I (19F) and one of my closest friends (20M) have been friends for almost 4 years. We've been there for each other through some pretty crazy shit, including a lot of his family and relationship drama as well as my parents getting separated. About a year after we became friends, our older siblings (22F and 25M) started dating. We're all really close so we'll often hang out all together. I really do love him and his older brother and they honestly feel like family to me.

Keyword: family. Which is why what happened has been rubbing me in such a wrong way. For context: he's well aware I'm almost exclusively attracted to women, and that I'm asexual. This has never been an issue and we've even bonded over both liking girls. Finally, he just broke up with a girl he'd been dating for quite a while. He's dated a few different girls throughout our friendship and it's really never felt relevant to me, but in this context felt important to mention.

The incident in question started off pretty normal. He'd mentioned via text that we should hang out soon and finish a videogame we'd started ages ago, but never actually completed. I had enjoyed playing the game last time, so I was down. We've hung out one-on-one loads over the past 4 years and this wasn't by any means the first time we'd hung out in his room so this didn't come across as a weird suggestion.

Then I'm at his house. The moment we enter his room, the vibe is completely different. He laid down on his bed and I sort of awkwardly stood there until I asked "soooo are we going to set up the gaming console?" and he responded with "huh? and when i didn't say anything, "oh, yeah. right" as if he'd forgotten the entire reason he asked to hang out. He reluctantly set it up and proceeded to hardly talk to me, laying on the bed the entire time while I played the game by myself. I can't emphasize enough that I felt the most uncomfortable I ever have in my entire life. After hours of me desperately trying to make conversation with him and him just laying on the bed effectively ignoring me, I made some excuse to go home and he drove me back.

That alone was enough to make me think I had misread his intentions, but the icing on the cake is that he hasn't texted me once since this happened (around two months ago). I'm so confused – I mean this is the guy who's relationship drama I've been lending a listening ear to for years. This just doesn't feel like him anymore, and I can't reconcile that the friend he used to be to me would also be interested in using me for shallow pleasure.

I've had other friends who've warned me that "guys only want one thing" and I've always pushed back against it because I don't subscribe to the whole "men and women can't be friends without there being feelings" bullshit. But this was my closest friend, the last person who I'd expect this from. I feel stupid and naive for thinking that this was a platonic relationship with mutual respect and it seems like I was the only one who thought that. He acted like a completely different person and I don't think I'd feel comfortable being around him anymore. Am I totally reading this incorrectly? Am I a dumbass for thinking that it was genuinely an invitation to play videogames? I'm terrible at reading this sort of thing and would appreciate some perspective from people who don't have the emotional biases that I do from knowing him for so long.


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