Her heart leaped into her throat as she saw the little message box light up red on her Facebook page. She closed her eyes as she clicked on the icon, holding her breath hoping desperately, praying fervently that when she opened her eyes she would see a message from HIM! Her insides were rolling around, churning with anxiety and all within the space of a heartbeat. She opened her eyes and there it was, on her screen. He messaged her! Oh my god! It had finally happened, all her patience had paid off. She almost shrieked in delight as she opened his message.

What could it say? Would he profess his love for her? Would he acknowledge that he had been watching her, staring at her and had often been blatantly obvious about it? Her best friend had seen him watching her, had giggled in delight for her, knowing how much she adored him and how she had tried so hard to remain cool, calm and collected in his presence.

Oh, how many times she could feel her cheeks growing red, her throat closing over so that she couldn’t speak, couldn’t simply say hello like a normal person. She had listened to hours and hours of self help subliminal messages, to help herself overcome her fear of men, to act naturally and happily around gorgeous men. Subliminal messages that were supposed to help her to subconsciously attract men to her, well in some aspects that had worked, unfortunately they were never the kind of men she would ever be interested. Gloomy, toothless bespectacled old men with leering glances and wandering hands, or deliciously attractive young men who desired her yet had a wife and family waiting for them at home. GODS! Sometimes the messages had worked too well.

 All she had wanted was this one man’s attention and more often than not, she thought that she had had it. He would spend many moments making eye contact, watching her surreptitiously from across the crowded auditorium, stared out of the window into the gym watching her play sports with her students. Ok so she had positioned herself so that she could see into his office, well, so that he could see her if he happened to glance out of the window, but she never expected that he would have spent so much time at the window staring at her as he did. Even her colleague had noticed his attention and commented on it. 

Her colleague had noticed many other things that she herself had not seen. He had walked into the auditorium and stood right behind her seat, he had walked forward as if to place his hands on her back and then as if he realised that others could see, he had quickly backed away and moved to stand at the end of her aisle. Always in view. But she had not acknowledged him on that day. Her shyness and insecurity had lead her to ignore him, a fatally rude error she knew.

He had, that very night beforehand, been to her house to help her put together a set of drawers. You would have thought that after having the man in her home helping her out, that she would have been comfortable with him, or would have even smiled in his direction the next day. Truth was, he had barely spoken two words to her when he was in her home. He had been chatting with the male friend he had brought with him to help and every word she had spoken was garbled gibberish as she had blushed furiously in the summer heat and being within such close proximity of this most gorgeous man.

He had stood next to her in the hallway ever so briefly and she had nearly swooned, he was so tall, strong and manly, he had the musky scent of a hard working man and she was practically drunk on the aroma. It was not natural to be so attracted to one man.

She had spent months attempting to find ways to be accessible, to try to start a conversation or to simply be someplace where a conversation was likely to start. Yet every time she had seen him, she had been unable to smile, nor even say a simple hello. She had despaired at her own inadequacy, at how retarded and unfriendly she must have seemed, so snobbish and oh so arrogant.

He was an elusive enigma. Attempting to be a part of his scene at work never worked. She had never been able to fit in with the ‘in’ crowd when she was a teenager and now it seemed to have been out of her reach again. Sure the higher ups at work were happy with her, she could converse and party with the leaders of the team, but the ‘young, hip’ group, they deliberately excluded her. Or at least that’s how it seemed, and she was not putting herself through that rejection process again. She couldn’t risk it. Her pride had taken many hits over the past year.

She had looked deeply into why she was so attracted to this one man. Was she at risk of becoming obsessive over this one human being? What was it about him that left her feeling so distracted? She recognised that having a crush on a colleague sure made going to work fun. Always the hope of a chance encounter, a glimpse,  a smile, an interaction with him. She worked damn hard at her job and it was a pretty emotionally intense role, so having something steaming hot to look forward to each day, sure made for a happy workplace.

But it was the suddenness of the crush. The way it had come out of nowhere and struck her like a lightening bolt. They had walked out of staff training and as she had turned to find her co-worker, she had seen him. For her it was like an instant recognition. She had never seen this man before in her life, but she had been waiting for him for all of her life. In that instant, she knew she had met her match. He was tall, dark and handsome of course, but he had a smile that lit the room and set her heart afire. She had a knowing within her that he was sent from God to her. It was absurd! How could she be so arrogant! How could she know so completely? She didn’t know the how’s or the why’s of it, but she knew it to be true. He was her soul mate. She was pretty sure he knew it too. An instant chemistry that buzzed around the room. He knew it. He had to know it. How couldn’t he?

There were so many reasons as to why he was out of her league, his gorgeous Adonis looks, his youth and his career status. But he wasn’t that much younger than her, five years wasn’t really that much once you got to your thirties, was it? This was back when he hadn’t established a place within the team yet. She had wandered over at the after work drinks and sat down with the group. He had given her the most incredible smile in the world; his whole face had lit up at her approach. She had nearly died from pleasure at that smile. But later after her disastrous reaction to him, her ignoring and not acknowledging of him, his smile had died towards her. His face no longer lit up when he saw her and he had ignored her in return. She had tried to make up for her stupidity. She had bought him a block of chocolate in appreciation of his help. She’d put it in his pigeon hole at work with a note thanking him for his efforts. She had never received even an acknowledgement of that chocolate until nearly two months later when she had emailed him. She had revealed a lot in that email. Told him how she felt nervous and tongue tied around him. He had replied briefly, explained that he had not known who the chocolate had come from and when she had responded to him again, he just ignored her. Completely. For another two whole months.

Then he had started his staring again. Finally after four months of insecurity she one day suddenly dropped a hello from her mouth as he was passing by. He stared at her in shock for a heartbeat, then smiled and said hello back. She had thought things were going great again. He was looking, observing, she was saying hello. Eye contact would be maintained longer than usual. And she was really excited. Perhaps it was ok after all. She had lost fifteen pounds over the past two months as well and was looking much better than before. She felt so confident about his returning the feelings she had for him, that she had confided in a friend of his, a woman who was like a mother to him. This woman had agreed to send him a text on her behalf and let him know that she had a crush on him and what did he think? And this was the day of telling. This was when she was going to get her reply. Oh God, all these months. She was so confident that she had read all the signals correctly, so certain that the attraction was mutual. And now it was time.

Finally she opened her eyes and dared to glance at the screen. Her heart dropped into her stomach and her jaw dropped in disbelief.

God she was going to be sick.

His message was laid out in two simple earth shattering words.

“Not interested.”