Meet the Passenger Prince

Some men do not exactly pursue you; they sort of stand nearby looking hopeful until, almost by accident, you begin the relationship for both of you.

He likes you, possibly very much. He enjoys your company, answers warmly, lights up when you suggest seeing each other and may be perfectly happy once the two of you are together, but what he does not seem especially eager to do is move anything forward without a small ceremonial push from you.

Call him the Passenger Prince: not necessarily lazy, cold or uninterested, just far more comfortable once somebody else has grabbed the wheel.

He Hands You the Keys Almost Immediately

You meet, have a lovely conversation, and at the end he says, “Here’s my number. Call me,” which is technically an expression of interest and, emotionally, a rather elegant way of handing you the map, the keys and responsibility for whether anything happens next.

How generous.

If you call, wonderful—he is relieved. If you do not, he may conclude that you were not interested, despite having made no actual attempt to find out, because the Passenger Prince loves certainty but dislikes obtaining it personally. In his mind, giving you his number may already qualify as a daring romantic maneuver, somewhere between skydiving and crossing a suspension bridge in high winds.

Green Lights, Please. Several

Once dating begins, he often requires encouragement in generous quantities.

You may think you are being obvious because you are smiling, flirting, accepting dates and sitting close enough that a reasonably alert person would understand the general direction of traffic, but he remains cautious. Was that smile friendly? Did you really mean you had a good time? Perhaps touching his arm was simply an unfortunate balance issue.

So he waits for one more green light, then another, and before long you feel less like a woman being courted and more like the person responsible for keeping the entire intersection moving.

At some point you may begin wondering whether he needs romance or a crossing guard.

Somehow You Become the Driver

The shift happens gradually enough that you may not notice it at first. You pick the restaurant because he is happy with anything, choose the weekend because whatever works for you works for him, suggest the trip, start the important conversation and eventually ask where the relationship is going.

He agrees beautifully, which is exactly why the arrangement can take so long to reveal itself.

Nothing feels overtly wrong because he is cooperative, pleasant and usually happy to come along, but months later you may notice that the relationship has been moving largely because you keep moving it. The Passenger Prince is excellent company once the car is rolling; he simply shows very little enthusiasm for starting the engine.

If you naturally enjoy choosing and taking the lead, this may suit you perfectly. Some women genuinely prefer being the one who says, “We’re going here, at seven, wear something decent,” while a cheerful man appears on time and causes no trouble.

But if initiative is part of what attracts you, all that agreeable whatever you want eventually develops a different flavor. You wanted a partner, but somewhere along the way you seem to have acquired a very pleasant passenger with excellent manners and no apparent interest in navigation.

Both of You Are Waiting. Splendid

The Passenger Prince can create one particularly absurd romantic stalemate in which both of you are interested and absolutely nothing happens.

You are waiting for him to kiss you because the evening has been practically waving a flag, while he is waiting for unmistakable evidence that the kiss will be welcomed. You lean closer and he wonders whether the restaurant is noisy; you hold eye contact and he suddenly develops a passionate relationship with the dessert menu.

Three dates later, both of you are privately confused about why the chemistry never went anywhere.

Nobody rejected anybody.

The romance was simply defeated by excessive caution, a rare and elegant tragedy.

Reassurance Can Become a Full-Time Position

A little reassurance is normal, but when a man constantly doubts your interest, your attraction or even your reasons for being with him, the relationship can quietly become a confidence-restoration project.

You compliment him and he questions whether you mean it, you choose him and he wonders why, and you show affection only to discover that he is still looking for hidden motives, as though your desire to spend Saturday with him may be part of a sophisticated financial scheme.

At first, this can seem vulnerable and rather sweet, but eventually, instead of simply enjoying being loved, you find yourself continuously submitting supporting documentation: proof of attraction, proof of loyalty, proof that yes, you really did enjoy dinner and no, you are not secretly planning to vanish because he ordered the wrong wine.

You stop feeling like his girlfriend and begin feeling like the woman assigned to keep his self-esteem above sea level, which was not mentioned when you accepted the position.

The Passenger Prince Is Not Necessarily a Bad Man

The old alpha-and-beta language makes all of this sound much simpler than real people actually are. A quiet man can be extremely confident, a gentle man can take initiative, and a powerful man can still require enough reassurance to power a small city.

The more interesting question is what happens to you beside him. Do you enjoy leading, or do you slowly begin feeling that the entire relationship would roll gently into a ditch if you ever took your hands off the wheel?

A cautious, agreeable man may be kind, loyal and wonderfully easy to live with, and he may never turn dinner into a power struggle or insist that his preferred route is the only route known to civilization. But attraction has its own peculiar preferences, and if what you want is a man who initiates, risks rejection occasionally, makes plans and gives you the unmistakable feeling that he is actively coming toward you, endless cooperation may not scratch the same itch.

You can appreciate how sweet he is and still become tired of supplying all the momentum.

He Is Happy to Go Wherever This Is Going

And that may be the Passenger Prince’s defining feature: he is not necessarily resisting the relationship at all. He may be perfectly willing to be in it, deepen it and enjoy it; he just seems to require somebody else to start nearly everything—the date, the kiss, the weekend away, the conversation and the next step.

Eventually you may wonder what would happen if you simply stopped steering for a while. Would he finally grab the wheel, or would both of you sit quietly at the side of the road, each assuming the other had somewhere in mind?

That is the curious thing about the Passenger Prince: he may be completely willing to go wherever the relationship is going.

He is just waiting for you to drive.