Extremely long post (tl;dr at the bottom). It's mostly venting but also any advice would be helpful. For the longest time I thought my manager was just being nice but starting early in the year, she'd always greet me with a huge warm smile and some kind of petname. She got promoted to management around July and went from working mornings, where we maybe only saw each other a couple times a week to working evenings so now we see each other more.

It started getting a little more obvious in the summer when the security guard at the time was crushing hard on her and always trying to talk to her. She'd have a casual, friendly conversation with him where it seemed like she was barely paying attention (lots of "hm-hm. Yeah. No totally" responses to him), no indications of flirting from her to him, then she would quite literally turn on her heel and have an engaged conversation with me. I'm talking open body language, face-to-face talking, laughing, trying to make herself seem shorter near me (shes about 5 inches taller than I am)

It stayed that way for a while. Just the petnames, the beaming grins, prolonged eye contact, open body language, calling me her favorite, blowing me a flurry of casual kisses on occasion, lingering later when I start my shifts (her shift ends when mine begins) and offers to come back after the gym or stay later if i need her to, even though she knows i dont need the help. I also started randomly complimenting her outfits, telling her that she looked nice today, that was a nice outfit, etc (and she always seems to get a little bit flustered and grins and giggles and says thank you when i do) I started casually dating someone in Sept and have mentioned them to her a few times but just as like a "Hey I need this day off cause I'm going out with someone".

In October, her flirting suddenly got much more obvious. One night I came in for my shift, was a little too high (normally buzzed when I start my shifts, but I accidentally hit the vape too hard in the car cause it got clogged 💀) and she was wearing a new blouse and tbh she looked fine af in it. She finished filling me in on some work stuff (wasn't even paying attention tbh. I hyperfocus when I'm high) and I immediately told her "I LOVE that new shirt btw! You look.....really nice" (had to pause to stop myself from saying "you look fine as fuck") She acted really flustered for a minute, giggling, sputtering her words, then finally goes "I could kiss you for that." It shocked & stunned me bc until then I had just been dismissing her flirting as her being nice or just her personality. She backtracked hard once she saw the blush on my face and I got silent for a few seconds just because I was so stunned. She apologized and swore she was just kidding.

Two days later I walked into work and she was talking to the other night crew guy so I just walked past them into the office, put my lunch in the fridge and was saying hi to one of the day shift people. Within 10 seconds of me being in the office, she pops her head in with a big grin and says "Well hello you!!" I said "Hello my darling" in a very casual manner while still facing my coworker. When I turned to her, I noticed she was wearing the same shirt I complimented the other day. We got to talking and I said something like "Yeah, I know you're not afraid to say what you're thinking." Which is true, she's very outspoken and isn't afraid to call people on their bs. She responds "Oh you mean like how I said I could kiss you the other day" with a laugh. I was just gonna let it be water under the bridge, but since she mentioned it, I said "Yeah exactly. Not to call you out but like... lol" she then proceeded to say "Yeah I don't regret saying it. But again if it made you uncomfortable in any way I am sorry." I told her "it's fine, it didn't make me uncomfortable at all." to which she said "Ok good," with another loud laugh. She then went on to explain "no seriously though, I have a pretty flirty personality naturally and I forget that I need to dial it back for work." I said "it's fine. If I'm being honest, I'll take the ego-boost where I can get it." and she responded "Oh babes, you can get it ANYTIME from me" with another laugh. I said "Good to know" and we left it at that.

Another time she was wearing a stylish bomber jacket with fuzzy collar and cuffs and some brown sunglasses as she exited the back office asking if I needed anything before she left (this was at like 12am) I said no I'm good but I did say "you look so cool!" (She did. She looked like a Cool Guy (tm)) She acted really flustered again, thanked me and blew a few kisses. Then proceeded to stay with me until 1:30am just talking about work and shit. The entire time she was sitting on my desk, close to me, kept leaning into my personal bubble, peering at me through the top of her glasses, ect.

