Friendship?

So this is something which has been bugging me for the last few weeks, but just seems to have got a whole lot more complicated over the past few days.
The fact that i'm writing this when i really should be writing my MSc thesis (due in next week) kinda indicates that this is playing on my mind alot!

I have a friend, my best friend, who i've known for a year now. He's great to be with, good company, talk etc, and generally a really good friend. I thought we got on well with each other, although now i'm not so sure.

A few weeks back we went to London together. I had managed to borrow my uncle's flat for him to stay in while he was on a set construction course (incidently this flat was very difficult to get in the first place). Technically i had to be there, but this wasn't something i was dredding, after all i was spending time with my friend.
Now at this point i should point out that what i value from a friendship is trust and honesty, which i don't think are two big asks. For the majority of the past year this hasn't been a problem, for some reason recently it's sort of disappeared.

While in London, i started to pick up (quite easily as he's a rubbish lier) that he wasn't being entirely straight with me, and generally not telling me stuff. Now, in general, it can sometimes be impossible to get a straight answer out of him ,or any answer sometimes, but i've grown to accept this and just work around it. This however was different. It got to the point where, even when an accident happened at home he didn't tell me. It's a fair comment to say he went into his shell. Fair do's, you may think, he just wants some time alone. I gave him this, but then realised (through a general look in his direction to check he was still alive) that all the time he was sitting next to me, he was talking to his other friends online about it, and yet ignoring the fact that an actual physical friend who cares about him loads was sitting right next to him. I didn't want to push him into it, all i could do was just try and let him know i was there if needbe. Needless to say i felt pretty useless as a friend.

Anyway, a couple of days ago he comes back for a weeks stay. Now in London, we had discussed, well as mch as he would allow anyway, where he was going to stay. You've got to understand that he's not always that organised, which isn't always a bad thing, but despite telling me he'd easily find somewhere i had my doubts (for the record, i had offered my room in my uni flat which he declined for reasons i still don't really understand).
So he turns up on Saturday (at main campus) with all his stuff and asks me for a key for a particular dingy place where a lot of crap is stored in. Now i couldn't really understand why he'd want this, and when i said i didn't have it, the reaction sort of gave me the impression that he was planning to stay there. So, i asked him where he was staying - at a friend's house in town - was the reply. Ok, so i may have been a little sceptical by now, but i was still willing to believe he had somewhere. However, i became more doubtful as the night (yes, it was about 1am by now) went on that he had actually got this room, and he said that he was going to do an all nighter on this essay that there technically was no rush to do, and anyway he couldn't get into the house past 1am. I was fairly ok with this. He kipped on my floor that night, all seemed relatively ok.

Still with me? Nearly there!

So, on Sunday i was elsewhere for the day, and my friend had been working on his essay for most of the day in a campus computer lab. As he had an exam on the Monday morning, i, as any friend would be really, was kinda anxious that he get a good sleep beforehand so over IM i asked how he was. He said he was going to meet his friend for dinner (apparantly it was being cooked when i asked, then afterwards it had turned into a pub meal...hmm). Anyway, he went offline, then quite a bit afterwards he came back on, was there still at about 11.30ish, so i suggested he go and get some sleep, he said he would soon. Now here's the clincher, i've got to know him over the past year, in particular his amazing courtesy towards friends so i thought it was weird that he be being generally anti social if he was at his friend's.
I should say at this point i'm not normally a suspicious person around my friends, it's just that as i say recently i had started to loose the trust between me and him.
So, i suspected i knew where he was on campus, and tbh i really really hoped i was wrong, i didn't really want to see my best mate ruining the chances of doing well in his exam. Thing is i wasn't though, i went in to the PC lab and immediately saw his stuff, bit like he never left really. He wasn't there though and so a bit later i returned. Now i had sort of planned what i was going to say to him when walking there, but, i don't know, i felt angry, disappointed, i don't know, when i saw him there and so what i had planned to say just went. I think i ended up just having a bit of a go at him, i didn't mean too, but it was clear from his sudden silence that he hadn't expected my arrival - he didn't know what to say to try and make me believe that he had somewhere to go. Here's the thing though, throughout this confrontation he still continued to BS me, claiming he could produce the bus ticket as proof of his pub trip (this is when it turned into a pub meal) and that he'd been given a key so he could let himself in. Now if you know my friend, you would know that he would see it as too much effort to come back to campus from town, only to walk back again a while later, so that didn't add up. I didn't want to ask for proof, there was, and i suppose still is, a small element of trust still there, afterall we are meant to be friends, right? I even brought him some food and drink, that's how much i knew he'd be there!
After some silence (as i say i had lost my soft words that i had planned earleir to my anger, i'm not good in these situations) he persuaded me to go back home, that he would only be a little while longer. I really wish i hadn't been so easily persuaded (but i wasn't completely convinced though). On the way he then, after having time ton think up some stuff (it may have been truem but i couldn't tell anymore) about what they randomly talked about at the pub. I still don't know if that was true.
So i went to bed. Got an offline IM next morning from my friend who had sent it when he returned to the lab, saying he was in pc lab 'A' and would be going home in about an hour. Ok, still not completely convinced, but hanging on to the hope it may be what had actually happened, his exam was that morning afterall so i wished him luck as i always do.

He mentions later that day that he had got chatting with this other guy in the pc lab when he returned later last night. I knew who he meant, thing was the guy was in pc lab 'b'. I later discover that my friend had had no where to stay for the first two nights of his visit. Sunday night he had spent on the floor of a not particularly safe and pleasant empty block of flats (incidently when i visited there was one accomodation flat which somebody had left unlocked - all the bedrooms were empty of people but had beds, so i half hoped he had used one of them. I even left the door open should he not have anywhere to stay at all).

So that's what happened. How do i feel? Confused about our friendship, that's for sure, however i'm pretty sure his sense of pride has something to do with it, and yet he's able to tell others just not me. I feel angry at being lied to over the last few days, and i can't quite understand why. As a result, i no longer know what from him to believe.
As my friend i care about him, like every other friend, but i've never been in this situation before and don't really know what to do. I wish for him to be more open with me, rather than keeping everything stuffed up inside, and really wish he would ask me for help. But i suppose that's the thing that he doesn't feel comfortable doing, and i've no idea how to let him know that he can. I guess i feel a bit shutout.
End of the day he will always be my friend, but i don't know if i can simply accept his lies and general lack of communication much more, without saying anything anyway...in short i simply don't know where we stand and what i can do.

He goes back home on Saturday. I'll update then.

Peace out,

A