Was it a real crush or just a missed “what if” situation?
There’s a guy from my class (I’ll call him Leo) that I can’t stop thinking about sometimes, and I’m trying to understand whether I actually liked him or if I’m just attached to a “what if” situation.
At the beginning of the school year, I became friends with Leo through our friend group. We would all hang out, play games, and join voice calls together. Sometimes everyone else would leave and it would just be me and him, and we’d keep talking or playing. It always felt very natural and comfortable.
One moment that stuck with me happened while we were playing a horror game. Out of nowhere, Leo asked me if I felt safer when he was around. It was a small comment, but I still remember it clearly for some reason.
Around that time, I think I started developing a crush on him.
Then one of my friends (I’ll call her Mia) also developed a crush on him.
Mia became very jealous of how naturally Leo and I got along as friends. She started gossiping about me, questioning other people, and acting like there had to be something between us. At one point, she even directly asked Leo if he liked me.
Leo’s response was apparently:
“she wouldn’t like me.”
Meanwhile, Mia also tried to set me up with another guy from our group (I’ll call him Ethan). There was a lot of pressure from the friend group, teasing, and pushing us together, so eventually I ended up dating Ethan for a while.
The truth is I never actually had feelings for Ethan. I think I mostly went along with it because I didn’t want to hurt anyone and I had never really been in a relationship before.
What’s ironic is that Mia couldn’t accept that Leo wasn’t interested in her, while I couldn’t accept that I wasn’t interested in Ethan, even though both of us were being influenced by the group dynamic.
Eventually, the whole friend group fell apart because of drama, gossip, and constant tension. Most people stopped talking to Mia because of how much conflict she caused.
Nothing ever happened between me and Leo.
But for some reason, he still sticks in my mind.
I’ve had relationships before and after that, but I’ve never really missed my exes or dreamed about them. Yet Leo, who I never even dated, sometimes appears in my dreams where we’re together and it feels strangely natural.
What confuses me is that he’s not even my usual type physically. If I had to describe my “type,” I probably wouldn’t have picked someone like him.
But what I liked was his personality. He was funny, a bit goofy, understanding, hated gossip, and didn’t seem like someone who enjoyed hurting or judging others.
I don’t think I’m actually in love with him, but I keep wondering what it would’ve been like if we had dated. Sometimes I even think about how we would’ve been in a different place or at a different time, where things weren’t so messy or influenced by other people. I’m genuinely happy with how things are in his life now, especially since he’s actually dating another close friend of mine but I still catch myself overthinking everything sometimes.
I keep wondering if he was just the first person I genuinely liked for who he was, instead of liking someone because they liked me, looked good, or because I felt pressured.
Has anyone experienced something similar? Is this just a “what if” my brain never let go of?