"I spent twelve years more or less alone." Romantically, he means. "I thought there might be something with Aaron but it was never serious. We were friends. And he would never have gone for anything like this."

What he means is she never saw this side of him because there was no place for it in their world. There was barely any place for him simply being gay.

"But...this did all happen fast. Faster than I would've thought, too. But this is all there is for me now. If you go home, you go back to the life you were living. All I can do is try to fit in here, try to find a way to be happy here. And it's a radically different place than I had before."