Crush on CoWorker

YunTheSchoolboy · Jul-22-2009, 04:49 AM

Hi all, just wanted to share a bit of frustration and uneasiness I've been having with you guys. Just kidding... I'd hate to drag you down haha, although it does seem some of the other guys on this forum try to do that. I suppose misery does love company, but hey, a sob story can only go so far.

I won't go into the OH GOD WHAT SHOULD I DO? I'M IN LOVE WITH A GIRL THAT DOESN'T LOVE ME BACK! and all that good stuff... but here's a typical problem for a typical guy I suppose.

So allow me to address the co worker thing first. Many people say to avoid romance in the workplace due to complications, but the way I see it, the people I work with tend to have more in common with me. Besides, this is currently a summer job, so we wont be co workers for much longer haha. >_> anyways on with it.

Last summer, I met a girl at a tutoring center for kids that I've worked at for quite a while. That year, I happened to be a volunteer, since I had other things to attend to and could not show up regularly. However, in the time I was there, I met a girl that caught my eye almost instantly. I won't lie. She's really cute.

The problems began when I realized that although I was there to volunteer with the kids about two times a week and saw her whenever I visited, I had a hard time communicating with her. Things became further complicated when I made the mistake of talking to one of my volunteer buddies (my former student who was age 13 at the time... I should have known better) through email about thinking that she was cute. After a week or two of taking jabs and poking fun at my former student, he jokingly threatened to tell her. Calling his bluff, I said "go ahead!". Little did I know... he wasn't bluffing. He actually pulled up our email conversation and showed her. Now to add complication on TOP of complication, he was teasing me about it in the emails to which I replied "So what? I think she's cute. And her sister is pretty too."
Yeah. Don't sass little kids. It'll bite you in the ass.
But yep, he showed them both. (The sisters are one year apart and they are both working as tutors haha)

Needless to say, I kinda messed up. I felt really awkward for a while, and even though I had talked to her about it and she said to not worry about it since she didn't take it too seriously, I realized that every time I would try to talk to her I would freeze. You have to imagine, I was 18 at the time, so it's not like "aww, the little boy is nervous around the girl." More like... damn, I'm a wuss. Thats what my friends told me, but hey, what are friends for?

Since we're from different cities and I was finishing up my last year of high school, I didn't get the chance to see her at all during the school year. I did occasionally visit the center though, but only her sister was working, and I developed more of a talking basis with her sister.

So sorry for the long intro, but let me enter THIS summer. THIS summer, I'm back to working as a tutor, and my coworkers are the two sisters once again.

For the entire school year, although quite unreasonable and irrational, I had retained a relatively big crush on my coworker. (Who is the older sister by one year if I didn't mention that already, but is one year younger than me).

So when I got into work the first day, I was thrilled to see her and my heart skipped a beat when I saw her. However, I was still horrified to realize that I was extremely nervous and had a hard time approaching her. I'm the type of guy to do the walk by hello's, stand there awkwardly, then walk off, but even though I was all googly eyed, the rational part of me still knew that it was still 90%+ infatuation.

Now, it's been a little over a month working with them, and I'm glad to say that I've become more comfortable with talking to her. For the first 2-3 weeks, I still struggled greatly, but these past 2 weeks or so, I'm becoming progressively more comfortable with talking to her and joking around with her. Sounds dandy yes?

I suppose so, but my current problem lies within this story. Because I've been becoming more comfortable with her and talking to her more, I've gotten to know her personality a lot more and I realize we both have things in common in terms of interests, ways of thinking, and values. I still won't pretend to know her very well, but that's what I'm working on now.

As a friendly basis, yesterday I was trying to draw up mental blueprints of how I would ask her (today which I did not do) to hang out after work tomorrow. I felt that it may be a bit early to single her out like that, even though it's just hanging out.

I'm a pretty paranoid person who needs much reassurance, so I sought out my friends to help me and give me advice. As usual, most friends give the "go for it" speech, but two people stood out to me: My godbrother and my best friend.

My godbrother asked me how she reacts and if I flirt, or try to drop hints. Honestly, I'm not sure if I do. Like... I do go out of my way to do nice things sometimes, like when I'm out buying a drink for myself I'll pick up one for her too, but also for her sister. That could be on a friendly basis though I suppose. To establish a more comfortable connection, I sometimes place my hand on her shoulder as I come from behind with a "good morning", and overall, I feel like it's fairly obvious that I put effort into communicating with her. However, because I'm a paranoid individual, I really DON'T KNOW whether or not she's responding to these "hints", if you can even consider them hints. However, I do know that when I like someone, the tendency is that I'm VERY obvious even when I try not to be, so I'm relatively sure she knows.

