AITA - My friend cancelled coming to stay over dinner plans

Not the A-hole

Me (24f) and my friend (26f) had made a plan to meet up in a city about an hours drive from where I live and instead of her having to drive all the way from where she lives just for a day, we instead planned (quite last minute) that she would stay the night at mine and we’d go to the city the next day.

On the day that she was due to come she was unsure about what time she would be leaving hers to head to mine and she may have ended up arriving in the later evening/early night. We were on the phone chatting about her coming down and she asks what we’re going to do for food, I said something about the fact that me and my mum weren’t going to have a proper dinner anyway since my dad was away (since we never do when it’s just the two of us) and suggested that when she gets here we could go grab a Maccies or Burger King or see what other food places are around near me to eat at. I could tell by her tone that she sounded a bit annoyed at that idea but just thought that maybe it was me being a bit indecisive and vague that was annoying her.

About half an hour later she phones to say that she doesn’t think she’s going to make it since she’d end up leaving hers too late and would be too tired to drive. It was a bit annoying since my mum had spent the morning cleaning the whole house to get ready for a guest to come over whilst I had been at work. My mum is terminally ill with cancer and whilst she’s not on her death bed by any means, she gets tired easily- my friend knows this very well. In fairness, I didn’t communicate this point to my friend and said it was all good we’d just meet in the city tomorrow.

Jump to a few weeks later, I’m on call with a mutual friend of ours and they tell me that this friend had actually been really upset and annoyed about the fact that we weren’t going to be doing a home cooked dinner for her and THAT was why she cancelled.

I was livid but then I started to feel guilty, am I the asshole for not offering home cooked food? Her side of the ‘argument’ apparently was that when I’ve gone to stay at hers, her and her mum have cooked and we’ve eaten together. I do fully appreciate this and do feel guilty in that respect. But from my side I genuinely gave not much thought as to the plans for food and the idea of going out to grab something easy. My family just don’t really think that way since we never expect for people to cook for us when we go to visit and it’s pretty normal to suggest eating out or grabbing takeaway. Because I also can’t cook well at all, I felt very guilty about asking my mum to help prepare a dinner when she was already very tired JUST because my friend was staying the night.

I can see her point of view and it’s really got me questioning am I the asshole here or is this an overreaction from my friend and should I bring this up to her? She’s not mentioned it once and everything has seemed completely fine between us so it’s genuinely baffled me to learn that she was this upset.

Posted Jul 26, 2026, 11:42 PM UTC

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