Write a story where a person feels offended but doesn't know how to deal with the situation. This story will be used to introduce a lesson about interpersonal relationships for college students. The situation does not involve romantic or family relationships.
Derrick held his head in his hands. He wasn't sure what to do next. The group he had been assigned to join in Economics 254 had been great for most of the semester. "Had been" were the keywords. Two weeks ago, they argued about how to proceed with their project, and since that day, he realized that things had shifted. Recently, Derrick realized that the other four members had discussed a topic, but he had not been included. And they had given him meaningless tasks to complete, and then when they met, the four agreed among themselves not to use his work. 

The members of the group were all very different. Tom was confident and a bit arrogant. His assigned tasks and contributions were usually late. Sander was shy. She rarely spoke in their meetings, mostly agreeing with everyone else. Bernard was a clown, hilarious but not productive. Julie was organized, productive and pleasant. What had he done to offend one or all of them? He wracked his brain but couldn't come up with anything personal. As he turned the question over and over in his mind, he had a glimmer of an idea. Derrick realized that during the argument, Tom had taken a strong position on the division of labor, and Derrick had been the only one to disagree. As he thought about it more, it seemed to him that at the beginning of the argument, it had only been him and Tom disagreeing, but slowly the other three chimed in and all three agreed with Tom. 

What could he do? He wanted an A in this class, and the group project was 50%. He had a problem. As he thought about it, three solutions came to mind. The first idea was to request a meeting with the group and lay it all out. Talk about it like adults. Another possibility was to go to the professor and seek advice. Or he could run a test? Go to Tom privately and say that he had thought about it and Tom was right. He would say that for the last three weeks, he would agree to Tom's plan so they could all forge ahead, get it done, and get an A. After sleeping on it, he knew what he had to do and headed to campus to put his plan into action. 