I'm starting to get paranoid. I'm beginning to think i may actually be good looking. My evidence for this isn't the strongest, but it's better than "You could be good looking if you weren't so immensely fat" or however it was P originally phrased it. Last Friday i was in 'town', (It simply wouldn't do for a stranger to find this and know where i live. I have no idea why.) walking along, in a bit of a hurry, both because i was meant to be meetimg up with my friends and because the rain was really starting to get annoying. A few girls were sheltering on my right, and one of them called out "My mate fancies you." Something like that, at least. I, naturally, thought it was a joke. I looked at the girl who'd said it (I can't remember what she looked like, even from only a metre or two away. It was raining, so i'd taken off my glasses.) out of surprise, and tried to convey through only my eyebrows (I've a feeling i try say too much through my eyebrows. There's only so much you can do with any feature, especially ones that have been shaved off. (Do you not just love the way i hint at an amusing incident in my past?)) surprise, disbelief and the fact that nobody would fancy me, especially having seen me for only a few seconds, walking up the street. I worry now that if she had actually meant it (But surely she didn't!) i may have just come across as arrogant.

I would have, and in fact already had, dismissed this as nonsense and a joke, were it for not something another of my acquaintances said recently. This was a girl who i'd met over the internet, via an increasingly long chain of friends. She's a bisexual (No idea why i feel it neccessary to identify people through their sexuality, but apparently i do.) and really rather sweet. Anyway, it was drawn out somehow that she found me attractive. This was from a photo i'd sent. I didn't look particularly fat in it, but i was pulling my worst loonish grin and looked a complete fool. But even so, the compliment is very reassuring. However, i've simply no idea what to do if i turn out to be good looking. i shall have to wear my glasses at all times and wear my hair in its usual dull way.

Today was my first day of 'freedom'. So obviously i went into school again. It looked at first like i was going to have one of those marvellous days where everything goes wrong but at least you get a lot to blog about. No such luck. Despite my alarm not going off, leaving me to wake up two hours late, despite my bus driver deciding he no longer stopped at my stop and drivng practically to the city centre before he let me off, i still got into school almost an hour before the book group meeting. I made my way straight to the library office, to see the librarian again. The first thing she commented on was my grin. Irrefutable evidence that i have a cheery disposition. (I'm sorry, it's just a wonderful phrase.) I do like my grin. It might not be particularly attractive (J did once tell me, though, that i have a beautful smile. I don't forget compliments. Even L said she remembered it from primary school (Yes, obviously that's a compliment.)) but it does its job. Really what i like about it is that its so often there. It's the expression i use most, i think, and the one i'm most comfortable with. There are surprisingly few things more fun than just walking along in bright sunlight, listening to good music and grinning. Especially if the walk leads into a bookshop.

The book group has quite a few of my friends in. J, S and G (I'm not sure i've mentioned him before. He's one of my fellow librarians.) are all in it, as is I. I isn't actually all that bad, theoretically. It's just that i can no longer speak to him without ending up being rude (But at least that's better than throttling him, which i sometimes wish so dearly to do.). So i was very pleased by his absence from today's meeting. Also absent, though, were J and S. J didn't turn up till halfway and J not until the end. So i hardly got to see anything of the Ace Crew. Didn't even get to speak more than about ten words to them. But it waqs good just to see J, as i hadn't in ages. Even when i went in for my exams he was off school with tonsillitis.

I'm still obsessed by this idea that i have low self-esteem. I really don't think i have got low self-esteem, but i have got related issues. I refuse to let myself have too high an opinion of myself. I like getting compliments, obviously, but i try to ignore half of them, in case i start believing them. I used to be horribly arrogant and big-headed and i'm just desparate not to be like that again. I still am, to an extent, but i'm not as bad. Take for example, D's comments on my blog earlier. He told me i had a real talent, and compared my writing style to Nabokov .(Nabokov wrote Lolita. I haven't read any of him, but i may have to now.) I suspect this to be nonsense, but i'm still very flattered. He even asked if i'd considered writing a book. I'm on more solid ground to defend myself on this one, as i have tried this, in a vague sort of way (I started a story imagining that i had sent that letter to J a while ago and had cut him out of my life. I've pretty much given up after two pages.), so i can easily ignore that bit. But i have unfortunately started to believe the rest of it, so if i get more pretentious and self-conscious, it's all his fault.

Incidentally, i would like to point out that i am now a computer genius. I now have links tto the blogs of three people mentioned here. Two of these blogs are rather dead, but i was too caught up in my technical wizardry to care about that. And L's blog, at least, is very witty and well-written. J's has me in. I'm 'A'. I'm actually rather desparate for him to write another entry, because every time i check it i see "OK the A thing is resolved now" as the first line of the top entry. I don't like being 'the A thing' and i don't likebeing reminded of it constantly. And, yes, i realise the logical thing would be to just not look at it, but i should have thought it quite obvious by now that logic holds little sway over my decisions.

I wasn't supposed to be in love with E anymore. I'd even convinced myself i never had been. So why did i feel like that when i saw him this morning?

I was in school today for my last exam. Before school started i went up, as i usually do, to the library, to see my friends, or the friends that were there. At one point i looked out of the window and saw E. Naturally, i made mjy excuses and abandoned the library for the common room (Among the sixth formers it seems i am (Should that be was? Oh God!) the only one who does the common room as their sole place to go outside lesson time), where, though i might not have been able to see him, i at least knew he was around. I didn't see him until everyone was leaving again for registration, but dear God! I'd forgotten how beautiful he was. He is very and extremely beautiful. I know it's shallow of me to decide i love him again based on that, but it isn't just that. It's just that all my feelings for him came flooding back today.

After i came out of my exam i saw that he was on guard duty (E's a prefect now.) on the opposite days. My friends happened to be going that way too, so i followed them, just for that brief rush of being near him. (Which was made even harder by the fact that i was trying to hide from him at the same time.) I think he saw me. I don't know. He must have seen me, though, on the way out, when i was a little behind anyone else and staring intently at the floor. I wished, afterwards, that i'd had the courage to at least look at him. I had fantasies of mouthing or whispering "I'm sorry." (Obviously i couldn't say anything out loud. Even fantasies need some basis in reality.) to him. Or even just of looking him in the eye, and the truth just washing over him as he understands and forgives me all in one second. I blame the books for this.

On a more alarming note, yesterday i found something carved into the toilet wall. I was gazing at the all those wonderful drawings which manage somehow to represent women with the aid of apparently little or no anatomical knowledge, when i noticed, carved into the plaster, "I LOVE [E]". (Capitals are easier to carve.) It must have been me that carved this. For one thing, it was blatantly my handwriting. But i have no memory of carving it. And surely, surely, i'd remember something as weird and stalkerish as this. It's not even like i only put in his first name. If he's ever seen this, no wonder he hates me. Louse. I have no idea what to do. I didn't even have anything to scratch it out with. And for some reason, i wasn't sure i should.

