I'm bi.

I stopped dating before finding FDS. Then Covid hit. So I've had every reason in the world for me not to date.

I've started putting more effort into friendships.

There's this one friend in particular I've been spending more time with. We go for long drives. We've got dinner tonight everyday for almost 10 days. We met through a game and got kinda close since we were the only female participants.

We've been friends for 2 years and we've been open about our dating lives. We're both bi and we were both in a shitty relationship before this.

Right now I think we're both kind of lonely with Covid so we've been hanging out a lot, nearly everyday.

For the past 5 times we got dinner she hasn't let me pay, even going so far as to find a waitress before hand to pay or to physically grab the machine when it comes.

I told her she didn't have to pay all the time. She just responded with "so what if I pay all the time?" I told her it wasn't fair and I didn't expect it. She just changed the subject.

Yesterday we went to a drive in movie theatre. We sort of cuddled under blankets together and we massaged each other and tickled each other's backs. We had space because she borrowed a friend's pick up truck.

She asks for massages from everyone because she works a physically demanding job. It's basically a running joke that whenever I see her at her work, she's coerced another security guard or friend to give her a massage (all women so far, idk if that matters).

The massaging and tickling thing was nice - I haven't been physically intimate with another person in over half a year, and it was just nice to touch and be touched by someone I trust.

But I realize it might not mean for me what it means for her. I'm not attracted to her and there are certain flaws she has I wouldn't want in a partner.

A day before we went to the drive in theater, in a round about way she mentioned we weren't going on a date. She randomly told me about how her coworker dated a trans person - this was related a talk we had where I told her I found it really difficult to call trans people "they/them" because that kind of verbage interferes with how I've been taught English.

So she told me about this coworker dating a trans person. She introduced the topic by saying that she told her coworker that she and I were going to see a movie at a drive in. Her coworker asked if it was a date. My friend replied, no, it's not a date, were just friends spending time together. Her coworker replied that you never know since my friend is bi, and the coworker said that since she dated a trans person she's open to a lot of stuff.

It felt like a round about way to either communicate that it wasn't a date, or to assess my reaction in being told that it wasn't a date.

Anyway. TLDR

Points for we're going on dates:

  • she pays for everything or almost everything

  • were both bi

  • recently she's asked me a lot of questions about my bisexuality

  • we've gotten more physical with each other - massages, light touching on arms/back. Nothing sexual or kissing.

  • in general, talking about dating we both said that we probably wouldn't ask another person out. So maybe, she's expecting me to pick up on the subtleties.

  • we text a lot

Points for we're not dating:

  • nothing was called a date.

  • she asks for massages from everyone, so its not necessarily something that she reserves for people she's being intimate with.

What I want of this is a friend to do fun things with during Covid. I want to work on my female relationships and relationships with women overall.

I don't expect her to pay for everything, and while I'm more than happy to pay I don't want to do aggressive things like track down a waiter to beat her to paying.

I don't mind being more physical with her. I actually really liked massaging each other.

But, I understand that everything combined might be... Something?

I don't know at what point hanging out with a friend frequently turns into dating. I don't want to date her, I want to be friends. But I also don't want to embarrass her or myself by initiating a talk to say we're only friends, if it might not even be get intention to be dating.

What do you think?