-CONTEXT-
(names are altered for privacy reasons)
I (19M), had a best friend, (19F), lets call her Sally. Sally was somebody who I could talk to about anything and everything, whom I trusted my entire life with, that is, until she started dating one of my closest friends. Let's call him Eddie (19M).
Me, Sally and Eddie met in 8th grade. I considered the both of them two of my closest friends at the time, but, I started experiencing thoughts that changed my views on that. I, at that age, had only seen girls as possible romantic interests, and had never thought there'd be a possibility of me ever liking somebody of the same gender. That was, until, I slowly started feeling something different, which I figured out were feelings I had developed for Eddie. I kept these feelings in me out of fear for what people would think of me.
One night, me and Sally decided to go to a party with some other friends of ours (Eddie not included). This night, I finally brought up the courage to tell somebody how I really felt about myself, and how it was affecting my mental health. I told Sally how I thought I had developed romantic feelings for Eddie. She comforted me and reassured me I'm not any different for liking the same gender, and completely understood and supported me from there on. Now, after this moment, I felt as if I could call Sally one of my best friends. With this, as time went on I only told three other people, two friends from school, Liz and Paula, alongside my long distance best friend John.
Fast forward to a month later, Eddie, who was dating a friend of mine at the time, broke up with her. With this, a couple days after, me, Eddie, Sally and another friend, Mia, all hung out at night. We went out to a somewhat isolated area near the local park. During this hung out, I can't remember who, but someone suggested doing a photoshoot of us fake making out. Not long after, he kept on showing these pictures as a joke to his friends, pranking them by saying that "we really did make out", I know this sounds dumb, and it was, but this moment made me feel as if Eddie had also developed feelings for me.
Well, after this, Eddie kept on continuously being flirtatious with me, jokingly saying we should make out, or that I should suck him off, stuff like that. I guess you could consider our friendship as homoerotic, where neither of us acted upon such things. This attitude continued on, especially when we were both drunk.
Also, for more context, Paula started telling everybody my feelings for Eddie, and most of my friends found out that way. Besides this, she is irrelevant to the story.
-What Eddie did-
Roughly a year ago, during summer break, me and Eddie went to the local music festival, where Eddie managed to sneak in a bottle of vodka into. Now, we were both dancing off and singing, until he turns to me and asks "Wanna make out?". This, of course, left me shocked, as I never thought he'd be so upfront about it. Weird thing was, he insisted I be the one that made the first move. I hesitated for a moment, and had my first kiss. After we smooched for a little bit, he turns to me again and says "This is a one time thing, nobody else can know about this." I, obviously, felt confused, but I didn't question it. After I agree he proceeds to say "Man, I wish I was making out with somebody as drunk as me", which apparently I wasn't?
Now, he starts turning to random men around him and asking if they're single and if they wanna make out. This, obviously, left me sad, I felt bad about myself, as if I hadn't been good enough, or as if I had done something wrong. After the concert ends, he proceeds to start making comments that seemed as if they were to spite me, or to make me feel bad about myself. So, I walk him home, and I stand outside, waiting for my uber. In this hour or so of waiting, I decide I have to tell at least one person, and that I can't keep such an intimate and important moment to my thoughts. So, I call Sally, the phone rings and rings, but she doesn't answer. With this, and in my drunk desperation, I call another friend, Liz. She answers and I tell her exactly how it went down, and she agrees that whilst this might've been an important moment in my life, the things he said were pretty mean.
During the following days, I experienced insane religious guilt and constant anxiety. I kept faithful to the "don't tell anybody bit", and truly didn't tell anybody expect Liz. Moving forward, me, Eddie, and a friend of ours, Mark, all decide to go down for some beers by the beach. As Eddie goes grab the beers at the store, Mark turns to me and whispers "I know your secret..", whilst smirking. This made me freeze in fear, as I slowly respond with "What?". He then states that he knows me and Eddie made out during the festival. I am obviously shocked by this, as he was the one that made sure to say that nobody else should know about this. Now, I wasn't too mad as I did in fact tell Liz about it, I just prayed that nobody else found out, and I made sure to warn Mark to not tell anybody, little what I have known he would be the least of my problems. Gradually, I start finding out more and more people know about it, and that Eddie had told them, this infuriated me, but as I was deep in love with this guy I didn't even think twice about making a big deal out of it.
A day or two after I went out with them, my friend group and I decide to go on a picnic in the park. This is where, I find out, the day after me and Eddie made out, he had made out with another girl, an 18yo girl from Germany.
He kept on bragging about how much fun they had and how they almost f*cked and what not. This left me totally destroyed for the duration of the hangout, to the point where I even pulled Sally aside and asked her what she thought, and she said she thinks its quite disrespectful for him to make out with some girl, the day after we did, and brag about how good she was. I was happy we were on the same page.
With this, she encouraged that I talk it out with him, and fully express my feelings. So, I do. We all organize a hangout at night, I pull him aside and tell him exactly how I felt about his actions. He proceeds to say that wasn't his intention, in which I did briefly apologize (dumb of my part). We then hug and promise each other that we'll remain close friends.
