He went cold after you texted first twice in a row: what to do

Look at what the silence looks like on his side. If he was the one who sent the last message before you started the streak, the thread was already his to pick up and he didn't. If the last message in the thread is yours, you have been carrying it, and the simplest explanation is that he drifted in the same way a lot of people do with someone they like fine but haven't decided about. Count the days since his last message, not just since yours. A gap of two or three days after a series of messages is normal. A gap of ten days when the earlier conversation had real back-and-forth usually means the momentum was mostly coming from you.

Also check whether he has been active elsewhere. If he's posting or responding to other people, the silence is about the thread and not about him being unreachable. If he has gone dark across the board, he may be busy or stepping back for reasons unrelated to you. Either way, you are reading signals that are mostly invisible to you, so don't build a story on them.

When he does write back, your first job is to answer what he said and not to make a point about the gap. If he apologises or says he's been slammed, take it at face value and move on. If he says nothing about it, don't bring it up. Anything you say about the silence will land as a request for reassurance. Respond to the content of his message, keep it at roughly the length he used, and add one small thing of your own that gives him something to pick up next. A question about something he mentioned earlier works well here because it shows you were listening without suggesting you were counting.

The move to avoid is the one where you hold back a little to seem less eager. Replying in a flat, clipped way reads as a message in the same tone you used to send, and it tells him you are guarding something. Be warm and brief, and let the length of the thread show that the conversation is still open on your end too.

Timing does a lot of work after a silence. If he messages during the day and you reply within a reasonable window, that matches how an ordinary conversation runs. If he messages late at night and you answer straight away, the exchange can start to feel like something else, and he may pull back the next day. Wait until the next normal part of your day before you respond, even if you already read the message. A reply sent after a few hours tells him you have a life and that the thread is one part of it.

If he doesn't answer your next message, leave it. Give it about a week before you send anything else, and make that one light and free of any reference to the gap, something you would have sent anyway. If there is still nothing after that, stop initiating. A thread that only moves when you push it has told you where it stands. Stopping is the cleaner choice than a fourth or fifth attempt that turns the whole exchange into a test.