He Loves Me Not

I have been thinking... and thinking and thinking and thinking... and I can't stop thinking about him - my friend with (phone) benefits - Mr. January. He's been popping up on my mind more often than usual lately. I thought about him on Wednesday when I came across an article about the law school he got accepted to and I thought about him again on Friday, while I was having dinner with my friend. I even thought about him again yesterday when I was out on a mini-date with a new guy.

It was sometime during that last delicious scoop of the mint chocolate ice cream melting in my mouth that I looked at my date and I silently wondered to myself just what flavor of ice cream it was that Mr. January preferred. I couldn't find the answer off the top of my head and I made a mental note to ask him about it the next time I talk to him. I was surprised at my wandering thoughts because I was having a perfectly good time with this new guy, yet here I was... sitting at a cafe, thinking about another man.

That night I even went as far as looking at Mr. January's profile on Facebook. My first tell-tale sign that I like someone is when I check their Facebook just to see if they had any recent activity - status updates, personal info changes. While I was doing that, I was mentally beating myself over my head with an imaginary shovel because I was fully aware of the warning sign. I cannot, simply cannot, allow myself to like Mr. January. We're totally casual. Just friends.

Nevertheless, when my phone woke me up with its vibrations around 1am last night, my fury of being unceremoniously woken up was quickly replaced with joy when Mr. January's name lit up on the caller ID.

"Hello?" I tried to stifle my excitement and attempted to sound as nonchalant as possible.

"Hey, are you still out?... Or did I wake you up?" he inquired.

I was beginning to feel very eager to talk, as it is on very rare occasions that he calls me twice a week. In fact, just earlier in the night I was thinking about how I should resist texting him, since we had already spoken once on Wednesday. I tend to adhere to our unspoken once-a-week-conversation rule pretty religiously and now I am beginning to realize that this rule needs to remain firmly in place if I want any real chance of not getting too attached to this guy.

"No, I was in bed but wasn't sleeping." I lied to him in response.

"Oh good, I was hoping you'd be awake. I miss talking to you," he sounded almost tender in the way he said it. Of course, my mind might have played tricks on me in my still half-awake state. Then again, Mr. January has always had a way of sounding like he gives a damn about me... without ever actually making that much of an effort to pursue any kind of relationship, beyond friendship.

I guess what I am trying to say and am afraid to admit is that I kind of like Mr. January as more than just a friend or a friend with benefits. I guess it saddens me a little knowing that, realistically, even if we both wanted to be with each other on more serious terms... it would be pretty impossible considering our current respective career goals and aspirations.

I've liked him in some capacity for five months now... and five months is a pretty long time to feel passionate about a person. I've seen this attraction, not diminish, but grow stronger over time. I don't want to fall in love with him.

I will not fall in love, I will not fall in love... repeat, repeat, repeat until it's working.