Ok, I know that the title sounds bad but just hear me out on this. So, for some small context; I’m currently in high school and also do/take theatre, and last year was in two productions, one of them I was a stage manager along with two other girls, we were all first-time stage managers. Our teacher never really told us what to do and how to do things so one of the girls was doing most of the work because me and the other girl didn't know what to do causing us to maturely argue and come up with a plan (mostly because I had been ranting to my mom about this whole thing and she ended up contacting the directors because she knew that I probably wouldn't talk to the directors, not that big of an issue), I explained to the natural-leader type girl who I’ll call Alexandra for simplicity sake that me and the other girl didn't know what to do and she needs to tell us what to do and we figured it out from there, which before that she was gone for two days so I took the responsibility of putting the blocking into our book, but this was also kind of an ensemble heavy script and so I didn't know who she had assigned as ensembles for number wise and I wasn't sure if she wanted it done in a specific way so I didn't do anything (bad idea I know) and afterwards had sent me a lengthy text message giving me kind of bad anxiety and upset (ending up crying and telling my mom about it which was one of the reasons why my mom contacted the directors) but from there, there hadn't seemed to be any issues after that, I got assigned to do attendance everyday so that's what I’d do. Now, before rehearsals, we’d have some time (about like 10-15 minutes or something) to eat snacks and talk, now for me I’m a slow eater so I’d walk up to my friends and eat my snack while sometimes talking, after a bit they’d come up to me and ask me to do attendance, normally I’d also wait a couple of minutes because it was directly after school and I wanted to make sure that everyone who was there after school was here, but they would check the sheet and notice I hadn't updated it, so they’d ask me to, so because of pressure I would quickly do it then continue with whatever I was doing and so because of that after a while I just started doing it whenever I would walk in and would update it whenever someone else would walk in. Now towards the end of the play, I was becoming very stressed, and anxious, and didn't want to come to rehearsal anymore but since I knew it was towards the end of the play, I didn't want to suddenly quit and add stress (I also didn't want it to make the others proud or happy that I had quit and give them an ego). Then, one day my mom suggested that I should just stay home that Saturday, I explained to her that I wouldn’t be able to and that I had rehearsal that day and she suggested some ideas, and since I thought it was a good idea and didn't care at that point I decided to text Alexandria telling her that I wouldn’t be going to rehearsal that day and that I had an important family event that we couldn’t move and of course she didn’t believe it and texted me aggressively (to me) to which I didn’t respond because I didn’t care at that point and wasn't gonna let her get to me so I just didn’t respond, didn't want that negative energy and be upset for no reason so I took that day off and after that nothing bad happened. Now because of that, I think that she thought I was flakey and started to not like me because of that. Now keep in mind I knew this girl for one year in elementary school because of something bad that happened nearby and had moved along with nearly all of her family and we hit it off really well, but suddenly might've moved back or was moving her mom there and I assume only came back in middle school. Now I’m pretty sure that the day I had been gone that she was talking shit about me behind my back because the energy was different which pissed me off. And the reason I can tell why she seems mad at me is because, at the beginning of this school year, she would wear outfits that I liked on her so I'd compliment her and she’d just roll her eyes and say thank you. Alright now into the actual story!

