Dear Meredith,

I am writing to you about a guy who’s my good friend. About four months into our friendship, I told him I had feelings for him. He said he did not want to date anyone at the moment, but insisted we stay friends, so I agreed. Our friendship continued as if I had never said anything.

Fast forward a year later and we are spending almost every day together. Before, he would never even touch me, but now we sit next to each other and sink into each other. He compliments me often. If we go out for lunch at a fancier location, he pays. For my birthday, he got me an expensive gift. He also got me a card and wrote two paragraphs in it about how happy he is to have met me, how happy he is that we are such good friends, and how he hopes that we will always have each other to lean on.

I want to say I am in love with him, but I am afraid he does not care for me as more than a friend, just because he has not said it. Sometimes I believe he behaves this way with me because it’s his nature. Other times I feel so confident that he’s into me as more than just a friend. I want there to be more.

He tells me all the time how he does not want to disappoint the people in his life, so I am wondering whether that has something to do with it. After all this time, it seems to me that he is not the type to date around, and that he has other ways of getting to know someone before he selects a good candidate, so … could that be why he has not said anything? Or does he simply consider me a friend, and nothing more?

– Good Friend