I 17M am questioning my friendship with 🟠(17M), 💪(17M),🤖(18M), and 🛻(17M)

A little timeline:

I became closer with all these guys exactly 1 year ago today. Ive known 🛻 since kindergarten but we ended up never being in any of the same classes for the rest of school(like literally all of 1st-12th grade) so we didnt really see eachother ever. But since theyre all a friendgroup, i ended up hanging out with him too. I met 🟠 for the first time in 11th grade(im in 12th grade now). And 🤖🟠💪 and me all sat at the same lunch table all of 11th grade(with a couple other people that arent really significant to this post). 🤖and 🟠 have been friends since kindergarden. 🤖 and i have been friends since we met in 10th grade.

A quick rundown on each person:

💪is probably my favorite person out of all these guys. Hes really genuine and sweet, but his strongsuit probably wouldnt be his smarts. He drinks like insane amounts of alcohol at parties he goes to with his friend who is like the worst influence. But, its not that often. Its happened like twice that i know of, and probably a few more times than that. And its always with that same friend. Anyways, he basically lives and breathes gym. He’s completely obsessed with it. Working out, Bills football, Lebron, and gay remarks are easily his strongest talking points. The thing is, this makes for a really just chill friendship. I admire his insane dedication to the gym, his progress has been wild. Hes on the quieter side, is really funny, and doesnt really get as emotional as other people. Hes the type to be more baseline or just happy, he doesnt get easily upset or angry. He’s really understanding and has grown up with a brother who is autistic, which means he knows the struggles of a life that isnt just like drowning with privelage. He has a friend thats a lesbian(i know this sounds so stupid that im meantioning this, but its significant later i swear😭), and they play basketball together on unified(thats right, he does unified basketball where he helps out kids that have autism or other disabilities). Hes just an all-around good guy.

🟠 is probably closest friends with 💪. I’ve been struggling with 🟠 b/c hes not very smart. Like probably one of the slowest people ive ever met in my life. He’s almost been made the runt of the group in that sense because none of them are like Harvard-bound, but 🟠 seems to lack like all common sense at times. He’s had a rough childhood with his dad, but his mom is really nice. He goes to the gym with 🛻 but they both arent very good at committing to that. He is extremely simple of a guy. He also doesnt get overly emotional ever, but that might be because he doesnt really confront those feelings. Everyone rips on him for his “cluelessness”, but it can actually one of his best qualities. It makes his relationships very lighthearted, and simple. He doesnt fake who he is or mask his personality. He is authentic and 100% him. Theres never any “drama” with him. He’s def not the type of person anyone would have genuine beef with. Hes really chill.

🤖He is like peak “i want to disagree just because i can”. He always has to be right. But, his strength is that he’s actually smart. He’s very much a math guy. He tries to flex all the time that he never sleeps, and tries to act like he doesnt care about anything. But, of all the people ive met in my life, he is 100% the most likely to become a serial killer or something. He also doesnt seem to experience any emotions. He is quiet, and i think might be gay or aromantic, but he fits in with the more popular croud so he buries it. Me and him are both in all advanced classes and stuff so the “popular” crowd for us is really just all of our friends in the AP classes because you end up spending the whole day with the same 40 people. I cant really talk to him about any “people”things because hes not really the type, but he has some other strongsuits. Hes really impulsive, which can be both fun and annoying. He seems to have no sense for danger. He likes abandoned buildings and doing tricks while we ski and speeding while going on his phone. His parents never care where he is because his older brother was like a drug addict and your classic rebellious teen, and kinda broke down his parents for him. 🤖 is very STEM-focused. I really like his intelligence, but he tries to make everything an argument. He can never admit if he was wrong, and he lies constantly. Like to the point nobody trusts him because its part of his personality. Like he thinks its funny or something because he genuinely lies every 30 words that come out of his mouth. The thing is, he lies about useless things. Like he split up from our group while we were walking on a fieldtrip and said he was gunna go look at the water and meet us at the bus. We all knew there was no time for that, and we legit told him he didnt have time to do it, but he was like “nah its alright”(he likes to act nonchalant)and asked one of our other friends to come with him. We were just tired of it so we were like alright whatever dude. So then we got back to the bus and he was already there(keep in mind we genuinely were walking straight to the bus we had it mapped out) and we were like alr u def just sprinted the whole way here theres no way u went to the beach. It was literally half a mile the opposite direction of the bus, so it would be like totally out of ur way, theres no way u actually got to sit there and do anything. Like he obviously was lying and js trying to act like we were wrong and he was right all along. And to top it off, the friend he broyght with him said they never went to the water. But 🤖 insists thats cuz our other friend went back wirhout him and that he like went to the water and had time to just sit and watch the sunset and everything. Its just like obviously a lie, there was no reasonable explanation besides that he just ran as fast as he could down a side road straight to the bus. But its like, why even lie about that?? Like its so insignificant. But like for stuff i like about him, when we are locked in, we can spend hours just laughing. He was my favorite for the whole first year but in recent months i changed my mind. Like over the summer we had a aleepover with 🟠🤖🛻(💪’s mom said no so he couldnt go—this is a common theme, his mom is really strict and almost never lets him out of the house) and i stayed up till like 4am with 🤖 laughing like uncontrollably cuz we were just totally in sync. Hes often the one i relate to the most. He just throws way more curveballs than all the other guys so he tends to be the one that can bother me the most too. But its probably just because i care about him.

