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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/39049
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

As yet another male with a female best friend, this happens frequently (I think I'm more often than not better friends with women than with men.). And I can say that there are some people who will see romantic love no matter how much you stress there is none. And they aren't wholly wrong. Love manifests in many forms, and not all of them are romantic or sexual love. Mutually... there can be times in these relationships where one does want to have a relationship, but the other does not. This will breed readers who think they should get together. It's not something that should be dwelt on long... most of the time the will they or won't they elements of this play so that one has feelings while the other is unavailable and then through the story the positions flip.

There are quite a few ways this could happen... maybe the book starts with one of them in a romantic situation with a third character and the other is not bothered by this... or maybe there's jealousy that the first falsely attributes to romantic desires for the other one, but comes to realize that he's not jealous of her boyfriend for being the boyfriend, but jealous of his best friend for finding a perfect romantic partner while he cannot manage to find one for himself.

Conversely, they could acknowledge early on that there is no way in hell they are compatible partners. She's looking to start a family and he's looking to have some sex (reverse the roles to be different... this gets used a lot but the reverse occurs too... in my experience often...). Basically, they both are looking for a romantic relationship, but their selection process excludes each other... there could be a cause that sex obssessive does make jokes (or serious but masking as joke) statements to the effect of they would want to sleep with the bestie once, just to say he did, but he respects her too much to actually go through with it... or that he knows most women have a low opinion of him, but she's the only person of the other sex who sees good things in him beyond his womanizing, and that's more important than one time to say he did it.

Conversely, they could be rather demeaning towards each other, but this is because they know each other so well, they know they can get away with it. This could ellicit responses from outsiders that they fight like an old married couple, but they are most offended by the idea of marriage to each other that they both rise to defend their offended friend, resulting in a strange defense where they are outraged that is equal parts insulting to their bestie and themselves. Rest assured, they are the only people that are permitted to say horrible things about each other, and they will turn on any one who presumes they have this ability. They're language is insulting but that's only from the connotations of the words... they are true recognition of personality strengths that are phrased in a way that is seen as disapproval by the outsiders, but are understood by the pair for what they are.

As a final note, there is nothing that says that romantic feelings for the best friend cannot occur, but they must be thought out, shown to be unrealistic, and show that it takes a friendship that does work and turns it into something that doesn't work... if you allow a date between the two... make sure it does not end happy and that they need to work through the break down to get back to status quo... they are not effective without each other, but they were wrong to try and be lovers... but they were perfect as besties... have them acknowledge why the change was a mistake... Avoid the story lines where they have to pretend to be a lovers or something... but it's okay that both are compassionate enough to each other that the she can recognize that he's been hurt by his prom date and will ask him to dance for one slow song... because no hopeless romantic idiot should feel unwanted during [insert overplayed song that the kids are slow dancing to these days].

By and large, beyond small gestures of acknowledgement that they do love each other in some way, if for a vast majority of the interactions you could sub the member of the duo with the opposite gender and the conversation is still appropriate for two heterosexual friends on almost all occurrences (even joking about romantic feelings between hetero best buds does happen.) then you're probably writing a good friendship.

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