Scarleteen

—- please don’t think I’m heartless; I just don’t want some person I don’t really know trying to make plans with me nonstop —-

Here’s the story:

I just moved, and I used to live here so I know a few people. This one guy - we can call him “E” - is someone who I used to hang out with at my old school. He’s not really my friend anymore (for various reasons) and more of an acquaintance, if anything.

I told him I moved back. That’s common curtesy, right? I only said it in case I bump into him in town because it’s a really small town - not because I want to hang out. I’m on a completely different walk of life than him.

Now he’s kind of trying to make plans “not to pressure you but let’s hang out soon” and that sort of thing. Ugh! I don’t want to. I wish I hadn’t texted him. I was just trying to be nice! He’s a year younger than me and I suspect he has a crush on me too so I really don’t want to hurt his feelings.

But seriously, I don’t have a moral obligation to hang out with him - I haven’t seen him for two years. We’re not even friends, and I honestly didn’t expect him to want to make plans - I just thought he’d ask how I’m doing and we’d end it at “maybe see you around”.

How do I let him down gently? I’ve never had to say that kind of thing before. How does one reply to the following: “ No pressure because I know you’re probably swamped with things to do, but whenever you’ve settled we should schedule a time to hang out”?

Hey there,

It can be hard to say no to people sometimes, but saying no doesn’t make you mean or a bad person. You’re right- you don’t have a moral obligation to hang out with them! I’m going to link a great resource with some scripts on how to say no to this exact situation: https://captainawkward.com/2017/06/12/9 ... ur-friend/

Some things the article highlights is that saying no can take some practice and might feel uncomfortable, to not imply that you can’t on a certain day, and to not apologize. Let me know what you think- is saying something like “Thanks for the invite, but no” something you could say?

Thanks, that article is perfect. I used a similar format to one of the suggestions in it and I hope E will understand.