My wedding is Saturday and we gave our final count/paid in full at the venue on Tuesday morning. Tuesday night a friend of mine texted and said her and husband can't come. I said ok fine, and she said she wanted to send me a check "for their plates" I said no way and I didn't get another text from her after that. Today 3 more people canceled and as luck would have it all 5 of our cancellations were at the same table leaving that table with just 4 people. My tables are between 8 and 12 so I decided I needed to rewrite place cards and nix this table. I called the venue and explained that I would be bringing a few new place cards tomorrow morning and had to switch some out. Our reception starts at 5:30 and our ceremony is at a church, if anyone arrives early and orders a drink we said to start a tab and we would pay it (we have open bar starting at 5:30 but didn't want anyone paying for anything so any drinks ordered before 5:30 will go on a tab for us to pay). The owner told me on the phone today that since we had these cancellations we could put that $500 towards that possible bar bill, which is great! I assumed we were out of luck with those who canceled. Then I got my mail today and found a check from the friend who canceled! There was no card just a post it that said "sorry" and a check for $300 which I'm assuming is "for their plates" do I send this back? I feel like it wasn't a wedding gift it was a bill payment and it feels awkward. WWYD?
