Hopefully this isn’t too vague - I’m trying to avoid it being outing.
Many years back, a friend of mine was going through some mental health issues and didn’t get in touch for a while. She then saw another friend of mine out one night and told her she was missing me, so I decided to give her a call. I left a voicemail, but never got an answer. Then the next thing I knew, I’d been deleted off Facebook. I tried a couple of times to get in touch, but while I got basic replies, she made no real effort to re-engage, so I decided I’d leave her to it.
This was over ten years ago now. Then a while back I got a friend request on Facebook completely out of the blue. She messaged along with it asking how I was and if I remembered her (which was odd as we’d been friends for years), making no reference to the fact that she’d dropped me out of the blue. I responded to the message out of curiosity really. It seemed she’d had a very sad life over the past few years - marriage break-up, lost both her parents, not a great time career wise. I felt sorry for her and didn’t mention anything about the years of radio silence.
Anyway, I saw via Facebook recently that something else awful has happened in her life. I sent her a message of condolence and she seemed very grateful. I get the impression she hasn’t really got anyone close.
The thing is, she’s now going to be in town next week and has said she’d like to meet up. I feel like it would be a kind thing to do seeing as she’s had such a rough time lately, and doesn’t seem to have anyone to talk to. On the other hand, it does feel a bit odd to meet up with her and just ignore the elephant in the room - i.e. ten years of silence. But I’d feel a bit of an arse bringing it up when she has so much going on. Do I go? And if I do, what do I say?