Friends and Lovers

What happens when two close friends of the opposite sex cross that invisible line of friendship?
Does it ever work out?

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As for me, the answer is NO (although if they ever end up married, then friendship could be a great foundation) because It happened to me and it didn't work out.
In fact we barely speak right now.
And it's such a shame cos we were soooo close. And I loved him a lot. Unfortunately, he fell in love and I didn't.
End of friendship.lol.

So here's what happened.
Remi and I attended the same University. He was a year ahead of me so at first we weren't close. Senior and junior stuff. Law students in Nigeria,dem too dey like to form.  And even from University there's this crazy seniority thing which follows lawyers about till you retire (and after retirement sef).
He was very brilliant, so that was a natural attraction to me. I was always in his hostel to borrow/steal his past notes and textbooks. I spent all the money given to me at home to buy books and used his since he didn't need them anymore.

He had/has a crazy sense of humor like I do.
There are times I would call him on the phone.
 "Remi! Are you coming"?i would ask.
"Not right now" He would reply. "I came yesterday night when Bola was with me".
I would blush and hastily rephrase my question to "Are you coming to the Library"?

He was the one I turned to for tutorials, relationship tips, gossip on our lecturers, we exchanged gist about whoever it was we were dating. During school break and even after he graduated, we still managed to see each other. He would come by my house and we would gist and gist.

Then I also graduated and fell in love lust with one Doctor guy like that. Naturally, I regaled Remi with gists of how I had met the love of my life lol, how handsome he was, how he made me feel, the restaurants we went to, what he said the night before bla bla bla.
Unlike before, I noticed that he was unusually silent. In fact I would go as far as saying he was angry.
I had no clue of what could have caused this mood? I ignored it and continued chattering on.
Suddenly he cut me off and told me he loved me and had been in love with me for a while.

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 He said it was torture for him to have to listen to me gist him every time I fell in love (which I always did).

To say I was dumbfounded was an understatement.Till date,it still ranks as one of the most unexpected things I have ever heard. I never expected it. Here was Remi! Playboy extraordinarie! My closest male friend talking about love.  I didn't even think of him that way. He was like a brother. You love them but don't want to marry them.
I am afraid I didn't handle the announcement well. I can't remember what I said but it must not have been good at all cos that was the beginning of the end.

We moved on. We both spent the next two to three years trying to pretend he hadn't said he loved me.
But his resentment that I didn't love him was always simmering below the surface during our chats/conversations. I also resented him putting me in that position. Why couldn't he have just kept quiet sef.*selfish me lol.*
 I found out I couldn't talk to him about guys like I used to. We couldn't return to what we used to have.

We were still friends. Or so we liked to think. I tried to convince myself that we could go back to before the declaration.
When I had a training programme in the town where he stayed, I decided to spend time with him to show that we could still be platonic.
Very wrong idea lol! Turns out he couldn't handle it. I think that's what even  killed our friendship totally and it's never recovered. He seemed to even hate me. It was like (in his words) I was playing with his feelings.*sigh*

If I had felt the same, we probably would be married by now.

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But two things stopped me.
1)As close as we were, there were some parts of him that I never managed to reach. His brother died some years back and he never spoke about it no matter how much I tried to help him talk about it.
2) It was like he was waiting for me to love him back before he gave me all of his heart. Which kain tin be that. I was uncomfortable with the fact that he could still control how much of his heart to give.

And 3) I no I said 2. I just wasn't that into him.

I don't regret the decision I made. But I do miss my friend. Terribly!

What do you think? Was I cruel? How could I have done it differently? But wait oh, what easy way is there to tell someone you don't love them?

How about you?Have you ever crossed that friendship line? do you think it's worth it to do so?
You know the drill. Lets share.
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