Dear Breakup Girl,

I recently started dating this girl and I like her very much. But everytime I see her she insists on bringing her best friend along. She expects me to bring a friend to keep her friend company. I didn’t mind this the first few times but now it is way outta hand. When she calls me she has her bestfriend on three-way. Plus she tells her best friend everything about our relationship and I feel that some things should be left between us. How do I let her know this without offending her?

— Anonymous

Dear Anonymous,

Yeah, well, as three-ways go, that’s not so much the kind that people fantasize about. Bringing A Friend — on a date, never mind a phone call – almost always means Take a Hint. But I wonder if in this case, we might want to reinvent the third wheel.

She (they) does (do) call you; she does want you to bring a friend for the Friend (thus upgrading her from Chaperone). Except for the telephone part, there’s something about it that’s a little Jane Austen/Edith Wharton — you know, where it’s unseemly for a single woman to be alone with a man to whom she is not betrothed, or with whom she is not having an affair.

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