So much drama

A couple weeks ago I had a one night stand. I know. Seriously, I know. This is so far out of character I don't even know what to think of myself right now.

He's only 20, and I was just supposed to be earning a bit of spending money by helping him with a research paper, but somehow I got distracted. There is an incomparable strangeness here, it goes without saying that I didn't feel at all like myself at the time, but I'm surprised by how strong and capable I did feel. There wasn't even a trace of the shrinking, guilty, unworthy feeling that I've always had any time any guy shows even the slightest interest in me. Instead I felt confident and somehow almost… superior? Not quite, but I'm not sure how to describe it. Maybe I just felt like I was on equal footing with someone for once, and I'm so unused to the feeling that I have trouble recognizing it. I felt self-controlled and in control of the situation, which makes my choices even stranger and more suspect. And I specifically informed him that he would not be seeing me again, and that I didn't want him forming any sort of attachment. And I meant it. Who am I and what have I done with myself?

All the same, I resolved not waste too much of my time moping and feeling guilty about it. I refuse to just sit around and mourn the loss of David, or try to save a place for him in my life. Errors in judgment aside, that night was a good exercise in both; I had a genuinely good time, and sleeping with someone else goes a long way to ensuring that David won't share my bed again, even if he did feel the momentary impulse to do so. I'm still pretty conflicted about that last one, but I expect it will be better for me in the long run.

Then a couple nights later, I was hanging out with John and we stayed up until the wee hours of the morning talking and… cuddling, I suppose, though I didn't think of it in those terms at the time. I enjoy his personality quite a bit, I'm not even remotely attracted to him, and he's been eager to spend time with me lately. All of this had me very happy and hopeful; it's so hard to move from acquaintances to friends, and I thought it was a sure bet with him. But, no. Apparently his interest is at least partly romantic. And, like an idiot, I didn't notice until way too late. He was so subtle about it, everything had a double meaning, and at some point I just realized that while I was exulting in having a friend I could share some simple, uncomplicated affection with, he was over there thinking of this as a date, and trying to take things somewhere I really didn't want them to go. If I had caught on sooner, or stayed calm at least, I'm sure there was a graceful way to deal with the situation. I was completely incapable of that, though, and instead worked myself into a hard little knot of anxiety that blossomed into a full blown panic attack the next day. I'm sure I confused him to no end.

I'm still trying to figure out what frightened me so much about it. I felt completely powerless and incapable of doing anything right, and I'm not sure whether that was cause, effect, both, or neither. And the thing is, I need to figure this out. I recognize it as the same thing I felt with Ben, and that didn't go so well for me. John's a sweet guy and he deserves a tactful, honest explanation. I have no idea what I'm going to say the next time I see him.

And I didn't get much of a chance to think about it before being distracted; a couple nights after that, David called. We talked from 8:30 until well past 5 in the morning. He told me about his new (largely failed) romance, and it's obvious that she's taking advantage of him and he thinks he deserves it after what he put me through. I don't know what to say to him about it, past explaining that if I don't hold it against him, then certainly no one else has the right to any sort of punishment, and I sincerely want him to be happy. Telling him all that, however, made him cry, which left me even more flummoxed and stuttery. He sobbed, to the point he couldn't even speak, and was less in control of himself than I've ever seen before, completely unselfconsciously heartbroken. I don't know if it was about her or me or both. When he recovered enough to communicate intelligibly, he told me that of all the girls he's been with, I'm the one he thinks the most of, and then went on to enumerate my virtues. I had no idea how to respond, especially when he went on to say that he loves me and always will. Which isn't that strange of a thing for an ex-boyfriend to tell you, except that he never directly said he loved me when we were dating. Unsurprisingly, I was crying by this point as well.

We went on to exchange some truly ill-timed tenderness and encouragement, and eventually recovered with some light jokes (all of which hinged on our knowing each other so well, but neither of us addressed that part). We talked about music and exchanged some songs, listened to a couple together and cried shamelessly during the sad ones. I think he might still be in love with me, and I don't know what to make of that after months of trying to reconcile myself to the idea that he never was. I did my best to be gentle and honest, but still self-controlled and aware of the situation we're in. There is too much history, too many things in the way at this point, to pretend that just caring for each other fixes anything.

It still felt incredible to hear it.

He's promised to help me get my grad school applications in, despite my telling him several times not to. I hadn't told anyone about dropping the ball with all that, but somehow he must have guessed… no, that's not giving him enough credit. He knows me very, very well, and I'm every bit as overwhelmed and terrified now as he was two years ago when I held his hand and cajoled and nagged him into completing his own applications, knowing all the while that in doing so I was setting him up to leave me. He insists that he's going to do the same for me. And he knows me so well that he can manipulate me completely overtly and with light-hearted references to pushing my buttons, and still have me completely under his thumb. He checked on all the deadlines for each of the schools I want to apply to and helped me (read:bullied) put together a to-do list , and told me he'll be disappointed if I don't get everything done on time. Flagrant manipulation, and it worked like a charm. I don't think it's a good idea to lean on him or give him such an important role in my life, but at the same time I hadn't so much as looked at a GRE schedule before I talked to him, and now I've scheduled my GRE, written emails requesting my letters of rec, and started three different applications. And he's called three times in less than 48 hours to make sure I'm on schedule. I love him more than I can say, and I'm so afraid that's just going to bring me more pain.

So now, I need to figure out how I'm going to comport myself as a sexually active adult, explain to a sweet, gentle guy that I'd love to be his friend but won't even consider anything more, and try to keep some significant emotional distance from the man I love even as he forcefully inserts himself into my life entirely at his expense and for my own good. God, I'm so confused. Sometimes I think things were easier when I was all awkwardness and bad hair and got noticed at best once every couple years. I have no idea whatsoever how to deal with positive male attention, and I need to figure it out, quick.