Girl is into me, but with another guy... ADVICE??
Okay, so I posted on a previous thread about a situation but I ask that those who have read about that to put it aside. This is about one girl and my relationship with her, nothing more.
So I met this girl, Tara, who I originally befriended via Facebook. We'd chatted on occasion, "poked", etc... all the silly crap for a few weeks, maybe even a couple months. Then one night she randomly wrote and asked if she could come over. Turned out we lived within a block of each other the whole time. This was my first time meeting her so I was surprised she felt so comfortable coming to my apartment. (For the record, I'm 25 and she is 21). I was surprised that she was the one to propose hanging out because I felt she was out of my league. On a 1 to 10 scale I'd give her a solid 9 and myself a 7, maybe an 8. In any case, we talked for awhile over drinks. We ended up making out in my bed and then she suddenly stopped me from going further because, as she put it, she wasn't "that type of girl". I later came to realize that she had a boyfriend who, apparently, had recently gotten into heroin. Within a week or so of meeting her she dumped him, partly because of his continued drug use and also because he hit her in the face which was the last straw. We proceeded to hang out without revisiting the physical aspects for close to a month.
Finally in late August of last year we were sitting on her bed watching Parks and Recreation on her laptop when I txted her "I'm going to make out with you in five seconds. Bad idea...?" She read it, laughed, and wrote back "okay". We made out for awhile and ended up having sex. But it wasn't just a hook-up, it seemed deeper than that. She preferred me to thrust slowly, we kissed gently, and we made more than a fair share of eye contact. While it was irresponsible on both our parts, she trusted me enough to not make me use a condom and I came inside her. All said and done, I hadn't experienced such meaningful, passionate sex in probably three years.
We continued to spend a lot of time together for the next month or so, in and out of the bedroom, until she had a pregnancy scare. Once that was ruled out, she said she didn't want to have sex anymore until she was on birth control. She also said I shouldn't get my hopes up of us being an official couple. I told her I was okay with that for the short term, but I hoped our relationship would eventually evolve further. We have since continued to watch movies, drink wine, and otherwise spend time together 3-4x a week. BUT nothing physical has taken place, not even kissing or hand-holding... nada.
About three weeks ago I was seeing a little less of her and she admitted she had started seeing this 20-year old cashier at a local Mobil station, a guy with no interest in going to college and no intention of moving out of the area (a real winner...). Which doesn't make sense. Tara had proposed moving with me to L.A. to pursue voice-acting (something she had no idea I'd already planned to do!). We have a great deal in common: similar issues with our parents, a love of the arts and cinema, creative minds, both of us do funny voices which others call "weird", same appreciation of being frugal, a shared loss of a loved one that committed suicide, similar taste in music, quirky sense of humor, etc etc. I could go on forever, but the point is that I've never met anyone more compatible, male or female. Yet she's still "seeing" (she's single on facebook...) that other damn guy!
She admitted she doesn't foresee a long term relationship with him and she does still sees me a fair amount, sometimes late into the night. (I don't know about you, but I wouldn't want my girlfriend hanging out alone with some other dude like that!). An interesting thing I noticed... if I post on her fb wall she'll often delete it, which I suspect is to hide me from the other guy (who she's admitted she thinks sleeps with other girls) or friends of his (I don't think he personally has his own facebook, actually). She has a lot of male friends and I've never noticed her deleting anyone else's comments so her deleting of mine is somewhat significant. I think?
My take is that she likes me quite a bit, but after going through such a shitty relationship with an abusive heroin addict she's afraid of opening herself up to a deeper relationship again. The other guy (Erik) is young, simple, and likely a passing phase. But still, I find it perplexing.
One last piece of information:
A couple weeks ago it was her turn to pick out a movie to watch at my place and she went with 'American Beauty'. I told her she had just earned 20 bonus points for picking my all-time favorite film. She then said it's hers as well. I asked her "So what does Erik think about the movie?" Her reply? "He hates it." That really stood out to me, and I even said to her "make note of that."
Lately though I've been ignoring her calls/txts on occasion or claim to be "too busy" to see her because I know I need to pull back a bit. Based on my experience, trying too hard usually makes things worse. I need her to make steps towards me and I think she might in the end, but I also don't want to get my hopes up. If she was open to dating me, I see some serious long-term potential, something I strive for. I feel so close yet so far from her at the same time.
What do I do with this girl?? She definitely cares about me, but how much is difficult to gauge. Half the time I feel like we're dating, but I know we're definitely not. I've communicated very clearly to her about how I feel so I haven't held back in that regard. I even told her that if this Erik guy made her happy then I was all for that relationship because her happiness is more important to me than my own.
Okay, I've written too much. Thoughts??
