Friendship Fallouts·
THE NIGHT WITHOUT A RIDE
A tired mom out with a drunken friend spirals through a night of wandering bars, shifting excuses, and mismatched boundaries, revealing a messy dynamic that tests loyalty.
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At 11 p.m., a drunk friend refused to get into the car, walked into a cigar bar instead, and left her ride home standing outside, exhausted and hungry.
The poster was a mom of three who worked full time, got up at 5 a.m. every day, and rarely went out. So when her friend "Lindsay," 32, invited her out around 6 p.m., she said yes, and agreed to drive Lindsay home later, too. Lindsay had already been drinking since 2 p.m. and was tipsy when the night started. She had also been out earlier with her boyfriend, "James," though the poster didn't know that yet.
James stopped by for 20 to 30 minutes, then left. The women bar-hopped once and chatted with a "really nice ER nurse." For a while, it looked like a normal night out.
Then the calls started.
Around 9 p.m., the poster's husband phoned and asked her to come home. She told him she'd leave in 30 minutes and relayed that to Lindsay. But after stepping away, she came back to hear a new version of events: Lindsay said she had called the husband, and he had told her the poster could stay out longer. The poster said, "I was like....okay."
By 11 p.m., she was done. "By 11pm, I was exhausted, hungry, and ready to go," she later wrote. She says she had to beg Lindsay to leave. They got up, tried to grab pizza, and found the place closed. Then the night tilted again.
When the poster turned back toward the car, Lindsay had wandered over to a cigar bar and announced she wanted to stay. She wasn't ready to go home. The poster says she tried multiple times to get her back to the car and even offered to go somewhere else, but Lindsay "wouldn't budge." The ER nurse was still there, and Lindsay told the poster she would stay with her and told her to go home. Then Lindsay walked into the bar, and the poster left.
At home, she turned her phone back on and found a text from James: why had she left Lindsay alone? He said Lindsay was "wandering around with homeless people looking for open bars." The poster apologized and said her phone was dead. She also said, "I didn't think to grab her phone or contact him."
James had already picked Lindsay up within about 20 minutes of the poster leaving, which made the poster think Lindsay had called him before she refused to get in the car. That led to more arguing. Lindsay later cried on the phone and called again and again. The poster finally ended the call around 2 a.m. and told her, "I don't want to go out in situations like this anymore."
Later, she added that her husband wasn't being controlling and was offering her an "escape." She also said Lindsay "absolutely does" have a drinking problem, but that this dynamic with Lindsay and James is "just kind of... their normal."