While friendships are meant to be comforting and fulfilling, Harriet Kane has gotten increasingly frustrated by the fact that her friend Katie keeps pushing Harriet’s social boundaries, even though Harriet herself has never once verbalized any said boundary to Katie.
“She’s always making so many plans together and inviting herself over to hangout, I don’t understand why she thinks it’s okay,” said the 22-year-old. “I mean, I’ve always enthusiastically said yes to everything, but that’s just common courtesy.”
Sources told reporters that the last time Katie said she was coming over for a night-in, despite planning to go to sleep early, Harriet replied with multiple heart emojis and suggested turning it into a wine-and-face-masks sleepover night.
“But you would think she would just pick up on the vibes, you know?” Harriet said. “Sure, my face, mouth, and multiple texts might be saying ‘Yes, please keep coming over,’ but my mind is saying ‘I need alone time’ and she should be able to sense that.”
Harriet reports that she has attempted to convey a semblance of communicating her boundaries, which has mainly manifested in indirect passive aggressive quips about the time and talking about how busy she always is.
However, when reporters reached out to Katie, the 21-year-old raved about her friendship with Harriet with seemingly no clue about her friend’s reservations.
“I love Harriet! She’s always so down to hang out all the time and always picks up when I call and responds so fast when I text,” Katie gushed. “She’s such a good friend and, like, always there for me. Last week, after this guy I’d been seeing ghosted me, I asked Harriet if we could talk and she immediately suggested getting coffee together.”
“I only did that so I had a solid excuse to leave once the cafe closed!” Harriet exclaimed. “It’s getting exhausting. I told myself I had to limit hanging out with her to once a week for my mental health, but then at coffee on Wednesday she suggested going out again on Friday! The nerve! Who does she think she is, trying to hang out more than once a week when I clearly set a boundary, for myself, in my head?”
Despite her increasingly drained social battery, Harriet continues to skirt broaching the topic of boundaries of any sort.
“I’m working my way up to direct communication – first I have to master the art of backing out on plans I agreed to despite having no intention to follow through, and then maybe I’ll finally tell her that I need time to myself.”
