Flirting with neighbour will only to lead to world of hurt

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 30/04/2016 (3490 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: I’m in love with my next-door neighbour, which is a real problem since he’s married. We talk over the fence all the time about my stupid broken-down car. He is soft-spoke, good-looking, kind and nice. His large-and-in-charge wife thinks he’s too soft and a big baby, unlike her biker-looking friends. I asked him outright why he even married her. He said because she told him he had to! She liked him for his good looks and got herself knocked up.

I know that’s a nasty term to use, but if you knew this foul-mouthed woman and the way she talks to him, you would say a few bad words, too. I’m very single, in my 30s and have never been married. She must see him talking to me outside. I invited him in the other day for coffee (just coffee, I’ll never be an adulteress). He said his wife warned him she would “annihilate” him if she caught him with another woman.

I asked him what he says about me to her, and he said he tells her I’m “a pest,” as if he doesn’t like me. But he followed that up by saying his wife was just making an empty threat and he didn’t want me to stop talking to him. I think he likes me too, don’t you? One time a few weeks ago, we were looking under the hood of my car and he turned his head to talk to me and I was close to kissing him. I’m a soft-hearted person and have rescue dogs and cats. The dogs like him when they see him, and I think dogs are good judges of character.

Anyway, I don’t know what to do about him. I time my comings and goings to be outside when he is. I know I’m being pathetic. Please help.

— Want Him To Be Mine, Winnipeg

Dear Want Him To Be Mine: You better smarten up, dolly, or you’re liable to get a clunk on the head. If you keep hanging around out in the driveway and this tough wife doesn’t happen to be at home, one day he’s going to follow you into the house — and at your invitation, too. He is married and it doesn’t seem like he’s making any moves to leave his wife. Plus, he has at least one child.

Here’s a tip. One way to get some closure on a flirtation with a married guy is to say: “It’s obvious we like each other, but you’re married. If you ever get yourself free, please let me be your first date. But until then, this flirting stuff is useless.” That tells him you like him, but it also tells him you won’t cheat with him, and it means you don’t need to keep trying to excite him under the hood of your car. He’s taken… for now.

Miss Lonelyhearts
Advice Columnist

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