At one point she tried to burn her arm with a cigarette lighter. Whenever I saw someone lighting a cigarette over the next few days, I felt like vomitting.

I've said this before: When it comes to love, I'm going to need a girl who has a more positive outlook than me on life... loving someone who's depressed can really bring you down if you already have negative tendencies yourself.

Not that my feelings for her are going to go away any time soon.  For perhaps six months after I met her, she was just another girl I had an infatuation for (and many of those feelings still remain), but since that time I have begun to genuinely like her as a person. And, actually contribute something to friendship, instead of being constantly caught up in my own selfish world.

Of course, I cannot completely divorce myself from my own issues these days. My feelings for her ensure that, even though I want her to fall in love with someone and have a positive, longlasting relationship, I would be incredibly jealous of the other person. Also, I subconciously live in this partial fantasy world when I'm around her... wanting something to happen between us, even though I fully realise that it won't, and that if it did it could have disastrous consequences for our friendship.

I don't think this is what love is. I don't even know if that is an emotion I am capable of. It even transcends physical attraction. Maybe I want to possess her in some way. I really don't know.

I know full well that, if Nikki and I did go out, we would not be suited to one another. We just don't share many similar interests, we have rather different world views, and I just don't think that we are what each other need in a partner. Why, if I've accepted that, can I not accept that we will never be anything more than friends?

Perhaps, upon reading this, the impression might be gained that I can only be making a negative impact on her life with the sort of mindset I possess. The irony is, I'm her only friend, and she actually needs me in that capacity. Perhaps its my mindet that does serve a purpose in the end... I'm always there when she wants me to be; because I don't have a girlfriend, she knows that she is number one; I may be a dork and a loser, but she realises that a 'cool', attractive, popular guy (and she has been friends with a few in the past) might not have nearly as much time for her as I do.

It actually makes me feel really good, though, that I have a positive impact on someone's life. Especially hers.

I really hope things work out for her. She is the only person in the world whose personal happiness can directly affect my own.... is that love?