When a favor costs you a friendship

I decided to help out a friend, do a good deed - we hired her husband at our store. One month was all it took to deeply regret that decision. Not only did we get a terrible employee, but I also ruined my relationship with my friend. Apparently, they expected me to pay him just for the mere fact that such a wonderful person as my friend's husband existed in this world.

"Can you believe they screwed Mike over with his paycheck again! His boss is a complete bastard, found something to complain about. He knows our situation is tough and jobs are hard to find right now," Sarah fumed, pouring me more tea.

We'd known each other for about eight years. We used to work together, but then I changed careers and we stopped being colleagues. But we maintained our friendship. So I was well aware of the problems in my friend's family.

Sarah herself was currently on maternity leave with their second child. Their oldest had just started second grade, and the youngest had recently turned one. The family was paying a mortgage, not without help from parents, but there was no other way. Mike had been having constant problems with work for the last couple of years.

"Employers went completely crazy after that lockdown. The bastards know people have nowhere to go, so they're tightening the screws. My husband comes home completely drained. The baby doesn't even recognize him, he sees him so rarely," my friend complained.

She was very upset about this, because the family had taken a long time to decide on a second child, and when they finally did, this whole mess with the pandemic hit. Everyone struggled then, only a few lucky ones came out ahead.

I sympathized with my friend - it was a difficult situation. She would have gone back to work herself, but they made it clear she should look elsewhere. Her company was going through tough times, and it wasn't even clear if it would survive until she returned from maternity leave. So even if Mike stayed home with the kids instead of his wife, it wouldn't have helped them.

About six months ago, Mike lost his job. According to Sarah, they just pushed him out. My friend said he was an "inconvenient" employee who wouldn't let them take advantage of him, which management didn't like. So they did everything to make him leave.

The man found a new job pretty quickly, but it wasn't without problems there either. Sarah constantly complained now that her husband left early, came home late, and management regularly looked for reasons to cut his pay.

I myself had long ago given up trying to work for someone else. My husband and I opened our own small grocery store, which brought in decent income thanks to its convenient location. We even thought about opening another location, but given the ongoing chaos, we didn't risk it and decided to wait.

We recently had an opening for a delivery van driver. My father-in-law used to work that position, but now due to health reasons, he decided he had no business behind the wheel anymore. And we were just looking for someone to replace him. We thought the position would go to my husband's brother, but he still needed to return from the army for that.

I offered my friend to hire her husband at our place - he worked in this field after all. The work wasn't the easiest, because besides driving, the job included loading and unloading goods, since we didn't have separate loaders. But we definitely wouldn't keep him until night, call him in on weekends, or withhold pay for no reason.

I honestly told Sarah what her husband would have to do, what the working hours were, what the pay would be. We'd make everything official, so his work history would count and there'd be no tax problems. She called the next day and said her husband agreed.

Mike spent two weeks quitting his old job, then came to us. I only met him to collect his paperwork for processing. My husband explained everything to him. That evening I asked what he thought of Mike, whom he'd only seen twice in his life - the first time was at his and Sarah's wedding.

"Hard to say yet, we'll have to see," my husband said slowly, but his tone made it clear he wasn't thrilled with the employee.

Just a week later, Mike simply didn't show up for work. The store staff blew up our phones saying he hadn't arrived, hadn't brought the goods, and wasn't answering calls. It turned out he hadn't been to the warehouse either. Neither my husband nor I could reach him.

I decided to call Sarah. My head was full of thoughts - there are plenty of idiots on the road, and he wasn't used to the van yet.

"His back seized up. He was trying to get out of bed and it was like he got shot - he started screaming. I got so scared, I called an ambulance. They gave him an injection for the pain, and then he fell asleep. I got caught up with the baby and forgot to call you. Sorry, you understand - I'm on edge, plus with a baby in my arms," my friend rattled off into the phone.

"So, is he getting a sick note? Will he go to the doctor or what?" I clarified.

"Why the doctor?" Sarah sounded surprised. "He'll rest for a day or two and come back to work. You think this is the first time?"

Well, fine. We're all human, we all can get sick. My husband got behind the wheel while Mike was resting at home. Two days turned into four, but he finally showed up at work. However, he announced that he wouldn't be moving boxes because he couldn't strain his back for another couple of weeks.

And who would? At the warehouse where we buy supplies, that's not their problem, and in our store we have two elderly women working. Should they load the boxes or what? My husband cursed, but arranged for loading at the warehouse for an extra fee, and handled it himself at the store.

By the end of the month, Mike didn't show up again, but at least this time he warned us he was sick with a fever. That evening Sarah called me.

"Yeah, our son brought some infection home from school, the whole family got sick," she complained. "They waited until all the kids got sick before closing the class for quarantine. What were people thinking?"

When my husband heard about Mike's latest illness, he just laughed outright.

"I'm beginning to understand his previous 'evil' bosses," he shared with me.

I didn't like Mike as an employee either. Out of the whole month, he'd only worked properly for one week, then either couldn't load anything, or went on sick leave altogether. His paycheck came out accordingly - that is, small.

"Wait, I don't understand - what's this ridiculous amount that came to my husband?" Sarah called me indignantly when we transferred Mike his first paycheck.

I patiently explained what the deductions were for, how the calculation was made, and why it was exactly that final amount. My friend was silent for about thirty seconds, then unleashed such a stream of profanity at me that my ears rang. Among her screams, I could make out that my husband and I were scum who were profiting from someone else's misfortune, that we had no hearts, that we should choke on our pennies, and things like that.

"I take it Mike no longer works for us," my husband calmly clarified when I hung up and added my friend to my block list.

"Yes, and I also have one less friend. But that's probably for the best."