Then about a week later we were talking about her learning the audit and working a shift with us overnight (all managers are supposed to at least once to learn how it works) At the time, we had three auditors including myself. I told her she'd learn xyz thing when she works her shift with Kay (the senior night auditor) and she laughed and said "Oh no babes, i get grumpy when I get tired, so if I'm working with anyone it's gonna be you." I asked what about our other auditor, cause he's pretty chill and relaxed and she reiterated "Nope, I'm only going to work it with you!"

I requested Halloween night off and she gave it to me. I hadn't seen her in almost three days as of Halloween night, yet I got a text from her telling me happy halloween, she hopes I enjoy my night and to stay safe. Before this, we'd never texted outside of work hours unless it was work related. I was high as fuck when she texted me, so I started overthinking about what would make her think of me and possess her to text me something so casual and non-work related when we never have before.

A few days after that, a guest noticed that she got her hair done. She said "thanks, you're actually the first person to notice" and when they said "wait really??" My manager gave a very pointed sounding, "Yeah, my name" and gave me a look like she was giving me shit. I said "I'm sorry, I would've noticed sooner, but I don't get to see you as often as I'd like" (my dumbass probably never would've noticed, cause autism and she went from dirty blonde to slightly more blonde ajdkgjsf) and she laughed, saying "Stop, you make me blush" and I said "Good" leaving it at that before doing my work.

Two Saturdays ago, she worked her first audit shift with me. The day before, she asked if I had picked up Kay's Saturday or Sunday. I said Sat and she got really excited and said "Good I was hoping you would. I wanted to text you the other day and tell you to pick up her Sat that way we can work together, but I realized that's probably not an appropriate thing to text you as your manager so i didnt haha. Now thay it was Saturday, I was nervous that she was going to be extra flirty, but we mostly just talked through the night. We talked about exes, family, work, she asked about the person im dating (I get awkward when she asks, so I always keep the details minimum/vague and then quickly change the subject) and I asked about hers. She said she's over dating atm but has expressed several times that her end goal is a husband and a house and a garden and kids and several dogs. We talked more about life and fears and perspectives and I confessed to her that I'm autistic. She was surprised by this but we talked about random life shit for like an hour after that. She was supposed to go home at 4am, I said she could leave at 3 but she insisted on staying. We kept talking so long that it was 5am before she left and the only reason she did is because one of the AM managers came in and that's when our conversation abruptly stopped. The most flirty thing that happened that night is when we were talking about smoking (weed) and I mentioned that I usually bring my vape but I thought it would be busy so I left it at home. She offered me one of hers for the night and I declined, saying it's probably not a good idea for me to be high rn. She asked why and I kicked myself for saying that. She kept pressing for an answer so I said (truthfully) "I can't be high around... pretty girls" averting eye contact from her. She asked why yet again, so I said "I just get flustered really easily when I do." Which is half truth. I do. I also get really horny and have low impulse control, so I didn't trust that I wouldn't confess my attraction to her if I was alone and high with her. After that, she insisted that I keep one of her vapes and hit it after she left work, and she slipped it into my pocket despite my protest. I put the vape in her office desk and let her know and thanked her for it (I didn't hit it though. Maybe I'm being weird about it but the idea of it being an indirect kiss freaks me out)

The next week, before she left for the night, she left me know that her vape is still where I left it if I need it. I told her I brought my own tonight but thanked her. She goes "Yeah I have so many I figured I'll just leave it there in case people I like need a little sneaky snack" for some reason my dumbass went "just a little scooby snack" and she echoed "Yeah just a little scooby snack." with a laugh. Then she added "Well you're the only one I really like enough, but it's there if you want it"

This past Wed she asked me if I needed anything before she left. I said "I mean, just you, but other than that no I don't think so." Her mouth hung open in silence and a grin pulled at her cheeks, she started sputtering something and said "Well I can always swing by after I'm done at the gym...if you do need anything." To which I politely declined

Then the next day, Thursday, I needed to confirm what time our front office meeting was on Friday. I could've asked "Hey when's the meeting again?" But I decided to be flirty and mean and when I saw her that night at work I asked "So we're still on for lunch tomorrow, right?" (We always have lunch at the meetings) She absolutely FROZE in her tracks, staring wide-eyed at the desk. She looked stuck and I could see the gears spinning in her head. She very cautiously and quietly asked "Are you....talking about the meeting??" And I immediately said "yeah, the meeting tomorrow! It's at 2, right?" with an innocent smile. The tension in her body broke and she laughed loudly, saying "Haha ok ok good cause I was like... 'did we have a date?' Haha" and I laughed with her and said "not yet anyway". She got quiet for a second and I immediately started apologizing because I was genuinely just kidding around and we both laughed about it

