At 6:45 my phone lit up with a message from Dylan asking where I was because we needed to leave for the restaurant soon. I waited several minutes before replying with a simple question asking which reservation he meant. His panic became obvious through a series of frantic calls and messages demanding that I answer immediately. Finally I sent the message I had prepared carefully.
“I canceled the reservation last Thursday right after you renamed me Free Food in your phone,” I wrote calmly.
Dylan responded instantly with accusations that I had ruined his birthday over a joke and that spying on his conversation was abusive behavior. I replied once more by asking how things were going with Caleb Turner, then I turned off my phone completely.
Later that evening Marco showed me a social media story where Dylan and several friends sat inside an Apple Barrel Grill booth under harsh fluorescent lights while pretending they had chosen the location deliberately. The caption read that real friends showed up and toxic people were unnecessary. I laughed quietly because the performance felt predictable.