Sometimes a misunderstanding spirals so far out of control that nobody can believe how it started.

This college student found herself at the center of one of those situations after she decided to embroider a quote from one of her favorite science fiction stories.

The project was supposed to be a creative joke inspired by a famous speech from the book.

Unfortunately, she left her supplies and part of the unfinished quote out on a shared table while her roommate was away for the weekend.

When the roommate returned and saw the project without any context, she came to a very different conclusion.

The situation escalated so quickly that police got involved and the roommate requested an emergency move-out.

Read on to see what happened next.

AITA For embroidering a quote I liked from a book

I (19F) was roommates with a girl (19F) in college. We weren’t friends, but we were good roommates. She’d make an effort to invite me out, and I’d clean the dorm and share the food I’d make.

At the time I was heavily into the story “I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream” by Harlan Ellison for roughly a year at that point.

I got into needlework and while I was teaching myself how to embroider I thought it would be funny to embroider a speech a character from the book made in a similar style to a “Live, Laugh, Love” piece.

Unfortunately, she left her stuff laying out.

Due to character limit, I can’t put the full quote but searching “AM Speech” and the book title should bring it up. For the sake of the story just know its about how much the speaker hates humanity as a whole directed at the protagonist.

Coincidentally, by the time all the supplies I needed for the project arrived, the roommate left for the weekend. Since I needed a lot of space for everything I set up shop on our communal table.

By the early Monday morning, I finished drawing the quote onto tracing paper and began getting the first few words down on the actual fabric. I left for classes and forgot to put up everything.

Then, the police contacted her.

On my way to my final class of the day, I noticed I got a voicemail. I listened to it and learned that the police wanted to get in contact with me.

After calling them back, I learned that my roommate came back from her trip and saw the project. Which from her perspective would’ve looked like the entire speech written on paper, the first six words embroidered onto cloth, and a bunch needles and string.

Since it was on our communal table, she thought it was a threat/expression of my hatred directed at her and called the police out of concern for her safety.

At this point, all she could do was cry.

I explained to the officer the aforementioned context, and I was informed that she requested a emergency move out for her own safety.

After that point, I remembered sending my now former roommate a text trying to explain the context, apologizing for leaving my stuff out like that, for making her feel unsafe, and understanding why she felt the need to leave.

Then crying on the phone for like five hours to my mom and the RA about the whole situation. She was mostly moved out on that Monday but I left for the entirety of the next day to give her the space she needed get everything else she needed.

She just wants help understanding the situation from other perspectives.

I’m posting for judgment on this situation in the hopes that I can stop pondering what ifs.

Since the only people I’ve told about this was my mom and friends who supported me, I can’t help but think that they might be biased.

Either way the judgement goes, I hope that it’ll help me get over this and allow me to get back into needlework and sci-fi stories again, since I’ve been avoiding them out of guilt from this event.

AITA?

Wow! That probably didn’t need a call to the police.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about someone who asked their neighbor to move their fence off their property, then learned the neighbor was trying to claim their land as theirs instead.

Let’s see how the readers over at Reddit feel about it.

According to this reader, she should’ve just called directly.

Here’s someone who sees the roommate’s side of things.

This reader loves being dramatic.

Great question.

The roommate’s reaction feels a little extreme.

Yes, the quote was strange, and yes, the student should’ve cleaned up her project before leaving for class.

But jumping straight to the conclusion that an unfinished embroidery project targeted her personally feels like a huge leap.

Not every weird piece of art revolves around the people who happen to see it. Sheesh.