“I haven’t seen him in over a year when we started filming, so that was the longest I’ve gone since I’ve met him,” Lindsay, 35, told Us at the Winter House premiere party at Eastpoint in New York City on Wednesday, October 20. “So I went into it like, ‘Hey, I’m just so f—king excited to, like, see my best friend.’ And we talk every day — sometimes breakfast, lunch and dinner, you know, sometimes we will go a couple of days without talking, but we’re always on the phone. … Austen and I do have a history when we’re both single that you don’t know what’s going to happen.”

The publicist noted that the Bravo stars never spilled about any behind-the-scenes hookups because they wanted to “protect” their friendship.

“We’re living in a very different environment than most people and you need as many friends as you can to just bounce ideas off and try to work through certain situations,” she explained. “If you can find that person in somebody else on a different show who understands what you’re going through, but it’s not too close to the situation, that’s where we became friends and we’ve been nurturing that friendship for the last three years. [Fans will] start to see that development, that friendship. I know it feels like it came out of nowhere, it really does, [but] it really has not come out of nowhere. We do have a history of friendship and physical history of romance.”

In the trailer for Winter House, the six-episode spinoff series featuring Southern Charm and Summer House stars and several newcomers, Lindsay is seen telling Austen she’s “in love” with him. She told Us that the moment was sparked by a conversation she had with the Charleston resident at the bar shortly after she arrived — and alcohol.

“I come in and start some s—t, and like, tell everyone I’m in love with them and I’m not,” Lindsay teased of her episode two arrival. “And I’m, like, wasted while doing it and you’re just like, ‘No, why? No! Brush your hair. F—k, No I can’t.’ And I’m not looking forward to [watching] me having that conversation that I’ve seen in all of the trailers.”

While Lindsay admitted she was “100 percent too drunk” on Fireball whiskey, she added, “In that moment, I did say that I was in love with a lot of people — I haven’t seen the episode and whether they play all of those people or not, I have no idea.”

In past seasons of Summer House, fans have seen Lindsay briefly date longtime friend Carl Radke, who chose to skip Winter House as he is focused on his sobriety. After they shared cozy snaps at Kyle Cooke and Amanda Batula’s wedding in September — and during an NYC outing earlier this month — fans began to speculate that they were dating again.

“We’ve been super close, we’ve been best friends, we started the show together. Not having him at Winter House was very strange for me. I mean, he was helping me pack the night before I left,” she told Us. “I FaceTimed him a bunch while I was there and we hang out all the time, we live in the same building in New York and we’re just, like, really, really close.”

Lindsay added that people might not necessarily understand what it’s like to be so close with someone of the opposite sex but admitted she understands the questioning.

“Here I am, like, on Winter House talking about Austen and how I’m in love with him, but, you know, I’m also in love with Carl, Kyle and Amanda,” she said with a laugh. “Carl and I, you know, he’s been going through a very different lifestyle phase and change of his life. I’ve been very supportive of him since day one.”

Winter House airs on Bravo Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET.

This story originally appeared on: US Magazine - Author:Sarah Hearon