So I have this friend (Roger) that has been more than slightly creepy recently. The thing is, he's actually a pretty decent friend when he's not being creepy, so it's not the sort of situation where I'd like to just cut ties and move on. We went to the same university for three years, but recently I've transfered to one back home (more than four states away from his), so all of our conversations have been online. During my time there, he asked me out twice and when I said I was leaving he mentioned being sad he couldn't go through with the plan he'd been working on to try to win me over this year. I turned him down each time and on the final one assured him it wouldn't have worked. Even that was presented as more of a joke, so I didn't feel anything wrong about keeping in touch. Now, I'm not sure if it's the distance or what's happened, but he's definitely been acting weirder since I've been back home.
This summer he decided to jump on the anime fan bandwagon with the rest of our friend group. He said he was tired of not getting our jokes and being the odd man out at the local convention (it's a comic/sci-fi/anime combination con) when everyone in the group wanted to really go see this voice actor or cosplay game panel. Plus, he said he's really like the few anime shows he's seen, so he asked us all for suggestions and we've all been marathoning shows with him individually. Alright, nothing weird about that, right? Apparently, not...
He'd do this thing where he'd finish a show and then refuse to comment on it until I told him how I felt about it. Like he was afraid to disagree with me or something. One time I had skyped in for DnD night and another friend (Tim) commented on how I should've gotten on sooner because they'd all just finished FLCL. I laughed and said, "oh god, I should've stayed off longer!" Tim in joking shock goes, "whaaaat?!" and everyone in the rooms seems to echo it. I just laughed and made some joke about it before asking how Roger liked it. He just sort of shrugged and said, "it was okay". And then Tim and the other people in the room just all look really confused and start saying, "yeah, that's why you were about to piss yourself laughing" and stuff that clearly told me was lying. After further talks with Tim and some other friends, I found out he'd been lying about more than one show as far as liking/disliking goes.
Now if it stayed there I would probably just ignore it and continue to assure him that I learned how to control my terrible fangirl side years ago and that I can perfectly handle someone not liking the same things I do, but this seemed to just be the starting point. During the shows he marathons with me on skype he'll, like, stop looking at the show at random points and stick his tongue out or make some sort of stupid looking face to try to get my attention or he'll just be looking at me instead of the show and it makes me really uneasy. "Watch the show, stop looking at me like that's super weird" or "if you're not enjoying we can watch another show or just not", but apparently it falls on deaf ears. Like, I'm all about goofing off with my friends on skype and while watching shows, but the way he looks at me or just the super weird 'flirty' way his actions feel are terribly uncomfortable. Making stupid faces and jokes about anime? I'm here all day for that. Trying to flirt with a friend that has turned you down two or three times while under the guise you want to watch a show? Not so much.
He's made a few uncomfortable comments, for example I told him about a new show I was watching and he says, "you really have a thing for young detectives, don't you?" and I responded with, "haha, not really. I just have a thing for detective characters in general--it's just anime protags seem to be on the younger side". And then he says, "oh, well then it looks like I need to change my major wink " and I said, "don't do that" and immediately changed the subject.
He always makes comments like this or asking oh so subtly what would 'a guy have to do to get you to say yes to a proposal'. Also, he does this thing where it seems like he's baiting me into a situation where he can be a white knight type of guy. It's happened a few time and the most recent one had to do with my appearance. Like a lot of people, I enjoy doodling and he asked me out of the blue if I could enhance one part of myself what would it be. I answered something about mental capacity and he goes, "oh". Then he asks if I could change a physical part of me what would it be and I said I'd probably like some sort of permanent hearing aid. My hearing isn't terrible, but honestly I'm 21 and it's already starting to go. That's irrelevant though, sorry.
He says, "oh, like robotic elf ears?!" and I say, "no, I wasn't really thinking about it in a fantasy situation." He then says, "you should totally draw yourself with elf ears!!" and I just kind of stopped. What? Why would I do that?
