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What should you do if your friend is in love with you?

How the ethics of relationships can untangle confusing feelings.

Hi readers! Shayla Love here, science journalist and longtime fan of Your Mileage May Vary. I’m honored to be subbing for Sigal Samuel while she’s out on parental leave. I’m diving into your questions as a way to help understand human nature and our choices through multiple lenses: philosophical, psychological, and beyond. Please send in any emotional, body/brain, sociological, perceptual, or other kind of life quandaries you might have.

My best friend confessed his love for me one year ago and I rejected him because I was unhappily in love with another man, and I was never really physically attracted to my best friend. He was devastated. I am happy our friendship survived.

Over a year later, I find myself thinking about how it would be like to be in a relationship with my best friend. He is the only man who ever showed me genuine love and support, and I wonder what if I try...maybe I will fall in love with him. However, I am concerned about hurting his feelings again. Is it selfish of me wanting to try this love out because it promises security and appreciation?

Dear Fanning the Flame,

I can’t blame you for being curious about the common “friends to lovers” storyline. It’s often portrayed as the best kind of pairing: Two people have the foundation of their friendship plus a newfound love; the romantic relationship is like a soaring addition to an existing sturdy house.

But real life is not always like the movies, and it sounds to me like you haven’t actually had an awakening of desire for your friend. In fact, it’s the opposite: He once expressed feelings for you, and you confronted a lack of physical attraction for this person. Now you’re wondering if it would be possible for you to fall in love if you tried. I think you’d agree that your timing is suspect. After a breakup, it’s common and understandable to seek out comfort and intimacy. Still, I detect a philosophical streak in your question beyond the issue of whether or not this would simply be a rebound.

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If your friend has always appreciated you, made you feel safe, and loves you — could that be a form of love that’s better than what you had in your last relationship? Maybe that is what love is.

Is it? Over a long night of drinking some 2,400 years ago, one group of thinkers allegedly debated the true nature of love, as Greek........

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