I think I'm dating a goose, written by Fainting Goat.

Okay, so to start with, my boyfriend hates birds.

Yes, I know. Why would I date someone with such an obvious character flaw?

But honestly, I didn't realize how bad it was at first.

It was just this little quirk, like, you don't like this cute little robin?

Who doesn't like cute little robins?

He'd complained about how they were dirty and obnoxious, and I'd write it off as nothing more harmful than a pet peeve,

like disliking the noise of other people chewing or hating the word moist.

Also, in my defense, we were only dating for a few months before I saw how bad it was.

Like, he legitimately hates birds, and I think his hatred is proportional to size.

Because with small neighborhood birds, it wasn't a big deal.

But I remember the first time we were at a park, and there were some pigeons crowding around the sidewalk.

I was like, aww, they want food, and then bam!

This rock comes flying past me, and lands in the middle of the flock.

So they all took off in a panic, and I turned around to find him standing there with this ugly look on his face, all twisted up.

That was our first fight. I told him that it was a cruel thing to do, and he defended it by saying that pigeons are nothing but dirty flying rats.

I finally resorted to saying that he scared me, by throwing the rock past me, with no warning.

And besides that, I didn't hate birds, and I was upset by people being mean to them.

So he apologized, and said he wouldn't do that anymore.

So, a bit of a red flag there, but I didn't have any obvious reasons to dump him yet, so I tentatively stayed in the relationship.

Maybe he had some issues with birds, I thought.

Let's be honest, some birds can be mean. Perhaps he was attacked by a swan as a child or something.

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