To think my male friend/colleague should not have asked me this!

[AwkwardMoment2020]

Backstory: We’ve been colleagues for around ten months and get on very well. It’s an informal, hipster type work place and all of us on the team tend to socialise together. Him and I have genuinely become friends and enjoy each other’s company. He’s always been very respectful and polite and we are both quite reserved people unlike the rest of the team who are more extrovert. We’ve never ever had any reason or cause to discuss sex.

This is our first week back at work in person and today we were having lunch together outside and catching up. My eye was a bit watery from hay fever and he leaned over and kind of put his thumb next to it as if looking closer and wiped a tear away that was running down and then commented it was a bit red looking in a concerned, caring sort of way. Then, really bloody randomly while he still had his hand near my face he said, really seriously

Have you ever let anyone cum on your face?

I was really shocked and told him it was none of his business and not ok to ask me something so personal. He laughed and said “is that a no, then?” and said it’s the kind of thing friends discuss and he didn’t know why I was being so weird.

I don’t really have anyone to ask this in real life as it’s quite embarrassing but AIBU and weird. Or is it just not alright for someone to ask you something as graphic/sexual as that? As I say we don’t have a friendship where we talk about our sex lives or anything remotely sexual.

What a sleazy creep.

Out of character? I think he’s showing you his character.

The character of a sleazy creep.

Do not engage with him op.
Report immediately.
He is showing you who he really is.

Someone was sacked from my workplace for asking a related question (it was BJ related, asked to a teenage girl)

It's absolutely not okay.

Good that you haven't responded, that shows that you are not ok with what he said. You have written it down on here so you can cut and paste it into an email and send it to a senior staff member who you trust. It will be really obvious that he did say it if he is confronted. I bet he will have a tell that an older male will recognise.

I’m just feeling really confused.

Up until that moment he just seemed like a lovely, respectful gentlemanly type the whole
time I’ve known him. I’ve usually got a really good creep radar and can spot them a mile
off. Then he said that and like I said it was so jarring because he’s never been pervy or creepy or sexual at all. Really the opposite.
But now I’m thinking all sorts like is he just a good actor and actually he’s a complete pervert but really good at disguising it.

You know those radio shows where they have to get a totally random word into a conversation with someone who has no idea? That is what it felt like. I even wondered was it a dare or something. It was just so random.

Please report him. What he said was massively violating and you don't deserve to accept him treading all over your boundaries because it's out of character.

He knew what he said was wrong. That's why he tried to put it all back on you and said you were weird. When it reality, it was him.

He's had ample time to apologise and prove what he said was out of character (although still violating and disgusting). He hasn't - what that shows is his true character.

Please report him.

Definitely don't take part in any private conversation with him again. Poor you - it's always a shock when someone reveals themselves like that.

I don’t know whether to report him or not because it’s really out of character

I think what this has shown you is that he has hidden his true character from you.

If you had a daughter, would you advise her to keep quiet about this?

Reporting seems a bit OTT, but I think I’d be incredibly cool with him and withdraw massively. I was horrified when a colleague sent me explicit pictures and told him very clearly that it wasn’t appropriate. He was mortified and never did anything like that again.

Crossed the line def

Actually my union rep is a woman so I’m going to speak to her in confidence and also run it by an friend in the UK who is some sort of mediator for ACAS, just for their opinion. If it’s a one off, I might let it slide and give him a ginormous berth but if it’s the start of something then I want it documented and I’ll take it forward.

I actually don’t want to go to work tomorrow so that’s not good/normal. I can’t bear him looking at me. I’m just going to be wondering what he’s thinking now.

Report it. It’s not an acceptable thing to say to a colleague regardless of how ‘informal’ your workplace is. Most workplaces would sack him.

Also touching colleagues during a pandemic? Cmon.

Wtaf. I first read it as your eye was watering and he made a terribly misjudged joke “have you let someone cum on your face” as in that was why your eye was sore - and still was going to say yanbu. But with your updates and a reread it’s even worse and actually really quite fucking sinister.

@Cherrysoup WTF?! Explicit pictures, that’s awful. What is wrong with these weirdos!

@Cherrysoup, he was not mortified, he just crossed you off his shag list.

Trying it on, but in reality you are two people not in work time (no different to the weekend) that decided to go out together on a social event - nothing to do with work, not in work time or in the work place.

Just don't allow it to extend into the workplace if uncomfortable, which it clearly is.

Fuck me. Someone has been watching a lot of porn on lockdown.

Office 'friendships' can be a bit dodgy because you are only getting a very filtered view of the person. I think this has slipped and you've seen him in his true colours; he's got a very strange and pornified view of women if he thinks this is an acceptable way to converse. It's like something the crassest, most emotionally illiterate incel would say.

@pinksauce I would say a lunch break is not a social occasion, it’s still during a work day. Also inappropriate behaviour between colleagues can still be reported even if out of hours, at my old workplace a guy tried it on with one of his direct reports at work drinks and was sacked even though it was out of hours and off premises.

Honestly OP, my comment above might look a bit flippant, but genuinely that's probably what's happened. He's spent that last three months watching wall to wall porn and has forgotten there's anything in the world like appropriate boundaries. Mucky fucker. Your plan to talk to the union rep informally is a good one.

@pinksauce it was our lunch break at our work place and we are paid to take lunch so so I think it would still be a workplace issue if I did complain.

We’ve met up socially outside of work in the past and he’s been fine, not at all creepy/flirty and I felt totally 100% safe with him.
I’d have described it as a brother/sister dynamic until today. Which makes it all the more shocking. I will never meet up with him socially again and keep communication to a bare minimum inside work hours.

Him and his girlfriend got stuck in different countries for months with the epidemic so yeah, maybe too much porn/Skype sex messed him up.

If it’s a one off, I might let it slide

No! Is that the advice you'd give your daughter? Do not let this slide. At the very least he should be confronted by people above him at work and explain himself. Do not hold this creep's secrets.

Maybe in your case then, my employment has never had paid lunch hours - so it's definitely not part of the work day for me.

@pinksauce, if you are in the UK then regardless of whether your lunch is paid your staff handbook and contract of employment is still in force. Why not try swearing at your boss during lunch and see what happens when you clock back in for the afternoon shift?