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Can You Really Be Friends With Your Ex?
The first girl I ever really had feelings for was a close friend in high school. We’d known each other for two years, sat side-by-side in classes and hung out together, but all under a platonic pretext.
Then, the summer of my senior year, everything began to change. I’d already come out as bisexual, but she was discovering her own interest in women for the first time.
I’m not sure when I started to look at her romantically — or if I always had — but once she opened up about her sexuality, our friendship began to blossom into something more.
While she was away at college, we talked over the phone every day, and when she returned home for the summer, we started hanging out. Although our relationship never developed beyond the beginning making-out-and-feeling-each-other-up-in-the-back-of-the-car stage, we did have a relationship. The border between friendship and romance had been crossed, and there was no going back.
Still, our affair didn’t last long — we both realized fairly quickly that we wanted different things from each other. She wanted a serious relationship, but I wasn’t ready to commit myself to someone who lived hours away.
