He went cold after you shared your number? What to send

The gap is the signal. A couple of days is normal, since people forget to reply to texts all the time. Eight or nine days after he said 'we should do it' means the plan never got real in his head. That often happens when the app was the only thing holding the conversation together and the number swap was the moment he had to actually picture meeting you. He may still like you and simply not know how to make the first move from text to a date.

Read the wording of his last message too. A vague 'we should do it' with no day or time suggested usually means he was not planning anything concrete yet. If he had proposed a specific evening and then gone quiet, that is a different situation and warrants a more direct nudge. Check whether he replied to everything you sent, or whether he only ever answered the easy questions. Someone who warmed up slowly and then fell off may still come back if the next step is handed to him. Someone who was always thin on follow-through probably will not.

Once you have a plan in mind, the single most useful move is to give him one specific, easy thing to say yes to. A suggestion like coffee near his end of town, or a particular bar, both reduces the decision and shows you were already thinking about meeting. Pick one option, name a rough day, and leave him room to pick something else. People stall when the question is open, so do the work of narrowing it.

Leave out anything that asks him to explain himself. Questions about the gap put him in the position of defending his silence, and most people answer that with a shrug or nothing. Keep the message about the two of you meeting, not about the quiet week. Tone matters as much as content here. Light and warm works better than apologetic, and you do not need to sound like you have no other plans. Keep it to one or two lines so he can reply in a single word if he wants to.

Send the follow-up in the afternoon or early evening on a weekday, when people are most likely to be on their phone and in a decent mood. A late-night message after a few drinks can come across as lonely even when it is not, and a Sunday morning message can feel like filler. Avoid sending it right after you have been thinking about him all day, because the urgency tends to leak into the wording.

Give it one clear follow-up, and then wait. If he does not reply within about three days, the answer is effectively no for now, and a second message will almost always make things worse. You can leave the door open with a single line later if you run into him or he reaches out, but do not send a series of check-ins. If he does respond, match his energy, and if he replies warmly, move toward a specific time instead of continuing to chat about nothing. If he answers with a vague 'maybe soon,' pin down a date once, and if that also goes nowhere, let it go and move on to the next match.