I guess I've had a few unconventional situations in my life... The good friend I mentioned who is getting married and his future bride has been so kind and accepting of me is someone I have known him over 15 years and we hit it off as friends right away pretty much the first day we met.
Through the years, we kind of "kept each other company", and always as just friends. Every Christmas, birthday, and Valentine's Day when we weren't seeing someone we would exchange cards and presents. He had an artistic talent and put together a gorgeous bouquet of flowers for my birthday one year. And I'll never forget the year I attempted to make two homemade cakes with the name and logo of his favorite baseball team on them. (We won't mention how they turned out. The good thing is that at least he could recognize the name of his beloved team.)
We would hang out with each other's families, go to church... (and these were every-now-and-then occasions... We didn't hang out all the time, maybe once a month or every other month.) There were a lot of ups and downs. But not once in all that time did we ever do anything "romantic" such as hold hands or kiss. All we ever did was give each other a hug goodbye.
The entire inspiration for this thread was that I thought about my friend today and how much he helped me through some really empty, lonely times... and I texted him to tell him that and thank you for always being there.
I didn't text "Love you" because his bride-to-be wasn't with him, but if she had been (when I was still living in the same area and very ill one weekend, they went to the drugstore together and brought me cough syrup) I would have written, "Love and hugs to you both."