So today I was sitting at lunch with some of my theatre friends, now in this friend group, every now and again Alexandria would join us, today she did not and there were about half of us sitting at lunch today and in this friend group, I’m more introverted and sometimes when we talk since we have a bigger friend group, we’ll end up talking in groups, and since Alexandria only joins us some days, I don't really interact with her group. Now today it was only half of us sitting there eating our lunches and since normally everyone is buying their lunches, I’m normally one of the only people there for a while, but today, there was only half of us there. Today I was staying quiet, not listening to their conversation and going on my phone, I don’t normally go on my phone but because really only one of my friends was sitting next to me and no one else was there I had a type of food (chicken salad in a cup/portable bowl), I could go on my phone. After a while, three other people joined us (now keep in mind, one of them is on the spectrum who we’ll call Sapphire, and I think that another one might also be on the spectrum, we’ll call her Emily, I’ll go ahead and add some more context about Emily, so basically she will talk shit about people or gossip, sometimes with people in our grade level and sometimes with upper-classmen, and also if you calmly point something out, she’ll suddenly get passive-aggressive about it and for me, I love matching other people’s energy, so when she would do that shit with me, it’d piss me off so I’d reply with that same tone, other people have also said that she gets passive aggressive about small things, that's all the context, back to the story now!) Sapphire had pizza hut and was sitting across from me on another stair, another friend sitting next to her on the same stair, I believe my friend who had come down with me was sitting in front/beside me (I sit so that I'm facing everyone else, I'm normally on the edge of everyone on the top stair) and Emily was next to that friend. At the time, I was on my phone scrolling on webcomics and I stopped at a panel I hadn't read and grabbed my chicken salad, going to take another bite when I accidentally dropped it in front of Sapphire and my other friend, it didn't spill on any of their lunches or anything apart from the fact that my spoon touched Sapphire’s napkin to which I apologized for, but for whatever reason, she got up and threw away her food which still had food on/in it, and when she got up, she gave the girl next to her like a weird look then came back. After the initial shock and surprise, I quickly got up and started cleaning up my mess, and during that when Sapphire got up to throw away her food, she went and sat next to Emily and my other friend instead of going back to sit where she was (which is understandable and I can understand) and I think after that, they decided to grab snacks for Emily’s lunch. After a little bit (I had gotten half of the mess cleaned up), I realized it wasn’t worth it and missing lunchtime cleaning it up, so I stopped. Now I absolutely love the janitor and respect her (I respect any kind of janitor or teacher), she’s a sweet, short asian lady who I’ve told/have said to my mom before, and even stays after school for fine art events to help clean up messes if anyone leaves any, and ended up continuing to eat my lunch. After a little bit, the girls came back and sat back to where they were, but I think before they sat down, one of them said, “are you going to clean up the rest?” and I explained the situation to them, and Emily’s like; “I know the janitor here, she's really nice so don’t make her job harder and grab some paper towels” now, another reason why I had stopped was because I didn’t want to go back and forth between the bathrooms grabbing paper towel after paper towel to come back and clean to which I just ignore her and keep eating. I think that our friend had noticed the tension so he spoke up and said; “hey, I have to use the restroom, would anyone like to join me?” (he’s trans, that's why he's asking if anyone would like to join him) and of course, Emily and Sapphire are like; “oh we’ll join you” so they walk off with him and I’m left with our other friend but keep eating. After a little bit, they come back and they’re like “hey [op], clean up the rest of this” and walk off so I get up and crouch back down and start cleaning up the rest of the mess to which they go to the bathroom. I get down cleaning the rest of the stuff and go and throw it away only leaving the liquid and little bits of chicken because I’m not wasting more of my time just to clean up little bits of chicken and I also didn’t have anything else to clean the liquid up with because I had wasted my one and only napkin and wasn’t about to go into the bathroom where they were just to grab paper towels and have a tense encounter, I then throw that away and sit back down and continue eating, and after doing that, the other friend leaves most likely wanting nothing to do with it (she was quiet the entire time). After a little bit, I guess they returned but decided to sit away from me because I “hadn’t thrown everything away” which I had a feeling that they had sat elsewhere, and when the bell rang telling the kids that lunch was over and the other lunch period that their lunchtime was then, they came up to me and told me, “clean the rest of this up” then walked off. Once again, I did not want to go to the bathroom and grab paper towels and have to go back and forth so I just threw away my trash and waited a bit before I went ahead and started heading to my class (I currently have braces so straight after lunch I have to brush my teeth and ask my teacher to use the restroom and I didn’t wanna waste time so I didn’t, also the guy who asked anyone if they wanted to go to the bathroom at the time wasn’t there so I just hope he wasn’t there with them or had left early to head to the classroom, I didn't see them in the room when I walked in).

So Reddit, am I the asshole for not cleaning the mess I accidentally made during lunch?