Ah, that idealized young love... and I'm sure he's really normal about someone he knew then aging naturally lmao.
Also I genuinely adore the "I've come to think of myself as a hostage" cause like. He IS still a child. A teen isn't "secretly" Actually An Adult. It kinda strikes a cord for me- I was a unusually tall kid for my age, and I got read as much older then I was. Instead of being a well spoken 12 year old, I was treated as a 'stupid' 16 year old.
I kinda like him asserting that right now, he's still a child. How someone else wants to treat him is up to them.