I’ve been thinking about my guy friends a lot—enough to maybe creep them out. Maintaining male friendships is strangely paradoxical. It’s like a tennis rally that bounces between “They don’t really get me” and “They’re the only ones who really get me.” It’s strange, but funny-strange, not therapy-strange.

Once, at a house party, a friend of an ex remarked on how men tend to size each other up. Shoulders straighten, backs stiffen, voices drop a notch as they go, “Sup, man?”—complete with the universal head nod reserved for unfamiliar guys. You don’t notice it until someone points it out. Cue the glass-shattering realisation: now you can’t not see how hilariously primal it is. Like a cat or dog doing a cautious sniff with a new stranger in their territory—minus the butt-sniffing, of course (most of the time). 
 

It gets funnier with age, I reckon. I’ve had my fingers nearly crushed by too many “firm handshakes,” each squeeze an attempt to establish who’s the alpha. I’ve been guilty of it too, though it never has the effect we’re led to believe it will. Yet, there’s something pathetically charming about it. I guess that’s men in a nutshell.

Making guy friends is easier than you’d think—years in engineering college and in an auto publication newsroom have taught me. We’re simple, I think. Straight male friendships are different from friendships between men and women. Think of it like menswear versus womenswear. One is a very, very tiny circle, all about pushing boundaries. The other is a huge circle, with enough room to grow and do your own thing. It’s neither better nor worse, just different. 
 

Emotions, though? A whole other ball game. With women friends, I can spill heartbreaks, embarrassing sins, even ugly-cry sessions without hesitation. But with the boys? No way. After a slow-speed motorcycle crash years ago, I earned the nickname “gira hua aadmi.” It’s been five years. It’s still here.

Male friendships are like synchronised swimming, if synchronised swimming involves beer, bad advice, and an unspoken agreement to never discuss feelings. There’s an instinctual choreography: the handshake-to-shoulder-bump, the back-thumping that’s a whisker away from breaking a rib. And the conversational staples like “That sucks, bro” and “She’s not worth it, bro”, are apparently all we need to navigate life. 

Then there’s the bizarre and entirely platonic male admiration society, operating under its own obscure rules. It’s not obvious, and it’s certainly not spoken. No, it’s in things like hyping your friend up at the gym while he attempts to sculpt his pecs into slightly shinier pecs. It’s calling him “chikna” as he heads out for a date, a compliment so loaded with mockery it somehow makes him feel like Shah Rukh Khan.

And the wardrobe critiques—oh, those are a spectacle. If one guy shows up dressed like he’s auditioning for The Wolf of Wall Street, he gets a whistle or a smirked “Oye, kya baat hai!” But if he turns up looking like he lost a bet with his wardrobe? The gloves are off. “Bro, are those your dad’s trousers? Are we going to his retirement party after this?” But even here, the cruelty comes from a place of love. If they didn’t care, they wouldn’t say anything. Instead, they let you know in no uncertain terms that you’ll be single forever if you insist on wearing Crocs to a bar. 
 

Admiration also thrives in the endless folklore of guy friends. Did your bro talk his way into the VIP section with nothing but the confidence of a mediocre Tinder bio? Did he land a six-pack after a gruelling year of squats, only to ruin it with a single weekend of beer? These stories are enshrined as modern-day epics, told and retold with the embellishment of a Marvel origin story. By the tenth retelling, his feat of sneaking into the club has become Ocean’s Eleven.

The gym, of course, is a breeding ground for absurdly specific compliments. “Bro, your triceps look amazing!” someone will shout as if he’s preparing for a bodybuilding competition instead of trying to outlift the teenager next to him. And promotions? Forget heartfelt congratulations. The response is always a gloriously backhanded “Oh, so you’re Elon Musk now? Remember us when you buy Mars.”

The most peculiar part? Compliments can’t exist without punchlines. Save a guy from a burning building, and he’ll say, “Thanks, but why so late?” It’s a system built on sarcastic jabs, and somehow, it works. 
 

But it’s not all teasing and ribbing. In the darkest, heaviest moments, the boys know how to step up. When I lost my grandmother to COVID-19, I braced myself for the usual half-hearted “It’ll be fine, bro” comments—well-meaning but hollow. What I got instead was different: they showed up. Quiet, sombre faces as I lit the pyre. After nearly breaking down, a firm hand on my shoulder gave me the shot of strength I needed to get through the day, no words were spoken. A month later, when the same friend lost his mother, I knew exactly what to do. No words were needed again. Think of that Vicky Kaushal scene in Masaan, breaking down near the ghat with his friends. Or Rancho clearing the way for the ambulance in 3 Idiots after Raju’s suicide attempt. That raw, unfiltered support? That’s the essence of close male friendship.

But here’s the rub: staying in sync is much more difficult. A new relationship, a move, a job shift—any of these can nudge that unspoken choreography off-kilter. Suddenly, the comfortable rhythm’s gone, and months, even years, pass by without a word exchanged.  

When you finally catch up, grab a beer, though and realise it’s as if no time has passed. It’s a bit of magic, really. One minute you’re wondering if they still care or if the thread has unravelled. And the next? You’re right back in it, laughing over the same stupid jokes, swapping updates in the language that only you two understand. There’s a sense of relief in its simplicity. Things don’t have to be said; efforts don’t have to be made. Everything just flows. You’re allowed to be yourself—even though jokes will be made at your expense. It’s like we’re programmed to leave off and pick up at the exact same point, sharing a moment that says, “I missed you, man,” without a word being spoken. There’s a quiet comfort in these friendships—the kind of home you always carry with you. 

Maybe that’s why we don’t need to say, “I love you.” It’s the type of bond that doesn’t ask for much. It’s there in the 2-am drives, the way we poke fun at each other with a smile, or in the knowing look across the room when one of us is about to do something truly stupid. It’s a thousand unspoken things that somehow mean everything. 

So, here’s to the bros. The ones who cheer your smallest victories and roast your worst decisions. The ones who’ll mock you relentlessly until someone else tries, at which point they’ll defend you like they’re auditioning for Gladiator 2. Male friendship isn’t about the big declarations. It’s in the quiet moments, the inside jokes, and the ridiculous banter that somehow means everything. Because maybe that’s all we need: knowing that, after all this time, we’re still there for each other, somewhere in the background, ready to pick things up right where we left off. 

And when we finally sit back with a drink, in the middle of some absurd story that’s been retold a dozen times, there’s this moment—a quiet, unspoken understanding that we’re in this together, through thick and thin, even if we never quite say the words. That’s the heart of it. I think that’s why I love my guy friends. But I’ll never tell them, of course.