I spilled my heart out to you over Christmas, and you did the same. Just the two of us left alone in the hall, we were bound to spill our innermost secrets. We were already so close after living together and working together. This was different, I felt like our friendship reached a whole new level and you were someone I could truly confide in.
You shared your secret loves with me; you told me how you felt about someone with classy bone structure. I held back. I don't like talking about how I feel about him with other people.
However, I broke down one night in the leadership study and told you about how much I care for him, how much he means to me.
Two days later his girlfriend broke up with him. You told me that now was my chance. He was single, and I was the first person he told.
He and I talked every single day of break. He texted me when he was hurt and angry. I was the person who distracted him from the breakup. He went from being my best friend to the best friend I've ever had.
After we got back to school, he told me he didn't want any more relationships--that he wanted to wait and be single for a while. Understandable.
Months passed, and his and my friendship grew stronger. He and I spent damn-near every waking moment together. There was no possible way he didn't know how I felt about him.
His and your friendship blossomed too. The three of us started a bond and it was always fun to be together watching movies or hanging in the lobby.
The staff meeting that Hannah made us write down our frustrations and burn them was the night I found out. I wrote down three frustrations: chemistry, Sam, and him. I liked him so much, and all I wanted was for him to show a glimmer that he felt the same. I wrote his name on the slip of paper, put it in the bag, and watched it burn. The frustration didn't go away, I just thought about it all night through hall council. Afterwards, you were telling me the frustrations you burned: Sam, and Madi. Funny how we both put Sam's name in. We talked abut that situation and how much you hate Sam.
Then I wanted to talk about my frustrations with him. About how much I care for him, and how much it eats me up inside. I said one sentence about him, and you changed the subject.
Clearly, you didn't want to talk about him.
And then I realized. You like him too.
I paid it no heed. He's amazing; its difficult not to like him.
Then the cuddling increased. I would walk into his room and the two of you would be cuddling on his futon. Not really an indicator of anything. You're a self-proclaimed cuddle whore. After he and Brittany broke up, he started cuddling with everyone. Everyone except me. I distanced myself and said I didn't like to cuddle. The truth was, I knew that his arms around me would mean something different for me, so I thought it best to leave myself out of it.
I don't exactly remember where in the timeline Spring Break happened. I was supposed to be at home for my birthday. Instead, I drove 3.5 hours back to La Crosse to spend it with him. He was working alone in Angell, and I wanted to spend my time with him. We spent every waking moment together--literally. I imagined that's how it would be if he and I were together. A fun little fantasy. The night of my birthday came, and the whole 2 hours I was downtown I wanted to leave, because I knew he was back at Angell. At Bodegas Michelle asked me if I could ever see anything happening with him. Only a handful of people knew how I felt, and she wasn't one of them. I confided in Michelle about my feelings for him. I told her how much I care about him, and I just couldn't stop talking. I blabbed out everything. She is a very good listener. She gave me the support no other friend previously had--not even you.
I went back that night and sat in his room and giggled hysterically about everything. I fell asleep on his futon and woke up to him covering me up. I looked up and saw he was wearing his glasses. I then proceeded to tell him how adorable he is and how cute he is when he wears his glasses. He was in his bed laughing at me. I read the duty log he had just written, and I put to memory what he wrote. "Best part of your day: Spending the day with my best friend Mari, who is now asleep on the futon."
The summer came, and I had to spend two weeks living an hour and ten minutes away. Apparently you took my place and spent all your time with him. I thought back to you liking him, and realized that something else was going on. He stopped texting me so much, and so did you. It's like I was written out of our friendship.
I wanted to talk to you in person about what was going on, so I sent you my work schedule so we could hang out together. We made plans to hang out, but you planned other things. Then we scheduled dinner. The night of I texted you, and your response was that a bunch of people were coming. I had intended this to be the time we talk about what was going on.
You clearly didn’t want to be alone with me.
That evening he and you had plans to watch a movie. I was awkwardly invited along as the third wheel. I sat in your room on the opposite bed as you two sat on yours. The movie was awesome, but I could hardly concentrate because I was too busy thinking about what was going on between the two of you. I was gone for a week, and already I was left out of all the jokes and shunned as a second-rate friend.
That night, he and I left together. I gave him a ride to his car, and told him I wanted to give him his birthday present. He seductively asked what it was, and I was shocked he made a joke like that to me. At that moment I wanted just to kiss him, but the feeling I had previously flitted through my head, and I knew something was going on between the two of you. I gave him his present and he thanked me and did the customary, "You didn't need to get me a present."
The next day I decided to look at likealittle. Something I don't do very often. There was a post about a girl liking her guy friend, and wanting to take it to the next level. I knew that it was you who posted it. After all, you had posted a few other posts about liking him throughout the year. One of the comments stated that you didn’t know what to do, because you THOUGHT one of your friends also liked him. I had a comment to say about that one...you didn’t think, you knew.
