Red flags in friendship

Kira was my friend from office. Both of us had joined the team around the same time. Both of us had undergone the training and certification process for project joining at the same time. As we had been going through the same phases be had become really good friends. At least I used to think that Kira was a close friend of mine. For Kira the equation of friendship was something completely different.

Initially I did not note the red flags. One day around 4:30 Kira asked me if I would like to go to the cafeteria. I had work that day but I needed a cup of coffee. I agreed and both of us went for a quick coffee break. At the cafeteria Kira ordered a sandwich that would generally take 20 minutes to prepare. I told her that I am working on a deliverable and need to return quickly. She made a sad and said, "don't leave me alone in the cafeteria. I will finish quickly". The quick coffee break consumed over 40 minutes. I had to stretch my working hours to complete my deliverable.

Next day Kira came to me and said, "because of you, last evening I ate that sandwich and I was so full I did not have dinner".

I could not understand why she said that when she ordered it herself, "I only wanted the coffee and you yourself went ahead and ordered that sandwich. It is all on you".

I thought it was a friendly banter. Kira got offended, "don't blame me. It was your fault". Kira was angry - not fake angry but real fuming angry.

"First you asked me to go to the cafeteria. Then you ordered the sandwich yourself. These were all your decisions Kira. I had nothing to do with them". My response was still not enough for Kira.

She snapped, "you should learn to take accountability for your actions".

Now her false accusations were making me angry, "exactly Kira. All actions were yours. Take responsibility for them instead of putting all of them on me".

Kira did not respond and just walked away from my desk. That day she did not speak with me. I too decided to ignore her.

2 days later she came back to me because she had a problem with her work. I decided to help her. Later she told me that towards the month end she was planning to take a vacation. She wanted me to take over her project when she would be away. I told her it was not possible for me because I consecutively had a project with me which would continue till the end of next month. As I asked her ask some other team member for help she lost her temper, "how could you say no to me? I have already informed our manager that you would be taking it over. That is why my leaves got approved".

I was shocked hearing this, "you never even asked me if I was okay and you directly told him that I would be responsible. I have no bandwidth to handle your project in addition to mine. I will speak to manager and tell him to reassign it".

Kira was not okay with this approach, "no you cannot do that. This has already been discussed and confirmed".

I looked at Kira and said, "you are not my supervisor. You do not have the authority to decide what project I would work on. You have already created a mess. I am going to clean it now. I thought you were my friend. Clearly you are anything but that".

That was the last conversation between us. I used to think that Kira was my friend and I kept ignoring all the red flags in our friendship. Once I started noticing them I could see that right from the beginning she had been taking advantage of me. Kira stopped talking with me when she realised that she could no longer take advantage of me.

I still have Kira's number saved in my phone. We have not spoken in 7 years. I have not yet deleted her number because if she calls I should know I should disconnect it.