She Stole My Books, Not My Brain

(I am sharing an apartment with a now ex-friend. We get along well until one day, without warning, she ends up taking around $200 worth of my stuff and selling it off so she can have some pocket money. I am, naturally, really upset with this. The police get called, and we recover about two-thirds of the stuff, and she ends up being required to pay the difference. Among the stuff we manage to recover are a few older books that were a gift from my late grandfather, which were the things that I was most afraid to lose. After this, I cut ties with that friend very thoroughly. However, we have mutual friends that still are in contact with each other. I never tried to force them to cut ties with her or anything, but I likewise never shied away from being up-front about what she had done.)

Mutual Friend: *via text* “Hey, [My Name]. Do you have a copy of [Book]?”

Me: “Yeah. I have the whole series.”

Mutual Friend: “It’s a series?”

Me: “Yep. It’s really good.”

Mutual Friend: “Cool. Hey, can [Ex-Friend] borrow it? We were talking, and she mentioned how much she enjoyed it when she was living with you.”

Me: *kind of shocked at what I’m reading* “Are you kidding me?”

Mutual Friend: “What?”

Me: “She stole from me! This was one of the things she tried to steal! Why would I ever lend it or anything to her?”

Mutual Friend: “Oh. Well, that was a while ago, though.”

Me: “No no no no no no no. I am not lending her anything.”

Mutual Friend: *after about twenty minutes of silence* “Could you lend me the book?”

Me: “Are you planning to turn around and hand it to her?”

(Total silence after that, and that particular mutual friend is now looking like another ex-friend, as she has stopped speaking with me. Sooo sorry for being defensive after being burned by a thief in the past.)