Everything would've been fine if it had ended that way.
Following the remaining weeks of summer break, he starts continuing flirting with me, and even decided to install a dating app, where he would talk to men and women, way above his age. He would then tell me all about it and how he ended up trading nudes with some random guy, and spent hours talking to him. In which I felt a tad bit jealous of.
-What Sally did-
On a random Wednesday, after I just had one of the worst tests of my life, I get a text from Sally, stating that she wanted to talk to me about something.
She called me, and started by saying that she and Eddie had developed feelings for each other. I, at first, thought this was a prank, but, as I don't take Sally as the type of person to do this, I just stayed silent. She then explained how close they've been getting and how they both mutually confessed to each other, and she asked if I was okay with any of this. I felt an insane anxiety at that very moment, but seeing one of my best friends happy, I said "nah, i don't care lol", and then quickly made up an excuse about how I had to go and hung up. Truth is I sat in my room and pondered if it was right for me to feel sad about my friend finally being happy. So, I kept quiet and left my thoughts to myself, once more. Until, me, Liz, Mia, and two other friends of mine hung out. At one point, they spontaneously asked me if I was truly okay with Sally and Eddie dating. I lied and said I was fine with it, but they could see right through me. They asked once more and I responded truthfully. Eventually, I came to find out that once Liz found out about this, she called Sally out for her actions, and how she wasn't thinking of how this would affect me, or the friend group as a whole. This argument ended with Sally stating that I was okay with it. Liz knew deep down I was most likely lying, and she was right. Later on during that hangout, they convinced me that I should confront Sally and tell her how I feel. So, two shots of rum down, I call her, and tell her exactly how I felt. How the only problem here was that it was HER dating him, that she'd know how I felt, how she agreed how shitty he'd been with me, etc. She then said she'd hope we figure this out. I said that there is no figuring out, she has to accept the consequences of her actions, and that we won't ever be as close as we once were.
Following this, I didn't talk to Sally or Eddie for a while. But during this time period, Eddie ended up telling a close friend of mine about this entire situation, in which she ended up telling me about it and sent me screenshots. He stated that "I was fine with it and then changed my mind", and that my only problem was that "Sally had betrayed me", now, first of all, my entire argument was that I lied about how I felt to not hurt Sally's feelings. Second of all, yes that is one of my points, but now my whole point. Well with this, I was scared he was telling most of my friends stuff like this, and I was scared of losing them. I did feel some distancing between some and that's what sucks. This was until Eddie sent me a paragraph explaining how he was sorry I felt the way I did, and that he hopes we can become friends again. He sometimes wrote "we", as in he was also speaking for Sally. Well, in my opinion, his apology was pretty half-assed, as it didn't even seem like he knew what he was apologizing for... I then reply with a huge text about all the things Sally did wrong and how it affected all of our friendships. But it seemed like I forgot to mention one factor, the things Eddie had done to me in the past. He then replied back with an even more half-assed apology. So, a couple days later, I meet up with Liz and Mia, and I call him, and tell him for 12 minutes how the things he's done are affecting not only our friendship but also me and Sally's, and how he should be sorry for that. He repeatedly said that wasn't his intention at all.
All that's happened after this is how they repeatedly tell our mutual friends how they want to talk to me and settle this once again, but like I've said, I want to completely cut them off my life and never be friends with them again.
-TLDR-
Me (19M), Sally (19F), Eddie (19M), became close friends when we were around 13/14. Quite later on I developed feelings for Eddie, came out to Sally, and she supported me through that. Me and Eddie started having a homoerotic friendship after he broke up with his gf.
A year later, we made out at a festival, and he started saying how I can't tell anybody, besides this he also made some rude comments about me and started flirting with other men right after. I tell a close friend of mine, Liz. He ends up telling other people. I then find out he made out with a girl the very next day we did, and he brags it to me and our entire friend group. We then talk about the situation to settle it. After this, he starts toying with my feelings, being flirtatious and doing stuff to spite me.
A few months later, Sally calls me stating that she and Eddie had developed feelings for each other. I lie and say I'm okay with it because I didn't want to hurt a friends feelings. Sally tells Liz and she calls her out on this, and how she wasn't considering me or the friendgroup. Liz and some other friends ask me how I felt about it, and they find out the truth. They convince me to confront her, and I tell Sally how I felt. I didn't talk to her or Eddie for a while. Eddie sends me a paragraph giving a half-assed apology saying he felt sorry about how I felt and was hoping we went back to being friends. I respond telling him everything wrong with this situation. He replies back with another half-assed apology. With this, I remember that this goes back to how he treated me back then. So I confront him about him playing me and how it's affecting me, Eddie's and Sally's friendship. He proceeds to say that he didn't mean any of that. They keep on talking to mutual friends of ours about how they want to settle this further, but I've made it clear I've cut all contact and don't want to hear from them.