Non-Boyfriend Games
By: Red Velvet
If there’s anything I hate, it’s when people say things they don’t mean. You know that saying - if you don’t have anything nice to say, then don’t say anything at all? It should be applied to this too. If there’s no truth behind your words, then I don’t want to hear it. I mean, what’s the point? You get the other person’s hopes up only to inevitably disappoint and hurt them.
Do I sound bitter? It’s okay, I admit it: I am feeling a little bitter. Once again, my non-boyfriend (as my friends have affectionately called him for years) has let me down with all his (empty) words and (fake) promises.
Let’s go back six months.
After being non-boyfriend free for a solid year, he wormed his way back into my life through persistent phone calls and instant messages. We talked regularly and without much arguing. I was actually happy with the way things were going (no drama!). I felt in control of the situation by keeping myself at a certain distance. And he was behaving himself - something he kept up for a good four months or so. Quite the record for him! But of course, four months is just way too long for him to not be an asshole.
It all started when he disappeared for days and at some points weeks. Unusual given how adamant he was that we talk and be friends again. I immediately knew something was up and that it most likely involved a girl (I swear, I have a freaking radar on these things). I tried to play it cool but curiosity (and impatience) got the best of me. And we were supposed to be friends now, right? So I not-so-subtly asked if he had a girlfriend. His response: “Will you be mad if I say yes?” Sigh. Had he really learned nothing in the last six years?
YES HE HAD A GIRLFRIEND.
He didn’t tell me because he didn’t want me to get mad (his other excuse: the relationship only started recently). Why, you ask? According to him, I got riled up in the past when I used to like him (the kicker was when he asked if I still had feelings for him). But… not before he called me immature for getting upset when he was telling me the truth and only trying to make things easier for me. Mind you, I asked for the truth - he didn’t offer that up on his own. And easier? Who was he kidding? It’s not easier for me, it’s easier for him.
This whole conversation brought me back to the same conclusion I always came to - we cannot be friends. The relationship is too weird, it has been from day one. We weren’t friends; we’re something else that neither of us can really define. He’s okay with the lack of definition. I’m not. So for the hundredth time, I told him not to contact me anymore because I was done. And of course he had to have the final word. Out came the grand statements:
You’re important to me.
I want you around.
We need to stay in each other’s lives.
We can fix our broken relationship.
We were once good friends, why can’t we go back to that?
What we had was good and it’s worth the effort.
I know I’m the problem but we can fix this.
Blah blah blah.
For the most part, I saw through his crap. It’s nothing I haven’t heard him say before. And yet, silly me did believe some small part of it. That he would keep trying to stay in my life no matter how hard I pushed him away.
Fast forward to today and I haven’t heard from him since then. It’s been almost a month.
It sucks because the very qualities I take pride in - having a open mind, being forgiving, wanting to believe the best in others - are the same qualities that usually kick me in the ass. Even when I know he’s going to disappoint me, I think that maybe it’ll be different this time (sickeningly cliche, I know). I want to believe that if given the chance, people can prove you wrong. And sometimes they do. The problem is when they don’t…
When do you finally learn to move on and let go of certain expectations?
I think it’s about that time.
