The friend I ghosted

“I consider the way I behaved to be a dark mark on my character”

I have had the same close group of friends for practically my entire life. Like Stranger Things’ Dustin, Lucas, Will and Mike (minus the Demogorgon), we were inseparable, despite being sent to separate secondary schools. While I made other friends it wasn’t until I was 16 and Fran* joined my sixth form that I even considered expanding my inner circle.

My secondary-school years were spent desperately trying to blend in, but when I went into sixth form it became a completely different story. I was finally surrounded by new people, like Fran, who allowed me to be myself. I went from the girl whose report card would urge her to be less shy in lessons to the girl who’d bunk off art class to stay in the common room chatting with her newfound friends.

Then, eventually, my two worlds collided when I invited Fran on a girls’ holiday – she had only briefly met the others but I really wanted her to be a part of my group and I figured… the more the merrier. It worked. After seven days of matching Primark boho skirts, shots of peach schnapps and shared sun- cream applications, Fran was officially part of the crew.

But when we were a little older, things began to unravel. Fran met a new boyfriend and stopped wanting to go out. Instead, she would invite us round and spend the entire night chatting to him on the phone.

She was desperate to buy a house and became so money-focused that she stuck her financial goals on her bedroom wall. When she refused to pay for our next group holiday, we went without her, but not before having a massive argument about leaving her out. We were all still single and wanted to have fun, but her life was moving in a different direction.

The demise of our friendship happened over WhatsApp. One of our group messaged Fran to say they no longer wanted to be friends, citing a lack of common interest. One by one the others followed, until, in our group chat, I was the only one who remained.

I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to end my friendship with her, but equally I didn’t know what we really had left. No one pressurised me, but I was scared that by remaining friends with Fran it would damage the relationships that were most precious to me. So I sent a break-up message and, out of guilt, blocked her number as if she was a Tinder match gone wrong. For years we had no contact until Fran reached out to me by letter. I felt sick when I saw her handwriting on the envelope. She had actually written an apology, explaining she was going through a lot of issues at the time that she never told us about. I did reply, but when she wrote again and suggested we meet up, I didn’t respond.

I always consider the way I behaved back then to be a dark mark on my character and shame hangs over every memory I have of us together. For a long time I justified it to myself, saying it was peer pressure. But when Fran sent that letter, I realised it wasn’t just the fear of pissing off my friends that stopped me rekindling our friendship.

While I did feel nostalgic about the years I was friends with Fran, the brutal truth is I didn’t actually miss her. We were very different people who drifted apart, but I just couldn’t verbalise that yet. I was still too young. Nonetheless, to this day

I still feel incredibly guilty about the cruel way we treated her. Ghosting her was cowardly and I would never do it again.