Anne finally admits to herself that her feelings for Peter are "pretty near to being in love with him" (March 3, 1944), and each entry in her diary records another topic of conversation discussed or another meeting between them. Anne realizes that Peter is very shy, and she does not want to appear too eager herself, so both of them seem to be hovering on the brink of declaring their love. She writes, "Who will be the first to discover and break through this armor?" And she then adds, "I'm glad after all that the Van Daans have a son and not a daughter; my conquest could never have been so difficult, so beautiful, so good, if I had not happened to hit on someone of the opposite sex" (March 6, 1944).
In one of her more introspective moods, Anne looks back to the girl she was and to the life which she led before she went into hiding, noting that ". . . it all seems so unreal. It was quite a different Anne who enjoyed that heavenly existence from the Anne who has grown wise within these walls" (March 7, 1944). While recognizing that her life beforehand had been enjoyable, she admits that she was certainly more superficial then, and that she will never again be able to live like that, at least not for long stretches of time. She maintains that even then she felt a certain emptiness, but disguised it with a constant flurry of activities and friends. She also analyzes the various phases which she has gone through after going into hiding. She speaks of her initial confusion, followed by depression and then, as she began to mature, both physically and emotionally, she describes her growing self-awareness, and finally, her discovery of her inward happiness through her close relationship with Peter Van Daan.
