'Was It Even Real?'

Making an expressive, sensitive man your best friend can be an exercise in disappointment.

The Blue Waltz (1953) by Dorothea Tanning

Dear Polly,

Over the summer I spent a couple months with a guy I met through a mutual friend. He wanted to move out of LA and said he wasn't in a place to date. At the time this felt fine to me and I agreed to be his friend. For the next month we spent every day talking, sending each other six-inch-long texts back…