Which brings me to what my best friend said. See, my best friend is the type of girl who is brutally honest. Though she encouraged me, something she said opened my eyes. She simply asked me "Do you think she's interested?" And I realized that's not even something I considered, even though it would make sense to. And the more I thought about it, the more upset I became because I don't really think she showed much interest, if any. I do know, though, that we've been talking more lately, and previously I had to initiate any social contact. Now, she'll turn to talk to me as well.

Something else my best friend said was that "well, here's the thing. When you like someone, you're HELLA obvious. So if she hasn't responded or shown interest, she probably isn't interested". It makes sense, yes, but it still sucks to hear.

But she said one more thing. "Just because she isn't interested now doesn't mean she will never be. You can't MAKE someone like you, but you can make them see things that are likable about you and they may come around."

So today I went into work, and I decided to just try to develop a more friendly basis before I try to advance in any way. I know that I do really like her, but I'm afraid that I won't know what to do or how to catch her attention. I still have the butterflies, the nervous feelings, the melty feelings when I see her smile and such, but I also am really interested in her personality and genuinely want to get to know her more.

Sorry I always ramble and forget the purpose of my writing, but...

Do you guys think this is something worth it to pursue?
How should I go about "dropping hints" and guaging if she's interested?
I'm not sure how to flirt anymore honestly, (rusty) and should it be something obvious?
How can I possibly eventually ask her out if her sister is there as well? (They are picked up together after work)

Reason for the last one is because I'm not sure I would want to make it explicitly obvious that I'm interested in her. Like I said before, I really want to just get to know her, and for that, I don't want to make her OR her sister uncomfortable.

Next fall I'll be returning to college and she'll be starting her first year, and we'll both be considerably busier. It would be semi-difficult to time, but with her dorming in college, I wouldnt have to worry about planning around our work schedule and factoring in her sister and whatnot.

Any hints as to how to increase the comfort level to the point where I can call her up to chill? I'd like to get to that point at least so I can at least attempt to continue my quest after summer ends.

I know many of my questions seem stupid and childish, but I'll be honest. I have confidence issues and I don't know how to go about many things. I just built up the courage to text her the other day, but no reply. (Probably because I didnt really ask a question that she could really reply to, I just wished her a good weekend) I'd like to be able to just be honest and tell her how I feel like they do in the movies, but lets face it, that's probably more likely to scare her off and make things awkward.

It's probably the kid inside of me speaking now, but from what I've learned about her in the past year or so, I really feel like she matches well with what I would picture as an ideal girl for me. She simply dazzles me in every way. Thus, any pointers you guys can offer are greatly appreciated.

Once again, I apologize for the length of my posts and I hope I didn't lose everyone haha.

Thank you.

-YunTheSchoolBoy

loganjlr · Jul-22-2009, 11:08 PM

Do you guys think this is something worth it to pursue?
How should I go about "dropping hints" and guaging if she's interested?
I'm not sure how to flirt anymore honestly, (rusty) and should it be something obvious?
How can I possibly eventually ask her out if her sister is there as well? (They are picked up together after work)

If you ask me, you should keep trying, just to find out if she has any interest whatsoever, there's no point in giving up when you've gotten so far. Even if she doesn't like you, you can still have a viable friendship with her. Maybe to drop hints, maybe you can casually talk about dating (her views, etc etc). Maybe you can just be playful with her in general. When it comes to flirting, I think, to me, everyone has their own style when it comes to this subject. Some people are playful, some people are suddle, some people just drop the most obvious hints. When it comes to asking her out, with or without her sister around, maybe get her into a private place and then drop the classic phrase. Even with her sister around it is possible. Though the difficulty in finding a private place varies with every location and circumstance.
Answering one of your last questions, increasing the comfort level can be easy if she has a good sense of humour. Just fool around with her, joke around, etc, and she might lighten up

YunTheSchoolboy · Jul-25-2009, 07:39 PM

Thanks for your reply. I've been struggling a bit these past few days. Although I do talk to her and all, I seem to be bothered quite easily when it comes to the possibility that she may be interested in someone else.

I tend to take my crushes too seriously haha, and I'm not sure how much it's helping as opposed to hindering my progress.

**And?** · Jul-25-2009, 08:09 PM

Jeez bro, that's a fucking novel right there.

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