After swearing off relationships for years (post-6 year abusive relationship) I finally found someone who is so incredible he changed my mind. After months of becoming very close friends with him while warding off his clear romantic interest in me with reiterations of my disdain for relationships, the very week I decide to ask him out he asks out a mutual friend of ours who is similar to me but younger in many ways. She overtly idolizes me to the point of excess; saying I’m her role model is an understatement as she thinks I am perfect and believes anything I say. I love her and my friend both dearly but a part of me wants so badly to tell him how I feel about him because I want to be with him. Of course I cannot tell him anything because she is the last person on Earth whose happiness I would interfere with. What kind of sick cruel act would it be for someone’s role model to swoop in and steal their new boyfriend?

If I didn’t love her too it would be so much easier but as it is I cannot feel jealousy for her. I can only be happy that they are happy and sad that I am not. After all, they both deserve to be happy and it’s not his fault I took so long to be ready for a relationship. I’m scared I won’t have enough self control to not interfere and I feel guilt that I’ve let enough flirting and hints slip through in the grey area already. Furthermore I feel like the implicit rejection feels right and that I deserve it because I never do end up in happy healthy relationships so at this point I’ve come to expect at best no relationship at all. I expect to always be the one left out and unhappy and I feel guilty for wanting to try to seek happiness at the cost of others.