention that the male class clown would have done in high school.

Anyway, R. came to Philly for a conference and told me this little gem: R and S are out socially for a wedding of a coworker. They've all had many drinks, and S decides to slide down the banister from the second floor of a very large lobby. S jumps on the banister, and in a scene I can only imagine, she falls BACKWARD from the top of the stairs onto the first floor lobby.

I should pause here - I do not in any way wish this girl harm. Again, I have heard many good things about her, she's just never warmed to me. I can imagine why - she's protective of R and may have liked him herself. I'm not in the market of wishing this girl bodily injury or death.

End pause.

S. falls 17 feet and miraculously avoids death and paralysis. She broke both her arms. I didn't hear this story until R. was in town and an industry colleague - no, not even from the same company - brought up the accident at a cocktail party.

I managed my best "gosh, that's awful" but was thinking "You stupid idiot, I used to handle DEATH claims where people had fallen shorter distances!" R. told me she was okay, but a lot of people had heard about the accident and it was sort of a story that wouldn't die with S. I dropped the topic, because R. is also slightly protective of S.

And then I ran home to tell my roommate the story. My roommate, an ER trauma nurse, has a way of associating humor in death-and-dismemberment situations. I'm guessing you have to in order to get through that sort of job. I tell her the story in as great of detail as I can muster, and just when I think the story can't get any more ironic, my roommate sheds some light on the injuries that S had:

"you know, Molly, that totally means that she had to get someone to wipe her ass for her."

I am evil. But THAT is funny.