I was once in the zone with a friend of mine. The difference between myself and the rest of you was that I made it very apparent from the get-go that I was not interested in being in that position and reaffirmed that I wanted more. When she would say "you're my best friend" or "you arelike a brother to me" and I would say "but I am not your brother and I want to be with you." At first she attempted to side step the whole situation by continuing to believe in her fantasy that she could still keep me as a friend without requiring any movement on her part. After that failed, she attempted to ignore my advances. Then she began to become angry and then treated me like I was her boyfriend yet with none of the commitment, emotion or sexuality that a couple would normally have. I put up with this for awhile but it didn't take long for us to have a fight and yeah she ended up losing.

We still talk on occasion but by no means I am her best friend any more. If anything I resent her for trying to avoid having any relations with me to ensure our friendship survived because not doing so destroyed our friendship. I am bitter towards her because the whole thing was so stupid. Even explaining to her what she was doing wasn't going to keep us friends as we had to progress or end it did not get through to her. So now shes lonely and misses her best friend and now I am hooked up with a girl thats far superior to her. Imagine that?

So the lesson you should take from this is that if your friendship with someone progresses to the level that you like them, it's worth trying to do something about it. Why? If it works out, then you will have a partner that you know better then anyone else in the world and your relationship with blossom because of it. If it doesn't work out, you wont want to be around them any more because it hurts you to see them with other people. You also wouldn't want a best friend who doesn't care about you enough to feel the same way. You will find a new best friend, you will have another opportunity to meet new people and you wont burden yourself with old flames.