The food i ended up getting - chicken alfredo and squash, walnut, and brown sugar pasta. Lemon and lavender mocktail + peach cocktail  
(Not pictured here is bread with olive oil and balsamic vinaigrette + tiramisu)

For context, I 17f had been eyeing this nicer restaurant for a few months now, i live in a small-medium sized town with only a few options for fancy restaurants so this is pretty new to me.   
It’s an Italian restaurant that sits on a lake, and its reservations only. Basically as fancy as it gets for a teenager in my area.  
I had invited a friend who said she couldn’t afford it, but since I had been really wanting to try their menu before it gets cold out and you can’t sit on the deck, I offered to pay for her.   
She lives near by, so the plan was to meet up before hand and get ready for our reservation at 4:15. 

The day rolls around, and i call her around 12:30 and she doesn’t pick up. Not a big deal, its still summer at this point and it’s pretty normal for my friends to stay up late and wake up in the afternoon.   
2 o’clock rolls around, and still no answer. Finally i just go to her house, and she’s laying in her bed with her boyfriend. No problem, I remind her of our reservation at 4:15 and she tells me that she forgot, but still wants to come so she’s going to get ready. Once again, no problem. I head home and finish my makeup. 

About 20 minutes after I get home, she texts me and asks me if her boyfriend can come with.   
I say fine, but no shade, if he comes with he has to pay for you. I’ll pay for myself, but I won’t pay double to be a third wheel on someone else’s date, especially since she had just gotten together with him and i dont know him at all.   
If i wouldn’t hang out with him  
In my own time, why would i pay to hang out with him?

She says that he can’t afford that. And quote “it’s not his fault he’s broke” its not mine either?? And he was offering a ride, but i already had a ride planned for us, so its not like he’s offering something i don’t already have. 

But, because I have known this girl a long time, I offer three other solutions. 

First solution, he can call in to the restaurant himself and try to get a seat on the grotto, because the way the grotto works is only 1-2 people get to sit there, and bigger groups have to sit at a table.   
Mind you, one of the main reasons i wanted to come was specifically to sit at the grotto (as pictured above)  
He did not want to call in to the restaurant. Fine. 

Second solution, there is a park next to the restaurant. It has a flower garden, venue for concerts, a malt stand and different tourist shops, ect. I offered we can go to the restaurant, and he can come to the park after and we can all hang out. Or he can hang out at the park for an hour, idk ride some scooters, read a book, find a snack, literally anything and meet up after. The reservations are only for an hour and a half, and with just 2 of us we really only need an hour.   
He doesn’t want to do that either, fine. 

Third solution, he can stay home for an hour and me and my friend can do the plans we already had and just head home after.   
He doesn’t want to do this either, and says if he cannot come with he’s going home. 

Now she’s clearly stressed out texting me, and says she doesn’t want him to go home and says she is “just trying to make everyone happy” but i have offered her 3 compromises and i have not been offered not one single compromise, even though I am the one paying. So is she trying to make *everyone* happy or is she just trying to make her boyfriend happy?

Finally i tell her she can just stay home because my mom’s birthday was in a few days and i still had yet to get her a present. She agrees that this works best, and says we should hang out a different day. Now it’s been over a month and we haven’t talked yet, but it’s still on my mind. Im not going to reach out first, because frankly that seems pretty pathetic even for me.   
But still, what’s even going through her mind?? I try to give her some grace because she is only 16 and she just broke up with a long term relationship and this new one is pretty important to her, but still? Just odd all around to me. I do kind of feel like a dick head for immediately taking my offer of the table, but idk i offered to pay for her under the guise that it would just be me and her. The atmosphere would be totally different with me watching a guy who is basically a stranger to me go on a date with his girlfriend that im paying for. 

I have a brother, and he has female friends. He and i both agreed that his female friends would *never**** ***ask him to pay for her meal and third wheel on a date with her boyfriend. So why do girls think it’s acceptable to treat their female friends like that? Especially since this isn’t a McDonald’s hang out, its on the lower end of 40 dollars a person. My order here was 100 and that was even without an appetizer. Who do i look like paying 100 dollars to be a third wheel??

friend tried to invite bf to something I was paying for?