A friend's scandal

Last semester, which was the second semester of the last academic session, was very eventful, and it was filled with a lot of non-academic activities. The whole school was rocking from one event to another, and it seemed every week an event or a party was happening in the school. Perhaps that is why the second semester has always been viewed as more difficult than the first semester due to the distractions caused by more non-academic events than the latter. Students get distracted by these activities, and the tricky part is that most of these activities always occur just a few weeks before the examination date.

Events range from inter-departmental sports to events like hall week, faculty week, and other miscellaneous events. These events were sponsored by big brands that wanted to boost their popularity among students. One of the events that always happened in the second semester was the school’s pageantry, and it is one of the biggest events in the school. It draws a larger crowd than most events, but unlike most events, it is more of a daytime thing. Although the main event is merely a day-long activity, it takes weeks to prepare for the events, especially selecting and grooming the candidates who would participate in the pageantry.

An announcement of the availability of forms for those willing to be contestants was made, and my friend happened to get hold of the information and send it to me, he told me, "Why don’t we contest in it?" Even though we hadn’t contested in any pageantry before, we decided to contest out of curiosity and the will to try something new. After picking up the form, we were among the lucky ones who were called to come for the screening. After the screening, we were shortlisted to just 47 contestants—27 girls and 20 boys. Both I and my friend made it to the shortlist.

The whole group of contestants spent their evenings almost every weekday training and learning different walks and poses; we were also taught choreography dances. Apart from the time spent on the training, we all had to source our clothes and accessories ourselves, which put a great strain on most of us financially. Also, I had to sacrifice the time that I would spend on my academics and reading to practice and prepare for the pageantry.

Just a few days before the event, I got so strained financially that I had to make the hard choice of quitting despite the immense time and effort I had already sacrificed. Everyone was shocked, and people began asking me what was wrong and why I decided to back down from the competition. Even the event organizers were not happy with my decision because they had already informed everyone about the number of contestants they wished to showcase.

Even though I had gone to great lengths to buy some of the apparel that I needed for the pageantry and also rented the suit I would use for the dinner walk at an extravagant price, In a true sense, I have made a tremendous loss, but I made up my mind to support my friend instead, and I even went the extra length to lend him the suit I rented for free because the suit he owned wasn't looking good. I gave my rented suit to him for free, despite him knowing the cost I used to rent the suit.

On the day of the event, just hours before the pageantry show began, one of the contestants was looking for a suit to rent. This contestant messaged me, asking me for my suit since he knew I wasn’t participating anymore. After telling him the price I rented it for, he said he would rent it from me. I was surprised by how desperate the other party was. So I reached out to my friend and told him that someone was willing to pay the exact price I rented the suit for, but I told him that since I gave him the suit, it would be bad for me to collect it back. Instead, I proposed that he give me his original suit so I could lend it to the other contestant.

To my outright shock, my friend refused. Despite my friend's knowing that lending his suit to the other party would help me recuperate a part of the money I lost renting the suit that I gave him for free, The biggest shock of the day was that he went behind my back to negotiate with the other contestant and rented his suit to the fellow. I happened to find out through the contestant, and I confronted him, but he denied it to my face. I was shocked; I didn’t believe that he would do such a heinous act as a very close friend of mine.

I didn’t rage out; instead, I feigned ignorance of the matter for some days. Then I brought up the matter with a friend of ours to meditate on it. After the mediation, he still didn’t view his action as wrong; he even refused to apologize. Perhaps when he sensed that I began to be wary of him, he promised he would give me half of the payment for the suit that he rented out.