I had a dumbass high school moment. Laugh at the stupidity I've inflicted upon myself.
I was one of the few Gr. 12 students to take French all the way through from 9, and to my surprise I saw that there was acquaintance from middle school. We knew we both existed in middle school, but because we were in different classes, we never really met or spent time together. We occasionally talked but very rarely as I sit in the front like a nerd, and she sat in the back (didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things since our French Teacher usually let us work together and sit anywhere, anyway). It wasn't until Winter/Spring that we started talking a lot and we realized that we clicked so well.
So fast forward to a year later and I'm in university and she's taking a victory lap to solidify her career choices, we're both super close and know a lot of personal things about each other's lives. One day, I blurted out that I liked her and she was taken aback. Judging by how she was taken aback, I thought she was going to say "lol wow, fuck off MegaManTrigger, I'd never be with you in a million years." Turns out, she wanted me to ask her out during senior year of high school. She apparently left me hints that I unintentionally ignored (but really, I had pretty major insecurity issues tied to my disability, and traumatic bullying experiences left me weary of social interactions with people).
So why didn't it work out? I was good friends with another friend and she was not doing well. She broke up with someone and had the whole "no one wants me" phase. To help her feel better, I said "You know that's not true. If things were differently, you know I'd love to date you." What I witnessed was the biggest fuck up in my history. Turns out she was ALSO close friends with the interested girl, and she spread what I said to everyone in her clique. The interested girl told me about that day, and I distinctly remember her going to the washroom after seeing me after school, and apparently it was because she cried for a good while. What I said was enough to destroy that chance, and left her weary about me despite how well we clicked after high school. Now I was the one taken aback and completely embarrassed, how something as simple as trying to make someone else feel better easily ruined my chances. After she told me the story, I explained myself and she understood what I meant (at least I hope so). I gave it a couple of weeks to try to let the chemistry do its thing, but something has undeniably changed; what I did was enough for her to take a hiatus from men/dating so I was shit out of luck in pursuing her. At that point, I couldn't help but wonder what could have been if I had simply changed what I said. And what could have been for the both of us.
Fast forward years later: she's been in a long-term relationship (which I'm happy for her), while I seem to continue to be cursed and struggle with attracting women. This left me pretty scarred, and made me more careful about what I say to people. Fuck, reliving that was painful to the core.