What Friends Aren't For

Story Sent in by Jonathan:

I was checking out dating profiles online, and one of my suggested matches was Lia. Her profile was great, and her pictures were terrific. Only problem was that she lived two large states away from me. Too far for me, so I left her profile without writing to her.

Two days later, she wrote me a message: "I saw that you checked out my profile. I'm Lia! Nice to meet you."

She wrote a bit more than that, and although she sounded friendly and sane, I replied that I wasn't looking for a long-distance relationship.

She responded, "We can still be friends, can't we?" and then launched into her life story.

I saw no problem with remaining friends, and I told her so. She wrote me at least twice a day for a week straight, and while I wrote her back when I could, writing to her wasn't a very high priority on my list of daily, much less weekly, activities.

She pointed that out to me after a few days: "Hey Jonathan, I've noticed that you don't write me as much as I write you. Why?"

I wrote back that I was busy (which was true, not a blow-off), and could only respond so often. She replied, "Okay, then it's time for plan B."

I had no idea what plan B meant until in the middle of my workday, my phone rang with a number I didn't recognize. I picked it up and was surprised to hear, "Hey Jonathan! It's Lia!"

"How did you get this number?"

She said, "I have my ways. You could at least be excited to hear from me. We're friends, right?"

Less and less so. I told her, "I appreciate the phone call, but now's a bad time. I'm at work and–"

"So when's a good time? Tonight? I'll call you tonight."

All six times she called me that night, I didn't pick up. She left me strange voicemails, all about what good friends we were and how she couldn't wait to talk to me and meet me. I decided at that point to stop talking to her completely, and while I read some of them, I ignored her future messages and didn't answer her future calls.

Instead of driving her away, this frustrated her to the point of writing me a message in which she wrote, "11 Windemere St., Columbia, MO 65201. That's where you live, and that's where I'll be this weekend. I'm driving out there to sort this out, once and for all. See you soon, friend!"

I would have been a little freaked out, but 11 Windemere, however she came by the address, was a place that I hadn't lived in three years. What a fun surprise that would be for her. The messages she sent me over the following two days were full of, "Here's what we'll do when I see you…" and "Can't wait to see you!"

The weekend arrived, and no joke, I must have received close to a hundred calls from her. Each voicemail was funnier than the last:

"Hey, I'm on my way! See you soon, good buddy!"

"I'm stuck in traffic, but I'll be there soon!"

"I just crossed into Missouri! Can't wait to see you, friend!"

"We're such good friends! I can't get over what good friends we are, and what fun, friendly stuff we'll be doing together, friend! Yay for friends! Yay for you! Yay for me! Yay for us, being friends!"

"I'm in Columbia! The city where good friends meet! I'm passing by the university right now! Maybe we can take a walk there later! There is so much fun stuff to do when you're with a friend!"

"I'm turning onto your street! I'll be seeing you in just a few seconds! I can't believe that we're such good friends that I would do this, but that's what I do for my friends! And you are such a good one!"

"Okay, so apparently, you don't live at 11 Windemere Street anymore, but I'll find you. I swear it. If I have to die, I will find where you live. If I have to quit work and spend all of next week and knock on every door in this fucking city, I will find you."

"I'm staying in a motel tonight. Sure would be nice to spend the night with my friend, but my friend's gone AWOL. Maybe it's time for me to change tactics. See you soon."

"Today's a brand new day in search of my friend. Can't wait to find him and set him the fuck straight about what friendship means."

Her messages abruptly stopped, and aside from a final email from her that said, "went home. byebye," I never heard from her again.