Dear Alice:

I am re-reading your three posts in an effort to answer the question in the title of your thread: “does my coworker crush like me back?”

This English, 24 year old man moved to France six months ago, and he works at an after school club everyday with you. You are French, 24, working and practicing your English with him. You wonder if the following indicate that he likes you back as a crush (my answers follow each item):

(1) “I’ve often seen him looking at me while we’re working and looks away when I catch him”- not an indication. First, he may be looking at your direction, not at you, and it only seems like he is looking at you, second, it may be that he is uncomfortable with an unexpected eye contact with anyone, and that’s why he quickly looks away.

(2) “He’s always  making jokes and laughing a lot with me”- not an indication: he may be joking and laughing simply because he feels happy being around people, and socializing helps him pass the time. (It may indicate that he does not dislike you as a person, because if he disliked you, he would be less inclined to make jokes and laugh a lot around you).

(3) “He’s said that he thinks of me every time he sees a football player.. because we’re from the same place”- not an indication. If he likes to socialize, he also likes to talk, so he says a lot of things in the many hours he spends with you every day, this may be just one of the many things he says with no particular intent.

(4) “he brought clothes shopping to work with him and another coworker asked why he had them and he said it was because he needed to impress me, and told me not to worry, that he was getting there.. some kids at school said the two of us are in love and so planned our ‘wedding’..”- not an indication. He probably heard what the kids say, just as you have,  so what they say is on his mind, and that may have prompted his comment regarding trying to impress you and getting there. The kids may have come up with the idea that the two of you are in love because they noticed that you have a crush on him, looking at him in that soft, in-love kind of way.

(5) “He also repeats my name to himself a lot, e.g. after he’s said hello to me or someone else says my name”- if you mean that when he sees you he says: hello, Alice, and when he sees another person, he says: hello (name), then this too is not an indication that he likes you as a crush.

(6) “An old friend of mine works at the school during the week, too, and says she thinks he  likes me but who knows”- not an indication. Your old friend probably knows that you have a crush on him, so she wants you will feel good by telling you that she thinks he does like you as a crush. Her “who knows” indicates that she has no evidence that he likes you as a crush. She may entertain a wishful thinking that he likes you because she wants you to be happy, similar to your own wishful thinking which motivates a person to correctly or incorrectly interpret his behavior to mean that he likes you.

You shared that he seems shy sometimes, but the majority of the time you see him, he acts “confident, open and friendly”- this means that what you interpret as possible indications that he likes you as a crush may be him being confident, open and friendly, and not more than that.

You shared that he is “direct with everyone at work, although there are not many opportunities where he needs to be assertive”- the more evidence you gather that he is direct and assertive with people is  an indication that if he likes you as a crush, he is likely to tell you so directly.

All in all, I do not see evidence that he likes you as a crush. He may, but I don’t see the evidence.

anita