JUST GOOD FRIENDS

Can a man and woman ever just be friends?

How does that work? How do you know someone that well and not ever have a sneaky feeling that you may slightly fancy them.

Mr Delicious has lots of female friends, friends that he is quite close to and it suddenly hit me, I don't have anyone in my life like that anymore, a male friend you fancy doesn't count and neither does one that you have shared bodily fluids with.

My person that would be my equivalent of him, well it was FBD (well was until I was a stupid woman who got drunk and crossed the line), God I hate the fact that most things seem to come back to him. I know I don't miss him in any other way, especially after the cock out on the sofa incident, but I miss having someone like him. We have been friends since I was 14 (believe me that's a lot of years) and I was going out with his younger brother.

Who could have known that a stupid mistake at a BBQ in August 2005 would make me regretful nearly five years later.

He knows so much about me, hell I even told him about one of my ex's having been in prison for attempted murder before I told any of my friends or family, why did I share this with him? Because I trusted his opinion. How stupid of me then only 12 months later to have been with him in my bed allowing him to do very dirty things with a vibrator! Did I allow him in to my life more than anyone else, because we were more than friends, perhaps more than I had before we had done the deed?

I wonder now if we had left it there whether we could have taken a step backwards and just got on with being mates. I know without a doubt that now that it is doubtful we could even be friends let alone be the kind of friends that we were before.

But it makes me wonder, before that night I had never, ever considered shagging him, I was as you will know if you have read earlier posts quite happy to be one of the few girls I knew that hadn't had the dubious honour of shagging him. If it hadn't been for copious amounts of alcohol it would never have happened. But now I wonder, did he secretly over all those years just want to be my friend to get in my knickers?

I've been thinking back today, about all my male friends over the years and what our friendships have actually been about, have I ever had a friendship with a bloke that didn't revolve around sexual attraction and if so why aren't we friends anymore.

Answer is of course yes, over the years I have had quite a few quite close male friends that I have not shagged, but how many of those were men that I have never once thought 'oh hello, yes please' about. Hell for a while I even shared a house with one of my male friends, and we had an absolute fucking ball, granted he shagged nearly everyone of my friends that walked through the door. An honour which was reciprocated by me with quite a few of his friends I must admit.

But the one male friend that readily springs to mind is Jim, and what happened to Jim? He ended up with and has since married one of my then best friends, I actually was the one that got them together. Why aren't we still as close as we were? Simple, even though for a long while she was my best friend, she still made sure once they were a serious couple, that me and him no longer had any time to just mess about and go to the pub, or have burping competitions in MacDonald's on a Sunday afternoon, whilst coming down from a particularly good Saturday night.

Even though she had never taken drugs in her entire life, and probably never would have if not for her desire to understand our friendship, she decided one Saturday night that she was going to do it, luckily she only took a little bit of speed, but it was a night I will never forget, she was off her head and he was angry, WITH ME.

The man who I had danced the night away with, who had been my dropping buddy back in the bad days of E's and illegal rave. Who had spent more than one lost weekend in my company. Who used to stay up all night with me, listening to the Charlatans and Stone Roses, talking the inevitable shit, that five minutes later you can't remember what it's all about. He had a go at me for allowing his girlfriend to take a little tiny bit of speed, I wouldn't mind but I wasn't even involved in her taking it, just had to look after her after she did!

That was the beginning of the end so to speak, they stopped staying at my house so much, found other 'couples' to go out with and I can't remember a time from that night to now, many, many years later where we have spent any time together without her in attendance.

I never want to be that woman, who can't handle the fact that a man can have a good female friend. Or at least I would hope I will never be that person, but I would like to think I am more understanding than that.

But looking back I realise that friendship was quite unique, yes I have had plenty of male friends, many of them who I have never even kissed let alone anything else, but did I fancy some of them? Yes. And more importantly did any of them ever fancy me, again I think that could be a yes.

The other side of the coin also is that a man with close women friends, how do you gain their approval, maybe the wrong word but the only one I can think of that is suitable. I have been there, no one but my BFF was good enough for my BBF. Blokes generally think that any women their mates come into contact with, are either a laugh, well fit, or have no opinion about them at all. But female friends, well believe me they can be a lot harder to convince.

I know it is possible for a man and woman to be friends without anything ever going on, but it still does feel odd that right now I don't have one. Maybe this is why I miss the best male friend I ever had, not for the mind blowing sex but for the fact that I don't have a male friend anymore that knows me better than some of my boyfriends have. Yes I have a male 'friend' who knows me pretty dammed well by now, and perhaps even knows stuff that I could never have shared with Jim or even FBD, but he doesn't count, why? Cos I fancy the pants off him and I most definitely intend on doing the deed with him A LOT!

xxxx