If you can bring yourself to do it, you should tell her, yes. If you ask her out and she says yes, you get what you want. If you ask her out and she says no, you don’t. If you don’t ask her out, you also don’t. So if you ask her out, she can say one of two things, yes or no, half the things she can say lead to the desired outcome and half don’t. If you don’t ask her out there is a 100% chance you won’t get what you want. Your odds are better if you ask her out. And let’s put it this way, if she is a true friend and she still says no, she’s not going to end your friendship just because you asked her out, if she does, she’s not a true friend and really painful though it might be now, you just are going to find out right away what time would have told you anyway. Bottom line is you’d probably eventually go your separate ways and move on with your lives and completely forget about her…if she says no and no longer wants to have anything to do with you, all you’ve done is to expedite a process that would have taken years othewise. If she’s a true friend, she won’t hold it against you or make you feel stupid about asking. And bottom line, given enough time looking back on it, you don’t regret things you did that didn’t work out, because you come to see that there’s a reason they didn’t work out. But you DO regret NOT doing things you could have, but no longer can. Missed opportunities will mess you up far more than rejection in the big scheme of things. It’s a no brainer. And I say this from a perspective of a person who didn’t have the balls to go through with it in my younger days when I was in a similar situation. I know it’s hard, but if I could go back, I’d have zero hesitation. Of course, I’m happy in my life now, so I’d never choose to go back…that’s the kind of perspective you will have on it some day, so trust me, I know what I’m talking about….go for it.