I once went out with a friend to the clubs while I was on vacation at his house in the big city. He had gotten a new job as a director and I was a minimum wage scrub.

He wanted to go to the restroom, so he gave me his coat and some money to store our things away. I find out they were charging an extraordinary rent for what many others offer for free. I refused thinking it was abusively outrageous and went back with our stuff thinking we could just store them elsewhere at a reasonable price.

He was pissed. He told me off and decided our night out was over. He railed at me, made me cry, and basically told me our friendship was over. In my mind, I was only trying to protect him. I left the next day.

He called me back a couple of times months later but I had already moved on. I want to think that he regretted it, but he’s in the big leagues now and probably thinks less of me.