What's going through her mind?

[WickedTrombone]

So I met this girl on an online dating website back in September. We're both 24. I managed to snag her number, but we didn't really start texting casually until mid Octoberish. Things would slowly start getting flirty. Unfortunately, I was extremely busy between work and school, as was she, so we didn't get a chance to go out until after the semester. Nevertheless - I managed to score a date with her, my first time meeting her after keeping in touch with her through texting and snapchat - a few days before Christmas. Our conversations are on and off. Some days we will text back and forth for 2 or so hours. Some days we will send eachother photos and videos of us talking to eachother through snapchat. Many times she will just send me photos of completely irrelevant stuff, like a photo of her and her cousin shopping. Somedays we won't talk to eachother at all.

Anyways, we went to a hockey game together, we're both big fans. Conversation went extremely well, surprisingly to me. We were both goofing on eachother, laughing, smiling, teasing. Throughout the night she was even being a bit touchy with me. During the game she said something to tease me and I kind of nudged her arm and she went to like pinch my nipple or something. I pretended to be offended and she would follow up with a quick caress of that same area on my chest. She crossed her legs and placed her ankle ontop of my knee for half of the game. I ended up resting my hand ontop of her ankle. She also felt up my neck and cheek a bit as I think she liked the way my beard felt. When the game ended I was thinking to myself that she was being very forward with the physical contact and I hadn't done much up to that point and needed to do something to show my interest as well. On the way out a few times I grabbed her arm so she didn't get lost in the crowd and helped lead her into the elevator by placing my hand on the small of her back.

On the car ride to her place, it was much of the same. Laughing, smiling, goofing off, teasing. As I finally got to her place, there was a moment of us just looking at eachother. I knew right then I wanted to kiss her and I should have tried, but I didn't. It felt weird to me to kiss someone I just met for the first time and I decided that the first date felt like it went so well that I would save it for the inevitable second date. She gave me a long hug, probably 10 seconds before leaving and saying goodbye.

I asked her out on a second date a few days later, which would've taken place 1 week after our first date. She accepted. One day before the date was supposed to take place, I texted her to make sure we were on the same page still and that everything was still a go. She got back to me saying that she wasn't sure and that 'some serious stuff is going down right now'. Now I'm thinking to myself, okay shes going to cancel on me..lets see what her excuse is. She ends up texting me something like "Wow I can't believe my friend has kept this to themselves for this long and not told anyone." I played along and told her I hoped her friend was alright and if she couldn't make the date tomorrow it was not a big deal. She said something like "Thanks, I knew you'd understand. He wants to meet up and talk about everything". Aaaaand that was it. She didn't offer to reschedule, which turned me off quite a bit. I started to distance myself from her a bit, communication fell off for a few days because I felt like it was up to her to reschedule if she really wanted to see me again. We didn't really text much if at all during this period, but she would still send me a photo or two a day like everything was normal. Photos of herself before work and crap like that.

About 4 days after the date was supposed to take place, I grew a bit frustrated and contacted her with the intention of figuring out what was going on. So I texted her just saying that I had hoped her friend was doing well. She got back to me right away saying that "he was working on it and thats the most that they could expect from him right now." More vague stuff. I told her that it sparked my curiosity but that I respected her privacy and casually inserted a comment asking when I was taking her out again. She said "I could explain the gist of it to you if you'd like but its definitely serious, and I don't know when." Again - another bad sign in my eyes. I told her straight up that I figured since she cancelled and never initiated a rescheduling that I figured she wasn't interested anymore. Well, she avoided that last comment. She said "I didn't reschedule because I've been sick and I haven't even been wanting to go out the past few days but I haven't been given much of a choice between work and some stubborn friends not giving me a choice lol".

That ticked me off a bit. I feel like she's deflecting or stalling. You feel too sick to reschedule, but not too sick to go out with your friends? We texted for another 2 hours or so about normal stuff, goofing on eachother, making eachother laugh, teasing, flirting. That was all tonight.

All of the things she did on the first date constitute heavy interest, am I right in that regard? Am I right to feel a bit confused and annoyed with these last two excuses of hers? I like the girl and there is undeniable chemistry in person between us so I want to give this a real shot before writing her off. What do you think is the best course of action now? Is it possible she doesn't think I'm interested because I didn't try kissing her on the first date?