like weather, the behavior or any given individual human is only predictable within a short range of time and with little degree of accuracy. however, like climate, the behavior of a group of humans is highly predictable over extremely long periods of time. applying the long-term prediction to any individual human is tricky. an expected behavior is probably going to occur at some point, but the tricky part is determining when. how did i know richard was going to betray me and how did i know that brian’s betrayal was going to cut more deeply? they are humans and every human i’ve met or read about betrays every other human eventually. that part is inevitable. i never trusted richard as much because he insisted on less trust and more protocol. brian insisted on trust and flaunted protocol. therefore, richard had less trust to lose compared to brian. brian was the higher risk. luckily, i kept my distance from both of them although i let brian in more than i should have. he’s going to have a harder time coping with the fact that i’ve shut the door to him regarding my personal life and he will predictably lash out. i never wanted his friendship and i still don’t want it. he followed izzy’s pattern to the letter. i suppose brian’s next move is to try to “reconcile” which is code for manipulate and dominate. it’s very simple: my answer is no.