New to dating apps and unsure what to expect
I’m 18F, graduating high school in 2 months, never dated or kissed, and I got hinge a couple days ago for fun—just to look at profiles with my friends and see what we find. I do want genuine connection and the experience of liking someone, it’s just that I have no idea what I’m doing and I’m not sure what to expect.
The first relevant guy I matched up with asked for a date the same day. He first commented on a fictional character from my profile, then we talked about our interests and shared some playful jokes without any heavy flirting and no mention of physical appearance. I was a bit nervous when he asked for a date because I assumed meet ups were typically suggested after at least a few days of talking (based on my friend’s experience). Overall however, I’m pretty excited.
The second guy is the cause of my stress right now. His opening line was a compliment to my appearance, and after exactly 3 messages:
Me: “actually my weekend is spent rotting on video games.”
Him: “awesome, when are we doing that?”
Unsure how to interpret his reply, I continued a different branch of the conversation until he popped a question similar to the one above. I assume he wants to meet up, but we literally know nothing about each other. Our conversation was going well, but it purely consisted of flirty banter and appearance-based compliments. I don’t know what his intentions are and my major worry is that his goal is to hook up. I understand that meeting in person ASAP is a common ideal for many people with perfectly good intentions, but I hope you can imagine the whiplash I felt going from the first guy to this. Unlike the first guy (who actually described what we are going to do on our date), I don’t feel any excitement to meet up with this second guy because I have no idea what to expect.
I’m sure I’ll be told to just ask the guy what his intentions are. I bet I’ll also be told that I’m too young for this and my worries are stupid and I need to get a journal. However, I’m posting this because I realized I have no idea how these interactions are supposed to go, I don’t know if there are any unspoken rules that I need to understand, and I’m hoping for some advice from people who have more experience on these apps. Please and thank you.