Dear Meredith,

I’m in love with my boyfriend and my gay best friend. First let me say that I met my best friend when he was unsure of himself. We met in high school and became best friends sophomore year. I started dating someone and he became super closed off and sad all of the time. A few months after this person and I broke it off, my best friend told me he had feelings for me. I wasn’t sure if it would work, but we gave it a try. We’d kiss hello and goodbye, and hold hands every now and then, but through the entire two-year relationship, we never really got physical. In the end, with his initiation, we broke it off but agreed to stay best friends, and though it was rocky at first, we were able to go back to how we always were. Except that secretly I was still in love with him as a person.

Fast forward two years and I meet the perfect guy. We have the same goals, are both in school, enjoy the same activities, and he always makes me feel loved. We’ve been together for two and a half years, and I don’t see us breaking up any time soon. I am completely in love with him – but then there’s my best friend. During the first year of my new relationship, my best friend came to me and told me he was gay. I was ecstatic because it gave me a barrier. I hated being in love with him and it made me feel guilty for even starting to date someone new. Now that he was gay, I had no choice but to get over it because it wasn’t possible for us to ever be together. But it’s been difficult because he’s been confusing. He’s kissed me twice – first to show that he had become a good kisser, and second because I had said he had the same taste, and he wanted see if I did, too (that was a few months after the first kiss). I allowed the kisses, but reminded my best friend that I loved my boyfriend, and he said he knew that and was happy for me.

But now every time we hang out alone, it feels like how it was when we were dating, but more intense because he is so much more open. We stare at each other and act flirtatiously, but I always tell myself that there’s no threat of cheating because he’s gay. He has a boyfriend now, and that made random kisses stop, but even his boyfriend feels threatened by me. When I asked why, the boyfriend said, “I know he’ll always love you in a way he would never love me.” My best friend has told me that if he were straight, I would be the person he would grow old with.

I hate this situation. My boyfriend is the best thing that’s happened to me. But I really feel like I’m emotionally cheating on him because no matter what I say, I feel like I am still in love with my best friend, gay or not. Its like he’s my soulmate in another universe and we accidentally met in this one. I don’t know what to do. Therapy? Tell my boyfriend? Ask my best friend to let me down hardcore?

– Feelings for my best friend