Curiosity can sometimes lead to unexpected misunderstandings.

This young man was deeply passionate about his hobby of worldbuilding.

He keeps multiple binders where he builds his fictional universe.

When a close friend visited, she stumbled upon his notes and mistook his fictional entries for real-world items.

She was humiliated and thought he did it on purpose.

Read the full story below for all the details.

AITA for accidentally tricking my friend?

I (19M) love worldbuilding. I would consider it to be my main hobby.

I somehow find a way to connect most things I find in real life to my fictional setting.

I usually jot down a note on a napkin or something.

Then, I transfer it to one of my worldbuilding binders when I’m alone.

This young man keeps different binders for the different aspects of the world he’s building.

I don’t talk about my fictional world with pretty much anybody.

I think it’s a little embarrassing.

I have multiple binders for the same setting for different aspects of the world.

Think one for food, geography, religion, etc.

It’s a little overkill, but it helps me organize my thoughts.

He invited a friend over to play video games with him.

I invited over my friend (22F), let’s call her A, for a movie night with me, my sister (18F), and my parents.

She’s very much not into the D&D or fantasy stuff and doesn’t know anything about it.

We ended up going up to my room to play video games.

And at some point, I went downstairs to go to the bathroom or something.

The next day, his friend called him a jerk for making her look stupid.

When I came back upstairs, she was on her phone, so I assumed she’d been doing that the whole time.

She goes home, and I think nothing of it.

The next day, at around noon, she starts blowing up my phone.

She was calling me a jerk for making her look stupid.

He found out that she had read one of his binders and thought his entry about Fool’s Bell Peppers was real.

I, understandably confused, ask what she means.

She admits she read one of my binders and asked her roommate to pick up one of the peppers she’d read about because it sounded good.

She said she wanted to make Fool’s Bell Peppers because she and her roommate both love spicy food.

Fool’s Bell is a fictional type of pepper I created that looks like an overripe bell pepper.

But it is actually a little more spicy than a serrano pepper, so around 25k Scoville.

She also thought he did it maliciously to make a fool out of her.

Her roommate had laughed in her face after looking up the type of pepper and said she “got her good.”

A says I’m a jerk because, to her, I “knew she would snoop through my stuff.”

So I put something fake to make her look dumb to her roommate.

I need to emphasize that this binder cannot be more clearly labeled as fiction.

He says there’s no reason he would deliberately embarrass her.

There are no real-life things in this binder, not standing alone at least.

And the front literally says “Worldbuilding: (type).”

On top of this, she’s one of my only IRL friends, and I love her a lot.

I have no idea why she would assume I would do this maliciously. AITA?

Let’s read the responses of other people to this story.

Is she really your friend, asks this person.

This user shares their personal thoughts.

Here’s a valid point from this one.

This person agrees that it’s not his fault.

Finally, here’s a good clarification from this user.

You know you’re a good writer if your readers confuse your creativity with reality.

If you enjoyed that story, read this one about a mom who was forced to bring her three kids with her to apply for government benefits, but ended up getting the job of her dreams.