It feels so weird to know that in a day's time i'll have finished all of my exams. Every single A-level will be over and i will have nothing to do but wait. I've just finished French, a two and a half hour exam which i actually feel went rather well. I don't like to give much thought to exams after they're finished though, so i'll just hope for a good result in August. But so far nothing has happened to really convince me i'm going to fail every subject, so i think i'll be ok.

I seem to end up giving far too much advice. I often seem to end up trying to advise people, but i'm worried that maybe i shouldn't. People do ask me for advice. I think they do. I don't think it's just me beingt nosey. Oh God, i hope i'm not like P, giving advice all the time, when it's not even needed. But i don't think i am. My main problem is that the advice i do give is just no good. If it were, then surely i would have a much more fulfilling life than this. My advice is invariably based on honesty, assuming it's somehow related. I always urge honesty, but where has honesty got me? It got E despising me and it ended up bringing P and J together which, whatever my feelings now, was definitely not what i wanted at the time. But still i say the same things. Yesterday, someone told me he was bisexual and that he was finding himself attracted to his best friend (See! Nobody should come to me for advice! Not only do i give terrible advice, but i post their problems on the internet and phrase it in a ridiculously over the top way. (Although at least i don't use names, i suppose.)) and was unsure what to do. He said this had mde him wonder if he could count him as his best friend anymore. This friend did know he's bi, but not about anything else. And he has said that he might be bisexual aswell. (This was in fact what prompted my friend to tell him.) Naturally, i advised telling him. And he trusted me. And now i'm worried in case i've given him bad advice.

It means a lot to me that people trust me, it really does, that they trust me enough to tell me their secrets and even let me advise them, but i don't really think they should. They can tell me things, i don't really have any problems with disgression (Apart from this. This blog and my diary. But that's it. And people are still quite anonymous. He is completely.), but i actually think it's quite dangerous to trust my advice. Not that anything has gone catastrophically wrong in my life so far (Much as i may tell myself differently.) but my advice really isn't worth that much.

And now i must talk about I. I and i (I'm rather glad now that i only put the pronoun I in capitals at the biginning of sentences now.) used to be friends and still, i suppose, are, in a way. Sort of. A very strained way, anyway. He is one of the most hideously arrogant people i know. But the worst thing about him is that he reminds me of myself. Perhaps a slightly less self aware version. I know that i'm arrogant and filled with many bad traits, but i do try to do my best to hide them. I used to be completely awful, but i do believe i have improved a little now. I still try not to like myself too much though, lest i should become convinced that i'm just a really nice person. Because that i am not. I used to think that I and i had a lot in common. He and i both like to read a lot, we both feel rather ostracised from society (Though i fell less so, now. I think it was partly my own fault, partly because of the society i was ostracised (or ostracised myself) from) and so on and so forth.

But know i simply cannot put up with him. Not five minutes. I feel terribly guilty for it, as i don't think he has many friends (It's hard to see how he could.) but i simply can no longer talk to him. Only this morning he butted in on a joovial conversation only to, effectively, start insulting me. And when i commented on his intolerance (Yes, i see the hypocrisy here too, don't fret. But i'm more tolerant than him.) he actually seemed rather proud of himself. Add to this his opinions on homosexuality (About which i don't know much, but it's enough all the same.) and we really have a character with whom i no longer feel able to associate with. So, really, i shall be glad to pretty much excise him from my life. Effective, i suppose, from the end of this week.

How can P be friends with someone like M? He seems to have no redeeming features. He adores getting people paranoid and revels in finding out gossip about people. I am one of his favourite people to torture because i'm so gullible and terrible at standing up for myself. He's been doing it since year seven, and yet every time i forgive him and believe he's changed. He is so smug and arrogant! How can someone so smug be so popular? How on earth has he managed to trick someone into being his girlfriend?

Earlier today, presumably with some intention of getting me into a state of paranoia so i'd mess up my exams, (Am i overreacting? Probably. It didn't work, anyway. General Studies is impossible to mess up that completely.) he told me "I know your secret." I asked him what he was talking about, but he wouldn't say. Not that i expected him to; i know too well for that. Later, though, he decided he would drop hints at it, and i'm pretty sure the 'secret' he refers to is about my feelings for J, who, as we well know, i am completely fine and happy about now. Still he and his sources evidently don't. And it sounded like he knew about E, too. He was talking about all this on the train, with someone else there too, never being direct about it, just saying enough to make it clear to me that he knew my secret and could, he thought, make things very uncomfortable for me. I don't really mind that, as everyone i care about knows everything important and i could hardly care less what anyone else thinks. And i'll hardly see any of them again anyway. It was later, when he and this other person where discussing homosexuality in general.

They started off talking about P, who is "not like other gay people. He's a real geezer". (The implication being it that is somehow good to be a 'geezer'(I was right there! Right there and he openly insulted all gay people bar one!) (Actually, in my bitchiest moments i wonder if this is why J likes P; he's the closest he can get to a straight boy. Naturally i don't actually believe that.)) The then moved on to talk about the 'shocking' number of gay people in our school. M was able to name seven in our year, saying this was close to the average of one in ten. i disagree, however. There are between a hundred and hundred and twenty people in our year. That's hardly comparable. He then moved on to naming everyone he could in the school (Incidentally, 'gay' can apparently be taken to mean homosexual or bisexual.). He got eleven. One of whom was J. I was very annoyed by that, actually. I realise he might not have known that J is not out, as he had answered to M's question once so frankly, but still... At least he didn't know J's last name.

And then they moved on to that bizarre idea of homosexuality somehow being engendered by the environment of a boys school. "It's because you're surrounded by us." the other one argued. I, unfortunately, had to get off the train before i could demonstrate how patently ridiculous the very idea is. But i really don't understand how they could believe that, especially having just 'proved' that numbers of gay people in our school were below average. It's just typical, really, of the arrogant attitude so many straight people seem to have towards gay people, assuming we must be attracted to every single one of them. It's true, there are a lot of good looking boys at my school, but i don't really think any of them are likely to turn one to sodomy. And i hardly think that i've only become the person i am in the last seven years of my life. That idea is just such nonsense, and i have no idea what to say about it. I've run out of things to say altogether.

