For starters, this story takes place about 2 years ago (beginning of 2023). Also it is kinda lengthy, so I apologize.

I (at the time of this story, 20F) had two best friends, and we will name them Sam (19M) and Tyler (24M). We met at a grocery store as all three of us worked there for a while before both of them left to work for Amazon, and I stayed at the grocery store. We had been friends for about 2 years and I have to admit, the fact that this was the breaking point of our friendship is a little crazy. Especially since there were no signs that there was going to be a problem in the first place. It kind of all just... happened???

For the sake of getting to the point of this post, I will start with the calm before the storm, 5 1/2 weeks before the incident, mid January.

One of my now closer friends and I have a birthday in January about a week apart, so we thought to have a joint birthday get together at her house, and invite some of our favourite people to hang around. This mostly involved our coworkers (She worked at the Starbucks in the grocery store I worked at), Sam and Tyler being two of them. We had a great time, the cake was awesome, we played fun games, and I received great gifts from all my friends. After this party, Sam and Tyler offered to take me home, which resulted in us talking about hanging out more in the future, since we mostly just hung out at work and on breaks. We agreed to meet up about a week after this, going to my favourite boba spot (I was lowkey gatekeeping it up until this point) and just having a great time as the three of us. This sparked us hanging out even more and becoming closer as friends and we hung out every 3-4 days, as we usually had schedules that lined up. We slowly moved our hangout spot to Tyler's place because both Tyler and Sam smoke weed and they felt the most comfortable doing it in one of our places, making it the official hangout spot. I did not partake in smoking because I do not find it enjoyable and the feeling of being high is kind of an icky feeling for me. However I can handle being around those who smoke, and they didn't smoke for long periods of time just to make me feel a little more comfortable.

Now, the last time that we hung out together, Sam and I ended up sleeping over at Tyler's place, as there was drinking and weed involved and it was not safe for anyone to drive. Sam was far gone and high out of his mind, Tyler was drunk off his rocker, and I was lightly buzzed. It ended up with Tyler and me setting up the couch for Sam to sleep on, and it took a while before he knocked out for the night. Tyler and I stayed up for a bit to just talk which lead to us making out for a while. I got really tired and told him I was probably going to crash on the love sofa in the living room, to which he offered me his room just to have a bed to sleep on instead of the small love sofa. His bed was a king size and he was pretty adamant about me taking his room, but he's like 5ft 11in and that tiny couch wasn't going to be even remotely comfortable. I offered for us to both sleep in the bed since we could both fit comfortably and have enough space. He was cool with it and neither of us expected anything more to happen, and that was that. The next morning we all woke up super hungry and decided to go to Walmart to get ingredients to make chicken tenders and fries. We ate, hung out a little longer, and went our separate ways before 10 am. This was the last time we hung out.

Here is where things go wrong. During the hangout, Sam asked me and Tyler if we wanted to hangout the Sunday coming up, (the last time we hung out was a Thursday) to which we both agreed. I go to work Friday and Saturday and I called out of a 4 hour shift for Sunday to hang out with Sam and Tyler. On both days leading up to the day we agreed to hangout, I asked if we were still hanging out, just to confirm that our plans were still on, and both times it was confirmed we were still hanging out. Sunday rolls around and I get up around 9:30 and start my day. I text our groupchat and ask when I was going to be picked up, not expecting a text as they typically wake up around 11ish. 10:15 am comes and I don't get a response... then 10:45 am... then 11:10 am and nothing. Here is the kicker: I was left on read for an hour by both of them. I sent another text and I left it alone. Our groupchat is on Snapchat and you have the option to swipe right to exit any chat, and from the chats you can swipe left to access the snapmap. I accidentally swiped left and opened the map and the first thing I noticed, is that Sam and Tyler are in the car together, however they are no where near me. In fact, they are on their way to the beach, about 2-4 hours away from me...

I didn't want to make assumptions so I started thinking of why they were so far away together and not responding to my messages. The biggest one being that they had plans already made and they were going to meet up with me later on. This did not happen, they did not text me back, they did not come back home until late that night, and I called out of work for nothing. After this day, there was another get together planned on the Saturday of the next week at the same close friend's house where the joint birthday party was held. Sam and Tyler were going to be there and they of course knew I would be there too, but they said absolutely nothing at all that entire two weeks, completely ignoring me and my existing texts. The day of the party, we are all hanging out and I get a ride from my girl friends instead of asking Sam and Tyler. They show up together and I say nothing to them, I kept it cordial and friendly but I never address them directly. We play a few games but because I'm out of it, I lose almost immediately in the first few rounds. I go to sit on the couch and hang out with one of the dogs there while I wait for the next person to be out, and unfortunately that was Tyler.

He sits down adjacent to me on another couch and starts conversation. He asks how I'm doing and why I am not speaking to him. I told him I have nothing to say, and I'm just trying to enjoy myself. He then proceeds to say he knows why I am mad and that he is afraid of confrontation, so that is why he never texted me. I didn't want to continue the conversation and just told everyone I was tired and wanted to go home. I left, made it home, and got ready for bed, but before that, Tyler texted me asking if I was alright. I said I was fine, and left that at that. The next few days they said absolutely nothing and continued hanging out together without me. I got fed up and sent them each a 5 minute voice message calmly explaining that what they did to me was wrong. Avoiding texting me was so rude and that I've always been understanding if plans change as long as they communicate that with me. Even if it was the day of, I would be totally alright if plans were cancelled. They violated the boundary I verbally made about communicating these things with me, and it resulted in me having no interest in being friends with them anymore. Of course, I was left on read/delivered by Sam, but Tyler apologized. I forgive them both, but that boundary was crossed and I no longer have interest in continuing a fake friendship. At the end of this, I had to be the one to bring up my problem with the situation even though they were both aware that what they did was kind of messed up. AND THEN it took almost three weeks before I even stepped up because of their silence. :/

I did feel a little bad about my behaviour and thought about the fact that I could have contributed to the end of our friendship somehow. It just bothers me because they never communicated with me. As I have said before, my biggest boundary is that no matter what it is, good or bad, I implore and encourage people to tell me what's going on and how they feel. Everyone's feelings are valid and deserve to be heard and I never want anyone to feel invalidated. I sent a text to apologize to Sam, but alas, he blocked me on everything and Tyler moved on as if nothing happened. I moved away to another state without telling anyone but my now closest friends where I was going and when (I live with my parents and they offered to let me come with them wherever they moved, so I agreed).

Before I left, I told my girl friends about what happened just to vent, but I tried to do it in a way without painting Sam and Tyler as bad people because we were all friends. I told them that I will not be upset if they were still friends with Sam and Tyler because who they are friends with, and who they do/do not speak to is none of my business and I don't ever want to control them in that regard. They all told me that they ATA and that whole situation is insane. Neither of the boys have spoken to the entire friend group now.

AITA for being petty towards Sam and Tyler and the way I responded to the situation?