Blue Ribbon Work Crush, Part Three

Three words, “no april fools” and then nothing.

I’d known I had to ask about the “smokes often” of it all. My hope was that it didn’t mean cigarettes, juts weed. IT NEVER MEANS THIS! But he’s my ******work crush****** and so beautiful so I had to at least try. Should I never have matched? Maybe? But I’m glad I did because I like this silly story.

Maybe I was too businesslike or cutesie or boilerplate or presumptuous when I asked him the cigarette question. Or maybe he just smokes, or maybe no answer was my answer for any other reason in the universe! If this were a stranger, I’d have felt pretty neutral about deleting the convo after a few days. Instead, I kind of…strived.

Spring is the perfect excuse to look extra cute, show a little more leg at work than usual. I posted a kind of Feeld-y lingerie pic on my regular dating app profile, hoping that might move the needle. When I wrote the first draft of this paragraph I felt a little judgey towards myself about the picture, but there’s something so tender and sweet about wanting him to just see me. I hope he did see that red lace. I hope he took a screenshot and put it in his hidden folder. Oh and a bad little part of me hopes he shows that hypothetical screenshot to the other guys at work.

The blue ribbon here is really for me, being so totally overflowing with fantasies and, at the same time, almost totally profesh! It’s almost like I have a sense of self-preservation.

The striving went on for a week or so, until one night when I had a beautifully hot hookup with a dreamboat who left a little too quick. That combination of satisfaction and melancholy opened me up enough to get a little bit honest with myself—Blue Ribbon Work Crush was the one I wanted, but he was probably a smoker and DEFINTITELY wasn’t a good texter-backer. I didn’t know what was going on, but I knew it wasn’t what I wanted.

I wrote him a note on our now-feeling-cursed dating app thread. I think it was a pretty good end-of-thread message. I apologized for my maybe-businesslikeness and was maybe a little too flowery about how great I think he is.

“Okay cool, I think you’re a nice person too.”

*dies a thousand deaths*

I’m not sure why it’s so devastating to be called a “nice person” but I hate it SO much. I cried, ended the thread, and realized it was only ever gonna be a flirtation. 

Probably, we're both just flirts! Some days I like thinking over every minute detail of what we say to each other, some days I feel mortified and ashamed if I pay him a little too much attention. Today, I’m tired of it and ready for something real.

But as I’m feeling the loss and muddle and awkwardness and BOREDOM, I also want to acknowledge the everyday gift of what has happened, the free-of-charge joy this not-quite-connection has brought. I liked the cute guy at work! He was attracted to me back! Huzzah! I’m proud to be walking away with a minimum of fraughtness. Learning and growing! I might be getting somewhere.