I spent my entire day off moping around the house. My aunt asked me what was wrong. I told her I had a headache. How was I supposed to express my actual thoughts: I’m in love with my best friend, and he’s seeing my other friend who knows exactly how I feel about him. I decided to wait and see how long it took for someone to bring it up to me. After all, someone had to tell me some time, and there was no use crying over something I wasn’t positive on. For all I knew, I was making this all up.
The next night was his birthday. I was running late to dinner due to work, and I knew that it was going to be awkward between you and I. I didn’t want to see you. I walked in, and you were sitting next to him. Of course you were. That night I forced his attention on me. He and I were waiting at the bar at Cocos, and he told me I was pretty. It was like how it used to be. All his jokes were told to me, and we laughed at everything. Then again, he and I were the drunkest. I texted him from the bathroom that I’m glad he’s my best friend. A few minutes later I asked him who he was texting, he giggled, and said, “you.” I held onto his arm the entire way back to campus; partially because he kept weaving into the street, and partly because I just wanted to hold onto him. He and I held hands for about 20 seconds before he decided he wanted to start running to get to a bathroom faster. That was the best part. Holding his hand for 20 seconds: the most joy I’ve felt in a long time.
Then we got back to Sanford, and he slept in your bed with you. I lay in Becky’s room. I drunkenly blurted out, “I think something is going on between him and her. But he paid more attention to me tonight, but he’s in her bed. She and I are even.” Nobody corrected me. Becky gave me her opinion, and we went to bed. I couldn’t sleep at all.
My thoughts of anger continued to grow. I continually argued with myself if there was something happening between the two of you. At moments I thought yes, others I thought I was being silly. I spent most of my time thinking about it, and my dreams were haunted by the thought of it.
We had our Angell Hall reunion movie night, and from outside Jeff’s apartment I could see you snuggled into the crook of his arm. In the car it almost looked like you were holding hands. I figured I was being ridiculous. Then there were the comments during the movie. Everything you said he laughed at. Everything that I said he either ignored or belittled. I sat there next to him thinking of the conversation I wanted to have with him, but it’s been such a long time since he and I had been alone together.
What was happening with my best friend? After I left I texted him if he was mad at me for some reason. He assured me, he wasn’t.
That night I had a nightmare about it. I woke up during the night and wanted to call you and have you assure me nothing was happening between the two of you. I couldn’t sleep. I couldn’t do anything.
I knew something was going on between you, it was only a matter of time of when I found out officially.
Why hadn’t you told me yet? You know how I feel about him. To save our friendship, you should have told me at the beginning that something was happening. How could you do this to me? You crossed a line and thought nothing about me.
He should have told me. He’s my best friend. He tells me everything. The only reasons I can think of for him not telling me is that he knows how much it will hurt me. He knows how much I care. He should have told me. Telling me would have been better.
And so we come to this morning. I was calm. I knew I wanted to talk to you in person, but my attempts at that didn’t work. I took a shower and was getting dressed. I walked over to my phone and texted you if I could ask you a question. You took forever to respond with “yeah.” I asked if something was going on between you two. I started cutting my nails to distract myself from waiting for your response. My phone buzzed, but I couldn’t look. I finished trimming one hand of nails. I felt that I was going to look at my phone and see something along the lines of, “Of course not, silly!” And all my worrying and crying would have been in vain, and life would return to normal.
That’s not what I saw. Your response was, “ Do you want to know over text or do you want to talk in person?”
That’s what I thought, you fucking whore.
I tried to continue cutting my fingernails, but I was shaking too much. Shaking with sadness, rage, and betrayal. I cut my finger I was shaking so much.
You told me we could talk tomorrow. I want to talk sooner. I’m not going to spend my day with this in my head. I want you to see the hurt and pain on my face.
Amazingly I have kept myself from crying. I’m bottling it up for when I see you. I want you to know exactly how much you’ve hurt me.
I turned on Harry Potter, and have had it playing on my laptop as I write this. I’ve told no one. When I’m hurt I always confide in someone. Too bad the two people I go to are the ones who are causing this.
There’s really no one else I can talk to. I hardly know the roommate who is watching TV downstairs, I can’t talk to any of our friends, because I’m sure they’ll take your side. After all, you’ve had a hard year. You’ve had a breakup and went through your best friend dating the guy you hate.
You’ve had a hard year, I can imagine. Well guess what, you took away from me the best friend I’ve ever had. You took my friend away from me. I know nothing was ever going to happen between us, I settled on that thought a long time ago. But you took him, his and my friendship can never be the same.
And you took something else from me. You took our friendship. You and I will never be the same. I hope you thought this through before you acted. I hope you thought about the anguish that you were going to put me though.
And so I sit here and wait. Waiting for you to text me that you’re done with work so we can talk. I work at 4, and it’s almost 1. I have a feeling you’re going to put this off.
Thanks for thinking of me, you selfish slut.
