Thirty

Every now and then Justin talks about his work.

At first I listened with interest, because he claimed to be involved in the development of artificial intelligence. But when it became apparent I knew more about AI than he did, I lost interest.

He then emailed me an article about AI that he claimed to have written. Suspicious, I made a Google search and found the original.

I bawled him out. Not for lying, but for lying to me. I’m used to people lying to themselves and each other, but I'm insulted if they assume they can lie to me as well.

That’s when Justin stopped emailing me and started telephoning me. 

The things he says are no more his own than was the article, but he provides me with a facsimile of intelligent conversation, so I put up with him.

I don't usually listen when he talks about his work, but yesterday he talked only about his work for over an hour (he sounded drunk), so I had no choice but to listen. 

He didn’t talk about the work he’s doing for his employer in Bangalore, which appears to have as little interest for him as it does for me. He talked instead about a project he’s doing for a private client in Ohio.

He said he's redesigning a wellknown computer program for this client. When I asked him for details, he spoke in such vague generalities (he wouldn’t even tell me the name of the city in Ohio where his client is located) that I began to suspect what he's doing is illegal. I now think he's plagiarizing this software, just as he plagiarized the article on AI. 

He reminds me of John S.  Both seem to be pathological liars. 

Everyone lies, but pathological liars are afraid of being discovered, not least because they want to be discovered. They want to stop lying and be known, and accepted, for who they really are, or think they are. I knew them both, and didn’t betray them, so they assumed I accepted them. I did accept them, as much as I do anyone, because they're all liars. 

Justin and John S are also alike in that I got both of them jobs, which they apparently took as evidence of my friendship. 

When I refused the job at Volkswagen, and recommended they hire John S instead, he was as grateful as Justin was later. He didn't know I did it because I didn’t want to work with him any longer. He assumed we'd be working together. 

Justin thought I recommended him for the job in Bangalore as a favor to him. I actually did it to see if I really had the kind of influence he said I had. I tried to end our relationship afterwards, but he kept emailing and calling me. I tolerate it because he's in Bangalore now, so I don’t have to put up with him all day. L'enfer, c'est les autres.