In love with my bestfriend who's possibly sexually confused

Me and my bestfriend are in our mid twenties. We are business partners. The business is in the arts. Won't get into details so that my identity doesn't become obvious, but pretty much we are extremely close and are a team. He's also my best friend because we have everything in common. Most of his common interests were from things I introduced him too. I've never met anyone that was exactly like me. For a while, I was extremely happy that he was my friend but then I started to grow some feelings for him. I developed fantasies about him and realized that I found him attractive. This was before I even acknowledged myself as bi-sexual. Around this period he told me that he was homosexual. This is when these thoughts and curiosities were getting to my head. However, months later he seemed to talk about women in a way that implied he was straight. He then told me about past relationships he had with women in high school and how they all went wrong. I wasn't so sure if he was actually gay anymore but talk about sex is a bit taboo with us as we don't partake in the activity.

Around this time though I began to fall more and more in love with him. I started to love everything about him and always longed to be in his company. He never seemed to mind my clinginess and he was always forgiving when I would act neurotic. The uncertainty of his sexuality made me hesitant to come out to him and express these feelings because I could not risk risking our creative endeavor/business. A year goes by and at one point I finally decide to open about how I feel. At first he acts like he isn't too surprised but he then tells me that it is a little unsettling. I panicked, thinking our friendship might change. Thankfully it didn't.

However, when he told me that he didn't feel the same and wasn't gay I brought up the time he came out to me. He said that he was "stupid" back then and that he enjoyed being with another man but then after a while didn't. It's difficult for him to express personal things in detail for him, so I could never know more about the situation. Thing is, is that our friendship has grown and remained stronger than ever. My love for him is still strong. We have lots of future plans together. He always tell me how he doesn't plan on marrying anybody and how he doesn't like the way modern women are so he plans to not get involved with them. It all just gives me this false hope that there can be a chance that he accepts who he might really be and realize that our bond is deep and that our love is a bit more than friendship. But it's killing me that I'm afraid to ever talk about this again. For a period of time I would keep telling him that I couldn't get rid of my feelings for him. It would lead to distress and I don't want to put him through this mess. I don't want this situation to happen again but it's hard to really know how feels. He has a form of autism and is completely aromantic. Feelings are complex and overwhelming to him...I wish I could just move on and forget about him but since we are committed to being a team it's not easy to distance myself from him and the possibility and thought that he probably is bi-sexual or gay or that he could one day feel the same is what keeps bringing me back.

Perhaps I am just being delusional and I can't accept that he doesn't love me and never will. Perhaps I am just rationalizing this all to ease this pain but sometimes his behavior and the way he's attached to me has me thinking it's still in the realm of possibility.