Friday at the meeting, she was passing out the checklists and handed one to me, whispering "Hello sunshine," under her breath. I said a very casual "hello" because we're surrounded by coworkers. After the meeting I stuck around to talk with one of my friends on the AM shift and cause my GM wanted to chat for a minute (nothing serious) and my GM asked me to put some papers up front in one of the desk drawers. My manager was up front at the time, but there were several other coworkers around her and she was helping a guest, so I figured she'd be distracted enough that I could slip by undetected and put the papers away then leave. As I'm putting away the papers, I'm standing like two, maybe two and a half feet behind my manager, undetected, and one of the AM girls sees me and goes "Oh my god girl what are you still doing here!? You gotta go home and get some sleep!" As I'm trying to explain to Z why I'm still here, my manager notices and does a 180 turn, stepping closer to me saying "WHAT are you doing???". Since she stepped closer, I backed up. Now my back is literally against a wall, she's a foot, maybe less from my face in terms of closeness. I look up at her and the eye contact is intense. I drop my gaze down because I can feel myself getting flustered and when I look down my favorite blouse of hers (the one she was wearing when she joked about kissing me) is staring back at me, also less than a foot from me. I darted my eyes to the side before I could really start blushing. I tried to explain that our GM asked me to do this, but she snatched the papers from me, saying not to worry about him, she'd take care of it, and told me to go home and get some rest. Idk if she did that to me on purpose, but I spent the entire weekend thinking about how close we were and how dominating she felt.

Friday night when I got to work, I was a tad disappointed to see she left early, but I knew she had a long day so that's fine. What wasn't fine is the security guard that used to have a crush on her was filling in temporarily that night (I don't like him cause he's a bigot. Like straight up told me "I don't agree with your lifestyle, but you're one of the good ones so I like you") So I texted her "damn I was hoping to see you tonight but I'm greeted by Nate instead RIP" and she responded "Awwww I was wanting to wait around to see you, but im mentally burnt out this week so I went home. The scooby snack is still at my desk if you need/want" I texted her that I hate that she remembered me calling it a scooby snack because idk why I said it and it was dumb of me lol. She texted back that I shouldn't hate that because she loved it and is going to call it that from now on.

She's also been having to clock me in and out manually for the last month and a half now since the clock-in program won't let me log in for some reason. So we've been having to text about that and every time she texts me she calls me babe, my love, my darling, etc. A couple weeks ago she texted me "Hey when did you clock in and out Friday, and did you take a break?" A minute apart, she double texted "Sorry, let me start over. Good morning Sunshine, when you get a chance, will you please let me know your times for Friday?"

TL;DR: My manager has always been affectionate with me, but in the last month and a half has been flirting really heavily, joking that she would kiss me, staying way late after her shifts just to talk to me, uses petnames over text and gets flustered and giddy whenever I flirt back.

I'm dense but I'm not that dense. I know by now she's definitely flirting with me. She gives off bi vibes, but I've literally never heard her talk about woman or anything queer, she's said multiple times that her end goal is a husband, a house and kids, and I have seen her be flirty with the male guests multiple times before and has only dated men from the few stories ive heard. I'm definitely not going to actually pursue a relationship with her, because she's too young for me, the employee/manager thing can get very messy very quickly, and I'm casually dating someone else atm. I've been flirting back since October and she seems to really enjoy it. I can't tell if she's actually into me, is just flirting for the hell of it, or if she's testing the bi-curious waters. If it's the latter two, I don't mind because at the end of the day I know feelings won't be involved, but I'm nervous that she's actually into me. I don't want to lead her on, which because of our age gap, I'm worried will happen. I do genuinely like and respect her as a friend and coworker and manager, so I don't want to hurt her feelings by "leading her on" but I don't want to confront her directly because if she is just enjoying the attention for fun I don't want to make it weird.

Any advice or insight?