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The original was posted on /r/maliciouscompliance by /u/Sea_Thanks_7677 on 2024-05-03 13:29:32.

On mobile, not a native speaker. I do not consent to this story being used outside Reddit.

When I was a teenager, my extended family (my parents, sister, me, aunt, uncle, cousins, all in all eight persons) went on our annual multi day cycling tour, but due to bad weather we had to reschedule and ended up renting an apartment in Ticino (Switzerland) that had enough beds for all of us, but only one shower. (It’s not that easy to find accomodations for eight persons in high season, so this was the only option).

So one late afternoon we came back from a long day cycling the steep mountains around Lake Maggiore. We did a couple of hundred (maybe even thousand) meters of elevation difference in a very humid climate that day, so you can imagine, all of us were REALLY sweaty and REALLY hungry.

I probably should add that this was long before e-bikes were a thing. We did those cycling vacations every year, going back to when we kids were in elementary school, always those two families who were really close and yes, we were (and are) crazy when it comes to cycling…

To prevent fights, we always settled on an order for the shower as soon as we got back to the apartment. I was supposed to be third in line, but my aunt insisted I gave her my shower slot bc she “needed to be finished sooner than me”. As most of the days the adults were cooking dinner and we all ate at the apartment, this made sense to me as I figured she wanted to get a shower before starting to cook.

As soon as she was in the shower, I found out we were supposed to go to a restaurant for dinner that day, so there wasn’t any reason for my aunt to jump the queue other than she was last in line and probably figured there wouldn’t be any hot water left for her.

I tried to get in the shower next, but my sister, cousins etc. insisted that I lost my spot by letting my aunt jump the queue and had to wait until all of them were finished. Everyone was in a hurry as we all were really hungry after all the cycling and we wanted to leave for the restaurant as soon as we could.

Cue malicious compliance: While I was waiting to finally get into the shower I secretly snacked on a packet of nuts to soothe my hungry tummy and patiently waited my time. When I finally got in the shower, I washed my long hair, used conditioner, rinsed again, made sure to put on lotion after showering and finally blow drying my hair. Like really thoroughly blow drying my hair (even though it was hot outside and I really didn’t need to blow dry my hair). By that time my family was banging on the bathroom door, trying to make me hurry up, as everyone was really hungry. When I finally got out of the bathroom my family gave me sh*t for taking so long and making them wait when they were starving. So I told them that my aunt had tricked me out of my slot in the shower line and that none of them were willing to let me shower earlier - what did they expect when they made the only person who wore their hair long shower last?!

Well, they always made sure I was one of the first to shower after that. On every vacation!