u/Kitchen_Fish4390

How do I get over a crush without distancing myself?

tldr: I like a friend I know since middle school. She knows I like her and (heard from another friend) said she woul never date me but her attitude towards me keeps being confusing. I want to talk to her but I don't want to cross boundaries

hi, so I (19F) like one of my dearest friends (19F), let's put her "Stella". The whole context is kinda messy I think but the thing is I have known her since first year of middle school. I always had this little attraction towards her and it started being loud(? the last year of middle school

on our senior year in high school we did together one of the obligatory preuniversitary courses our school had and there we meet "Sarah" (18F at the moment). She went to a different school (lowkey important for later). We became good friends and slowly I saw my friend develop feelings for her. I told Sarah I liked my friend, time went on and Sarah and her started seeing each other.

it was awful for me but I tried to be supportive cuz they were both my friends. Things got rough within them cuz Stella is really avoidant and distant and Sarah was really dependant and anxious. We were finishing school so Stella was spending a lot of time at my house with other friends from our class and wasn't spending too much time with Sarah now that the course was over and since she wasn't part of our class nor school she wasn't invited. In one of this hangs out Sarah went to my house to walk home with Stella and have A TALK. Stella told us that they broke up later that night.

Weeks later, at prom, a former friend invited Sarah and her and Stella talked all night. Another friend of ours told me later that:

1. One of the motives they broke up was because Sarah was insecure about Stella spending so much time with me, telling her that I like her in the process

2. She told Sarah that NOTHING would EVER happened nor would happen within us

there was other stuff happening around the friend group, like, lots of drama, so I really thought, knowing how she was, Stella would avoid and ignore me, but she keep talking with me like nothing happened, being more sweet than ever.

Where I live we have a graduation trip after finishing high school and I was the only one going from my friend group so I asked her to have a talk about everything before the trip. She agreed but kept pushing the meeting until the trip day arrived so we never talked.

I don't know how or if I should talk to her, I don't know how to read her actions towards me, I'm so confused. For starters, we are overly touchy with each other, she pets (? me a lot and let's me rest on top of her even tho she hates physical contact, she didn't even do this with Sarah (this is kind of tricky cuz before Sarah I was the one initiating and after her I tried not to do it anymore but now Stella initiates it, even if is not often). Also we sleep (literally) together when we have slumber parties, we cuddle and hold and pet(? each other almost every night we spend together, thats something that besides me she has only done with Sarah.

She knows I like her and I don't know what I should do. We had lots of issues during school that were left untalked and thats stuff we should talk about too I think but she hasn't bring it up now and I really dont wanna push her if she doesn't want to talk. I'm trying my best to stay grounded and distance myself. On one side is easy cuz she really doesn't text me (but she doesn't text with anyone lol) nor hangs out alone with me but at the same time I really do wanna talk to her and chat and hang out one on one and all that yet I don't wanna cross boundaries nor make trouble within the friend group cuz we'd been friends so long now and I dont really wanna ruin anything for them but ughahajdnajka

sorry if my english is wacky. Pls someone help