I suppose my exams should get a mention in here. Had my first proper exam today. Speaking exams don't count because they're so short and the art exam doesn't count because i failed it (Although today one of my English teachers complimented me on the final piece, so that was nice.) It was the English Literature unit five exam, closed book, so we had to learn our quotes. By heart. I can't be bothered to go into how evil that is, it just is. But that is the first of six exams over and done with. I am far happier than i should be, considering my lack of confidence in how well i actually did, but i just had such a good day (apart from the exam). I got to see J and S for the first time in ages, and it turned out that they didn't have any exams or lessons at that point, so i was able to just sit around with them for ages, just talking, and sometimes not. We were interrupted occasionally, moved around a bit, broke up and reformed. All the things i miss in only communicating over the internet. And it all just made me think how much i'm going to miss this school. Everyone else keeps claiming they won't at all, but surely that's nonsense. I have some amazing friends here, and i get on so well with a lot of the teachers. All my A-level teachers have been brilliant, and always so nice to me. I'll especially miss Ms. A, my English teacher since year ten, probably the person i've lent more books to than anyone else, and Ms. R, the head librarian, under whom i served as a pupil librarian for quite some time. I will, of course, try to remain in contact, but i've proved before that i'm not the best at keeping up with my letter writing. Hopefully e-mails are easier to keep on top of.

I've just realised i never cleared up the story of F and P. Nothing, it seems, actually happened. I know have all the timing sorted out in my head. After P found out J had loved him, he realised he couldn't be with S any longer. This was the day before the Ace Crew Outing. So somewhere around this point P arranged to 'do things' (I wouldn't give details even if i knew them.) with F but then, once he realised he could be with J, changed his mind. Much anger ensued on F's part, revealing he'd felt betrayed all that time ago in after the incident in the toilets with J, and culminating in a bilious attempt to destroy P and J's relationship.

It feels rather good to know there's someone, relatively objective but still acquainted with P and J, who is sceptical about things between them. That someone is D, one of these people lucky enough to be obviously gay enough for people not to be surprised when they come out. He's sort of unnofficialy in charge of gay people in the school, but perhaps he underestimates people ability to cope once he's gone. Anyway, D reads my blog, and was shocked to find out these new revelations about P. He does not trust him to be sincere, accusing him of simply trying to work his way round the Ace Crew. "I don't think it's good to mess around with people's heads. It might be fun to him but to them it ain't. They are younger and, not trying to be patronising, not as grown up." I did, actually, stand up for P a little, saying i think his feelings for J are different, but obviously i didn't want to argue to much, for selfish reasons.

There. I've decided. I'm not in love with J. Not properly. I am, but only until someone comes along to snap me out of it, like he had with P. But i'm not giving up my 'being in love' to reasoned argument. I haven't been reasonable before, there's no reason to start now. I'm not letting P or anyone else defraud me out of my feelings, however imaginary they may be. I can still enjoy it, even while i wait for something real to come along. Incidentally, that stuff about not needing people to be in love with me is true, but only to an extent. Obviously eventually i'll need someone to be in love with me, but for now i'm fine pottering along alone.

You see, i think my reasons (Yes, that's right, another of my wonderful theories!) for being jealous of J are not because i'm in love with him, but because i miss being needed. There was a time, really not long ago at all, though it feels it, when i was a great help to J. I don't think it's too arrogant of me to say that, i'm pretty sure it's true. I was, for a little while, the only person he'd come out to, his only openly (Well, openly to my friends.) gay friend. I've never really been in that kind of situation before, where i'm actually able to help and advise someone. But now J doesn't really need my help and support, or not as much as he did. He has more friends than just me now that he can talk to about the things that affect him, and he even has a boyfriend who, although it'll be a while until i fully trust him or forgive him for the assumptions he's made about me, i'm beginning to agree might just be right for J (That isn't meant in an angry, dismissive "They deserve each other!" way.), and i'm getting better at being happy fo them. They're out right now (Well, sometime today, i don't know exact times. I think sometime in the afternoon.) and, well, there's something down there in my heart that's not quite sitting comfortably, but mostly i'm fine.

I realise this idea of wanting to feel needed is rather a selfish one, but i never tire of pointing out that i'm selfish anyway, so that's just more proof for me. However, the problem may be resolved for a while. There is a very good friend of mine who pretty much everyone believes is gay, even me, though i try so hard not to judge people. He never admits to being gay, with good reason; our school is filled with some of the worst homophobic (I hate that word, but it's all there is.) boors imaginable. Fortunately, by the time one reaches year thirteen people are generally better and more understanding. Otherwise I don't suppose i'd have come out at all.

However, remembering when i wanted to come out, wishing someone would ask me if i was gay, wishing i hadn't denied it so many times that i'd somehow convinced people, i thought perhaps i should ask him. I debated with myself for a few days whether i should, and spent some time trying to frame the question perfectly (This was, of course, over MSN. Hardly anything goes in in my life in the real world.), as sympathetically as possible, emphasising that i understood his situation, trying as hard as possible not to pressure him. He didn't answer the question directly, and the convrsation moved round to other things. The next day i brought up the subject again and eventually, with me tentatively getting nearer and nearer to asking the question, until finally i asked "Are you gay?"

"I think i might be." I did feel a little guilty about having perhaps pressured him into it, but i'd tried as hard as possible not to, and once i'd reassured him that no, his answer did not seem silly, i definitely began to feel i had done the right thing in asking him, that i had helped.

Why am i so sad? Things have turned out not badly and i'm sitting here moping. Apparently, nothing actually happened between P and F. they were arranging things towards the end of his relationship with S, but they wee called off once he'd sorted things out with J. J's happy now. So should i be. But, it seems, i'm not. And my opinion of P seems to be getting gradually worse and worse. Which isn't good as, if all goes well, we'll be going to the same university. I did think about screwing up a teensy bit so i'd go to my second choice university (It's not as if i'll be able to avoid him, we're doing the same subject.) but my chances of getiing the grades for my first choice are precarious enough. And who knows, maybe we'll be really good friends again up thre. I doubt, i doubt very much, he'll have top stop treating me like a child or an alien first, but maybe.

Perhaps i should make more of an effort, he is going out with my best friend. But i have, i have made an effort, and i just end up angry at the way he talks to me. "I don't understand you", he says it constantly. There's nothing to understand, i'm just a shallow fickle mess. I'm still trying to work out how telling me J can still be my best friend was supposed to help. It's as if, even when he's trying to make me feel better, he still needs to assert that he's the one going out with J. How i can i be friends with someone when i talk about with so much bile, whether or not it's justified.

However, it looks like i am, once again, afraid of losing J. Not for the reasons P thinks, just that if i'm going to keep insulting P to him, and in here, then it's hardly going to make him think better of me. Oh well. If J starts to hate me over this, then so be it. I don't believe he would, and if he does, i don't know enough about him anyway.

