Girl in class, strange situation

[robertdawson]

There is a girl in one of my classes (started Wed) who I have a slight interest in (she is very attractive) but in the first two class periods it has already become weird for me. I'll try to make this as succinct as I can, but I may not be too successful.

The first day of class I went in and without thinking about it sat next to her (I just looked at the people sitting on the row and tried to sit where I had a seat distance from everyone). The teacher then insisted that everyone find a "partner", so then we were partners.

After class ended I asked her why the teacher wanted people to find partners, if there was there was some sort of project later on the course (she had taken the professor for the prerequisite). She said no, and I then commented on how I thought it was strange that the teacher insisted that partners exchange emails and phone numbers. After I made that comment she said "you can lookup my email in the online class directory and study".

Her being an attractive woman, I assumed she thought I was prying for her contact information, so I "corrected" the situation by saying "no, I just thought it was strange that the teacher was insistent on exchanging emails" (thinking I was making her more comfortable by enforcing the fact that I wasn't trying to get her information). I thought it was strange that she offered up her information and mentioned studying (she could have just said "no, there isn't any group work, I don't know why she wanted people to exchange contact information), which to me could possibly be a sign on interest, but the way she offered her contact information sounded almost like a tactful way to defuse what she could have perceived as a uncomfortable situation.

The next day I came in, sat down and simply asked her how it was going, nothing special. I didn't say anything else (or really look her way or anything) and then when the professor left the room to get some papers she turned to me and asked how my second class was the day before. I told her about it and said that the professor kept calling this one person out for being on her phone and she said something along the lines of: "oh my goodness! My face would have turned so red, I would have been so embarrassed!" which I thought was a rather exaggerated comment.

While we were doing practice problems I made a couple short comments about off-topic stuff (nothing weird or out of the ordinary either) and she responded but in my opinion, rather awkwardly. After class I asked her if she had done anything interesting the day before while I was in my second class (since she had started asking me about things first) and she responded rather enthusiastically with a handful of things that weren't really all that out of the ordinary (for example, she told me about having lunch with one of her girl friends, but didn't have an interesting story to go along with it or anything).

But when I said what I had done the rest of the day (told her our team had a softball tournament) she acted fairly strange, almost as if she had misheard me and thought I had been talking about some esoteric subject. The only other thing I could think of is she didn't hear me at all and thought I was just standing around waiting to follow her out of the room or something (worst case scenario). I just assumed she heard what I said so I just tried to finish off the conservation by saying that we had to wait another month until softball started again.

I don't even remember if she responded after that, and if she did it was probably something as short as "oh". Then she just kept walking out of the room with me and the rest of the class and left. I made sure to pull back and let her get a few feet ahead of me because I definitely didn't want her to think I was following her. At this point I was extremely confused as to how an enthusiastic response in which she gave lots of information she didn't have to give (e.g. she could have said "no, nothing that interesting" instead) let to a super awkward situation.

It almost seems as if she is switching between being overly friendly/flirtatious/enthusiastic and being really uncomfortable/nervous from conversation to conservation... To be quite honest I don't think I've ever encountered a situation like this. What is likely going on? Could there be some other reason I'm unaware of that she keeps acting uncomfortable/nervous for seemingly no reason? If I made her uncomfortable why would she have initiated a conservation with me?

[lion87]

She's interested in you! She got self conscious and thought she was being overly warm, so she pulled back! That's all!

Go for it! Best of luck!

And dont get hung up on these small things!

[robertdawson]

Why did she tell me to look up her email instead of just giving it to me?
Why did she act indifferent at my comments, like she didn't want to respond?
Why did she basically ignore me after I told her what I had done the day previous? She acted so weird (at least it seemed to me) that you would've thought I told her we should go have sex in the elevator or something.

I was under the impression people were more direct about things once they quit being teenagers, apparently not...

[Rich]

Sounds like she's interested to me.

[KingZ]

Why did she tell me to look up her email instead of just giving it to me?
Why did she act indifferent at my comments, like she didn't want to respond?
Why did she basically ignore me after I told her what I had done the day previous? She acted so weird (at least it seemed to me) that you would've thought I told her we should go have sex in the elevator or something.

Girls get insecure and overanalyze everything when they like someone.

Go for it.

[robertdawson]

Are there any other good explanations other than interest, like being friendly, or trying to make things less awkward after the day before? I prefer to he cautious about this. All of this occurred in just two days and I was convinced the way she responded on the first day was her way of dismissing me (and/or being polite because she thought I was fishing for a study partner).

Is there anything I can do to probe her interest level some more? Obviously I plan on seeing if she iniates another conversation before class and I'll probably ask her if she did anything fun over the weekend regardless, but does anyone else have some decent ideas? We have an exam in a few days and I was thinking about asking her how she felt about it. If she doesn't respond negatively I guess I could bring up studying (she mentioned it the first day not me), but I want to be careful about this.

