AITA - I am not going to my best friends destination wedding.
My best friend Charlotte moved from the US to Spain 2.5 years ago to pursue the life she wanted. In that time she got engaged to her fiancé. Her and her fiancé have decided to have a wedding in Spain rather than back home where their friends and family are. I am happy for them to do what they want, but the expectation that I come has been difficult.
The trip to the wedding would run me at least 2.5k USD, and while I technically could pull it off — I don’t really want to spend all of that money on this wedding for a multitude of reasons. Namely, I don’t save much money given my own lifestyle in the time charlotte has moved. Also, I think I would have a better time making that trip when it was just a trip for Charlotte and I because I can realistically make this around the world trip once. With the wedding, I feel as though I will go to this foreign country I wouldn’t really choose to go to on my own volition, and wait around until the wedding festivities were over, an then go home. I get two weeks off a year, so I’d l effectively be out of vacation time until next year, and in the two years Charlotte has been gone, I’ve built my own life that I wouldn’t like to invest in.
Anyways, I told Charlotte I wasn’t going to make it and she has not talked to me since. It seems crazy to me that the ultimatum of our friendship is this wedding, but I don’t know anymore. AITA?