Good friends to admitting we like each other.

We’ve been friends for 5 years. And it’s quite a cute story to be fair, I’m just scared and would like some other peoples opinions/perspective on the whole situation.

So basically I’ve liked him since college, but after new years the unexpected happened and he had said he wanted to kiss me on new years. I was not long out of a relationship at this point, and neither was he. We broke up with our partners around the same time actually.
Now, because we were only out of relationships about 2 months, we were kinda of like, friends with benefits would be fun. Nothing ever came about of it though and then

My ex came back into the picture, and well, I got sucked back into to that toxic “relationship” again with my ex. Even though me and my ex said we were “just friends”, as the months went on it was basically like we were in a relationship, doing things couples would do but not actually in a relationship. Yeah it f*****d with my head. that’s why 3 weeks ago now I finished with him and I’m so much happier.

So while I was in this toxic “relationship” with my ex, my friend was always there for me. And we’d talk about how we felt about each other and say things like “I wonder what it would be like”. He was the one that helped me basically, break up, with my ex. Now since I’ve finished with my ex, things have been, how should I say it, progressing? With my friend. I see him like twice, three times a week. I kissed him for the first time like 3 days ago. Everything seems to be going really well. I do like him alot. I finally think I found myself one of the rare ones, the good guy. But what I’m scared of is,

I feel like I miss out on red flags and get caught up in this ‘fantasy’ in my head. And then, theres always a catch, or something goes wrong. What I’m scared of is, does he want a relationship with me, or does he just want in my pants?