Assuming I don't start getting a lot of negative signals, I need to just do something casual to get to know her more and evaluate whether or not I will actually like her past the initial stage of attraction. However, I have heard that study "dates" (especially if you only end up talking about course material) can be a quick way into the "friend zone" (I've actually heard that some people don't like to study with people they're attracted to because it is a distraction). Once you're in the friend zone it is pretty hard to get out and I don't want to doom myself to the friend zone from the beginning.

Whatever I do, I've got only 15 class periods (~month) to do it. If studying is a decent approach I've only got three exams in the class, so options are limited there also (unless studying happened when there weren't imminent exams, which would seem a bit odd to me at least.

Thanks.

[HeartIsAching]

If you wanted your opinion validated, you shouldn't have bothered asking for the opinion of others.

[robertdawson]

I wasn't validating my opinion or invalidating anyone else's. I was simply asking if anyone thinks it could be something else because everyone else apparently thinks it is obvious she is interested. Also, I had asked a few other people before posting this and they said she didn't want anything to do with me (in particular they thought her telling me to look up her email in the directory was childish). So if anything, I was asking what part of my logic was flawed since I believed rather strongly the opposite of what everyone here did. Asking about probing her interest level more isn't invalidating anyone else's opinion either, I'm just asking what other people would recommend as doing this would make me feel more comfortable about the situation. Either way I'm going to have to be around this person for the next month so I'd rather it not be very weird every class period.

[MerryH]

Why did she tell me to look up her email instead of just giving it to me?

You didn't even ask her for it, did you? So she did the next best thing without being presumptuous and handing over her info as if you wanted it, and told you to look her up. Then you basically told her you didn't want to. But this doesn't mean anything anyway, because you guys were instructed to share email addresses for class.

Why did she act indifferent at my comments, like she didn't want to respond?

She did respond, though. I guess you wanted to be more dazzled by her answers?

Why did she basically ignore me after I told her what I had done the day previous? She acted so weird (at least it seemed to me) that you would've thought I told her we should go have sex in the elevator or something.

I think you're reading too much into it. Honestly, and this isn't an insult, but I think you might have acted awkwardly around her due to nervousness. Just reading parts of your post made me feel awkward. If you're awkward, she's going to be, too. Loosen up. Don't be so apprehensive.

I was under the impression people were more direct about things once they quit being teenagers, apparently not...

One could also say, "I was under the impression people were better at picking up signals once they quit being teenagers." Also try not to make disparaging remarks about a girl you're trying to pull. But no, people generally aren't that direct because people generally don't like unnecessary confrontation.

Anyway, ask her out. A study date is not a real date. It's what friends do. You're not trying to be her friend. Ask her for coffee or dinner or some other actual "date" activity. Who cares if she rejects you and it gets weird. You only have to deal with her on a "professional" basis for a month. That's nothing. Go for it.

[robertdawson]

"So she did the next best thing without being presumptuous and handing over her info as if you wanted it, and told you to look her up... because you guys were instructed to share email addresses for class." You're right that I didn't ask her for it. I can't tell by your last sentence whether you meant it to be sarcastic or serious, though I'm leaning towards serious. I must be terrible at reading signals because I thought that the email exchange was significant.

- Yes she did respond. I don't know what I was expecting, I guess more of an attempt to grow the conversation instead of giving short responses.

- I didn't feel awkward but it is entirely possible I came off that way.

- my remark wasn't intended to be disparaging, it was just a terrible way of saying that I am fairly oblivious and had just happened to think people were more direct as they got older (I am apparently wrong) I've never been great at interpreting signals.

Anyway, you're right, studying is not a date. However, I feel I don't know enough about her and I haven't known her long enough to have a date. A while ago there was a cashier at a store I go to regularly and I saw her/spoke to her four or five times before I asked her if she wanted to do anything (I didn't know if I'd see her again so I went ahead and did it). I told her she seemed like an interesting person and wondered if she wanted to hang out. She took my number but refused to give me hers. You can guess what happened with that. So, right now I'm under the impression that it is a bad idea to ask women to do ANYTHING unless you've known them a while. But again, I don't have much experience with this.

[robertdawson]

This topic aside, what do you think about this: "A while ago there was a cashier at a store I go to regularly and I saw her/spoke to her four or five times before I asked her if she wanted to do anything (I didn't know if I'd see her again so I went ahead and did it). I told her she seemed like an interesting person and wondered if she wanted to hang out. She took my number but refused to give me hers. You can guess what happened with that. So, right now I'm under the impression that it is a bad idea to ask women to do ANYTHING unless you've known them a while. But again, I don't have much experience with this."