Mindy Kaling and BJ Novak have something special.
The “Office” alums dated on-and-off for many years, always maintaining a loving friendship. The friendly exes are so close that Novak is even godfather to Kaling’s 1-year-old daughter, Katherine.
“The truth is that BJ is so much more like family now than a platonic friend. He’s the godfather to my daughter,” Kaling, 39, shares in a new interview with Good Housekeeping published on Friday. “He comes over like once a week. Sometimes he’ll come over just to hang out with her.”
Admitting that from other people’s perspective hers and Novak’s relationship could seem a little peculiar, she says, “If I was on the outside looking at it, I would think the same thing.” However, she stresses that Novak is “a real staple in my household.”
“When you’ve known someone for as long as I’ve known him — the time that we met each other, which was like 24. Now, we’re both almost 40. It’s such a long time that he truly is just a part of my family,” Kaling relays.
Earlier this year, the two attended the Vanity Fair Oscars party together, once again fueling rumours that they had rekindled their romance. However back in 2015, Kaling even admitted that she knew her and Novak’s friendship was “weird as hell.”
“He is not my boyfriend, but he is not my best friend,” she told InStyle. “I guess you could describe our relationship as a ‘romantically charged camaraderie with loud arguments,’ but I don’t think Facebook would accept this as a new status.”
Meanwhile, as a single parent, Kaling couldn’t be happier to have Novak by her side. Last year, the “Ocean’s 8” star got candid about how scared she was to raise her daughter by herself.
“After my daughter was born in December, I remember bringing her home, and being in my house with her for the first time and thinking, ‘Huh, according to movies and TV, this is traditionally the time when my mother and spouse are supposed to be here, sharing this experience with me,’” she recalled during her commencement address at her alma mater, Dartmouth College. “And I looked around and I had neither, and for a moment it was kind of scary, like, ‘Can I do this by myself?’ But then that feeling went away because the reality is, I’m not doing it by myself. I’m surrounded by family and friends who love and support me.”
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