Obligatory sorry for my English, I'm not a native speaker and I'm a couple of beers in right now.

To give some background when I was 16-17 years old I dated this girl for about 6 months, I'll use the fake name Maria for her. It was a very bad relationship for me. She was extremely abusive mentally (and sometimes physically as well). She was also mentally ill, she was very depressed and even had some psychotic symptoms such as occasional hallucinations. I was young and it was my first relationship so I tolerated way too much mistreatment from her, but eventually I managed to break things off (and to my surprise we ended on pretty good terms as well!). After we broke up she surprisingly left me alone though she did tell my friends that "we were just taking a break" even though I made it very clear that we were over. I didn't really think much of it as she left me alone after that besides from the occasional weird message or two (I ended up blocking her after a couple of months though). Also just to be clear, I never hurt her in any way.

Fast forward exactly a year since I broke up with her. I get a new friend request on Snapchat. It's some random guy I've never heard of but after some research I found out it was my ex's current boyfriend. He had sent me a message saying something along the lines of "I heard you raped Maria, if I ever find out where you live I'll fuck you up". I still remember the moment I read it and my heart sank, I don't think I've ever had such a feeling of anxiety and confusion before or after this happened. I immediately unblocked Marias Snapchat and sent her a message asking why the fuck have you told someone anything like this. She replied something cryptic like "meet me at the mcdonalds in the city centre in an hour" and I basically told her to fuck off and explain herself immediately. I was so anxious and stressed that I remember next to nothing of the conversation that pursued, but I recall her admitting that I had never raped her. I also threatened to pursue legal action if I ever heard anything like this from anyone else ever again.

That was it. That was the accusation. I never heard from her again. But those 45 minutes of pure terror have affected my life for the past 3-4 years now. Every time I go visit my hometown and I happen to see someone I knew back in the day I think "has my ex told them I'm a rapist?". Every time I see a friend of mine I think "has my ex told them I'm a rapist?". Every time my girlfriend starts a conversation with a slightly different tone than usual I think ""has my ex contacted her and told her I'm a rapist?".

Because of this I've (partly) subconsciously cut off almost all possible ties to my hometown. I've cut off ties to my friends, especially the ones that my ex knew of. Because all I can think of when I see them is whether they think I'm a fucking rapist or not.