"Friends," he repeated, though perhaps not with the insistence that he'd intended. He noted her smile and dropped his eyes, a flicker of the old self-deception. He knew perfectly well that they were more than friends, even if neither had given voice to it.
He eyed the book, Bill Bryson's A Walk in the Woods, approvingly. "I haven't read that one," he said, "though I've skimmed through some of his other works. He's an entertaining one."