I joined a large friend group that had been together for 7 or so years. There was a person that I noticed would tell different people slightly different versions of stories. Normally I'd dismiss these as white lies but I noticed a pattern. The person in question saw relationships as transactional and I highly suspected that these white lies revealed a much deeper penchant for emotional manipulation.

I tried to warn some people that I thought I could trust within the friend group, but this upset some people and I had the step way back. After all, who is the new person to come into this group and fuck things up? I kept my mouth shut and out of the drama as I had to watch this person build a giant rift within the group.

Thankfully a few people had finally remembered the warning I had given years before and started comparing notes on the stories this person had told everyone. In the end I was vindicated when people started confronting the lies, but a lot of people had to go through therapy for the years of suffering that person caused in the meantime. I'm not giving too many details, but it got bad: suicide attempts, cops, legal battles. I had to just sit there and watch it all.