Back and forth

17 months ago I split with someone after 12 months. He was someone I had been to primary school with, had brief dalliance in our late teens but it didn’t amount to much. Mid 2017 we got back in touch. He had had a child with someone else, they had split whilst she was pregnant with his second child. We went on a couple of a dates and things were going well. I had come out of a pretty bad relationship a few months before and still bore every single scar from that and I ended up messing it up really and slowly sort of moved away from him. In May 2018 I had been out all day and I was drunk, asked him to come and meet me- he did and we ended up getting a hotel and doing the deed. The next day was my Dad’s 60th. By this point my Dad was pretty poorly with cancer so we spent the day in hospital for his birthday. He didn’t message me once this day to see if I was okay. I asked him about this and he said that he didn’t want to disturb me and then went on to say that he wasn’t really ‘feeling it’ and from that I blocked him. In July that year my wonderful Dad passed away and I was all over the place. I had become fixated with an ex boyfriend (the toxic one from before) and was on a rollercoaster. I got a new number and sent it to him and he responded. We ended up going for drinks and had such a nice time. From there we started spending more time together. I was still fixated with my ex boyfriend and I slept with him a couple of times. Even now I feel sick to my stomach typing that- I thought he would solve all my problems but I never understood that he was the biggest one. I got my head out of my arse and gave 100% to this guy and we were in a relationship by the Dec. We got on so, so well and had a good time together. I bought my house and gave him a key and we sort of settled into a routine. He told my mum he had met someone he wanted to spend the rest of his life with but nearly a year in he still hadn’t said he loved me and I still hadn’t met his kids. When I asked him about his feelings he said he was ‘sure it would come eventually’ and it did dent my confidence. He told his baby Mama we had been together for less time than we had. He would break plans with me and tell me it was easier for him to upset me than her. I just kept letting things slide. In July 2019 I went on a night out with the girls and we got chatting to some guys. Everyone ended up coming back to mine and I stupidly had sex with one of the guys- even though we had spent all night talking about our partners- I don’t even know why I did it. We split up in Aug- the day of our one year anniversary. He didn’t even seem bothered, would message me when he could be arsed. We didn’t give things another go. His friend contacted me and we started to spend time together and slept together but it was very short lived. We would message on and off after this but it always turned sour. He messaged me in March 2020 saying he wanted to try again and could we go out for the night- we did, we had sex but it was too soon and the timing was wrong. Fast forward to last week- he messaged out of the blue, hung out and it was absolutely lovely. Kind of talked about what went wrong. I am still in touch with his friend and terrified he will tell him what we did. I was selfish and I wouldn’t act like that now. I have learned from my disgusting mistakes. But now I’m at a point where I want to give things a try and try and build on what we had. He told me how much he enjoyed hanging out and we should do it again- I asked to see him this weekend and he said he needed to check something with his sister and would let me know. A little bit of back and forth texting but nothing to give me any clues to how he might feel. I know I have been an arsehole but do I just walk away because of everything I’ve done? I know you can’t force it and I know it’s obvious when someone is into you. I do have some rationale with this. I just don’t know how to act or what to do. But really writing this all out it feels like too much has happened and I’ve messed everything up.