The difficult phone call I'm going to describe was one I had to make to my landlord in Toronto about three years ago. I'd moved there from Vietnam to study, and I was renting a basement room in a family house.
The call was difficult because I had to tell him that I'd accidentally caused a flood. I'd left a tap running in the bathroom while I went to answer the door, got distracted by a long conversation with a delivery driver, and when I came back, water was everywhere. It had soaked the carpet and leaked into a storage room full of the family's boxes. The landlord and his family were on holiday in Florida.
I was terrified to call for several reasons. Firstly, I was worried I'd lose my room or have to pay for damage I couldn't afford. Secondly, my English was still not very confident, and talking on the phone is much harder than face to face, because you can't see the other person's expression. And thirdly, I just felt ashamed. I actually wrote a short script before dialling and practised it twice.
During the call, my voice was shaking, and I apologised probably ten times. To my amazement, he was very calm. He told me who to call to dry the carpet and said their insurance would probably cover it. Afterwards, I felt a huge sense of relief, but also a bit of pride that I'd called immediately instead of hiding it. Since then I've never been afraid of difficult calls; I've learned that being honest early usually makes things easier.