Some betrayals stick with you, especially when they cost you something important.

What would you do if someone once cost you a leadership role because they broke their word at the last second? Would you let it go? Or would you remind them that some promises shouldn’t be broken?

In today’s story, one man finds himself in this very situation and, after 35 years, opts for the latter. Here’s what happened.

My father’s decade’s-deferred petty revenge

As indicated, this is not my act of petty revenge, but my father’s. When he was in college, he was in a small fraternity (20 or so members).

At the start of his senior year, he ran to be the fraternity president. He knew that every vote would be critical and thought he had secured the necessary support.

However, at the last minute, one of the guys who had “promised, promised, promised” that he would vote for my dad changed his mind and voted for the other candidate, who won by a single vote.

The guy didn’t see this coming.

Fast forward some 35 years, and my father is sitting on the board of trustees of the college, which has narrowed down the selection of a new president to 3 candidates, one of whom is … yes, that same vote-changing fraternity brother from 35 years before.

This time, there are only 5 voters, and that guy knows certain the current/outgoing president will vote for him as well as his long-time fraternity brother friend, so he only focuses his lobbying efforts on the other three trustees.

My father poisoned the well so sufficiently that the vote was 3-2 against. The applicant was stunned, and all my father said to him was, “Sorry, but no one is promised, promised, promised a win.”

Wow! That revenge must’ve felt so good all those years later.

Let’s see how the folks over at Reddit relate to this father’s situation.

This person was not impressed.

For this reader, a congrats is in order.

It must’ve felt pretty good indeed.

Here’s someone who wants to have coffee with the dad.

That revenge was definitely cold.

As another reader mentioned, it must’ve felt great to get him back after all those years.

If you liked that story, check out this post about a group of employees who got together and why working from home was a good financial decision.