Dear Prudence,
I have a college friend who is getting married this fall (I found out about the engagement from a mutual friend and a subsequent email blast from the engaged friend). I haven’t really spoken to Engaged Friend in the last year due to a history of minor slights and her overall sense of entitlement. (Honestly, I’ve always known she had the potential to be an awful person, but I disregarded it because I wasn’t on the receiving end.) At the wedding I’d be one of the few attendees who knows that the groom was engaged to another woman two years ago and used Engaged Friend as a rebound. Knowing their history and Engaged Friend’s general bad behavior doesn’t put me in a celebratory mood. I don’t mind just sitting this one out, but I am concerned that I will lose our mutual friend if I don’t attend (she asked me to coordinate flights and hotel arrangements for the wedding weekend). I don’t know how to explain I’m not attending without speaking ill of Engaged Friend, and I’m really just over the situation. Should I lay out my cards for our mutual friend I want to keep, or just risk losing them both by not attending?