@colxeric I think it's the opposite. You would say it's forced when they are blushy-blushy around each other for no reason. But their relationship is natural, and they don't think about romance at all as you can notice. At this rate, they may even remain friends but either way the air around them is very natural.
They aren't in a romantic relationship yet tho, so this is just casual flirting as it seems, I doubt it is being expanded upon objectively for the time being but I do think their interactions are too "script-like," seems to be because of the influence of the author trying to expand upon the idea of movie references, so I can partially agree.