best friends no more

Last weekend when Rob and I were hanging out he suggested he'd like to take me out to dinner for my birthday this week. I really hadn't expected anything like that, but I said sure.

The day before my birthday he called me at work. He said he'd found the right screws to hang my curtain rod, but asked what I was going to do next. When I suggested he might like to come over and help me hang it I got some attitude in a snarky little comment about the kind of relationship we have now. I tried to laugh it off as nothing.

Then he said he'd rather go out to dinner another night to celebrate my birthday because after all, we'd just seen each other and there really wouldn't be that much to talk about. That didn't sit right with me, but I certainly wasn't going to insist.

Back onto the curtain rod issue and he said he'd come over that night to have a look. After we hung up, I felt very strange. I got more and more disappointed about the birthday dinner cancellation, then I felt angry. All these feelings came out of nowhere and before I knew it I was on the verge of tears. Couldn't explain it at the time.

An hour later I received an email from him saying he needed to get something off his chest. It had really bothered him the other night at my place when he heard me say I love you to Andy on the phone. Although he understood it all, he was angry in being reminded that our relationship was going to be ending in a matter of months. And since then he's had a hard time feeling very giving towards me. He added that he didn't feel like coming to my house that night either.

In my volatile state, I fired back an email stating that I didn't think he'd been very giving in a long time. I implied that I had reason to be angry too, and that maybe this friendship just wasn't working out anymore. I left it at that.

It took several days to unravel my feelings. I realized there were a few matters that got all tangled together, and they shouldn't have.

I felt bad that he was hurt because of what I'd said to Andy on the phone. Andy was a little insensitive at the time by fishing for reassurance when he knew Rob was within earshot. But I made the choice to protect Andy's feelings at Rob's expense.

Speaking of Rob's expense, I think he's been stingy lately. And that's what I've been kind of pissed about. I've been generous in sharing my homemade soup with him, my vino, and buying him a Christmas gift (when we don't normally exchange). Yet when we went out to a movie and for drinks a couple weeks ago, we each paid our own way. And then he let me leave the tip! He makes more than double what I do, and I find that just plain cheap, not to mention bad manners.

I felt like blasting him when all these feelings welled up. But I didn't. I can't help but feel like he's been manipulating me. I end up feeling bad for every little favor I ask of him. And wouldn't friends just do those things for each other? It's like he's got to keep driving the point that since we are not lovers I have to pay for my share of everything. Buck up pal and be a man. Every other male friend of mine pays, even when I offer to.

OK, so I'm bitchin and meanwhile I'm hearing you stand in his defense. And you know, I'll take it, I understand I made my bed, now I gotta lie in it. The man is hurt, and has given me way more than expected, and certainly more than any other man would have given under the same circumstances. But I never coerced him. He always had the freedom to make choices, to stay or to go. Now he's hurt. Maybe to the point that he can no longer be my friend.

Tonight I went to his house to give him his gift. We had our usual 'catch up' conversation. Then he talked about one of the dates he'd gone on last week (after our incident). The girl he was out with confronted him about still being in love with me. He couldn't deny it.

Rob knows he has an issue. He says he's fine when he's not around me, he can get on with his life. But he really looks forward to our time together, and then when we are together, he is still so attracted. And he gets sucked right back in. I am not attracted in that way. So he is left sad, unfulfilled and in recovery mode after we've been together. If he was invoved with someone else, we'd be on a somewhat level playing field. But it pretty much kills his chances to advance any other relationship if he's still hooked on me. So he needs me out of his life. And that's what he asked for tonight. I've lost my best friend.