DD finished school today. Her school always finish at lunch time on the last day of term. We arranged to go out to lunch with a group of her friends and whichever of their parents could make it, very casual arrangement with everyone paying for their own share. There were 18 of us altogether including children.
One mum came with her 3 children They all had 3 courses. Just as we finished our puddings and before we got the bill she suddenly said she had to go. Someone said OK we'll just get the bill and she said "oh sorry we're really short at the moment would it be alright to split our share of the bill between the rest of you I can put in a couple of quid towards a tip". A couple of people said that actually it wasn't alright and she said well I'll pay you back after the holidays if its a problem but I thought you wouldn't mind.
There was nothing we could do we had to split her cost between us
Most of us could afford to do this but it just left such a horrible feeling all round. One mum though was on a really tight budget herself and said she couldn't manage it as she'd budgeted almost to the penny herself to pay for this end of term treat so she couldn't take on the extra cost. She was obviously embarrassed being put in a position where she had to tell us that as well :(
Even though I feel sorry for her, I feel so angry that we were put in that position. If she'd spoken to me or some of the others before the meal we could have organised something as we wouldn't have wanted her children left out but it just felt like we'd been deceived when she dumped it on us at the last moment