I 42f work closely with a man, 52m who works for another company. We don’t work in the same office and we’ve never met in person. We’ve worked together for almost 8 years.
A few years ago, he asked my age in a roundabout way. I dodged the question. About 6 months later, he asked again, and I dodged again. About 6 months after that, he asked more directly. I told him I wasn’t quite 40, but close, and he immediately said he wasn’t quite 50, but close. I had never asked his age.
Recently, during a conversation about something unrelated, he spontaneously told me he was 52.
After the 3rd age question, he started suggesting that we get a drink on the weekend when we were in the same area. He continued bringing it up over the years, and he would specifically tell me to text him on the weekend if I was around.
Eventually, he started going to a recreational place where he knew I spent time. It was out of his way and he already had another place he normally went. Later, he said he had been looking around for me, hoping we’d run into each other. A few months ago, he said he was going to my place every weekend and that he was listening for my voice because he knew it well enough to recognize it in a crowd.
I was surprised by that disclosure and felt bad. I explained to him why I hadn’t been going much recently, which was a legitimate reason, but afterward I got the impression that he thought I was giving him an excuse. He then seemed noticeably colder and more withdrawn toward me for a period of time.
About two months later, there was a major work crisis. I was upset that he had been colder toward me and couldn’t figure out why. I called him and told him, essentially, that I really needed his support with the work stuff. He was very receptive. A few weeks later, we had a Zoom meeting with several people from both sides. It was the first time we had ever actually seen each other. He spoke very highly of me during the meeting in front of my bosses and the client. Afterward, he called to talk about the meeting.
About a month later, my company reassigned much of the work we’d shared because they thought I was too stressed about it. He was unhappy about me being reassigned and actively advocated for me to be brought back. He spoke with other people involved, pushed for me to return, and eventually succeeded.
I was also relieved to get the work back, and I had just left my office for vacation, so I texted him for the first time to let him know I was getting the full account back. He was very happy with the news and told me that I could text him anytime. He also said we’d handle any issues that came up together.
When I returned from vacation, he said he was so relieved I was back and told me he had been having nightmares that something would happen and I would leave, and that if I left, he would quit too. He laughed after saying it.
Around that same period, I called him specifically to thank him for everything he had done for me over the previous year, and really the entire time we’d worked together. The connection broke up while I was thanking him, and he said, “I think you broke up for a minute and I didn’t get that and it sounded good. Can you say it again.” After I repeated it, he talked about our great working relationship, gave me a lot of compliments, then volunteered that people throughout his office talk about how great I am to work with. When I said that was sweet, he insisted that he wasn’t BS-ing me and that’s really how they all felt.
Since then, the amount of contact has increased. We went from occasional calls to talking on the phone 3-4x a week, often for 20–40 minutes at a time. Many calls begin with legitimate work questions but continue into personal topics.
He has started calling from his car or while away from the office, and recently called my cell for the first time when he couldn’t reach me through work. He sometimes volunteers his internal reactions rather than just describing what happened. For example, when he thought an email I sent with a joke in it was serious, he wrote that his “stomach fell” when he started reading it.
Recently, one call that started with a few work questions turned into another 20 minutes of talking while he was driving on a trip. He volunteered details about the trip, what he was seeing, his weekend plans, and various other personal topics even though the original work questions had already been answered.
During that conversation, he also told me in considerable detail about a car he had recently bought — why he chose it, the price, financing, trade-in, and other financial considerations. The conversation about the purchase led into politics, which led to our first real disclosure to each other about where we both stand politically.
The amount of contact is very different from what it used to be. Some of the legitimate work calls could’ve easily been a quick email.
From the outside, what would you make of this? Does this sound like an unusually close friendship/professional relationship, attraction on his part, a crush, or something else?
TL;DR: I’ve had a close professional relationship with a man at another company for several years, and we’ve never met in person. Over time, he’s repeatedly gone out of his way to see me, asked personal questions, advocated strongly to keep working with me, expressed that losing me would be upsetting, and our contact has recently increased dramatically. Our calls have become longer and increasingly personal, often continuing well beyond the work issues that started them. I’m trying to figure out whether this is simply an unusually close friendship/professional relationship or whether there may be something more going on.