Read other letters about this article

• Friday, April 25, 2008 06:31 PM

  Finally

  Though I regularly join in the chorus of Broadsheet critics, I can acknowledge a fair and nuanced analysis when I see it. I imagine the usual trolls will still find something to rip apart though. And I just can't wait to see brightstar's take. I could do some critical analysis here, but instead I'm just going to share a story.

  When the semester started I met a girl. We started hanging out, a lot. In the first week, we ended up hanging out three days in a row, going grocery shopping, having coffee, and eventually ending up at a hookah bar snuggled together on the cushions. Most other guys would tell you that was enough of a 'signal', but I was looking for something specific - (intentional eye contact, tilting her face towards me, etc) that just never happened. Regardless, the tension must have been obvious because the next day she IM'ed me and told me that she really likes me but she has an old boyfriend in Florida and she's not sure how things stand with him so she needs time to figure things out and would still like to hang out in the meantime.

  I'm not stupid - normally I would take this as a polite rejection and move on. But she keeps calling me, IMing me, basically going out of her way to hang out with me more than one would for any normal friend. When we are out with other people from school she constantly looks and smiles shyly at me, to the extent that I later find out that everyone else just assumed we were going out. Then one night she invites me over to watch a movie at her place. Again, same tension, same lack of obvious body signals. Eventually I thought "fuck it" and went for it anyway, only to be stopped with a reluctant head-shaking. Same explanation from her again.

  Fast-forward another month and we are sitting on my bed, her telling me that her boyfriend is now casually seeing another girl and she thinks it might be over with them. There is a long silence. Finally I speak:

  "Does that mean you won't pull away this time?"

  "I...should. I still haven't completely broken it off and I don't want to be involved with two guys at the same time."

  "So does that mean you'll pull away?"

  "I don't know...I should."

  I try and she does pull away. The stagnant cycle continues until one day I resolve to tell her to forget about the whole thing. There is another night of hanging out where, at her suggestion, we first eat ice cream in the park, then walk over the Williamsburg bridge together, then end up at my apartment. We sit and talk for a while until she uses that famous line: "it's getting late...I should go." At this point I take a deep breath and say we need to talk. Before I have a chance, she says that things are over with the Florida guy, but she's not sure what to do now, because it's dragged on for so long that now she feels like I have more invested in this emotionally than she does and she doesn't think it would be fair to me. In further conversation, she reveals that if I had been more pushy and aggressive she would have probably forgotten about the other guy and just gone with it.

  In conclusion, it appears that 'no' does not always mean 'no'.

  —achilleselbow Read achilleselbow's other letters
  Permalink
  Flag
  Click "Submit Flag" if you feel this post is inappropriate. Explain why below if you wish.

  Cancel