Lastly, 🛻 At homecoming last year, we hung out in a group because he was a friend of a friend, and i thought he was awesome. 💪 was playing “3 big guys” while we were sitting outside of some building(if u dont know what “3 big guys” is, its basically like this parody “song”—if you can even call it a song—about gay guys and just like vulgar language), which like, whatever, its teen guys, what do you expect. But, 🛻 was like “what if the security camera sees you” and “what if the neighbors hear, u have the music all the way up, what if theyre trying to sleep” and 🤖 was like ”dude nobody is even in that building to watch the cameras right now its fine” which is like totally true, and it was kinda funny, but i just really liked that 🛻 acknowledged all of those details about our surroundings. Just a little preface- i was new to the friendgroup(this was in the first month) so this was a time i spent particularly people-watching while i talked to everyone, trying to get a sense of who everyone was. 🛻 came off as like the “typical rule-follower” and like the designated mom of the group. I really liked this, because usually thats the role i take on. I also thought it showed his maturity because obviously the song was just stupid, thats the reason 💪 was playing it, but the fact 🛻 was thinking of the consequences of that and like how it might impact other people really stuck out to me and was something i admired. Flashforward to now, hes like a completely different person. He wants to go into political science or international relations, but changes his political stance based on whatever instagram reels he finds funny. I told him how trump was a bad person and a bad president, and 🛻 was like “well yeah but hes not like that bad” and he wqs going on to say that like he isnt the best person but like nobody is a perfect person so u cant expect that out of a president. And i was just like “dude noone forced trump to be president, if youre unqualified, just dont fucking run. Its that simple. U dont have to play devils advocate for this guy. We should have someone in office that we feel proud to have representing our country, not somebody who doesnt know what planet he’s on”. 🛻 also was raised by democratic parents, hes an only child, and has a gay flag outside his house(hes not gay, his parents are just supportive of the community). But like the thing is, he swears hes more like “center”. And i was sayinf how you cant be neutral with trump or youre giving in to all the horrible things he’s doing. Like at this point he isnt really a republican, hes going further than that. Yet, 🛻 insists that “trump isnt doing all good stuff, but not all bad either” which is like whatever, youre entitled to your own opinions, but the most upsetting part for me is that these arent even his opinions. Like he legit just quotes instagram reels and tries to pass it off as his own thoughts. Like he wants a big truck with lifted tires, he wants to be this macho man but hes not. He doesnt believe in the gender pay gap, and again quotes instagram reels about how its all a hoax and tries to pass them off as his own thoughts. He believes trans people should have to wait until theyre 18 to transition. Theres just a lot that i whole-heartedly disagree with about him. His personality feels fake. He’s always making controversial comments and trying to pass them off as jokes, and i feel like im fishing for a fight whenever i correct him and tell him not to say stuff like that, but i dont want to stand there and act like its funny either. I know were teenagers so hes just like experimenting with who he wants to be and obviously like hes gunna wanna fit in, we all wanted that at some point, but its just hard to tell which version of him is actually real. I miss who he used to be and i dont know what happened to that version, or if maybe that just wasnt really him. Its so hard to tell. Last year we were in the car together and talking about how we were eachothers’ closest friend and that we wished we had more friends like eachother to talk to. This year, i no longer see him as someone I want more of in my life. I feel like i cant trust him with anything personal, and i absolutely dont see him as someone id ever take advice from. It feels like every single one of his thoughts are things i thought of in 6th grade. Like im being so genuine right now when i say this. Everything he has expressed interest in has been things i wanted to do or wanted to have in 6th grade. Because 6th grade for me was the year i really wanted to fit in and be one of the “popular” guys. Like the typical sporty not-so-smart ones. 6th and 7th grade i lived that life and hung out with those guys, but then it wasnt really for me, so in 8th and 9th grade i was friends with mostly girls, which also wasnt for me. I also was on and off with being religious. I really wanted to believe in God, because I thought that would be more “guy” of me, but i really just couldnt stick with it. I tried 6-7th grade, but by 8th it faded pretty quickly. I felt like having friends that were mostly girls made me look gay, and at the time, that was something i didnt want to be associated with because i was scared people would judge me before they met me. But, i found that girls were way more mature than the guys at my age, and maturity is another huge value of mine. 10th grade i hit the reset button and just focused on myself and figuring out who i wanted to be and who i was. 11th grade i became a part of the friendgroup im in now. Basically, 🛻 is the person i want to hear from tou guys about. I dont know what to do about him. I cant just drop him because hes a part of the group. And he used to be one of my favorite parts of the group for a period of time. Now i dont know. He thinks hes really educated but he kinda isnt. Hes very “malleable” in the fact that he can be very easily influenced. Which again, i know comes from being a teenager and stuff, but like its just exhausting. He was telling me today that bc his parents were so strict with him, hes only gunna go wild in college. And i was like, lowkey that sounds like it would partially be on your impulsivity as well. And he was like wdym and i was like “cuz u cant sit around and blame ur parents for the way you act the second you lose ur guardrails. Youre actively choosing right now how youre going to act, and saying youre going to drink and go crazy— thats you talking, not your parents” Which like, i’ve seen the arguement that “u should give ur kids alcohol while theyre at home with you so you can make sure theyre using it safely cuz theyll do it anyway in college” and he uses that reference all the time(which of course is again something he saw off instagram reels), yet my parents never gave me alcohol and i feel no desire to drink it. AND 🛻 always preached that he’d never drink alcohol in his life because it only has negative effects. Then Halloween came around and he got invited to a party with a bunch of Junior girls(which just tells u a little more about him, if his croud consists of girls younger than him) Then he started talking all this crap about how he was gunna drink soo much. Till his parents found out there was gunna be alcohol and said he couldnt drink, so he didnt. Which like, good for him for listening, but it feels like a red flag that he doesnt actually hold those morals himself. Like my parents im sure would not be proud of me if i came home saying i drank alcohol, but that isnt the ONLY thing holding me back from drinking. I literally just dont because i dont want to drink underage. I def think that i will eventually drink in my lifetime, but i dont see myself downing 20 shots at some random party any time soon. He also started liking instagram reels that were like “my parents think im such a good kid cuz i dont go out and party every weekend, but they dont realize i would be doing it, i just dont get invited”. Which on a certain level, i totally understand it. Like you want to fit in and go to a party and just feel like you can be independent and stuff. But, id prefer that my friends are good kids regardless of if they get an invitation to be something else. The trouble i have with this is that i want to believe that he talks about stuff like that because he is trying so hard to fit in, but that it isnt actually who he is. Like at the store the other week i convinced him that it wasnt gay to get lavender essential oils for his room. He said he really liked the scent but that people might think it was gay. And i was like dude who are you bringing into your room that would be upset by a lavender scent, cuz i promise you noone from our friendgroup would ever seriously make fun of someone for being gay, and especially not over a scent. And i told him that itd be better for it to smell like lavender than dirty laundry or something. And that tiny little pep-talk was enough to completely change his mind on getting the oil, he like immediately got the diffuser and the lavender oil and was like super hype to set it all up. Hes still got it going in his room and he talks about it randomly. It comforts me a little that i can convince him that its ok to be himself in that sense, but all of the other things that just add up worry me a little. Its clouding my vision of who he is as a person, because i really dont feel like hes making me a better person. I feel like my role is more just to make sure he stays on the “right” path, which who am i to decide? Like he can do whatever he wants. I just wont want to watch my friends go down a path of like drugs or alcohol or wrecklessness. Im torn between deciding if its something i need to fix about myself, or if its something i need to walk away from, or even just ignore and wait it out(or some combination of those).

