What Happens When You're on Two Different Frequencies of Intimacy

I still think about that night. How we both wanted the same thing, but were terrified of what the other version of closeness might demand.

There was a man once. He was a close friend. He wasn’t ready for sex with me but he was ready to hold me. I was the opposite. I was ready for sex but not for the holding. Not for the quiet vulnerability of bodies pressed together with nothing to hide behind.

We were both terrified of what the other version of closeness might mean. Two people, flipped mirrors of each other’s fear. Him, afraid that sex would bind him to something he wasn’t ready for. Me, afraid that being held would bind me to a tenderness I wasn’t ready to believe I deserved.

When I was younger, I used to think if a man didn’t want to have sex with me, it was because he wasn’t attracted. With age, I’ve realized it can mean the opposite. That he likes you too much.

Here’s the plot twist: this mind game only happens when someone doesn’t actually want to date you. They just want to orbit close enough to feel intimacy without committing to it. If you’ve had healthy relationship dynamics your whole life… congrats.

Sex has choreography. Rules. A beginning, a middle, an end. Giving my body meant I set the terms. Avoiding being held meant avoiding being known. At the time it felt like rebellion. In hindsight, it was survival.

And it’s not just me. Women are taught sex is power. A chip to trade, a lever to pull, a currency to spend.
Tenderness, though? That’s weakness. Needy. Dangerous.

Men are taught sex is conquest. But tenderness? That’s their PR. It makes them “good guys.” The thing women are supposed to crave more than sex itself.

Women like me read sex as love.
Men like him read holding as love.

The real test of intimacy isn’t how you touch, but what the touch means. I realize we both had the same longing, different translations of the same desperation: please don’t leave.

The internet doesn’t help. Online, intimacy is shorthand. A like, a heart, a flame emoji. One-size-fits-all closeness. Dating apps made intimacy logistics. Swipe right, swipe left. Efficiency porn.

But offline, intimacy is polyphonic. Sex means one thing, holding means another, silence something else entirely. It’s never just the act. It’s the story you assign to it, the cost you risk, the fear of not being mirrored back.

I still think about that night. How we both wanted the same thing, but were terrified of what the other version of closeness might demand.

Me letting him hold me.
Him going all the way.
Both of us nervous but doing it anyway just to say: I see you.