Have patience to read about my " love (?) life" and give me an honest opinion?

So I have known this guy for about 6 years now. We met online and we've talked constantly for 2 years and he was my go-to guy for everything..I was 16 back then and he was 17..we were both new immigrants in our respective countries from the same state in India...so we could both relate to each others problems and lives I guess and we bonded really well..and then due to a misunderstanding and a fault completely on my part..i stopped talking to him for 2 years..but then whenever anything happened I felt like talking to him but my stubbornness got the best of me..anyways long story short I wrote to him two years after and cleared up the misunderstanding and slowly and steadily started talking again...it was kind of different this time around...i started getting really comfortable talking to him and I dont know how to explain it but everytime I saw him online I had this huge smile on my face...he makes me happy..really happy..now we are just friends but I feel a lot more feelings towards him and sometimes I doubt whether he has them too but I am too much of a chicken to ask him or take a step toward that because of my uncertainty that things will work out..we are both in different countries and there is no way I can meet him in the next year and a half atleast..but not being able to tell him that I miss him or that I like him a lot or not having the liberty of being in his life like he is in my mind is driving me nuts...I don't know what to do..Should I just tell him how I feel? Should I wait till I meet him? I don't know what to do..am I in love?