I’m having L-word troubles, but my troubles don’t involve a lover. There’s no romance or sex in this. No flowers, candles or dancing. My L-word troubles are with my boy, my best friend, Kichi. I’ve told him I love him probably five or six times now, but he never says it back.

When people say, “I love you,” especially for the first time, there are a number of things they may be saying. Maybe it’s, “Do you love me?” (the question smuggled inside the confession), or, more urgently, “Please love me.”

With Kichi, it’s not like that. I know he loves me. I feel it all the time. I don’t need to ask for his love. I don’t need to wonder. I tell him I love him for a simple reason: Nothing could be more true.

But he doesn’t say it back. Mostly I’ve said it when we’re leaving each other, a couple of times over the phone, once when I was drunk, another time when he was hurt and I was trying to be supportive. There’s always silence for a moment, and then he says something like, “Yeah, bro, I’ll catch you soon.”