Well, i have to report this, but it will most likely come out as nonsense, as i don't really know what's going on. Apparently P has also had some sort of... dalliance with F, who everyone knew felt something for P, but i'd generally assumed that P's feelings had always been for J, even while he was with S. And noone is certain when this happened. F (Who i can't speak to because i've just been pretty much ignoring him these last few week. It would be, well, not right to suddenly confront him know.) is the original source, and i heard about it first through S and now i'm speaking to both S and J about it. F apparently says this happened after P left S, which would mean he's betrayed J aswell (I'm sorry, i really am, for all these letters. But i can't have people knowing who's who. especially as i may start showing this to more people.) as S. But noone's entirely sure of the chronology. And apparently P has said that F was lying, i'm not sure about what.

All this is absolutely killing S. He felt bad before, but he was getting to be OK, but now he just feels terrible. He keeps mentioning suicide, and i'm trying to help, but i'm a terrible comforter. And J isn't much better, he's so worried P's betrayed him. I think, personally, that P probably hasn't, much as, low down, some evil part of me wishes he has. But that isn't much of me. I want J to be happy.

A month ago i would never have believed this, not the slightest bit, of P. And i thought i knew him quite well. I've sorted out, now, i think, my own idea of how things have happened, and i hope, for J's sake that i turn out to be right. I think all this happened while P and S were still going out. But i don't see why they'd have broken over J but not F. I suppose the most likely thing is that it happened in the short period after P and S broke up, but before P and J were a definite thing. But i can't know, and i won't, until everyone's able to talk again.

Wow. P can be so very condescending when he tries to make me feel better. I'm sure it can't just be me. I shall, as i so like to do, reproduce our conversation (Why, for greater objectivity on the part of the reader, of course!).

P: I know it's the stereotypical question, but how are you? Don't tell me 'fine'. Give me an in-depth analysis.
Me: Jealous. Glum, peeved, wishing that back when it seemed i might have had a chance with [J] i'd taken it, so at least i'd have a better idea if i'm in love or not. Annoyed at myself for not being happy for my best friend. Annoyed at myself for making everything into a tragedy. Happy, because i can never stay sad for long and i'm listening to good music. Erm... there's more, but i cant remember it.
P: [J] can carry on being your best friend, just as [P's best friend, M- not a person i particularly like (for different reasons)] is mine...
Me: Aaw, its so nice of you to say that. [Please say the sarcasm there was completely obvious. I wouldn't even ask, but i'm not sure he picked up on it]
P: By the way, I have extremely strong feelings for [M] but don't fancy him. If you don't fancy [J] perhaps it's exactly the same way
Me: Shut up!!! I dont need you trying to make me feel better! You are absolutely no good at it!!! You just get me annoyed, and perhaps that's deliberate, maybe youre trying to rile me out of whatever slump i'm in, but let me enjoy my feelings for [J], whatever and however unrequited they may be.
P: [inserted eye-rolling smiley (you know, the kind of thing that, applied to a woman, might be accompanied by "moody bitch" or some comment about "that time of the month")]

Tell me, tell me i'm not alone in finding his attitude frankly insulting. What say-so has he over whether or not J is my friend? What did that have to do with anything? I'm completely satisfied that J will stay my best frined, but that was irrelevant. It's as if he'd decided how he was going to respond before he'd even read my answer, as if he'd only even asked as a matter of politeness.

I might have made it clearer, I suppose, that all this was said after both he and J had returned from their (I suppose i shall have to say it, but with reluctance.) date in, as the locals call it (Can you hear me sneer? I should certainly hope so.), 'town'. And, much to my chagrin, it seems the thing went rather well. He's made me feel better about not liking that, aswell, which is good. They "would have kissed if the cinema wasn't so full". They "held hands and he made sure i was happy and he stroked the side of my face". Rather a lot of me wishes he had been horrible and it had all been terrible, but i'm forced to admit they may be in love. Which leaves me no option but to smile ruefully and publish this.

Today is the day that P and J go out. I don't mind as much as I thought I would, but I mind more than anyone seems to think.I've been talking to J as if I'm fine, and mostly I am, but I'd still like to discuss a little how I feel. But I feel guilty to bring up, even to feel bad, because really I'm the person least affected by what's gone on. And I sort of feel that J should be able to tell. Another reason I won't bring it up is that I'm still so afraid of going anywhere near the boundaries of friendship. Things are great and fun again, but I don't know how secure. I'm sure it's all fine really, but I can be a little paranoid.

I want to tell him how I feel, but perhaps writing it here is the next best thing, as I know he'll read it. I act fine, and mostly I'm OK, but sometimes, today especially, knowing he's out with P, I do feel... less good. I've been rather mopey today, in one of those moods where I just keep wandering round the house, occasionaly lying down and feeling sorry for myself. You know the sort of thing. Just the thought that if I hadn't done my much trumpeted 'Right Thing' I might at least have been able to have some sort of physical contact with him. I've never even hugged him, my best friend. I love hugging, but it gets sort of forced out of you after a while in a boys' school. Even S got to hug him this week, S who has every right to despise him completely. I am doomed, aren't I, to forever be the outsider of the Ace Crew. The other three, and R even, although nobody really counts him any more, are all much closer than me (Oh dear, I'm going down the "I will die alone" road again.). Well, perhaps not closer, but more linked. More involved. More experienced with each other, definitely. Although perhaps that's not all that bad. Someone described the relationships between the Ace Crew as 'incestuous', and it's a good point. Perhaps I am better off- this is too self-indulgent even for me. I can't even continue this paragraph. Sorry.

I feel a bit of a hypocrite because of the advice I was giving to S a few days ago. He was obviously very upset by everything that had happened recently, but kept saying how fine he was, all that "life goes on" nonsense. I probably only just stopped him saying "plenty more fish in the sea". I kept telling him he had a right to feel angry, to be upset, and eventually he admitted he did feel that way, a little. Actually, I've just realised that perhaps my own motives for thi won't so savoury. Unlike S, I'm not really justified in being angry and upset, so I had him feel like that for me. Not deliberately, obviously, but I think that may have been going on subconsciously. Anyway, what I was originally saying was that I'd been exhorting S to feel bad and show it, but here I am hiding my feelings (Although not that well, if I can't resist blogging them.) from my best friend. But I am a great believer in the smile. I do believe that smiling does actually make you feel better, generally. And sometimes to do that the smile has to be a bit fake.

Actually, no, there's nothing wrong with me being happy and sad at the same time. Why shouldn't I smile and be unhappy at the same time? That doesn't make the smile fake, it just means it's isn't everything I feel, I have other feelings going on underneath. And it isn't neccessary that everyone know all of these feeling, just that I recognise them. There.

