I’m Falling For My Best Friend & I Don’t Know What To Do About It

Let me preface this by saying, first and foremost, that I won’t be saying his name.

Only that he’s my best friend and one of the greatest people I have ever known. He’s an amateur filmmaker with a love for funkos, the MCU, and Star Wars and he’s one of the sweetest, biggest dorks I’ve ever met.

He’s also distractingly gorgeous and the smell of his cologne makes me lose all sense of my thoughts. Makes me lose all my concentration.

It also causes my mind to go to the most inappropriate places while at the most inopportune moments.

It’s pretty terrible and inconvenient at the worst of times and thrilling and amazing at the best.

We met at work — my former place of employment — and at the time he was a manager. Not my manager, mind, but a manager, nonetheless, and honestly, we didn’t so much meet, more that I saw him around work and we never spoke a word to each other.

At all.

Absolutely nothing. While I got to know a few of the other managers outside of my department with time, I never spoke to him and he never spoke to me. And since he kinda looked like a dick in his button-ups and khaki pants, I never made the effort to introduce myself and I was fine with the fact that he never did either. He remained but a blip in my workplace radar, the guy whose seemingly standoffish vibe I wanted nothing to do with and who’s perfect face didn't hold enough behind it to grab my attention at the time. I was neither attracted to him nor did I truly give him a second thought.

(I really didn't, though. He was hot, sure, I wasn't blind. I was just... ambivalent. God, I can't even imagine how much more complicated this all would have been if I'd felt this way back then.)

Enter a certain virus.

Like the most of the US in March 2020, my home city implemented lockdown procedures and like many others, I was furloughed from my job for quarantine and remained so until later in August when we reopened.

And in September, he was also rehired.

Unlike before, he and a few others came back as employees and until further notice, not managers. And though we saw a bit more of each other, we still didn’t really speak. On that September day, I made a crack about my eyes not being used to his wearing anything other than a button-up, he responded briefly in humor and later, after his meeting, he and one of the managers came down and chatted around my podium area as I told guests to have a nice day.

Still didn't really speak to him then either. I didn't much on it and neither did he, apparently.

Then, suddenly, we did. Or rather, he did.

“Hi.” He greeted me one day a month after he’d come back, my duties for the day taking me to the front briefly where he was stationed to deal with guests.

“Hi.” I repeated after glancing at him with disbelief because what the hell? “Guy I’ve ever talked to before. How’s it going?”

“Great.” He replied, nonplussed at the syrup thick coating of sarcasm in my voice and I felt his eyes, curious and sharp, on me as I went about my paper work before I finished and went on my merry way.

And that was it. The seed of… something in me.

(There's a lot that I wish right now in life and yeah, not giving a devil's backside about seeming rude and ignoring him that day is indeed one of them.

I wish my VA business would take off already. I wish I wasn't still broke and struggling at my age. I wish my brother was still here. I wish I lived in a house and not a small apartment still.

And at the very bottom of the list? I honestly sometimes wish I had just let him think I was a rude little bitch and ignored him. But, who knows? He's a nice enough guy and would have probably found another way of engaging me... because he's nice.)

A few days later, I initiated a hello and we talked all day. My workplace had not been busy since we reopened and this day was no different and so, breaking up the monotony of work with frequent conversation wasn’t new to me.

It was this time because I was talking to him.

We talked a lot. Talked about anything and everything under the sun and before I could see it coming, I was utterly charmed. He was funny, snarky, and so much more interesting than he looked with his love of film and fun stories of rebellion when he had first been hired.

And the more I noticed that personality and sense of humor throughout the day, the more I noticed other things, too.

I noticed the width of his shoulders and strong look of his arms. How soft his hair looked. The line of his jaw through his mask.

The scent of him that would soon become my kryptonite.

I noticed it all.

I remember looking up at him. Laughing at his genuinely funny stories - this funny, sweet, beautiful man, this hot nerd - and feeling that swoop in my stomach and thinking, oh god no, no, no, not this, please no, ffff-

And so it went from there. Months went by and our friendship solidified. I watched and gave him my critique on his short films. He later gave me his own feedback on my writing. We talked about bullshit and much more serious stuff. And at one point, he even assisted when I was moving storage units without asking for anything in return.

That’s just the kind of guy he is.

For the first time in years, I even opened up to him about my late brother and he, in turn, told me about his own stories of sadness. His presence like a warm security blanket and being around him me feeling like I’m breathing fresh air from a dark cave. I trusted him so much that it scares me. He was solid and good and supportive and it just makes it worse.

I didn’t have a name for this. I didn't want to have a name for this.

His friendship was valuable to me, it really was, but at the same time, I want him so badly that it physically aches. This persistent burning inside me that tugs at me like a devil on my shoulder. I think about him all the time and yet it never seems to be enough.

I don’t even know why I’m writing this. For manifestation, maybe? Do I want him to see this and know my dirtiest secret that he doesn’t know?

I guess time will tell.