The conformation was unpleasant, if not really a surprise, and for a moment he wasn't quite sure what to do with it. It mattered because it was annoying, but it wasn't like there was any iron-clad reason he could trot out. "No," he said, a little more defensively than was probably warranted. "I just don't know why he wants to." ... Maybe that wasn't the best way to say it. "Aside from being friends and all, I mean." Doesn't he have other friends? he managed to keep himself from asking.