Heartbreak

I'm hurting right now. I don't know how much of it is my fault and how much is just bad luck, but I've been tense all day. This stuff relates to a sleepover I went to that went from Friday to Sunday, and I wanted to post the story of that first, but I suppose I'll just skip to the moneyshot so I can get this out of my system (even though I've spoken to a friend and it's still there...). For the record, the sleepover was fucking awesome, and I met eight amazing people who I had an insane amount of fun with. Though I made some mistakes along the way, I don't regret going at all.

So when I went for the sleepover, the other guests were all from the host's college; I, on the other hand, was from the host's high school, so they were all strangers to me. There was one girl there who, for the sake of this entry, I shall refer to as 'Violet'. For some reason, I thought she reminded me of Violet from The Incredibles—in retrospect, I don't actually see much resemblance. Her hair seems be based off Suzie's grump-face (which looks like this), but I'll call her Violet anyway.

Violet was one of the last to arrive on the Friday, and when I saw her, I thought she was really cute. She had black hair with a blonde highlight on the front, with a beautiful smile, and a thin build. As the night went on, I started crushing on her really hard. I loved her laugh, I learned she likes the same YouTube channels I do, and that she's a gamer, big time. Not being able to contain my feelings, I told a friend in private that I liked her, but she walked past the room we were in while we were talking, so I was somewhat afraid she'd overheard what I said. After a mostly-fantastic two nights, on the Sunday, I actually managed to ask her out.

Here is what happened, verbatim, to the best of my recollection:

Violet is due to leave in a few minutes. She and a few others head towards the door.

"Hey, Violet, could we talk for a minute?"

"Yeah, sure!"

Violet comes to me, but we don't go anywhere private; all the other guests are standing nearby.

"Uh, did you happen to overhear the conversation [the host] and I were having on Friday in the other room?"

"No, I didn't hear anything"

"Oh. Well, uh, we were talking about how I like you."

Violet smiles and laughs

 "I was worried that you overheard the conversation and that I might have offended you or something"

I'm not sure what Violet said here, if anything, or even if she heard that last line.

"I don't know if you're interested, or..."

"Well, I'm very flattered, but I just got out of a relationship, so..."

"Oh, that's not a problem then, no worries. So long as everything's cool between us, cos you guys [the whole group] are super cool and I'd love to hang with you again, so yeah."

"It was nice to meet you too!"

Violet holds her hand out and we shake hands.

At first, I took "I just got out of a relationship" to mean 'no', but I was still stoked I pulled it off given I haven't asked a girl out since my ex, and that was three-and-a-half years ago. I came home feeling triumphant: I didn't get the answer I wanted, but I more-or-less expected a 'no' anyway (because I thought she already knew due to hearing that conversation I mentioned earlier), so I wasn't torn over the rejection. I just revelled in the fact that I managed to conquer my fear of asking a girl out, if only once.

In telling friends about what I did, they both said "well, if she said 'I just got out of a relationship', maybe she meant she isn't ready for a date right now, but may be willing in the future". I was like "...what? I thought it was just a copout", because I was sure she just wanted to reject me without hurting my feelings. I don't think she was lying about just getting out of a relationship, but I was pretty sure she only said it to avoid rejecting me on a personal basis, just to not make me feel bad. I've never been fed this line before, but it wasn't hard to decode, and my Google-fu confirmed my suspicions regarding the true meaning of what she said.

The thing is, as soon as my friends suggested that it might not mean that, I began to regain hope of getting to ask Violet out, thinking that if I waited until the next time we met, if the conditions were right, I could try again. Hope started to return to me.

Today, I felt the opposite: the hope started to run away from me. I told my mum the story of what happened (she was sick so I couldn't tell her as soon as I got home), and she also told me it was probably a copout. She admitted this could be wrong, but that it probably wasn't. She also said that because I asked Violet out in front of her friends, she was more likely to use a copout so she didn't come across as a jerk in front of them.

The words she used weren't the only problem, though—I also started to regret how I phrased my invitation. When I was there, I remembered quite common advice I found in r/seduction and r/socialskills which said you should be assertive and specific when asking girls out. Like, you should make the offer in the imperative ("Let's go out!") rather than as a question ("Would you like to go out?"); and you should make the date for a specific activity, place, date, and time rather than leaving it open. Both these things supposedly make you come across as more confident and leave less decisions that need to be made by the person you're asking out. This is something people subconsciously like, apparently. Rejection can still occur; you're just more likely to get a 'yes', I suppose.

