Keeping It Casual

It's safe to say that while I'm a dramatic person of sorts, I'm actually painfully shy when it comes to my feelings.

Case in point:

I spent a fabulous six months dating this guy named Jared. We had a great time together and we laughed all the time. He let me talk his ear off about my obsession with Musicals and David Bowie's hair from Labrynth and I think he actually enjoyed it.

At one point in the relationship I left the city for a month to visit family. During this time things got weird so I'd do some Facebook stalking (you all know you do it) and noticed this girl commenting on his page all the time. While sitting on my parents couch, cotton balls in between toes and bag o' chips in tow, he asked me if I'd noticed this girl writing on his wall. Instead of the obvious answer (YES!) I decided to be the 'cool girl' and lie, lie, lie, lie, lie. So I said no. He told me that it was nothing anyway and not to worry if I ever saw it.

Another few weeks goes by and it gets increasingly awkward, so I finally ask him in my most casual voice what is going on. I get the story from him that he doesn't know, feels bad, wants to work it out, blah, blah, blah and I suggest that if there's anything going on with the FB girl then he should explore it, I don't want to hold him back. He said that he had no desire to and that's when I said what I didn't mean, and nobody wants to hear. I said "Well, I can go either way." Silence on the other end.

'I can go either way?' as in, "Hey, wanna go to the movies tonight?" "Oh, I don't know, I could go either way." Or "Hey, how do you feel about Mexican or Chinese for dinner?" "Hm...could go either way." NOT "I really like you and want to work this out," "Well, I could go either way."

Sheesh. Brilliant Shelley, Brilliant.