How do I tell her?

[TG 12X35]

Ok so I've known this girl for years. Well technically I've known her since the third grade and only stopped going to the same school as her after freshman year when I decided to attend a different high school. After freshman year was when we actually started to become friends. It was pretty much just me, her, and her friend just hanging out all the time. During all of this she had an off and on again relationship with her boyfriend. She probably hung around me equally or more than she did with her boyfriend during sophomore year and the summer after. Right around the start of junior year I began to express an increased interest in trying out drugs. Mostly just weed, but alcohol too. This did not go well with her and our relationship died down right around christmas of junior year and at the same time she became much closer to her boyfriend and they started to have sex frequently. From what some of my friends have told me, I had a pretty legitimate shot at her right around I was expressing my interest in drugs, but it did not happen due to her strong disapproval. He is the only person that she has had sex with and I am still a virgin to this day. Their relationship continued and ended a bit over a year later.

I also happened to be good friends with her younger brother who is almost three years younger than me. We would smoke weed together all the time. One time during march of senior year I ended up at her house alone with her in her living room, because her brother was late meeting me at their house and I ended up walking in anyway. She had hated me up until this point and she had broken up with her previous boyfriend about a week prior to this incident. Nothing physical happened at all. It was basically us catching up with each other and from what her brother said to me later, she no longer had any feelings of hate towards me at all. She went through a tough period through the next few months as although she and her boyfriend were broken up, it was not 100% as she still went to prom with him two months after we started talking to each other again. From the second she started talking to me again her opinions on weed and alcohol gradually changed to the point that at this current day she fully accepts that I smoke weed everyday and she doesn't see a problem with it at all. She has even gone so far as to let me smoke inside her house a few times and attempt to smoke and drink a few times.

Now there is also another relationship that is going on. I had a friend (male) that I was very close to in elementary school that I fell apart with in middle school and very slowly started to become close friends with in high school culminating towards the end of junior year where we would hang out all the time and smoke weed. This girls younger brother would also usually be with us. Right around me and this friend became close weed smoking buddies he also became good friends with this girl. He had essentially replaced my role, but he talked up his habits (weed) much less than I ever did and it wasn't nearly as much as an issue.

Fast forward to the summer after senior year and my friend and this girl are starting to kind of become something more. Right around this time my feelings for this girl start to grow continuously, but I hold back all my feelings to the best of my ability for the respect of my friend. After about a month and a half of my friend making advances on this girl he confronts her and gives her an ultimatim(sp?), now or never, and she says never.This happened last July and my feelings have been growing steadily every since.

The first time I ever told anyone of my strong feelings for her was last October when I told her brother. Since then he has helped talk me through any emotional stress I have encountered through this situation. My other friend ended up moving on as he went away to college and had a three month relationship with a some other girl. I approached him about seriously approaching this girl after he had broken up with his girlfriend at college. He stated he was no longer looking for a relationship with this girl nor any other, but just sex. He has also told me that this girl has approached him crying numerous times over emotional issues involving her ex boyfriend. Unfortunately I can not 100% specify when this happened, but I am pretty sure it occured both while he was trying to pursue her and after she had denied his ulimatum. Her coming to my friend crying over these issues came as a shock to me, because I never knew it hit her that hard, because she made no attempt to console in me like that at all. For this reason I believe I may easily be out of the friends zone, but not guaranteed.

No matter what this is tearing me up inside and I feel at this point that I can no longer just stand by and not be very active with my pursuits. I want to tell her I absolutely love her, but I very much realize how strong this may come off as. I'm sick of trying to drop hints, because I've held back more than I felt I should and haven't given her the right message. I feel I need to get this whole situation over with whether that is actually starting a relationship with her or just moving on. I just don't know how to say this to her at all. I've tried to think it through and I don't feel comfortable with what I have come up with. I just want to tell her that I want to pursue a relationship with her or at the very least ask her out on a date. Any suggestions as to the exact wording that may be appropiate?

SHORT VERSION: how do I tell this girl that I want to pursue a relationship with her? Any other advice on my overall situation would also be appreciated.
Sorry about that. Better?

[Cain]

You'll get more responses if you break it into paragraphs.

Until then, I'm not reading it.

[Gigabitch]

SHORT VERSION: how do I tell this girl that I want to pursue a relationship with her? Any other advice on my overall situation would also be appreciated.
Sorry about that. Better?

Well, I wouldn't write her a letter if I were you, at least not until you learn how to make things a little more approachable.

[TG 12X35]

Is there anything I can say to make it easier for you guys to help me. How can I better help you to help me?

[lesa]

You flirt and show her that you are interested by the things you say. Don't just talk to her as a friend....add some sweet flirts in there every now and again.

I only read the short version.

[TG 12X35]

Is there something I may not be saying clearly enough?