I told a colleague I was busy. She’s asked me to prove it.

A colleague invited me to her Saturday barbecue. I said, “Thank you, but I’ve already got plans.” My plans were to be in my own home, with no shoes on, seeing nobody. She asked what I was doing. I said I had a few things on. She asked whether it was something I could move. At this point I should have said no. Instead, I panicked and said I had “a booking”. I meant the sofa. It was booked by me. On Monday she asked how it went. I said lovely. She asked where we went. I said we stayed in. She looked at me for a very long time and said, “So you could have come.” I tried to explain that sometimes I need a quiet weekend. She said it was only a barbecue, as though I had confused it with a climbing expedition. Her last “only a barbecue” involved sixteen people, a gazebo and someone asking us to go round saying how we knew her. She has now invited me to drinks next Friday and asked me to check my diary properly this time. We were standing by the office printer when she said it. I had nowhere to go because it was still doing my second copy. I like her. She is kind, funny and very good at remembering birthdays. I simply cannot offer every unallocated hour of my life to someone who happens to ask first. Do I need to start saying, “I’m free, but I’m not coming”? It sounds harsh, but my current system appears to require witnesses. She asked what could possibly have been so good on television that Saturday. I told her I couldn’t remember. That was the lovely thing about it.