Hey, I'm Steph and this is not today.

Hello and welcome. Before we jump in, I wanted to remind you that we have 42 bonus episodes over on our Patreon at patreon.com slash not today podcast. We put out one new bonus episode every month and our patrons get to vote on the stories that they want to hear. Our new poll for our upcoming bonus episode will be out soon, so head over there to get access to all of that and more. But with all of that said, let's get into today's story because we have a lot to talk about. trigger warning for domestic violence, listener discretion is advised. Benjamin Obadiah Foster was born in the mid-80s

and grew up in Oregon, but as an adult, moved to Las Vegas, Nevada. In the summer of 2012,

Ben began working as a barback at a day club at a Las Vegas strip hotel, and it was there that he

met a woman named Amber, who at the time

was his co-worker. Much of the information I got for this episode is from the Netflix series

Worst X ever, and they refer to her only as Amber, so we'll be doing the same. Amber was a server at the

club, and she said she was initially drawn to Ben because he was smart. He also

wasn't too hard on the eyes. He was tall, athletic, good looking, he had dark hair and icy blue

eyes, and he had a fun personality. Amber wasn't exactly looking for a relationship, but that was

what it eventually turned into. Amber and Ben dated for about a year before moving in

together in 2013. Things were going really well for them in the beginning, and she even thought

that he might be the one. Ben could be very sweet. He'd leave little love notes around their place.

They'd go out on dinner dates, they'd go to Disneyland, hang out with friends, they had fun together.

But Ben wasn't always very comfortable around people. He was a lot more introverted than her and could be kind of

closed off. She described him more as a lone wolf kind of a guy. She also said he could be

quite jealous at times. On one occasion, she was helping an ex stay in the country. He wasn't a

citizen, and she said she was helping him with a few things. But when Ben found out about this,

he became visibly upset. He began pacing around and hastily asking her questions. She didn't

understand why he was so upset. She wasn't being secretive about it, and her ex was in a different

relationship with another person who he was actually engaged to, but he still accused her of

cheating. Looking back on it, she thinks he had this reaction because of what he had been doing

...