More Than Friends?

Hi everyone,

I have had an incredibly difficult past few 5 months. In December, I graduated from undergrad early, moved 8 hours away (no family or friends nearby) to a new state to start an extremely rigorous medical grad school program, and had my relationship of 3 years blow up unexpectedly. I’ve also been dealing with the death of a parent that occurred about a month ago.

Within these 5 months I grew close to a classmate in my grad program. We became friends, started seeing each other more and more in our social circle, and found we had a lot in common. 2 months into the program he kissed me. We tried being fwb at the start but he ended up deciding that it was something he was uncomfortable with so we went back to being friends since he wasn’t sure what kind of relationship he wants. We’re now 4 months into the program, sit with each other everyday during class, see each other one-on-one on the weekends (dinner, movies, or just talking for hours), and genuinely just seem to enjoy each others company. I guess my dilemma is, I have developed feelings for this classmate - especially the more we learn about each other and the more we have in common. Even though we’re just “friends” it does not feel platonic at all. When we’re together, he’s still touchy and flirty but nothing beyond that. I feel like there’s something more there, but I know he’s had lots of fears of starting a relationship when our grad program is so intense and short in length (we’ll graduate spring of 2027).

I guess my question is, what should I do? Continue being “friends” and respecting this guys fear of a relationship? Give him space and see if he develops feelings on his own? Or do I put myself out there, confess feelings soon and potentially lose my closest support system in the program? Being rejected would hurt so much considering everything else I’ve gone through.

Has anyone else had a strange experience where your friendship with someone just felt like so much more than that?