"In love" makes you nuts. The movie "Moonstruck" depicts it very well. "Love" in my opinion is much more encompassing, and can be deeper. I used to be afraid to use the word more broadly lest it be misinterpreted, but now that I've been around the track a few times (*cough* old enough to be your dad *cough*) I'm starting to care less about that and more about expressing feelings that are important. The best way of explaining it I have yet found is, Love (in that sense) is Family (in the good sense - your blood family may not qualify). These are people (and almost everyone I know has more than one) we trust implicitly, we know are on our side, for whom we'd go to the ends of the Earth. We can live with these people (or could imagine doing so - sometimes we're incompatible for cohabitation).
For me, this group includes birth family (my father, mother, and brother), extended family (at least one uncle, one aunt, and one cousin), and chosen family (my fiance, my best friend forever whom I met in college). Whether that relationship includes a sexual element is up to the people involved, but American culture is on the prudish side about it, and even such things as back massages with adults in one's extended family can get the hairy eyeball. Physical contact (at the hugging and cheek kissing level) with people in this group is completely normal, and sanctioned in many cultures. In my personal opinion, more sexualized contact within this group is probably also perfectly normal for humans, in a biological and psychological sense, but that culture and the incest and adultery taboos have mangled our natural responses. That said, if the individuals involved are sufficiently self-aware to transcend that cultural baggage, it can work just fine, and probably does more often than we hear about. Furthermore, because sex in this context is less about eroticism and more about the expression of a personal bond and trust, it can (and does) cross the lines of "straight" and "gay" (which are only sensibly defined with respect to erotic inclination). I can attest to those possibilities from personal experience - in my case they did become reality, and though very occasional in that case, it was more than once and quite clear that it was intentional and there were no regrets (I was not the instigator).
So, if you and your friend are respectful of each other's feelings and boundaries and can get past our cultural neuroses, it seems to me that you need not fear claiming whatever kind of love you have together and enjoying it to its fullest blossom, whatever that may be in this case. Love is Love, and there's no such thing as too much!