Why does my dance partner M22 seem to flirt with me F28, but also brag about other girls he’s dating?

**\*\*TL;DR;\*\* : My dance partner and I have become close but I can’t tell if he’d be interested in me as more than a friend. He also brags about his dates with other girls.**

I met this guy through dancing about four months ago. Slowly he became my friend and my primary dance partner. Now I’ve developed a crush on him although I realize it may be unwise to act on it due to our age difference.

I try to keep a little space with him but he asks me to dance constantly. Sometimes we carpool to the dances and go back to his place to practice dancing. At one point, we went to his gym and his apartment to practice dancing, and he wanted to practice lifts. This involved him picking me up and carrying me on his shoulders and then twisting me around and holding me in his arms. But nothing beyond that happened. He didn’t try to kiss me, and he proceeds to tell me about his date with another girl.

I assume this means he just wants to be friends but then occasioanlly something happens that confuses me.

Random people mistake him for my boyfriend at the dances and I have to inform them that we are just friends. Sometimes he leaves his arm around my waist while we are sitting and at one point he told me to stay away from a guy that he thinks is bad news.

One time I came back from dancing with someone else, and people told me he looked jealous afterwards. They go, “Is he your boyfriend? Because he looked super upset watching you dance with that guy”

I talk to random people at the dance club and they constantly tell me that he is looking for me, wondering where I went.

Then one evening he introduced me to his parents who happened to be in town hanging out at the bar. We had some bar snacks and it was spontaneous but kind of weird, like I ended up almost having dinner with him and his family.

Now all this behavior has led me (and many others) to wonder if we are dating. But I don’t think so–he must just think of me as a friend or even a sister–he constantly tells me his thoughts about other girls. He tells me who he thinks is attractive, casually mentions his hook ups.

One day we were hanging out together, dancing as we do, and I was sick, so I accidentally got him sick. A week later he told me that because I got him sick, he missed a handful of dates.

I laughed it off, but later on he’s tells me about his dates in detail. So and so is really into me, he tells me. This other girl left town when I got him sick, so he lost his chance with her.

I started to feel almost like sick from hearing all these details and I was feeling jealous, so I groaned audibly, stood up abruptly and told him, “I have to go.”

He was like “What? Why? You should stay.”

And I said, “No no I have to leave right now.” And I left.

The next day he’s texting me asking why I left. He asks if I’m alright and I tell him I’m fine. He says I should call him if I want to talk, and I say there’s no need.

Why does he act so interested in me when he only likes these other girls? Idk I’m just confused.

I might have to take a break from dancing with him because it’s really messing with me.