How to tell my long term crush that I like him?

I've known him since we were both about 15/16, we clicked pretty quickly in school and then went and did a year of the same courses at college (he did both years, I dropped out). I'm about to turn 20, and I tried to tell him how I feel about him when I invited a few friends to a poker night (this weekend just gone, as my house was completely empty) and he was the only one who replied to the invite. We were flirting a bit beforehand, and he even suggested (jokingly) that we 'Netflix and chill'.

When he arrived he came straight upstairs, sat on my bed...and we just watched some YouTube videos and barely said a word to each other. He ordered us a takeaway (his treat), and we ate (again in near silence, broken up by pointless small talk) - I was struggling to eat as I was so massively over thinking what I wanted to say that I couldn't even look him in the eye.

After he'd been here for about 3 hours, he said the bus was in 20 minutes, and that he'd be leaving soon, I panicked (making my job even harder, although at least I was no longer so much embarrassed as I was terrified of missing another opportunity).

I should explain that this is the second time that this exact scenario has existed (we even ate the same meal), but this time was different, I was trapped in a bubble of self doubt and shame - I've never found it this difficult to talk to him, maybe because I've never tried to go so head-on.

Just as he was about to leave, I got up, sat right next to him on the sofa, put my arm around him and really tried to just ask him if he'd like to be more than friends...you might've guessed by the fact that I'm writing this that what actually happened is more *playing a game on his phone* than *having an honest discussion about starting a romantic relationship*.

In short, I bottled it.

He left. I stood at the door, banging my head against the wall :bang: and calling myself some very unhelpful names. I'm at the stage now where I want him to either stop flirting with me and we just be normal friends, or we become 'an item'. I'm wondering if it's worth just texting him 'do you want to be my boyfriend?', but I wanted to do that face to face so as not to seem impersonal (or worse, as if I'm joking) - it seems clear that I haven't got the stomach for it (literally, considering the constant state of nerves-induced nausea I was in for the entire evening).

I should also add that I came out to him years ago, I think when we were maybe 16/17. I'm fairly sure he's gay (90%), out at last not straight - I've picked up plenty of signals, and I think he's dropped hints, for example: he went onto a friend's computer at college typed loads of random letters, and I noticed that in the middle, in a little empty space he'd made, it said 'I'm gay'. He's done things that don't seem like hetero behaviour, winking at me, putting his hand on my thigh or his head on my shoulder - people in college thought we were a couple anyway (further adding to my regret that we still aren't).

Admittedly, this is mostly just me venting my thoughts - I'm not at all an emotional person normally, but now I feel rejected and unwell (I've not been eating or sleeping properly since he came round...it's past 3am as I'm writing this). I would like any suggestions regarding what to do - he doesn't seem phased by the other night, he rang me the next day and we played Xbox together (online, not in the same place), and talked as we normally do over Xbox live voice chat, I felt nervous again, as I contemplated just telling him then. I'm mentioning this because it seems like I've got a chance to just forget that anything happened (or rather, didn't), and stay as we were for so long. As I said, I'm done with that now - I want to still be friends, even if he's not interested romantically, but I feel like he's leading me on - I really hope that he knew what I was trying to do the other night, and that he just was as nervous as I was, and that's why he didn't speak up.

I've never been drunk before, but it's looking like an increasingly nice idea right about now.

Maybe I'll just send him a link to this post?

 

It says in there (after I say I'm 90% sure), 'out at last'. It should read, 'or at least'. It might've caused confusion.

 

I texted him asking out on a 'proper date' after I get paid next week...

He said no.

I'm hoping that because I'm texting him, that maybe he thinks it's someone playing a prank on me - or maybe it's just because I sprung it on him a little bit suddenly (I was just talking to him on Xbox about 10 minutes before, for a few hours).

We'll see what he says after he's had chance to sleep on it, although I'm not as heartbroken as I thought I'd be - I'm quite relieved to get everything off my chest to be honest. (And I'm not fully convinced that he really has no interest, it seems like a knee-jerk reaction).

Anyway, if I speak to him tomorrow, and he really doesn't want a relationship, I'm perfectly willing to let him go...hopefully it'll not be too awkward from here on - this was the hard part, right?

 

It's been about a week now, so I texted him to see if he had reconsidered (I'm willing to take no for an answer, but I didn't want to give up hope so soon).

He very clearly said that he's not gay (or non-hetero), and I should stop trying to 'seduce him', I lost my temper slightly when he made some kind of remarks about me being 'basically just gay' (which I really didn't see coming).

Anyway, I think it's maybe time to let this crush fade - if he is straight he's been inadvertently fanning the flames for years (for context, I've had two crushes since I've known him, a guy and a girl, both of which faded after a few months of getting to know them, this one's been 5 years in the making). I feel really led on, and I felt confident that this was almost a sure thing, I've had a week of feeling pretty bad but having hope that'll he'll change his mind, but now I don't see a way forward, we'll probably still be friends, but never anything more.

All in all, I don't regret doing this, what was said needed saying, I'm just sad that it didn't go the way I'd hoped.