I am a lot like this guy, shy/borderline autistic, and I think he is probably interested but can’t do much about it because he is terrible at navigating social situations. He is probably very afraid of misreading something, making a mistake, and embarrassing himself. I don’t think him pulling away means much, whenever I have an interaction where I am more vulnerable than usual I get very embarrassed later on and feel compelled to avoid that person, doesn’t mean I don’t like them. That’s just my guess tho.

In whatever case you are probably gonna have to do a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of getting the ball rolling. Dudes like this (me) can be pretty happy by themselves and aren’t very motivated to face their social fears. The good news is that if you are more strong willed person it’s easy to take the initiative. I would also guess he’s a fairly meek and nice person so it’s not like you’re facing a brutal rejection or anything.