I'm clean again! Until this morning, I (I know it's disgusting, but remember, I was in a slough of despond) hadn't washed since Friday. I must have smelt absolutely awful, especially with the heat and my new nightly 'exercise' (Which may, incidentally, be working. After I went to bed at two o'clock last night I didn't get up again.), and my hair, although it was actually looking not too bad, felt revolting because of all the grease in it. But now I am clean and all is lovely. I rather like my hair. I may not do many interesting things with it, but I recently had highlights put in (not entirely of my own accord) and I'm told they suit me. But what I rather like about my hair is the way it feels (when clean, obviously). I happen to think I hve rather nice hair for running ones fingers through. I remember one time, quite recently (This has gone up there with the store of compliments I keep for rainy days.), having my hair done in the school production of Grease wth our sister school (Well, this one was officially their production, featuring us (Dear God, I go into a lot of unneccessary detail), unlike all previous productions.) by a group of girls. It was so lovely, they kept cooing about how nice my hair was and I, being the reticent fool I am, just sat there and occasionally said "thank you" quietly. Actually, I'd been rather the same throughout the whole make-up process and it seems (I know I'm being vain here, but allow me to be.) that I'd somehow become rather well-liked. I even remember saying that they fancied me, but he was obviously just wrong and didn't realise one can be liked without being 'fancied'.

But that wasn't meant to be the subject of today's post. This was: Don't you just love finding your own feelings or situation mirrored in a book you read? I read "Breakfast at Tiffany's" by Truman Capote yesterday, and really enjoyed it. Especially when I realised that here was my own situation. The narrator was in love with Holly (The Audrey Hepburn character. Actually, my edition (Penguin Popular classics. Lovely editions, but rather expensive.) has a picture of her on the front, and she really is as beautiful as they say. She looks very sweet and lovely.), who was in love with, and carrying the child of, José, who naturally our narrator hated and was jealous of. However, this being fiction, I did expect that things would go well in the end between Holly and the narrator (Or would have, anyway, were it not for the way the story begins.), so I was rather pleased that, although Holly was abandoned by José, she also left, and everyone still managed to be quite happy. Unfortunately, I don't think P will abandon J like that (Though I doubt J is carrying his child either. So that's good, at least.), and worse still, I can't even hate him. I don't think that really he's a bad fellow at all. I just hope he never feels the need to boost J's self-esteem.

Fickle. It's a word I like to use a lot. But I think I'm justified. I change my mind constantly. Earlier today, around two o' clock, I'd planned a post on self-esteem and my supposed lack of it, in which I intended to prove that I had plenty of self-esteem, thatnk you very much. A few hours later, when I decided to post it I'd forgotten all but the very basics of my argument. And now here I am to contradict myself (possibly). My stance on my own self-esteem has changed, I suspect, because of today's conversation with J. I am, of course, overreacting again. He said the reason the conversation was so one-sided (and I'm not good at being one half of a conversation, never mind both) was that he was revising and I've really no good reason to do that. But it looks like every time I have a conversation with J where anything seems slightly wrong I'm going to end up in a bad mood again. Well, not so much a bad mood as just wistful. Wishing, perhaps, that I hadn't done 'the right thing' that I've been praising myself for having done these last few days. But I did, and so on.

Perhaps the poor conversation was all my fault, for immediately launching in with my newest shallowness: "I'm in love!!". It's just a while since I've felt the centre of attention. Sorry, but that's who I am. I crave attention. Which can often jar with my lack of confidence. I feel guilty about it now, as I know J is still not exactly happy right now (Another thing I feel guilty about: I'm a little annoyed that this has all happened if people aren't even going to have the decency to be happy. Obviously the small part of me that feels that way is generally overruled though.) And conversation did pick up towards the end. But I felt throughout that it was more than just revision that kept him so reticent, but all my attempts at prying came to nothing. which suggests that he was either telling the truth (likely) or that he no longer trusts (me deluding myself to feel important).

But, yes, this was intended to be a post about self-esteem. People generally assume I don't have much self-esteem, and I had originally planned to contradict that. I still will, though not to the same extent. I like myself, I really do. I know I have traits which aren't really desirable, but so does everyone. And I feel that, other than the fact that I'm fat (And I'm not obese; not as fat as P made me out to be in a recent tirade about self-esteem ("Trust me, if you lost weight you would be attractive to more people. Enough willpower is all that's needed, and you would be so much happier with yourself.") intended somehow to cheer me up.) I'm not too ugly. There's nothing particularly offensive about my face and any other deformities are hidden. I like myself and think that overall I'm a good person. I have self-esteem. It's whether other people hold me in esteem that is my constant worry.

I know I have friends, I do believe I'm liked. I don't think I generally give much reason to be hated. Obviously there are people who don't like me, but I do like to think there are those who do, aswell. It's just that I often find it hard to convince myself of this. I'm very concerned with how I present myself. Not physically, so much (But a little. And more so recently), but as a person. I am constantly afraid of seeming arrogant, or self-obsessed, or boring, or I change my mind and repeat myself too much. And parts of me believe that actually that is all nonsense, that I'm rather a pleasant person. But naturally these opinions have their oppsites, and they often seem to be more numerous.

However, I will say of my bad moods that they generally don't manage to remain at their darkest for too long. I'm always eventually buoyed up to wistfulness at the very least, and I go round smiling vaguely. And I make up for my bad moods, I think, by often just feeling ecstatic. These moods are short lived too, but I enjoy the memory more.

As a final note, obviously I know that my 'love' for Robert Frobisher is actaully just an atempt to force my feelings for J away, but is there anything wrong with that? It's not like it's going to hurt him, and I'm doing to stop myself hurting. And I still think he's rather groovy.

I'm happy again. You may choose to think I am fickle and shallow, but my in my good mood I hae decided that I simply have a cheery and loving disposition. I spent last night, once again, grinning instead of sleeping. After retiring to bed fo a fourth time at around half four I finally did achieve sleep a little after. I know why I'm finding it so hard to sleep at the moment. Well, harder than normal (I am naturally a little insomniac, but I'm getting to sleep later and later). I think it's just because I'm not doing anything to get me tired. So I'm working on a solution. Last night, around quarter to three, I got out of bed, put my recently burned CD of songs that mean things to me (or are just plain cool (it starts with "I Want You by Moloko, which is (and I don't use this word lightly) fucking gorgeous.)) and danced around in the best way I can. Thankfully, even with the orange of the street lights and the blue of the next day, noone would have been able to see me, as I must have looked a complete idiot. My dancing 'style' was never intended for public display, involving as it does much flailing of limbs (the left arm in particular) and singing to my many plastic figurines rescued from cereal boxes. And, of course, it was far too hot to danced fully clothed, so I was forced to remove my pajama top. I wouldn't take off any more, of course. The sight of my rolls rolling is bad enough, nevermind the thought of gyrating genitalia. But, of course, none of that could have been possible if I weren't already in a good mood.

