The Story of Us- Part III

Ok....so where did we leave off? We left of with Wednesday, April 14, 2004.

The following day, Thursday the 15th, was Nostalgia night. I went with my friends and Chip went with some of his friends....so we didn't hang out. I remember seeing him from across the room and thinking he looked in my direction and I winked at him! I couldn't believe I had done that....but I was relieved later to find out that he never even saw me at all that night : )

Friday the 16th came. This was a very interesting night. My floor had a formal "Pick-A-Date" event that night. About a week earlier, or so, my friends had been bugging me to go. I was already really starting to like Chip, and didn't want to waste a bunch of money on a formal event to just go with some random guy. So I told my friends I would only go if Chip agreed to go with me. So I asked him.....and I told him I was just asking cause I didn't really want to go but my friends were bugging me about it. He said no. So I told my friends no. So I was pretty bummed that he didn't want to go with me (I took this as a sign that he did in fact like Emily and that I was fooling myself thinking he might like me). Anyway....this was where our mutual friend Karin got involved. She decided if I wasn't going that she didn't want to go either. So we decided to try to do something else that night. She got one of her good friends (Toll...the one who wore the suit to the fish funeral) to agree to go out to dinner that night with us and got him to bug Chip to come with us. Chip agreed...although he was NOT excited about it. He pretty much wanted to go to dinner and then get home as soon as possible so that he could be in his room when open house started in case "other girls" (ie:Emily Wilson) decided to stop by. So....we went to Applebee's. I was SO excited about this "date" (that I knew wasn't REALLY a date....). I borrowed clothes from a friend and worried about how my hair looked and got sweaty hands and butterfly feelings and everything. So then, Chip REALLY confused me while we were at Applebee's...and Toll didn't help the situation. Toll paid for Karin's meal, which put Chip in a really awkward spot. It was VERY clear that Toll and Karin were just friends, yet Toll wanted to do the gentlemanly thing and pay. Well, this meant that if Chip didn't pay for me he was going to look like a big jerk. So he paid. This confused me though, because I wasn't able to use this as a sign of whether he liked me. I had no idea if he paid out of obligation because of Toll's action (which he did) or if he paid because he liked me and wanted to send a message of it being a date (which he did NOT). So of course I spent the rest of the evening analyzing and re-analyzing and over analyzing every aspect of dinner and trying to decide WHY he paid for my food. The other thing he had done that made me wonder about everything, was as we were walking back to the car, he was being exceptionally flirty and using these cheesy pick-up lines. It was really fun : ) But it confused me about whether I should read into it at all.........

SOO....we got back to Taylor and went to his room...I think Karin and Toll came, at least Karin did. We listened to a Brian Regan CD in his room. That was about 45mins long. After that, I could tell he was pretty much done with me for the night. So I told him I was going to visit other friends. I hung out with some people on the BroHo(the floor above him) and visited some of my other SIIS friends. Around 10:30 or 11, Karin and Toll and I decided to watch a movie at Toll's house (his dad was a prof and his parents lived 2 mins away...). We got Chip to come (mainly cause it was so late and the "other girls" hadn't shown up).

So, we got to the Toll residence, and another awkward/confusing situation came up. There were three places to sit for watching the movie. Karin and Ben sat right down in the most obvious choice of the three....a couch with a good view. That left 2 options.....a chair with the BEST view of the tv in the whole room, or a love seat with a side view of the TV. So I was the next one to go into the room. The chair is the obvious choice as far as viewing goes, but that left no option for him to sit by me. So I sat on the loveseat. I knew that he would REALLY have to WANT to be sitting by me specifically if he came and sat with me. But no....he sat in the chair. I was really bummed....but it made sense....it was the best place to watch the movie from.

Well, I decided that it was stupid to sit alone on a loveseat with a bad view. So I grabbed one of the pillows and laid on the floor a few feet in front of the chair so that I would have a good view. I could not believe what happened next...........all of a sudden, Chip was getting up out of the chair and grabbing a pillow and laying beside me on the floor. Now I am all full of butterflies again and definitely going CRAZY trying to figure him out. I was SO confused. Throughout the movie (which I barely paid any attention to at all since I was so busy trying to figure out what Chip was thinking....) I must have convinced myself that he probably liked me....because I got up the courage to hold his pinkie. Not his hand. His pinkie. It was a very slow progression. He had laid down on the floor THAT close to me, so that made my decision easier. It started with just having my hand at my side. His was at his side too. Which meant our hands were by each other. So throughout the movie I just moved mine closer (meaning like millimeters at a time...lol, since they probably only started about an inch or two apart) until our pinkies were touching. It was getting closer to the end of the movie, maybe 15-20 minutes left, when I decided to go for the pinkie hold. I got really nervous and was SURE he was going to freak out and pull his hand away. But I looped my pinkie around his and he didn't move. He didn't move at all.... In fact, it kinda seemed like he was totally fine with it. And eventually, through both of us shifting more and more, we were pretty much holding hands. So then.......the thing that REALLY shocked me........was that when the movie got over, and the lights came on, he STILL DIDN'T MOVE! I figured there was no way he'd want Toll and Karin to see us holding hands, but he DIDN'T MOVE! After like 3 minutes we decided we were tired and it was late and we needed to go back to campus. I rode back with Karin and he rode back with Toll. Of course at this point I was FREAKING OUT! I had NO CLUE what was going on.

And....I am going to have to stop here for now. I will keep writing later on and you can find out how long it was until I finally had some answers : )