This is my first post so not sure if this is in the right place, also sorry to vent! Ok I came out a few months ago to my family and have been gradually coming out to close friends since, fyi I'm 17. So one girl in school's boyfriend recently got an exchange student from Austria who's here till June. He has come to a few of our school parties but I only met him for the first time properly last weekend. Anyway one of my guy friends who is gay (and who I haven't come out to) is convinced he is gay and has been hitting on him majorly and trying to pull him. The exchange student keeps rebuffing him and telling him he's straight. So after this party the other night we went back to a girl's house, as we were walking to the house he kept like playing chasing with me and generally being quite tactile and touchy. I was drinking but I vaguely remember him touching my hand and/or ass. Once we get to her house we're all just sitting around and I go outside to get some fresh air and sit down on a bench, literally 2 mins later he comes out and sits down right beside me even though they're are about 5 other empty chairs. We start chatting and he starts to roll his eyes when our gay friend comes outside hinting that I leave (which I most certainly was not going to do, I forgot to mention the student is literally an adonis, tanned and talks like Arnold Schwarzenegger). His host family happens to live near me and he asks if we should get the train home together, so we leave and once it gets to his train stop he keeps asking me if I get off there too which I don't so he gets off. All the while he keeps repeating that he is not gay and does not want to get with our gay friend. After this I message him on fb, we swap numbers and we've been whatsapping for the last few days, he's really engaging and spends sooo long sending really lenghty texts about everything. Anyways I'm wondering what I should do? How do I turn our conversation towards finding out if he likes me or not? I'm not sure if he's gay or it's just his culture etc? Should I just try and pull him when I next see him? HELP! I really like this guy! Thanks in advance x ---------- Post added 20th Mar 2014 at 01:05 AM ---------- Also I forgot to mention how he continuously stares at me and smiles ALL THE TIME. He doesn't look away, and if I acknowledge it just encourages him!
It's hard to know. I myself am currently doing an exchange right now. You need to consider the language barrier. I expect his english is very good (it generally is from Europeans) but there still might be issues in communicating subtly things... which might be giving you the wrong idea. If he says he's straight, assume he is until told otherwise.
I agree that you should try to accept what people label themselves. What you're doing is very similar to your gay friend, but you are being more subtle. You're walking a fine line because this guy may get frustrated constantly being hit on by your friend, and he might feel you broke his trust if you were also pursuing him. Even if he was gay/bi, he could be in the closet and getting pushed farther in by having a gay guy hit on him. Maybe the best thing would be to first find if he's homophobic and, if not, think about coming out to him. It might allow you to show him no all gay guys are overt and aggressive. Also, he may be more comfortable to share his own personal feelings.
My guess is he's probably either questioning or gay, but it's hard to say for sure. The problem is, regardless of what he *actually* is, you have to go with how he labels himself. I'd focus on just being his friend for now, and perhaps you can, once you get to know him better, talk about your own questioning and simply see if he joins in on the conversation.