Why was I in a good mood? Well, at the start of the night I was in a good mood because I turned out to once more have been being a self-indulgent fool, and J didn't hate me. So that kept me smiling. But what got me really grinning was reading "Cloud Atlas" and falling in love with the second narrator, one Robert Frobisher. I've never been in love with a fictional character before. Or a bisexual (Notice how I've casually taken to assuming E's gay). Or someone quite so cocky. So plenty of firsts all round. Unfortunately, we only get sixty pages of his charming voice before the third part begins, each part being so far hardly related at all. The first part is a series of diary entries, which we later here have been found by the adorable Frobisher, and the recipient of Frobisher's letters (the second part being told epistolarily (Actually, there are a surpising number of words related to epistolary (pertaining to letters, for the less well schooled (oh go on, let me patronise a little)). I once structured an English essay around including ten of them. Terrible essay, but more fun to write than most of my others)) appears to be one of the main characters of the third part. Intriguing, non?

I'm rather pleased to have found a fictional character to love. At least I don't have to blame myself for our lack of relationship. But I don't really feel I need my amorous feelings to be reciprocated, not yet. I get enough of a glow from simply loving, I don't need people to be in love with me, though I do hope there are people that love me (I'd like to say I know and indicate J, but I'm far too afraid ever to make such definite statements about other people's feelings and perceptions of me.) And it would be nice to be kissed, just once, in that way, but I suspect the closest I could get to that for a while would just be out of pity, so I won't hold out any hope.

I know I keep saying the same things again and again, but I'm allowed to. It's my blog. It's for me. I asked J today how he could love P, because really I still don't understand it that well. He responded "Why don't you? Whats not to understand?", then asked "How can you love me?"

I reproduce my answer in full because I feel it is actually rather well expressed, clearer than any other time I've tried to say these things.

"I can love you because you're the first person ever to trust me, the first person I've ever trusted. I love you because, whatever my deficiencies, I feel there is a similarity between us, and the way we think. I can love you because you're the best person I know, the only person it seems sometimes. I can love you because whenever im upset and I look inside myself, and I feel alone, and I'm blind to the rest of the world, I can still see you. And I can love you because you won't be arrogant about that. It may please you, but you wouldnt crow. You wouldn't... I dont know. But you're so much better than he is.

"I love you because you make me feel that perhaps I'm not all that bad. Because you understand that advice isn't always neccessary, sometimes all you need is sympathy and understanding. Because I can be in love with you and you don't mind. You're even flattered! Because, of everyone I know, you were the only person I could see being old with me, the only one I would be happy to have stand at my grave.

"And because even though I know the only way I can stop this destroying me aswell is just to fade away, I cant do that."

All he said to this was "Don't overanalyse your feelings then." It's here, I see now, the final proof. I can love him, be in love with him (though not as much as I might have thought), but his feelings don't have anything like the weight of mine, nevermind what he's said previously.

"What does that mean? I dont know what that means! You just asked me to analyse my feelings!"

"Not to that extent. You feel bad about things that I don't even realise are important."

"I feel bad about everything. I built my whole personality around feeling bad"

"For goodness sake why?"

"I never chose to be who I am. That's just how I turned out"

I don't think he understands me anywhere near as well as I thought he did.

How am I happy all of a sudden? I don't understand how I'm happy right now, when every few minutes I see images of P and J which are really not comforting. Still, it seems best to capitalise on my happiness, so I have on my happy music. Who knows, perhaps if the mood lasts until I see J again things will once again be like they were. Not exactly the same, not everything, but things between the two of us (ie. me doting on him as my bestest (sometimes it's justified) and he still foolishly seeing me as some sort of role model). I don't actually believe the good mood will last tha long, it will no doubt eventually give in to my usual wistfulness (I'm sure I'm too young to spend most of my time being wistful.), but I can hope. And, in the mean time, grin. I do so like to grin. Which is unfortunate, as my teeth have many shades of yellow green and brown, but little white.

I couldn't sleep last night, not at all. So I wrote a letter to J, telling him I would have to cut him out of my life, that I was too afraid of ruining his happiness to remain a part of it. Why do I always have to do this? Why do I try to do the right thing, when I can't know what the right thing is? It's all just me trying to appear noble, it isn't what I want at all. But what I want doesn't have any place here either.

P has, I think, broken up with S. He sent me an e-mail last night saying he was going to and this morning S is really depressed. But I don't feel I can talk to him until I know for certain, and he doesn't feel able to tell. So I'm just trying to be generally comforting, though I doubt I'm much good at it. It's made harder by the fact that I can't really seem anyone to blame but myself. If I can't move this blog I should just stop using it and delete it all, but I can't.

When I woke up this morning I felt better, after writing the letter. As if, now I'd exorcised those feelings and that way of thinking I could just go back to normal. I thought I should just ignore the resolution I'd made. But perhaps I was right last night. I don't think I'll ever be able to help J again, and the person I am at the moment is not someone anybody would want as a friend.

Damn. I thought I could move this thing, to a new address so J couldn't read it and be affected by any ridicuolus sense of honour or loyalty. He shouldn't try be loyal to me, I really am not worth it. I'll only push him away eventually, as I do with all my friends. I had thought that maybe this friedship was different, that it would last, but perhaps not. Maybe I should have taken him up when he was suggesting that things could happen between us, so that when it did all go wrong I could blame him; it was his idea, it's him that's in love with someone else, I'd be almost free of guilt. But that didn't happen. I think it's time I did go into reclusion again. Sulking may be immature and selfish, but it helps me.

I thought things were sorted out. I thought I'd got my feelings under control. I thought things between P and J were, well, weren't. But everything's gone bad again. And it's all my fault. If I hadn't let J see my blog...

I don't, selfish as this might be, want anything to happen between P and J. But it's beginning to seem as if they perhaps might. I'm sorry to talk so vaguely, but I can't be specific about something I know so little about. So much as it galls me, things are going on. And I now have volunteered to try advise P, unwise as that may be. I spent the first half of the evening warning him off J in a jovial manner, as I thought there was nothing going to happen anyway, but then when I realised (It took me so long. I can't belive what a self absorbed idiot I am) I of course ended up trying to be helpful. J seems to be less willing to let me know what's happening, which upsets me. After talking so brilliantly last night I feel like I've already lost him again. And it's my own fault because I'd been so blunt and tactless earlier.

I was convinced I wasn't in love with him, that I was just his best friend. But my behaviour tonight is surely not that of a rational, loving best friend. I'm again more like a snubbed suitor, the jealously obsessed fool who needs to be got rid of. And yet somehow I've inviegled myself into this position where I'm trying to help the person I saw at the beginning of the night as my enemy, and now am starting to think of like that again, as I realise that I might be in love with J after all, despite all resolutions to the contrary. But I can't be. Perhaps, while J is also single, I feel that I as his best friend, own him more than anyone else (I hate this, I hate how possesive I am. What sort of way is this to treat anyone?), but if he and P somehow work things out then P has him. I'm suddenly a third wheel. I'm rejected again.

