So, by the end of Part 4, I was pretty, kinda, mostly sure that Mr. Thor liked me at least a little bit. This was the middle of January. When we both worked at The Dirty Store, I usually worked until 4. He usually worked until 9.

Did I mention the part where I had never had a boyfriend before? Because I had never had a boyfriend before Mr. Thor (other than the handful in 6th grade, but, c’mon.) and I had no idea how we were going to get from where we were to where we should be.

So, I loitered. I stayed after work and kept Mr. Thor company while he wiped up coffee spills and lottery ticket shavings and sold dirty magazines and cigarettes. We talked, and talked, and talked some more. And when we got home, we e-mailed. We were in communication, a lot. We e-mailed on our days off, on our days on. We talked about our families, about our coworkers, about our interests and fears.

In our e-mails, we talked about how lucky we felt to know each other. I called him my favorite.

And then, something happened to me one Saturday. February 2, 2008. A realization hit me: if things didn’t move forward, they would move nowhere. And Mr. Thor would fade off the end of the page into the pile of other guys I have liked too much to be just friends.

Except… wait. Panic! I felt total panic at the thought of losing him. That afternoon, I took his picture. That night, I stayed overnight with my friend Jax – we were planning to watch the Giants play the Patriots in the Superbowl. Tom Petty was playing the halftime show. Mr. Thor and I were both rooting for the Giants, because the Patriots had, up til the Superbowl, had a perfect season and we were going to be rooting for the underdogs, who also happened to be “his” team.

(shut up, I know, I know! I got into football for a guy and I actually love it!)

The Giants upset the Patriots in that game, and Mr. Thor and I sent a flurry of e-mails back and forth throughout the game.

The next day, we kept the string going. I had a job interview and he sent me an encouraging e-mail.

Then, we got into a conversation about work, and how he thought our manager had busted us for having so much fun, because we hardly seemed to work together anymore.

And then, I wrote:

“i think you’re right, PJ has busted us.

well, that, and it might have something to do with the fact that she thinks you have a crush on me. she informed me of her conclusion last week sometime by saying: “Mr. Thor has a crush on you.”

i said, “he does?”

she said, “you didn’t notice?”

(i have no clue about these kind of things.)

she is actually the second person at work to bring this to my attention.

what say you to these allegations? do you have a crush on me?

i hope so,
amelia
xoxo”

I totally put it all out there!

The only problem with my timing was that Mr. Thor was at work when I sent that e-mail.

…for another 2 hours.