Have a friend, and we have a complicated relationship. Making friends as an adult is hard, but then life shit happens and even the friends you do end up making can be assholes.

I had just gotten out of a divorce, and wanted to throw a big halloween costume party. Told everyone months beforehand, with plenty of reminders and groupchats, spent over $1000 on decorations, couple hundred on snacks, alcohol, weed I’d have stocked. It was going to be a rager. Well, a bunch of people cancel, because my house is like a 40 min drive, but my best friend at the time, he was, for some reason, not giving me a definite answer. Like, I figure even if nobody else shows up, my buddy and I could still hang. But come the day of the party, he tells me he’s not coming, and it’s just so he can maybe find something better to do closer. And I’m just… So upset. Cancel the whole party via an on-line thing, and just sit there feeling fucking awful.

Shit messed me up so bad, it’s like 5 years later, and some of the decorations I put up for that party are still up. I obviously haven’t even tried to host anything since.

anyway. like, a couple months after that fiasco, my buddies brand new girlfriend texts me, asking me to come to his birthday party. She was putting a bunch of work into it, making it a scavenger hunt thing for him and his friends. I told her immediately, “nope!” Not coming. She asked once or twice more and got the same answer.

But in the end, I was still nicer, because at least I gave a clear answer right away.