GUY FRIEND OR EX?

Dear Jellybean,

I have a little situation. I'm 16 years old and I have fallen in love with one of my best guy friends. Lets call him J. Maybe it is love, maybe it's not. I know that when I think about proms, dates and weddings, I can only imagine myself with him.

I had loved him for a little more than a year, we had acted like a couple and had been asked that many times. That is when I met a boy, Tay, that lived down the street from me through my other best friend,Gen. She liked him and I encouraged her on trying to get him but when me and him started spending time together a spark flew and soon enough me and him were connected by the hip and were a "couple". When this happened when Gen was on Holiday. I had completely forgotten about her and the situation due to my puppy love with Tay. When she found out however, she did everything possible to ruin our relationship; she flirted with him (which he dismissed, thankfully), stopped talking to me besides making rude comments and turned all my friends against me.

After about 4 weeks, I had had enough and broke up with my boyfriend.

Me and J started talking much more now that he had noticed I had broken up with Tay.

Now, I'm just utterly confused. I still love J, but he never really showed that much interest in me even though everyone claims that he likes me.

And I still like Tay a lot. Every since we broke up, he has been extremely moody, doesn't like to talk a lot anymore and Gen is doing what ever she can on getting him but he isn't showing any interest at all.

I have no idea what to do. Me and Gen have become "friends" again due to we have to work together in Theater class, I just have no clue on what to do.

Please help!
Love,
Lissa

Dear Lissa,

My advice: Bust your butt to be a real friend to Gen. Respect her feelings, do nice stuff for her, listen when she talks, and do NOT go after one of her crushes again!

Anyone can say "sparks flew" - I'm sure that's what Angelina said about Brad, when she stole him from Jen. Stealing a friend's crush is still wrong though (especially when you were supposedly "helping" her to get him!) and I'm not surprised that Gen turned on you for a while, and tried to make things hard for you. All in all, I'm quite impressed that Gen has put this betrayal behind her and is playing nice with you in Theater class. You should be grateful that she's so mature, and vow to never backstab a friend like that again.

As for your love life, it sounds to me like you have a hard time figuring out what you want. Or rather, you want to get everything you want, and are trying to keep all your options open, in case one doesn't pan out. My opinion is, you'd do much better if you made a clear choice about who you want to be with, and decide to focus your energies on that.

You tell me that you love "J", think about him in relation to major romantic events, and have a history of friendship with him. It seems pretty obvious that he's the guy you truly care about. Tay is just the one you know you could probably get back if you tried to - but think about it, if you two were meant to be, you'd still be dating. Whether it was guilt over what you did to Gen, or frustration with everyone's opinion of you as a BF-stealer, you ditched him, and that was the best decision you made in this whole mess. Not to mention, if you are going to try to be a real friend to Gen, you can't go after Tay again - since she obviously still likes him, that would be evil of you.

Focus on strengthening your friendship with "J" for the time being. Don't rush the romantic side, just spend lots of time together and see what develops naturally. You might have to be without a steady boyfriend for a little while, as you build the friendship - are you up for this? Hopefully, you're not one of those girls who feels incomplete without a boyfriend. If that's the case, you need a hobby, or a self-esteem boost, because you can be a pretty happy person in-between BFs too. Especially if you're not making enemies by going after other people's crushes.