Suddenly I feel so selfish. Here am I complaining, when in so much worse a position there's S, who knows nothing at all of what's going on, and who, much as he professes that he is comfortable with the fact that their relationship will not be very long-lived, I doubt will be remotely happy with the way all this is pointing at the moment.

Oh God! they are actually in love with each other, aren't they! And I can't let my feelings be a part of this. But they can't! How can J love him? How? He may be good-looking, but he is very arrogant, and doesn't seem to care for other people's feelings at all. And I know these are all criticisms I make of myself, but I really think they are worse in him: "You have escaped, i think. Be grateful to your mind, for the strength." When have I showed strength of mind? I think it can be said that I've had clarity of mind, to an extent, but strength?

Dammit! If I get angry at him all he does is apologise and make me wrong again! "I try so hard not to be arrogant. I evidently fail." Maybe he and J should go out.

I have to hide this.

The house is full of people, about forty friends of my mother's. She's raising money for a mission (that's mision as in missionary, not some sort of futuristic space thing) to Paraguay. So naturally I'm hiding upstairs again. Fun-oh.

One of the only things I am at all proud of about myself is my singing voice. I am very probably horribly mistaken, but I actually think I'm rather a good singer. I was once even complimented on my voice by the legendary E (recently fallen from grace, but on his way back up, it seems, now things are worked out between J and I (That's I the pronoun not a new character)). So I do tend to sing along to things rather loudly, with the window open, with some hope of attention. I don't know why, I'd be horrendously embarassed if anyone actually came up and said anything.

I'm a little peeved now. After twenty four hours of grinning to myself, J finally came online, having kept me waiting, desparately, to tell him everything even vaguely interesting I could think of about my life, and he was accompanied by O, a friend. The frined, actually, who originally provided a connection. So hurrah for O! Still means I can't talk to J though. Darn. Still, I've plenty of time.

Oh wow. What a difference this last day has wrought in me (I promise I'm not being pretentious, I do actually think in that sort of language a lot of the time. Besides, wreak is far too underused verb). I enjoyed the Ace Crew Outing, but when I came back I talked for ages to J online, and it wa just so wonderful. I can't think of anything either of us said particularly, but we just seemed to be so comfortable with each other. I love him more than ever. I don't care how I love him, whether I'm in love with him or not, just that I love him and it's the most gorgeous feeling. I went to bad last and I was grinning all over. I even believed him when he said he thouht I was attractive, even if he's not attracted to me. That's actually raher dangerous, it doesn't take much at all to get me all bigheaded. I looked at myself in the mirror afterwards and started to agree. But I was grinning so much my sight was impaired, so that was probably it.

I want him to know everything about me, all the petty irrelevant things that nobody would really care about, but I want him to know it all. I want to lay my life at his feet (As an insomniac you get a lot of time to think of how to phrase things (and this is the best I come up with?)) and have him see it all, and have him approve of ever part.

So, the Ace Crew Outing went rather well. Troy was good, although I couldn't stomach the soundtrack, which consisted only of drums and wailing. I had been planning to go into reclusion again if things didn't go well, but I rather enjoyed myself. Felt uncomfortable occasionally, but nothing too bad. And I did keep wanting to look accross at J, who was sitting next to me and imagining if things hadn't been how they are. But generally I'm happy with the way things are. I feel vindicated about my decisions, and while this may not be the best attitude, it's better than the week long mope I was planning.

Last night I went to bed and cried. Not very well: it was sort of like weeping but without as amny tears and almost soundlessly, apart from me singing along to the sad song on I had on repeat. I got up again and went downstairs. I had a drink and hid a knife up my sleeve, came upstairs, wrote in my diary and then got into bed. After a little experimentation I cut my left breast, a little above the nipple. I didn't cut deeply, only just enough to draw even a few beads of blood. And it didn't hurt much. It hurt, but not as much as I'd wanted. I hid the knife and went to bed again. Then I got up, brushed my teeth, glared at myself in the mirror and went to bed again.

This morning I have five red lines on my chest, pretty pathetic really. And what annoys meis I'm now wondering if I did them for thegood (ok, not good but... usual) reason of being in pain emotionally and wanting to feel it physically too (Although that was very much the case. Beforehand I'd just been imagining myself being beaten up etc.), but because I want to make people feel guilty. Which is a really, really horrible reason, manipulative and evil.

I made a mistake earlier. He had a power cut, he doesn't hate me. He's back now and we're getting along, best friends again, it looks like it'll all be ok. I'll see him again tomorrow. We're having an Ace Crew outing to the cinema and I dont think it'll be uncomfortable. I did think it might be with P and S because I'm not sure how willing they'll be to stop meddling. I'm not so worried about that now, now I know what J has said to P: "i meant that if you weren't attatched id want you"

SEE!!!! I was right! I said nothing should happen, and I was right. He isn't in love with me at all. He's in ;love enough with P to actually define what his feelings are. I knew I was right to convince him things shouldn't happen. But between then and now I've been convinced otherwise. I've been tricked back into being in love with him. I don't know if that's why hearing about this hurts so much, or if that's completely coincidental, but it still hurts now. It took him two days to admit he might feel anything for me; it took him an hour or two decide and tell P that he wants him.

Am I being selfish? I know I'm being selfish. I can generally be pretty sure that anything I do is selfish. But this is worse. I refused to take him (It's besides the point that I was right) and now I don't want him to be in lov with anyone else. Or not with P. I didn't mind him being in love with his straight boy. I actually encouraged that really, even once I'd sorted out my feelings and told him. So why not with P? I thought I liked P. He's meant to be my friend. And the only thing I'll be able to hold against him would be if he did fall in love with J too, because he's still going out with S. But I don't think he would do that.

This shouldn't be hurting this much! I'd promised myself and J not to be in love with him. I can't do this now. It's killing me and it's playing around with other people's emotions too.

What have I done? My first chance of love and I turn it down? The most important person in my life, who I love more than anyone else and I tell him it can't happen? Am I insane? I know I want this, really, I'm just too scared to let it. I said a while ago "I will die alone". Am I just so desparate to never be proved wrong that I'll screw up my life in the process? Why am I such a stubborn idiot? Not only have I ruined my chances of love, it doesn't seem to have done much for our friendship either. He just went straight offline, deliberately, in the middle of our conversation. I realise I had been a little annoyed at him, but still, why did he do that? I thought he was, well maybe not happy, I don't know tha, but I thought he'd accepted the situation. I'm such an idiot. I tried so hard to protect our friendship that I destroyed it completely.

