ROMANCE AND RELATIONSHIPS

Yana and the Case of the Curious Crush Pt. 1

A Victor Investigates Special

Yana Bostongirl, if that even is her real name, has a crush. No, it’s not a carbonated beverage and no, she isn’t referring to the industrious gravel industry. She wrote a now-viral post about a romantic crush on a Medium writer.

Speaking of crush variants, a crush of thirsty writers flooded into her post after it went viral, not unlike the ‘49ers flooded into California — well AFTER the initial discovery of gold by James W. Marshall in 1848 at Sutter’s Mill.

But what hero will emerge and attempt to get to the bottom of this mystery? Who will massively burn precious waking hours trying to analyze a short, lighthearted post the same way one would engage with a rebus puzzle — a puzzle requiring cognition, memory, and perception? I’ll be your hero.

What Available Evidence Is There?

A Profile, two posts, and numerous comments. Yana would probably become Medium’s first multimillionaire if the bosses logged the read hours I put in reading her profile alone during the course of this investigation.

Fun Fact: part of Yana’s charm is that she is courageous. She is so courageous, in fact, that she wrote “https://” in front of her Twitter URL. I haven’t done that since the Angelfire days.

The best evidence can be acquired firsthand. Due to the swirling rumors and innuendo about us, I dared not go to Boston to complete this investigation. People would talk. Plus, I might try to drink that green river water.

That’s right, I am a person of interest in this ongoing investigation. I am also just generally an interesting person. It doesn’t seem plausible, but when you stop to think about how magnetic I am, it makes perfect sense. My doctor just notified me that my ferritin levels are abnormally high. I’ve been pumping iron.

Or perhaps I watched that documentary “Pumping Iron” one too many times.

Anyway. A lesser but still valuable type of evidence in an investigation is documentation — especially documentation close to the time of the event. Let’s check those receipts.

Stop Talking About Yourself and Deliver the Evidence Already!

I am so sorry to inconvenience you with my musings. In the original post, Yana used a lot of winking emojis, leading me to believe her crush had one eye or perhaps an eyepatch. That didn’t track¹.

I read every single post and can say with certainty that Yana used more emojis than that godawful “Emoji Movie”. I’m not sure if that’s a clue or if I just wanted to bag on a bad film experience. Mature audiences demand more from these cartoon elements of digital expression, filmmakers. Maybe “Love in the Time of Emoji” or something.

I read every single comment and wrote one as well. Yana used the gender pronoun “he”. A critical clue. I’m thinking He-Man, but He-Man isn’t real, man.

Then this!

“Unwitting” is an interesting choice of word. I thought it might be me at first, but I’m so witting it can’t possibly be so.

Ruled out based on airtight ‘analysis’: Richard “Dick” Steele. That would be too obvious anyway. Rodrigo S-C and Lanny Knight (self rule-out) Lindo Shandu (in love with a female version of his own self), International Poetry Newsletter (newsletters can’t love, I don’t care what the Slackjaw team tells you), T.A. Adam, Micah Reeves, E Savaria, Jesse Ya Diul, Obinna Uruakpa, and The Sturg.

Ruled out by Yana:

Yana used the word “magic” in the original post, leading readers to believe the pseudonymous Smillew was the beau. Don’t give him oxygen, air, or light because he’s like an invasive kudzu.

Gooodbye to: Smillew, David Perlmutter, Srini

One of these is probably the person.

The final 38: Autistic Widower, Nitin Dangwal, Nour Boustani, Gill McCulloch, Goran Vinchi, James Beaufait, Owen W, Jordan Arthur, Aldric Chen, Nikolaos Skordils, Dan Reich, Craig Davishoff, Joe Merkle, Andy Spears, Habib Rehman, Rajeeb Ghosh, Daniel Serrano, Dr. Titus Varghese, Kallol Mazumdar, Inda Raj Pathak, George Blue Kelly, David Conte, Jack Bohannan, Thomas Gaudeaux, Shane Berry, Francis B., Kevin Alexander, Scott-Ryan Abt, Maximecjunior, Tom Owens: How I REALLY Feel!, Harry Hogg, William J Spiridone, Scot Butwell, John Hansen, Shameem Anwar, Abhimanyu Bhagarva, Fox Kerry, and Victor Cardenas.

You can pick any person on this list and have over 2% chance of being correct. Which ones are taken? Hmmm.

Other clues: initials are ‘not vvp’, but also not not VC. Hmm… curious.

The final clue: “dang that guy’s writing feels damn sexy to me 🥰”

Do any of the people on this list have sexy writing? Very Curious.

Call to Action

Are you one of the Final 38? I want to hear from you! Let me know in the comments if you’re married or not, so we can pare down the list. Look at the original post and give a maximum of 50 claps for anyone you think could be the beau on the above list.

Don’t worry, I won’t send the remaining people to an island to play games with their life on the line. The winner won’t be competing to receive a private note from Yana while multinational billionaires in shiny animal masks gamble on who will win the ultra violent competitions.

That would be absurd.

The investigation has paused for now. To be continued in Part 2.

Related Content Because I am basically Netflix.

¹If you’re an ophthalmologist, you may use this joke attribution free. I’m sure your cycloptic patients will appreciate it.