For some weeks now I’ve been mourning a never-was and never-would-be relationship. Since then, he has back peddled on some of the things he said, of course not by admitting he was wrong to say them but by telling me that I misunderstood, and I have come to realise that my infatuation probably had less to do with him as a person and more with who I made him out to be. It turns out it’s fairly easy to project the idea of a perfect partner onto someone who wasn’t physically present in my life to prove to me that he didn’t fit the mould I made him. On top of that, it probably says a lot about me that I imagined an ideal relationship for me to be one that allowed me literally a thousand kilometres of personal space.

Although, rationally I am aware of our incompatibility and how easily cramped up I feel by relationships, emotional me hasn’t quite caught up just yet and the fantasy, which unfortunately still wears his face, lives on. I need a distraction, a good one. The casual hook-ups I’ve been indulging in lately have been fun, but my emotional investment in them generally lasts about as long as the men in question do in my bed, which at quite some occasions leaves much to be desired.

What I want is a crush. A good old ‘wanting to hold hands with someone’ type of crush, a ‘grinning at an incoming text’ type of crush, a ‘laughing at the cringiest jokes ever told’ type of crush. A kind of crush that makes someone seems smarter whilst making me dumber. Nothing serious though, just a crush. It doesn’t have to be real, it can be another fantasy, as long as it’s a fantasy that isn’t able to escape reality like the current ever elusive target of my affections is. I need a distraction that exist here, in my physical realm and whom can therefore be held up to the scrutinising light of actuality whenever I choose to do so.

I’d like a crush that can be crushed simply by meeting reality, for example by meeting my friends. Because little spoils a crush as quickly as introducing them to your friends at a party. The way you are able to lie to yourself about the amazingness of the fresh target of your obsessions, your friends cannot. They’ll try to, of course. They will say things like: ‘I didn’t talk to him much, but he seems really nice’, or ‘I’m sure that when I get to know him better, we’ll click’, or ‘Perhaps he needs some time to warm up to us, but I’m sure he’s a great guy’. And if that hasn’t disillusioned you just yet, seeing your crush interact with your friends from a distance might do the trick. As you watch him from across the room, you finally notice his insecure posture and ill-adjusted mannerisms, that you simply hadn’t been able to see when he was naked and laying on top of you.

Yes, I want something simple and harmless, an irrational infatuation that is as easily and painlessly gained as it is lost. A little distraction that offers more substance than a one-time fling but won’t escape reality when I want it to.