Sometimes, you never know who really are your friends until a 小人 comes and shakes things up.
Say you met this 小人 through whom you thought was your Friend A, but he gives you a bad first impression. Then you think, 'Maybe I was too quick to judge.' So you meet for a second time and this time your gut feelings are confirmed. The 小人 turns out to be a self-centred, freeloading kinda guy and you don't exactly part on friendly terms.
Fast-forward 2 weeks and so-called Friend A appears to be ignoring your email. So you ask mutual Friend B to ask so-called Friend A about an event he is organising, to which he had previously proclaimed, 'You are always welcome to join.'
Friend B later reports that so-called Friend A says you don't get along with his friends, indirectly meaning that he doesn't want to invite you to his event. Of course, the 小人 isn't mentioned by name, but you know what has happened, since you have only ever met 2 of his friends. Admittedly, you don't like both of them but you don't go around bad-mouthing them to mutual friends.
Still, pulling the 恶人先告状 move isn't beneath a 小人-type of person.
Now, your friend isn't the guy who takes the 小人's words and doesn't even bother to ask you what had happened.
He also isn't the one who doesn't have the balls to tell you directly that he doesn't want to invite you to his event, but instead tells it in an indirect way to a mutual friend, counting on someone else to pass the message along.
He's also not the one who tells your mutual friends that you don't get along with his friends. This is really distasteful since it implies to others that you're a horrible person that all of his friends don't like, even though the truth is most of them don't even know you.
And he's definitely not the guy who pulls the primary school era my-friend-doesn't-like-you-so-I-also-don't-like-you shit.
So you see, 小人s play a really important role in exposing friendships, or lackthereof. Embrace them.
NB. It appears that another 小人, not coincidentally from the previous Friends drama, was in the mix. She has become so-called Friend A's friend, ironically, through my introduction. I suppose it was this initial move that ultimately led to the shit hitting the fan. Oopps.
