I’m such a mess please help me

I have a friend(?) that I have a major crush on. I’ve never really liked anyone before, let alone like this. We are both the same orientation, and they pretty much made me realize mine. Anyways, they flirt a lot with me, like constant teasing and also calls me ‘baby’ ‘babe’ etc. We don’t live that close so we don’t see each other unless we plan something which isn’t that often either. When we do hang out, everything is great. There’s a lot of flirting, and they’re really touchy and we’re always holding hands, constant cuddling, they place hand on small of my back or rest head on me, etc. They even kissed me on the forehead for the first time recently. But right after we hang out, they hardly speak to me (we only text) and they seem cold if they respond at all. I try to give them space so I don’t seem too clingy but it kills me. Even normally, they take forever to answer back which bothers me bc it’s when they’re active on social media and the response ranges from several hours to even days, even though I make sure I don’t say anything to kill the convo. I’ve spent so much time and money and emotions into them and I feel that most of the time they don’t care at all, but I like them so much. I feel like I can’t confront them about this, especially because I don’t even have the guts to ask them out (if you want to leave tips about that too, go right ahead because I don’t know what i’m doing in anything) so what am I supposed to do and how should I do it ??

Hello ! Thank you so much for the reply (: I’m not always the one who plans stuff, but since we’re both only 16 and don’t have cars we have to rely on my parents to be able to bring us places. My parents also don’t like them, because they believe we like each other and this is the first time i’ve liked someone of this gender. Anyways the thing is that when they’re by me they put in effort but that’s not the case afterwards