Last summer my friend applied for my job through indeed and I encouraged her. I mean I couldn’t tell her not to because I know she needed the money since my job pays well. Since she’s been working at my job she’s been an absolute pain. She complains about everything and she’s always in a sour mood.

I have a coworker friend that’s the same age as me (28) and we started our job at the same time. We have lunch together every so often and we’re always friendly to each other. We don’t hang outside of work and we keep our coworker friendship very professional. My friend (38) doesn’t like my coworker at all and she always reminds me how much she doesn’t like her when she knows I like her. My friend initially started off by saying things like “look she’s wearing black to copy me because she knows I wear black”. I told my friend that I’m sure she’s not copying her. Another time, my friend told me that our coworker doesn’t like her because she’s intimidated by how pretty she is. I told her “oh that’s weird I’m really pretty too and I never had that problem with her” my friend brushed it off. My friend even told me that she told some coworkers how much she doesn’t like this person and according to her they informed her that she’s just jealous of how pretty she is. I told my friend that she shouldn’t talk about our coworker like that to other people at work. She told me she really doesn’t care.

Last year my coworker was getting by a guy coworker. I supported her through it and stayed on her side without getting involved. I guess the guy coworker told my friend about what happened with her and my friend bashed her to me. She said that she’s a horrible person for giving him the wrong number. I told my friend I’ve given guys at college the wrong number and it doesn’t mean you’re a horrible person you’re just trying to keep yourself safe. My friend told me that she should have given him a pass and be nicer to him since he has autism. I told her it doesn’t matter this happened last year and she did what she had to do for herself.

My friend told me she isn’t a good person because she never says hello to her. She then continued to tell me she purposely won’t stop saying hi to her until she acknowledges her. My friend also told me how no one at work likes this coworker. She’s actually really well liked at work and everyone here likes her. I finally snapped and said to her “I understand you have a different experience with her but you don’t need to keep talking poorly about her”. My friend told me if it was someone doing this to me she would stick up for me. But this seems to be all one sided beef with her and our coworker.

She still makes rude comments about her and I still defend her. I don’t know what else to do? I don’t want things to be awkward with my friend since she’s a friend and I don’t want problems at work. But with my coworker I want to stand up for her whenever my friend insults her. I don’t know how to keep peace with everyone in this situation?