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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Was bystander in teenage argument and it's stuck in my mind - WWYD in this situation? (too late this time but if it happens again...)

5 replies

moonshinepoursthroughmywindow · 20/03/2026 20:52

Last night I was coming back from somewhere by bus at about 10.30pm. At the town centre bus stop there were two young people (I'd guess about 16-18) having an on-off argument. One was a young woman/girl wearing a tiny crop top and shorts (I was finding it very cold in a padded jacket) and she kept crying and accusing the young lad of having done various unkind things to her. Two that she repeated a lot of times were "you made me take my clothes off" and "it was really unkind of you to ask me to give you your stuff back." The guy was ignoring her some of the time and the rest of the time saying things like "this is ridiculous" or "give it a rest." She'd walk away but then come back and start saying the same things and crying. Then at one point when he wasn't taking much notice of her complaints she suddenly darted across the road in front of traffic, then sat on the central barrier with her legs sticking out into traffic, crying loudly. Another young woman intervened at this point, checking that she wasn't physically hurt and encouraging her to come back to the safety of the pavement. The boy just kept saying "she ran across the road!" in a shocked sort of way.

Then the two of them were on the same bus as me and we were the only people. I didn't want them to feel I was intruding on their conversation and I sat further forward than them, but couldn't help hearing the same old argument was being thrashed out again and again. She still kept starting to cry loudly and at one point he said she was fake crying - I can't be sure whether this was true but something did feel a bit stagey about her whole behaviour. He didn't actually have that much to say for himself, she just kept mentioning the same two things that he'd supposedly done. But then she started saying "I need to know if I'm still coming back with you, because if not I need to get off soon." I never heard any resolution to this but they were both still on when I got off.

At a few moments I wondered if I should have intervened in some way; although there was no indication that either of them was likely to get physically violent. The whole situation just made me feel a bit uncomfortable as I really couldn't work out who was in the right or wrong. "You made me take my clothes off," if it was true, would be a big red flag, but she didn't seem to have any other clothes with her and she wasn't the only person out in a surprisingly warm-weather outfit. My gut feeling was that she was trying to get some reassurance by a method that had worked before, and he was getting a bit fed up with it, but he could have been some kind of abuser for all I know. Was it rude not to ask if everything was OK/if there was anything I could do, or would it have been rude or nosy to say anything?

OP posts:
Endofyear · 20/03/2026 22:47

I think, without knowing the whole situation, it would be difficult to intervene. If he didn't seem threatening or controlling, and she didn't seem in immediate danger, I probably wouldn't have intervened. It sounds like she had free will to leave if she chose to. Obviously her saying 'you made me take my clothes off' is worrying but it's very possible that neither of them would have welcomed the interference of a stranger. I suppose you could have tried to catch her eye and ask if she's ok or needs any help?

INX · 20/03/2026 22:53

Then at one point when he wasn't taking much notice of her complaints she suddenly darted across the road in front of traffic, then sat on the central barrier with her legs sticking out into traffic, crying loudly

And you didn’t bother calling the police?

Honestly these threads (of which there are many) seem to get worse.

TheDevilFindsWorkForIdleMums · 20/03/2026 23:03

She sounds like a manipulative pain in the arse and he sounds like a young lad who doesn't have a clue how to deal with it......I wouldn't know how to deal with it either (( nor would I want to ))

If you see anything like that again (( people running in traffic )) just ring the police. Let them deal with it.

youalright · 20/03/2026 23:06

TheDevilFindsWorkForIdleMums · 20/03/2026 23:03

She sounds like a manipulative pain in the arse and he sounds like a young lad who doesn't have a clue how to deal with it......I wouldn't know how to deal with it either (( nor would I want to ))

If you see anything like that again (( people running in traffic )) just ring the police. Let them deal with it.

Basically this

moonshinepoursthroughmywindow · 20/03/2026 23:45

INX · 20/03/2026 22:53

Then at one point when he wasn't taking much notice of her complaints she suddenly darted across the road in front of traffic, then sat on the central barrier with her legs sticking out into traffic, crying loudly

And you didn’t bother calling the police?

Honestly these threads (of which there are many) seem to get worse.

Somebody else intervened and helped her - I'm not sure whether she called the police. If nobody else was doing anything I might have done.

And thanks everybody who's commented - is good to know I'm not the only one who doesn't think he was much of a threat.

OP posts:
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