Obviously this is all stuff ive held in for too long, so it sounds more negative than it actually is. Please take this all with a grain of salt. Ive been stressed out recently with college apps and just the workload ive been getting from school, which has def added to this idea of highschool ending and a new chapter beginning and the question of who im gunna be or turn into. I truly love all of them, but i’m intentionally blunt in these descriptions because im not about to sugarcoat something while asking for advice. I dont wanna leave anything thats been on my mind out cuz it might change the replies. I really appreciate these guys because they all seem to care about eachother more than the other friendships ive had. We hang out all the time and just do random things, usually just go random places, pick up food at some point, and get home late. Its exactly what i pictured of highschool when i was little. Especially since 🤖 always has to have that “wow-factor”(he does stuff just because you wont expect it), he will just show up at my house unannounced and ask if i wanna go somewhere. For Halloween, i was just applying to colleges and said i couldnt go to that party 🟠and💪 went to, and 🤖 showed up to my house with chipotle. We just talked for a couple hours then i did my application and he fell asleep on the couch, woke up, fell back asleep, and left. Its nice to just spend time with someone and not have to try so hard to meet their expectations, cuz he doesnt really have any. He enjoys the same thing as me, just being in someones company. He’d never verbalize something like that, at least not without framing it as a joke first, but thats just who he is.

I guess i just dont know if im missing something or if i should be doing something differently. Tbese friendships are all very easy to maintain, i dont text any of them individually much at all. We mostly talk in groupchats, just to plan the next hangout. I kinda like that tho cuz id rather be with them and doing something than just texting.