I Believe In 2nd Chances
I believe that everyone deserves a second chance. About a year ago, one of my close friends made a comment that came off as homophobic (This was pretty specific to the time this was). I tried to ignore it at first because I knew he didn’t mean anything by it, but one day about 2 months later I decided to talk to him about it and let him know that he shouldn’t say things like that, because it might give people the wrong impression about him. He took this as me insulting his character and his intelligence. He went off on me and no matter how many times I told him I wasn’t and that I was just looking out for him, he continued to yell at me and tell me that I was wrong.
I explained to him that he should at least hear me out considering his comment was something that directly affected people like me. That he should at least try to understand why his comment could come off in a way that he wouldn't want it to come off. But he only wanted to see it as an attack on him. I was completely in shock, he had been one of my best friends at the time that this happened, so seeing him like this scared me. This happened in October that year. We didn’t talk to each other again for over a year. Both of our moms were best friends, so I can imagine you understand how hard it was to keep a big secret like that. They would usually come and visit us at least once a week. But after that argument, they stopped visiting, his girlfriend who I was close friends with stopped talking to me, and they didn’t even come by for holidays anymore.
In May the next year, they made an unexpected visit. It caught me off guard. I went downstairs to see him sitting on my couch and suddenly I didn’t feel safe or comfortable in my own home. I didn’t know what else to do, so I went outside and called one of my friends as a way to escape. I was panicking and no matter how much he tried to calm me down, I couldn’t stop panicking. I was at the point of tears as I sat outside getting texts from my parents asking what was going on. I lied and said a friend needed someone to talk to. They believed it, but they sent my brother outside to check on me. I was very obviously distraught, but he didn’t say anything about it. I ended up being outside for about 4 hours, until it was 11pm. When I finally came back inside they were gone, and I just wanted to be alone.
Flash forward to Thanksgiving of 2023. They came over to spend the day with us. I decided that it had been long enough and it was time we talked things through. When they got to our house, I went up and hugged him and told him it was time for us to have a long overdue conversation. I wanted to give him a second chance, but I knew I would have to make the first step towards fixing our friendship. After we talked, everything went back to normal. It was like we had never stopped talking. We just continued on with our day and hung out like we usually did. I regained a friend that I never should’ve lost. And this is why I believe in second chances. (Cue disney Channel Music)
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