Would you want to see a list of everyone who has ever secretly had a crush on you?

I mean, what would I do with such a list? Just more regrets about what could have been?

Two secret crush stories.

Story the first.

I had a tutor working for me, that had a crush on me. Male tutor, as it transpires.

At the end of semester, he worked up all his courage, and confessed his crush. It was actually heartbreaking: he was really in quite a state about admitting it to me, and he didn’t know how much of a risk he was taking.

I smiled.

Well, I replied, nothing will come of it, I’m afraid. But pray tell, Tutor! What was it that excited your interest in me? My sparkling wit, no doubt?

Tutor just stared at the ground, and mumbled embarrassedly. “No… I just think you’re hot.”

Hah. He fell in love with me for my body. I felt so cheap!

🙂

He was into bears, I guess, and sure enough, he’s since moved to Sydney, and become a bear himself. And good for him.

Did I need to know it? Or want to? Probably not, I couldn’t do much with the information. But I was touched that he trusted me enough to tell me (or was foolhardy enough to: ultimately, same difference). It was nice to know.

Not the bit about him only falling in love with my body, of course. Cheap, I tell you! 🙂

Story the second.

I had a crush on someone I studied my PhD with. I’ve mentioned her already here. She had a cover story about being married, which she wasn’t, precisely to forestall being importuned. And by the time she confessed to me that actually there was no husband, I’d got the message that she did not want to be importuned. So that got put aside.

We met up two times after that. The first time, I went all moon-eyed, and she got the message that I was still interested. She still didn’t want to be importuned; by then I’m pretty sure she had moved on to someone else.

The second time, I crashed at her dad’s for a few days. Her, her dad, her partner, her two kids. She was quite overwhelmed with the kids, she welcomed me being around so she could actually get a break from the kids. (The dad disapproved of the arrangement, and the partner, well, the partner was sweet, but not dependable.)

I don’t know that I should have, but I did have to know. And by the time I could get her to focus on the question, it was the wee hours. And yes, it turns out, she had felt something for me at the time.

… And that both refutes and corroborates the first line of this answer.

It was a missed opportunity, it’s sad to know that. Do I want to know that? I shouldn’t.

But there was something there on the other side, however tentative. That… that was nice to know. That gave me a little smile.