Had no idea how lonely I was until a couple of nights ago: where do I go from here?

Had no idea how lonely I was until a couple of nights ago

Went out for drinks on Tuesday night with the fellow students in my faculty. There aren’t that many of us so we are quite a tight group of friends. There’s 8 of us and 3 (including me are guys).

I ended up sitting with one of the female students and we got chatting a fair bit, just banter nothing serious. She’s in a relationship if that proves anything. Regardless, it made me feel this horrible pit in my stomach like “god I’m 25 and never even gelled with a guy like this”. She kept up with my awkward and nerdy sense of humour and when the night drew to a close she insisted on getting the bus back to our flat (we live near each other on campus) and we ended up taking a fair bit more on the bus ride back.

This sounds really pathetic but it just made me realise how much I crave companionship, it isn’t even romantic, just gelling with someone’s personality and sense of humour. She made a few playful jabs at my PhD and kept nudging me which again didn’t help like jesus am I this sad?