I knew I couldn't make it for a specific place because Violet lives in Sydney and I don't, so I'd have to organise that with her later on, because I wanted to travel up there to save her the hassle. I'd have been happy to ride the train for two hours up and two back to meet up with her, absolutely. I also knew the date/time could be a problem for the same reason. But I did want to offer a specific activity: meeting for coffee. Casual, cheap, allows us to talk and get to know each other—the perfect activity. The problem is that I only said "I don't know if you're interested" and stopped there, rather than saying "I don't know if you're interested in meeting up for coffee sometime", or, better yet, "Would you like to meet up for coffee sometime?" For all I know, she thought I meant "I don't know if you're interested in being in a relationship", which is way too forward.

I'm anxious because I don't know why I was rejected. It could be any combination of a) the fact Violet just got out of a relationship, b) the fact I worded my invitation wrong, and c) Violet just not really being into me at all. If it's Option A, that's my bad luck, but if I'm patient, I might be able to ask later and see if she's open then. If it's Option C, then there's nothing I can really do about that. But if it's Option B, I'm going to be really irritated. If I learned she didn't want to go out with me simply because I chose the wrong fucking words... goddamn it.

I don't know if I'm crushing on Violet anymore, but a huge part of me still wants to meet with her for coffee, cos I wanna get to know more about her. We didn't talk too much at the sleepover, certainly not mono-a-mono, but with what I know about her from listening to her at the sleepover, I know we have a lot in common. There are lots of things we both like that she doesn't know I like, and there are lots of things she doesn't know about me full stop (like I never mentioned to anyone in the group that I do stand-up), so maybe if she's aware of those things, we can become closer.

For now, I can't really do anything other than distract myself. I'm still kinda hurting, but that comes with the territory. I've sent Violet a friend request on Facebook (same for everyone who went), but she hasn't accepted hers yet (though everyone else has). I don't believe she's on Facebook often, but hopefully, next time she's on, she accepts the request—it's the only communication avenue I'm going to have. Having her accept it will also make me feel a little less tense, like it's a sign she's cool with being friends.

But I have a plan. I still wanna meet with Violet, which I think I can do: it just can't be a 'date'. I don't even want it to be a date: I just wanna chat to her, hang out, have fun. So, I'll give it some time, and if I can get in touch with her (hopefully not through Facebook, cos she'll never respond), I'll ask to meet up with her for coffee where she lives. In constructing my invite, I'll have to be very very clear that it's not a date and that I just wanna meet up cos I think it'd be fun. My mum suggested I do it on a day where I take a friend to Sydney for other things: this could be a good idea. I'd be asking Violet if she wants to meet up when I'm already in Sydney, rather than me travelling to Sydney specifically to meet with her, which could come off as a bit extreme. The friend I'll go with has similar interests to Violet, too; and she's a girl, so it'll be more comfortable for Violet.

The way I see this working is as follows: if Violet isn't interested in anything romantic, which I predict, then we can just hang out, chat, learn about each other, and maybe it'll be the start of a friendship. If, for whatever reason, she is open to more than friendship, it will come across when we meet up, and we can explore that if it goes in that direction. Either way, I'll get to see her again, I'll get to learn more about who she is, and she'll get to learn about me.

To be honest, I wanna see the whole group again, too, because I had a fantastic time with them. They were so kind, so accepting, and so funny to be around. But ironically, though I crushed on her, Violet is the one I know the least about. I'm just curious about her, you know? As far away as she is, and as disconnected as we currently are, I'm still game to meet her. I know I've got my whole life ahead of me, and there are heaps of women out there, but given how close we are in terms of similarities, I don't see myself meeting a girl like Violet for a while. So I should make the most of it, even if we're just friends. Maybe I could become closer to the whole group and become really integrated—that would make me really happy.

I hate the tension, though. I'm so uncomfortable that I wish I was with the group again just so I could be comfortable once more, because I felt so free around them, like I could joke around and be myself. I'm so glad to have met them; I think I'd feel ten times worse if I was told I'd never see any of them again. But Violet is still special to me. I hope we can at least be friends.