Sometimes it’s hard to know when to speak up, especially when it involves someone you care about.

What would you do if you watched your best friend take on more and more financial responsibility in a relationship, and it started to look one-sided? Would you just stay quiet and mind your own business? Or would you speak up and let him know what you think?

In the following story, one man does just that, and it doesn’t end well for him. Here’s what’s going on.

AITAH for telling my friend his girlfriend is clearly using him

Jake and I have been friends since college, so like 11 years at this point.

I know this guy better than most people know their own brothers. He started dating this woman, I’ll call her Dana, about 14 months ago. I didn’t say anything for a long time because it wasn’t my place, and honestly, I kept telling myself maybe I was reading it wrong.

I wasn’t reading it wrong.

Jake used to be more responsible with money.

Dana doesn’t have a job. That’s fine, not judging, life happens. But she also doesn’t have plans to get one. Jake is covering her rent, her car insurance, her phone bill, and, apparently, her nails and her “self-care” budget, which, from what I can tell, is about $400 a month.

Jake makes decent money, but he’s not rich. He told me three months ago that he had to pause his 401(k) contributions because things were “tight.” This is a guy who used to lecture me about compound interest at 23.

Last weekend we were all at a birthday dinner.

When the bill came, she disappeared.

Dana ordered two cocktails, an appetizer, an entree, and dessert, and then excused herself to the bathroom when the check came. Not a quick trip. A strategic one. Jake paid for her without blinking, and I watched him do the math on his phone quietly before putting his card down.

On the drive home, I finally said it. I told him I was worried. I told him that what I was seeing from the outside didn’t look like a partnership. It looked like a situation. I wasn’t mean about it. I said it the way you say something hard to someone you actually care about.

He hasn’t texted me back in four days.

AITA?

Wow! You never really know how someone will take comments like that, even when you mean well.

Let’s check out how the readers over at Reddit feel about what transpired here.

This person agrees that it’s not a healthy relationship.

Here’s someone who’s happy his friend called him again.

According to this comment, his friend needs space.

For this reader, it may take a little time.

This is a hard topic to bring up with a friend, but it sounds like he needed to hear it.

If you enjoyed this story, check out this post about a daughter who invited herself to her parents’ 40th anniversary vacation for all the wrong reasons.