Everyone has their own way of protecting themselves. Kelli does it by not letting people know how she actually feels because then they have that advantage over her and can use it against her. I'm sort of an exception to that because she doesn't hide from me how she feels (at least I hope she doesn't, hehe). Even though I've proved to be less than trustworthy with her feelings, she still trusts me with them and I've gotten a lot better at realizing when I'm leaking something I shouldn't be. Part of it was not realizing what kinds of things she didn't want known. I've pretty much stopped altogether telling people things that she doesn't want others to know. From what I can tell, that's her safe place. She has walls up. If someone knows how she's feeling, then they can find out what causes her to feel that way and, from there, find out what hurts her. Once they know that, she is vulnerable. That's her way of protecting herself. Other people I've known protect themselves by putting others down to hide what hurts them. My way is knowing exactly what is going on so that I have a good chance of seeing something bad coming and knowing how bad it is for me and if it will cause anything else bad to happen. Strangely, though, I only worry about that with Kelli. I couldn't really care less about what other people think. So, most of my fears have been put to rest now that I've talked about them and have been given enough information about them to feel comfortable about what exactly has changed and what has stayed the same. The only things that offer any doubts in my mind at all are the fact that she no longer likes me as more than a friend, and that she doesn't want me to call anymore.

The first one has a better chance of me assuming the correct reason for. She had feelings for me before I visited her this last time, and she was more receiving of my affection than she seemed to be the first time I visited her. After I went home, she said that she really liked me, and was even unsure when I asked if she loved me. One of the things she said was that she needs me as a friend but wants me as more. Then we had some unpleasant conversations, I told her about the thing I had done at her house (seeing her), she stayed offline for a while, and when she came back, she said she no longer has any more-than-friend feelings for me and that the ones she felt before were probably only her misinterpreting what was actually just her missing me when I left. I can accept that, but it still saddens me when I think of how happy I was, finally having the girl I felt I belonged with, to feel the same about me. It's a little disappointing to have all that just vanish in a small amount of time. It's like we've taken many steps back. At one time she said it may have been brought on by my betrayal that happened the last night I was there. I'm not sure if that had any part in it or not. I believe that little incident has been cleared up and isn't what we first thought it to be, but if her decrease in feelings for me was in any way brought on by how she first thought of that, then clearing it up won't put the feelings back. I seriously doubt that it was all that caused it. Nevertheless, it would be nice to have some sort of reason as to why she stopped liking me that way. In my mind, only something bad could cause her to stop feeling that way toward me, and I can't help but wonder what it was and if it could have been avoided. Have I done something wrong? I'm really not sure, but I can't keep out the nagging feeling that it has something to do with me not being a good enough friend to her.

The part that really has me confused is the second of my fears... her not wanting me to call her. It's not the fact that I can't call so much as it is the fact that she doesn't want me to. It's not even a neutral thing where she doesn't care if I do or don't. She has a distinct desire that I do not call her, and what makes it even more confusing to me is that it's one of the few things that she won't tell me about. She tells me a lot of things, but this one has some hidden reason that she doesn't feel like telling me. She used to like talking to me on the phone. When she had to get off the computer, whether it was because her parents told her to or she couldn't stand looking at the screen anymore, she'd sometimes have me call her so we could keep talking. Sometimes she wanted me to call more often than I thought of calling. We almost always had really nice/fun conversations on the phone. We'd often talk about things that would make us laugh. Since she went away for a while, she has strangely stopped enjoying that and it really trips me out because I can't find any reason why something that used to bring about some of our best conversations is now something she is strongly against and has a secret reason for. It's not that I'm worried about it, like it means we aren't as close as we used to be, so much as I'm very curious about what could have caused it and if the reason for that would cause other things to change in an unfavorable way for me. I suppose the worst that is likely to happen is that my curiosity will never be satisfied and I'll just have to trust her that it's not a big deal, though I'd rather know for myself.