Girls = Drama

   Things between Rachel and I got really intense really fast and burned out at pretty much the same speed. We had actually gone out for drinks after work on Valentine’s Day because her boyfriend was going to be working all night. His job was really important to him because he was on the cusp of making a lot of money.  To this day it sounded like the company he worked for was structured like an elaborate pyramid scheme.

   Anyway, I started to actually pursue her openly and it put her in a terrible spot. She admitted she had feelings for me and we both used the ‘L’ word, but at the same time was not willing to end it with her live-in boyfriend that she just bought a condo with. Possibly sensing she was pulling away, her boyfriend got her a new puppy.  She wanted to start a family with children and this was his compromise. It was effective. Now she had to go straight home after work to take care of this puppy and wasn’t able to hang out with me.

 Now, if we got too close, she would pull away, which would make me try harder. If anything, that made it worse and  it probably scared her.  We would take a break from each other and take separate lunch for a few weeks, and then be going to lunch together again. It was really hot and cold.

  At times I actually became angry at the whole situation and it takes a lot for me to hit my boiling point. If anything good came out of this time period was that I no longer looked at Rachel through Rose-colored glasses. She was very pretty, but she wasn’t the sharpest tool in the shed. She was also very OCD. All of the quirky things about her I found endearing would grate on me in the long term. For example, she lived by the airport. If she heard an airplane, she needed to get her feet off the floor and wouldn’t put them down until she heard another airplane. I thought that was amusing, but after a while, that kind of crazy would just be crazy.

  When Alan was given a promotion he was forced to find someone to take over in the ACH department, Rachel wondered if she should apply for the position and I told her she should apply because it would be a promotion for her. Whatever the reason, it caused Claudia to be mad at me, but I didn’t know why. Rachel claimed to not know why either, but I couldn’t figure out whether it was true or not. At that point, I felt like I was on the outside while Rachel and her were the best of friends.

   For a few weeks she didn’t even want to speak to me to tell me what I did wrong. In the end, it was when I was encouraging Rachel to apply for the position she wanted a list of pros and cons. I told Rachel the only con I could think of was that Claudia would have to work till closing instead of her. It got back to Claudia from Rachel. While we thought of it as an inconvenience, Claudia thought of it as an impossibility because of her kids and would be forced to quit than take those hours. When I finally found out, I explained that was not our thought pattern. She was still annoyed. In light of this new information, we suggested she take the position and that is what ended up happening.