How can I recognize and thank a man for being really respectful to me and his buddy while saving us from a messy situation ?

So, I’m in kind of a funky situation. I mainly just want to thank this guy for doing the right thing when I was in a sort of vulnerable state, but I don’t want to sound belittling or “here, you get a gold star,” and I also don’t know what y’all like being recognized for.

I went to a bar and had interacted with this guy a few times, having accidentally ran into him. At the end of the night, I was inebriated and wanted to apologize for running into him, and I also thought he was cute and thought I’d try to talk. Let’s call that guy J.

So I’m talking to J, and my friend said that I was being “cute and flirty,” I don’t really remember this much, but I apologized and was trying to chat with him. His friend, A, kinda kept joining the chat, and I was confused, but went with it. I gave him a compliment and then he wouldn’t stop talking to me while I was trying to get J’s instagram. He gave me his band’s account instead of his personal, and I did not take the hint, and that’s on me, And then A decided to give me his instagram, and I wasn’t really vibing with him, so I was a little hesitant, but I have his instagram now, too. J apologized for being a little out of it because he was drunk, I said it’s fine, I’m also not sober, then A said he was, and he’d make sure we’d figure it out later.

Obviously nothing came of this. I laughed it off for a while, until I saw a post from them including J’s girlfriend. Now this is really dumb, but he was wearing a weezer shirt at the bar, so I just assumed he didn’t have a girlfriend, which in retrospect, is incredibly faulty logic. Like I said, I was rather messed up.

In retrospect, I realize that A was both helping J and being a good friend by trying to get him out of an awkward situation that I caused, and also helping me by treating me with dignity and not making me feel awkward.

I also matched with someone on bumble recently who seems real cool, and they’re in the band too, of course. Which just makes this feel more awkward.

Anyways, I want to reach out to A and thank him for being chill about that, because I’m ngl, a lot of men I know would have handled that with… less grace. They all seem like chill people and I want to clear the air a bit, and also I want to recognize this guy who took charge and was really emotionally intelligent there, it didn’t go unappreciated. It’s a bar popular with the local punk scene, and I’ve seen men enable other men to get away with awful shit, and he could have either been aggressive towards me or encouraged his buddy to cheat or something, so I appreciate him not being just neutral, but trying to deescalate the situation.

Ig my question is, I’d like to reach out, even if it’s not that deep or anything. What do yall like to hear, ig? I know we don’t always teach men how to manage emotions or how to socialize with women tbh, and I don’t want to belittle this man or anything, but I also do want to recognize that that was really good on him. Thoughts?