"AITA for refusing to take the blame for my roommate losing her job?"

I (21f) have been friends with my roommate (22f) since kindergarten. Our whole lives shes been bad at borrowing things, not giving a borrowed item back for weeks or months and sometimes ever. But she's an incredible person otherwise and I love her... this event may change things, though.

Her laptop charger stopped working on Saturday and she asked if she could borrow mine. I said yes as long as she:

1.) didn't take it out of the house

2.) gave it back to me on Tuesday as I had a very important meeting at 9 am and would need to plug my laptop in for it as it would be hours long

3.) gave it back to be on Sunday (the 18th) as I will be going home (to my mom's house) for the week.

She said no problem, she planned on going to buy a new one on monday anyway and wouldn't need it that long and she began using my charger. I texted her yesterday morning to remind her I needed my charger for 9 am the next day (today) and because I'd be home from work around 1 am I asked her if she'd leave it on the kitchen table or in my bedroom.

I got home around 1:30 am and the charger wasn't anywhere in the house. I checked my laptop to see if i could do the meeting without the charger but it was at 20%. So i went into her room, unplugged her laptop and took my charger back.

Today around 1 pm I heard her wake up. She started freaking out. Apparently she'd lost her phone and was using her laptop as her alarm. She was supposed to open at her job at 6:30 am. She asked if she could borrow my phone and called her boss and she left for work. She arrived back home at 3 basically weeping. She'd been written up three times before this and because of this, she lost her job.

She started going off on me about how messed up it was that I took the charger. She thinks I should've reminded her in the evening to leave my charger out or woken her up before taking my charger back to ask if i could have it so she could set up a different alarm or asked me to wake her up. She asked me to call her boss and explain that it was my fault she was late. I refused.

I said it was her fault she lost her phone. Her fault she didn't charge her computer that day when i texted her in the morning to remind her i needed my charger back. Her fault she'd already been written up 3 times.

She refuses to speak to me now and our mutual friends say one of three things, I should've known better to let her borrow something because i know how she can be, I should've woken her up and asked for it back or at least called her boss to explain. But i just cannot agree with any of them that this is my fault! Is it my fault she lost her job? AITA?

What do you think? AITA? This is what top commenters had to say:

Dr_Asshole_PhD said:

NTA. You are well rid of this "friend." You said yes and established some pretty clear and reasonable conditions for getting your stuff back. You needed it for an important work meeting, she apparently needed it as... an alarm clock?

If she was written up 3 times before, she obviously has more issues than just this one incident, it's just MUCH easier to blame you than to take responsibility for her own actions.

AussieinHTown said:

NTA she is showing a lot of immaturity. You made the conditions for her using your charger incredibly clear, and she didn't even follow them. It might be hard to come back from the impact on the friendship, which is a shame.

Hopefully once she calms down things will improve, but fundamentally, you aren't responsible for her poor choices, and none of the 'solutions' to the problem are reasonable. The solution is for her to grow up, and stop trying to turn your shared friends against you.

And NotZombieJustGinger said:

NTA Is she serious? What job would possible accept “my roommate took back her charger” as an excuse to be late to work? She needs to take this firing to heart and get serious about how she treats her responsibilities.

She later shared this update on the situation:

1.) my refusal to call her boss was out of frustration with her and my friends. i was feeling attacked so i was refusing to help because i felt like they weren’t seeing my side. why should i lie for her? it was also extremely out of character. i love lying to authority to make things better!! haha who doesn’t!?

2.) she is not lazy. people who were so ready to judge are a huge bummer. this was her 9th day of working in a row. the majority of those shifts were 9+ hours. something i didn’t mention but didn’t feel like it was necessary. if someone sleeps for 12 hours it’s usually because they need it. usually people who work shift work have a messed up circadian rhythm.

i work until 1 am sometimes and have to be in for 11 am the same morning, then i’ll be off for three days, then i’ll work 5-midnight for a week, then i’ll work 9 am- 8 pm. it changes constantly. same with her. we don’t have a sleep schedule. we sleep when we can and work the rest of the time.

3.) she’s apologized for blaming me and knows she should’ve bought a charger yesterday and should’ve told me she lost her phone but was too embarrassed and thought she’d solved the problem.

she didn’t think i’d take the charger when i got home but can understand why i did, being afraid she wouldn’t give it back in time as she never really does. but she does still think i should’ve woken her up when i took it. maybe she’s right idk.

4.) she knows if i call her boss and say the truth that her boss will just say “well she should’ve told you she lost her phone and she should’ve replaced her charger”

5.) she’s been at this job for 7 years. she’s been in the wedding of a coworker, and we both babysat for her boss when we were in high school which is why this blew up so much. and why she and all my friends were so quick to blame me. her job is super important to her. which is why we’ve decided this:

i will lie to her boss and say i was the one borrowing her charger and basically flip the story entirely to the other way around SO LONG AS she makes immediate changes. i have horrible time management and was late CONSTANTLY until this year.

i created a ton of tricks (like writing things down in my planner 15 minutes earlier than they actually are to trick myself so i get there on time, setting an alarm an hour before i have to go, 45 minutes, 10 minutes etc) to attempt to fix this so i’ll show them all to her.

we spent a while looking up apps that people that struggle with executive function use and bought those things that are all over tiktok that you stick to your keys and phone so they make a noise when you can’t find them. i also said i wouldn’t call until she makes an appointment with a therapist to try to see if she needs a diagnosis.

i figured this would be a win/win. a way to maybe get her job back without enabling her behaviour. i do believe she might have just become ok with being “the forgetful one” as we always forgive her because we love her. i think this was a wake up call she really needed. she had to realize that her forgetfulness doesn’t just inconvenience her.

6.) i’m still pissed at my other friends who blamed me. they can eat it. no i’m not her mother but we’ve been best friends for almost 16 years so it’s a little more than just a shitty roommate situation. when i said she’s a lovely person otherwise i meant that! thanks for the input!! it helped with such a quick turnaround