Cast:

Me: 'gifted' stoner, in my early 20s, emotionally incompetent and unmotivated.

Her: cheerleader type that works hard at everything, very smart and driven.

Him: jock with an ego but not dumb

Long story but it is required to get to one tiny issue that fucked everything up.

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The three of us were in a two-year psychology course together.  None of us started off particularly liking each other but as the classes went on we grew quite close, close enough for the jock and the cheerleader to start hooking up and close enough for me and the cheerleader to call each other best friends.  The three of us got on great together and it was easy--until he started treating her like a dick.

She would get sad because the jock would say things like 'I don't care about you' and blatantly stare at/flirt with other girls, but I was happy to listen to her and help her and we still talked every single day for over a year.  She helped me through my bullshit and I can honestly owe a huge deal of my maturing process to her (she's older).

Then as the course was coming to an end she just cut me out of her inner circle.  There was no reason that she just stopped including me in her life and when I said it to her she just said that she was so busy--looking back it was gaslighting.  I was stupid and didn't realise it for a few weeks, until it became painfully obvious to me.  She would never admit to being done with me but her definition of effort was saying "Hows things?" most Sunday nights which would lead to a three message 'conversation' of pleasantries and surface level bullshit.  We literally stopped talking in person and after a party at my house, she and I were alone, sat in the kitchen for an hour without saying a single word to one another as my girlfriend went out to get more drinks and she waited for her jock to wake up.  As you can imagine this was hard but I did what I could to move past it.  Seeing her do things with other people was like having my heart shat on with razor blades, but I stopped trying and it started hurting less when I didn't think of her.

This lasted until after we were done--it had hurt like nothing else to see someone you care about forget that you exist, but it happened and I moved on.  Then my phone rang for two seconds and hung up.  It was her.  I called her back and we were tense but we made up without really addressing the cause of the issue.  Things were good again and despite myself, I trusted her again.  We were best friends again and there were fights here and there, but we were good.  She was still hooking up with the jock who started treating her worse and worse and I was still friends with him, this was the source of almost every fight but there was nothing serious. 

There was another bout of exclusion somewhere in there but it was nowhere near as bad this time as she wasn't being cruel and I shot my shot early and pushed her out of my head after I realised she was being a stranger.  The jock never included her in things so when she finally reached out (after two months) to say 'Hi' it was the morning that the jock was earning some triathlon medal.  I had been invited and, being not bothered, I said I didn't want to go.  When she said Hi I knew it was to try and tag along and I didn't want to reply with "Hey, I'm not going to the ceremony" because that would have been short and that's the only way I could see around having to do the painful pleasantries, so I didn't respond.  Later that week we grew close again.

Finally, the potentially assholey bit of my story (I think I had been pretty supportive and forgiving so far)

The jock was being exceptionally cruel to the cheerleader.  She was miserable and I was there for her.  I wasn't great as I was drinking a lot and smoking too much weed at the time, but I was always there for her when she needed it and she could snap me out of my self-destructive stupidity when she wanted to, she just didn't think to do it this time or I was beyond a finger-wagging, or she just didn't see the bout of depression.

I was a bit shitty with her but nothing too bad.  We went on a road trip across countries together and despite me not being in top form, we still created some wonderful memories.  Then before Christmas I was invited to lunch by the jock. I went and he invited me to another sports ceremony that I politely said I didn't care about (I'm endearingly honest), then he invited me out for Christmas and proposed a road trip in the new year.  I agreed to both of them without much thought of the cheerleader, and when I saw her that night I told her (not that endearingly honest).  Of course, she was pissed off but not bad enough to be done with me.  

That sports ceremony was a week after I was with her.  I was drunk when I told her about the road trip and the Christmas bar crawl, but we still had a laugh and though she was hurt, I clued her in and was there for her, made her less sad.  The next morning I asked her how bad I was since I was quite fucked up talking to her.  She took four days to respond which is rare enough in itself, but then she said "Hi, just seeing this now..." which is a barefaced lie but not a big deal, to be honest.  

The problem is a switch flicked in my head and I subconsciously thought 'Oh, she's going to be a stranger for a while' and I pushed her out of my mind.  The day after she and I had our quick catch up (over text) the jock said he needed someone to go to his gig (that I had already passed on) and it seemed like he needed a favour.  I said okay while depressed as hell (around birthday (which I hate) and an old girlfriend was pregnant and trying to talk to me (not mine)).  

I went and didn't invite her; I didn't even think of inviting her.  She found out on Facebook (fuck Facebook) and she got mad at me before my phone died mid-conversation.  I left it there and when my birthday came during the next week she sent me a message saying "I was at work until now, happy birthday." at 11:25 at night.  We had a shallow and meaningless three messages before it became painful.  A few days later without contact, I texted her "Are you going to let me apologize to you before Christmas?"  This caused a fight since; of fucking course it did, I was stupid for presenting my apology to her like that.  

That fight was our last communication.  I went out over Christmas, I'm doing that road trip soon.  I did try and convince the jock to include her in things and he sees her as just hurting herself and there's nothing to be done about it.  She blocked me on everything after I went out at Christmas. I dropped a letter into her for Christmas with a present I know she likes.  That's the end of it.

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This has been a rambling mess but I shake when I feel strong emotion and this has stopped me shaking.  I feel better just sharing.  I tried to paint this whole ordeal in a fair light, I assume I failed.  So, am I the asshole?  Do you guys think she is going to talk to me again?

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I would honestly consider her a soulmate and I don't remember the last time I saw her because I was almost blackout drunk.  I don't want our last uttered word to be "The two of you are cunts".  I'm over my sad spell after Christmas was torture.  I have no idea how she's getting on. 

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TL;DR - I didn't think to invite my best friend to the event of a guy she is stupidly in love with.  I then made it worse by being resentful that their shit was becoming my problem.  I see the hurt from her perspective but there's nothing wrong with the way I treat her.  I feel like I'm getting 100% of the negativity she feels towards him. 