How do you get someone to open up to you?

I have this friend and we're great together, we play, we laugh all the time, we talk about everything and anything, we have a great time when we're together and we miss each other when we're not but we have one major issue.....we just can't seem to open up and admit our feelings to each other and be together.
How do we get past this major obstacle? It's like having an 800 pound elephant in the room when we're out with other people since they see love.
The other night we both went out with different sets of friends and my friend and I spent the entire night texting each other from different clubs. My friends finally had it and said just go be with your friend already, but that didn't work out so the texting continued until almost 6am.....lol.
A few of us met for breakfast the next morning and when we left my friend was hugging me and kissing me telling me over and over that he loves me and I was doing the same to him and all my friends just roll their eyes and call me stupid

I forgot, we are both guys and I am 37 and he's 28 so do you think that's an issue for us? I'm just confused and don't know what to do but I do know I love him very much.
Thanks for your help!!!!!

From what you have just described of your situation, it seems to me that you've been doing the "coy dance" for far too long already, and as I've always believed, waiting around for things to "happen to you" is sometimes an exercise in futility, you have to take charge and be proactive about it!

And this is exactly my response to your question of how to get others to be open to you (of course, we know it's this one particular guy, hehe), and that is, "be the first to open up and come cleanly and honestly about your feelings". This may sound like a cliche, but the Golden Rule most definitely applies to your situation: if you want openness in your relationship, you have to strike that very same level of openness, which will unconsciously give him permission to do the same.

Your ages are fine, even if the difference in them might be considered "far apart" by some people, but it's a totally different situation if, say, he was 18 and you were 29 - the difference in education, life experience, background, finances, etc. are too vast - compared with your current ages.

It sounds like it's a question of "who's going to admit it first?" between the both of you - just go ahead and do it, let him know how you feel! From the way that you have waxed poetic about the "tension" you both feel, I'm also fairly certain that a little nudge in the positive is all that's needed to make this "magic" work!

Good luck to you both, and after all this pushing and pulling, all I can say is, your first sexual encounter will be SO hot, owing to all this "friction" in "foreplay", LOL!

A large dry gin&tonic and a good intense slow shoulder massage, once they feel relax enough, they will open up.