I am swamped in advice and moral support. But I'm not sure I need it. And noone can agree anyway. And J's gone. I feel bad. So obviously I'm listening to my saddest music.

P appears to have completely the opposite opinion. He believes I'm not in love with J. He says "if you don't want to have sex with him then i don't think you're in love with him. one of the components of non-platonic love, whether people like it or not, is lust." I'd never said I didn't want to have sex with J, but I can't really imagine it happening either. Not that I can actually imagine myself having sex at all. But, um, I can (Oh my giddy god, what the hell am i about to say?!? I shall just have to hope that when J himself reads this he is rendered too embarassed to atually say anything about it) see myself (GAAAH!) giving him a... um... i cant say it, but its frequently known by the initials BJ. But the thing is, I'm not sure I'd want anything back. I just want to make him happy, really.

A little while ago he sent me a short film of himself and a friend just messing around really. But I've watched it many times, often without sound so as not to attract attention, just to gaze at him. I actually yearned. Is that lust?

But then other times I seem to have different feelings for him when I'm with him in person than when we talk online. I haven't really got much to base this on, because I've only seen him in real life once at the most since I possibly fell in love, I think. I don't know how to carry on talking or where I'm going with this, so I'll stop now.

I've convinced him. We've convinced each other not to do anything, that it wouldn't work. And now we're just talking about other things, about trying to not let things be uncomfortable, and all the time I'm dying just to scream out what a fool I am, how he should ignore what I've been saying. Why is he trusting me to know what to do, to know what I think? How have I suddenly become so persuasive that I can convince people away from what I so desperately want? When did I become enough of an idiot to actually do that?

Oh God. This isn't good, I feel completely lost. J read my last post, and he posted in his blog about it and asked me, as soon as I came online, to read it. I did. And didn't understand. I understood that he had been offended, despite me trying to say he shouldnt, and I understand why he could be. But I hadn't expected (always hoped, but never expected) that he might, perhaps, be in love with me back. His blog seemed to suggest it, but I couldn't let myself form conclusions based on that. So I had to ask him. And so it seems maybe he is. But he doesn't know.

The thing is, though, I cant let him be in love with me. And know I've spent the last half hour telling him he can't be in love with me and why he can't and it kills me to say it. I want him to love me, I want that so much. But it cannot happen.

I wouldn't be good for him, I wouldn't be good for anyone. I don't deserve to be loved, and especially not by J. And even if I were worthy, I can't. He's my best friend, and I love him so dearly as my best friend and if he were more than that I mightn't be able to turn to him like I can now. What would happen if something was terribly wrong between us? I wouldn't be able to turn to my very best friend, because my very best friend would be him! And I couldn't cope without being able to turn to him.

And what if we broke up and it was really horrible and we could never forgive each other? I'd lose him forever and I wouldn't be able to love him forever and ever. And I have to be able to love J. I have to. If that means not loving him in quite the way I want to because it's the only way to be certain of being able to love him at all then I have to do that.

J's gone now, he left a while ago, but since then S has been trying to persuade me to give things a chance. But there isnt anything to give a chance yet anyway! And he isnt helping. Hes just making me feel worse and worse about something I'm determined to do, something I have to do. He just doesn't understand, he isn't even listening. How can he say that just because things are going well with him and P they will here. He even accepts that his thing will end soon! He doesn't believe that it will keep going once P goes off to university. And I'm not sure if I could see love that way. If I were to regard it as a success it would have to live forever. And at the moment my love for J can do that. Because it doesnt need us to become any more dependent on each other, to fall any deeper in love. Because there's less chance of it failing.

I know this isn't the right way to live life, or so we're told. We have to take risks to enjoy ourselves. But if risk only leads to disaster, as it so often does, how is that a sensible way to be? I still remember back in year ten, when I screwed up this completely unimportant speech for a drama competition, and in the end just ran off stage and hid in the wings, the wings being hidden by a very small curtain less than the span of my arms (my arms in year ten). And then at one point, my favourite teacher, Ms. E (for Eniglish) came up and told me I'd been ok, and said not to cry. And it was only then that I cried. But that isn't my point, my point is that I still remeber it and it still hurts and that was something that meant nothing at all. If I screwed up a relationship with the most important person in my life I wouldn't be able to live with myself. And if I hurt him, in any way at all...

It seems to me that there are few more embarassing ways to be inspired than in watching a bad teen movie. However, a couple of nights ago, when watching "Boys and Girls" (I think) I came up with another of my theories (These, as with most things I do or say, generally come out as self-indulgent nonsense, but I think they generally have some truth in them. I've believed faithfully in one of them since I was in year nine. I called it my Theory of Me. Yes, I know (Actually, having said I still believe it, I can't remember right now what exactly it stated)). I may have already said this on here in some form or other, but I have every right to repeat myself. So my current thinking is that, subconsciously, I've fallen in love with J precisely because he won't reciprocate. I get to enjoy being in love, it's with someone who doesn't really mind, and I never have to fear rejection, because there's nothing actually going on. Or it was something like that.

I've just thought about what I've written and it's not actually very nice to J at all, is it. It doesn't give him any credit, just portrays him as someone convenient. That isn't what I think at all. I actually thinks that's pretty clear from previous entries, but I wanted to be sure.

Sometimes admitting to something makes it stronger. I admitted I love J, I told him, and now I think I love him more. Well, I always loved him, or have for a while. I'm in love more. Or is that just because I get so reflective on long journeys? I went by coach to London today to see Measure For Measure. It was good. But anyway. The thing is, I've started having a recurring daydream. I lean over to hug him, hold him tight (surely I'm allowed to hug my best friend at least) then I whisper in his ear "Sorry", pull back and kiss him quickly on the cheek. That's it. That's not so bad, is it? That could almost be best friend behaviour. Sometimes, often, I do think that this love isn't necessarily being in love, it's just that I've never had a best friend to love like this.

Sort of on this subject, I should probably tell P that I've let his secret slip, but I don't want to yet. Although my feelings have changed since earlier. I do love P, but I'm sometimes not sure how much I trust him. And S seemed to be rather concerned at times about the longevity of their relationship. But he did tell me today he'd had the "best date ever!" today. But I was worried that maybe if P knew that J had liked him too he might be tempted to... I don't know. It's just that before those two started going out I'd heard a lot from S about how much he loved P, but never any indication anywhere that those feelings were reciprocated. I thought he still loved J. And although I don't want to be obsessively guarding J against all suitors (and I really don't think I do that), I don't think I'd like the two of them going out at all. Oh dear. What if I start judging everyone J loves as not good enough? But maybe I'm right to. He does deserve the best. Maybe that's why I'm happy not to try have him reciprocate; I know I'm not good enough too.