I was the stupid friend. As a young adult 18 or 19 years-old, I had what I thought was a friend. 

But looking back, he used me poorly. 

He and I were out partying in a small town in Iowa on a weekend night. 

We left one place and headed to another place. My friend sped down the main street in his car. 

A policeman came up behind us and flipped on his red lights. 

Knowing he was caught speeding and would get a ticket, my friend sped off, intending to out-run the cop. 

We drove on county highways gravel roads, going way too fast on loose-surface gravel roads. 

We got quite a bit ahead of the cop, and my friend said something like, 

“If I get another ticket, I lose my license. I need you to drive for a while.” 

Like a dummy, I traded places with him and drove to a town a few miles away. 

We managed to avoid the cop.

It occurred to me 20 years later how stupid that was. 

What if the cops had cornered us?  

Then I would have got a ticket for what he did. I would have been forced to decide to take the ticket to save my friend or to protest the ticket and ‘betray’ him. But this would not have been a betrayal at all; it would have been the truth. 

What my ex-friend did to me was a betrayal; putting me in a situation where I would have to take the consequences of his poor decisions. 

Don't ever be stupid like I was.

Eric J. Rose 

middlegrademysteries.com 

photo: roadtrippers.com