This will probably get lost in the thread, but here comes storytime.

I don't have an exciting story about what I did when the new year started. What did I do? Nothing much really. I can't really remember the first thing I did, but I can remember the most important thing I did. I was at a small party with some friends and some of their hometown friends (I drove for nearly two hours to come to this party because these are some of my best friends). The girl I like had another man, drunk off his ass, attached to her. I mean, it's not like they were together or anything, but yeah. This guy aside, she has a man already (kinda; their situation is endlessly confusing to me). She's out of my league anyway, but the first thing I will think about me doing in the new year was just me holding her hand through a good bit of the night. I might have feelings for her, and I know she doesn't feel that way about me, but she is, without a doubt in my mind, my best friend. I gushed to her so much last night, and (if she remembers it) I wonder what she thinks of me now. I can't believe myself, honestly. As we went to bed (in a reclining couch thingy with dividers), I went and said "I love you" to her. That's the funny thing about me when I'm drunk. I'm normally a fairly reserved person with my feelings, dealing with most any of my friends in a joking, almost never serious manner. When I'm drunk, that filter gets thrown away, and all I want to do is talk. And, being drunk, I act true to my feelings. Hence why I said "I love you" to her as we were going to sleep. Those are my true feelings, and there's no use hiding them. I hadn't seen her in a few weeks. We don't talk online much to each other, nor really text each other (it was something that sort of happened naturally). That's because those don't even compare to how her and I are in person. We gel together so well. We just "get" each other, you know? I've only known her for a little over a year, but we've grown so close in such a short time.

Yeah, she doesn't feel the same way about me. I'm not going to throw some bullshit about the "friendzone" or whatever. No. The truth is, I'm not attractive. And I don't think I'm the kind of man she's looking for either. She has an idea of how I feel, me having asked her out about a month ago. Her response, and mine to hers, still bothers me. Something like "I don't know what to say. We're such good friends, I never thought about you in that way." Then I, untrue to my feelings, tried to play it off a little, as though me asking her out was perhaps a confusion within myself of my strong friendship for her for romantic feelings. There's more to it than that, and things were truly settled the next day in a string of text messages, basically culminating in "I just don't feel that way about you," more or less.

Emily. I know you don't read Reddit. But I wouldn't be surprised if someone I know sees this. I don't care.

I know you don't feel the same way as me, but Emily, I love you.