"Just" friends, worried about me or a crush on me?

Some of you may have seen my thread "he wants to sleep over" and know who I am talking about the same guy, but that 's not so relevant to the story.

So there is this guy. He's a really good friend of mine and just last weekend he was at my place for the night and pretty much the next day, in total he spent 28 hours straight in mt company. There's nothing strange about that right? Yeah, well, but before that we had never seen each other outside of school. Still not that strange? Well he used to claim he has a crush on this girl but hasn't mentioned her in a loong time. He is very trustworthy and somehow within weeks of actually starting to talk to him we had created this amazing trust between us. I have told him things I never told anyone before and he's helped me feel better and a little less depressed. When I told him I was cutting, he freaked out and blamed himself and that was kind of a terrible conversation, I don't know which one felt worse, him or me. He has made it very clear that he cares a lot about me. In fact, when I came out to him as genderfluid he said "It doesn't matter what you feel your gender is. What matters is that you are you. You're Aliisa. The aliisa who *insert a lot of stuff only he knows the meaning of*. And that's the aliisa that I love." The fact that he actually used the word LOVE kind of bothers me. Of course I just smiled at that moment and texted something beautiful back, but later it kinda got to me. He had said he loves me. Okay, he just means it in a friendly way right? I pushed that aside when I couldn't find the answer. Then came the day we finally met for the first time outside of school. And this is where it gets weird. After the nervousness of not really knowing how to act disappeared and we grew comfortable with each others presence, we started talking about all the serious stuff that we had earlier only discussed via text. In the end we were hugging. That lead to being comfortable with touch. I would push him and hit him and everything when we were joking, and when things were more serious he wouldn't have to ask if he could hug me. The first day of the sleepover went easily. It's the next one that really made me think. He would constantly be complimenting me. "I like you necklace" "Sad that your hair dye is starting to fade, I really like the pink one" even "You look beautiful" not pretty, beautiful. We watched a movie and as I was getting comfortable on the couch I accidentally leaned on his shoulder instead of a pillow. He said he didn't mind so I kept my head on his shoulder. Soon I realised my legs were swung on top of his thighs and he had his arm around me. After the movie we stayed like that. And then things got weird. We spent the whole day on the couch, hugging each other and cuddling. Either he would have his head on my lap and hold my hands or I would be lying across his sitting form, my hands around his back, his hands around my waist and my face buried in his chest. Even both of us just lying on the couch, him supporting himself so that he's hovering over me and our legs in a mess.

The thing is, all that cuddling etc could be just because he IS a very touchy-feely person. He cares a lot about me and I can't even count the times he told me he can't stand to be scared that I'd be gone one day. I just don't want there to be something he's not telling me about his feelings for me. I know there was a rumour when we started to get to know each other that I had a crush on HIM but I said I didn't! This might be why he wouldn't admit he has a crush on me because he thinks I don't feel the same way! Or then he just sees me as a friend who enjoys hugs. All my friend a seem to think he has a crush on me BUT then again they think he's just one of the tough guys which he REALLY is not. His behaviour just really left me wondering and I would appreciate some thoughts from others as well. Thanks for reading all this :lol:

 

Okay I know there's a lot of absolute bs in there but come on :lol: Somebody? Anybody?

 

Even if it was so, I can't just bluntly ask him... How to be sure? Are there like any tell-tale signs or what....

 

So....wait.... Is everyone but me seeing this is something??