we ran into my friends talking stage out with another girl

last week my friend and i went to a sushi restaurant after work. when the hostess asked if we had a seating preference, we asked for a booth. we had a lot to catch up on and wanted comfortable seats instead of wooden stools. she said the only open booth was toward the back, which was fine with us.

as we were walking to it, i saw my friend slightly freeze. the guy she has been seeing for the last four months was there. he was sitting in a booth with another woman who looked around our age. they were dressed up, just like we were. the restaurant is on the fancier side, so it was not giving casual quick dinner energy.

we had to walk directly past his table to get to ours. he looked up and they made eye contact. but we were falling behind from the hostess, so we just kept walking and sat down.

she tried to act normal, but i could tell she was spiraling. she kept asking if she looked stupid for pausing. if it looked obvious that she noticed him. for context, he has been inconsistent the last two weeks. just enough to make her uneasy but not enough to fully call him out. and now that we saw him with another girl it all made sense.

we kept our conversation quiet because we did not want them overhearing us. she realized she had no idea who the girl was. it definitely was not any family member she had seen on his social media before. that is when i had an idea. i do not follow him, so i had nothing to lose. i pulled up his instagram. his account was public and he only followed 128 people, so my plan was to scroll through the list and see if we could spot her.

i clicked his followers. but the second i did that, his account switched to “user not found.” he had just deactivated while i was on his page. i saw my friends heart basically drop.

after that, the mood was completely off. we barely touched our food. what was supposed to be a girls night turned into quiet tension and overanalyzing everything with her man a few booths down laughing with another girl. we ended up leaving while they were still eating, which made it feel even more awkward.

i drove her home, and i was actually thankful i had driven because she was not mentally there. she was quiet the whole ride, just replaying everything. he ended up calling her three times while we were driving, but she was so out of it she did not even notice until later (she sent me texts throughout the night with updates)

she decided not to return his calls that night. the next morning, he sent her a message saying the girl was a family friend, someone his parents have apparently wanted him to get to know for a long time. he said he just did not know how to tell her. and he was going to go on this one single date to convince his parents that they tried it but also to tell the girl that he is already seeing someone. but why could we hear you two giggling together? not so serious of a conversation in my opinion.

it has been a week since this happened and she still does not know what to do. he continues to send her messages, casual check ins like nothing happened.

if it was innocent, why deactivate? if it was planned, why not mention it beforehand? and if his parents wanted him to get to know her, what does that even mean? you’re old enough to draw a boundary especially when you have a sweet girl (my friend) in your life.

anyways we would like another perspective. she has texted him back since but she has been dry because they haven’t had a conversation addressing the situation.