I said, "no thanks, haha. I might try to draw some sort of robotic elf later though." He asks why I wouldn't just draw me instead and I told him I'm not really the self-portrait type of person seeing as I never enjoyed having to do them in school, but he still didn't let it go and it felt weird, like he was expecting me to say, "cuz im soo ugly :'(((" or some s**t like that. He asked yet again even after I'd tried to change the subject and he says something, like, "what specifically don't you like about drawing yourself?" and I said, once again, it just wasn't my style and drawing myself is something I do when I'm trying to practice proportions/anatomy or need some sort of pose reference--not something I ever just feel like doing on a whim. He finally stopped asking, but said, "well, if you ever draw yourself with or without elf ears you need to show me!".
Finally, I told him that that was more than a little creepy. He said he didn't understand why I thought it was creepy, and he just wanted to see what I'd look like in my art style. I changed the subject.
Now, this may seem innocent enough and hell, maybe it is, but this paired with several prior situations is making me skeptical. Like, we were on group skype with two other friends and one asked how my day was and I said, "fine, now that I'm home for winter for the first time in years I can wear my cute clothes". And after being asked about it by said friend, I sent a picture that I'd taken earlier. It wasn't anything much really, just a sweater dress and some Marvel leggings. I mostly just made the comment to show off the leggings, haha. The other two friends make say your basic responses when your friend is trying to show you clothes, "oh, cool leggings" and just, you know, move on with the conversation and talk about their own days. I didn't think anything of it, I didn't even think he'd said anything when it happened, but later I just checked my phone and saw that I was wrong.
He'd sent me a message that said something like, "well, who's this beautiful lady wink ", and I sent back some form of "wtf?"
He responded with "oh, that was from the skype call" and I just sort of said, "yeah, I assumed that part. What's with the weird response?" and he seemed to be confused with what I meant because he said, "it's not weird, you're pretty." And I was like, "I didn't say I wasn't, but I just wanted to show off my new leggings. I appreciate the compliment, but the way you went about it was really weird." He said sorry and changed the subject.
Another thing was he said something totally out of the blue like, "I don't understand why girls bother with makeup. Most girls look way better without it and if you need makeup for a guy to like you then he's the wrong guy." And I just sort of rolled my eyes and said, "most girls I know wear makeup because they like wearing makeup" to which he asks, "well, I just don't want you to think you have to wear makeup to impress guys" to which I immediately responded, "dude, I've literally worn makeup like four times in my whole life and that's been for prom photos and halloween costumes. I literally do nothing to impress guys." To which he said he was surprised because he thought I wore it regularly and just moved on.
There's a lot more, but I think this is the last story I'll bring up. I'm a roleplayer and the past few years my main rp hub has been tumblr groups. Now, I was in a DC group not too long ago and Roger found out about it, applied and was accepted as Cyborg. I didn't think much of it at first and thought it was kind of cool to have a irl friend involved in one of my rp groups, but then it seemed a little off. He made a comment about, "so this group is okay with smut, right? Haha" and I said, "...it's not really encouraged or anything, but no one's going to stop you as long as your partner is 18". I thought it was an odd question since it's stated in the rules that it's fine. Then he jokingly(?) asks, "Should I expect me to see your character smutting it up, haha. Who are you anyway? Are you using a fake name?". I told him no, I personally don't smut for a variety of reason and that I was the Nightwing.
"Why are you playing a guy?"
/sigh/ I explained why and found out he'd apparently check the OOC page on all the female character's blogs and one of the other members had the same name as me, but he'd apparently messaged her and figured out that she wasn't me. Anyway, he only stayed for like a week before dropping out of the group because 'it wasn't what he thought it was going to be'. It just seemed really fishy to me.
What do you girls think? Is it possible I'm just being paranoid? I've had some bad experience in the past with male friends asking me out and then things going south when I said no and I don't know if that's effecting my outlook. Also, I don't have a lot of friends right now at this point in my life and I just, I'm not sure what to do.
