All I can find is anonymous stuff on a website called http://techrights.org/ which has a series of articles trying to in some way associate Nat with [redacted]'s domestic violence.
The "best friend" claim seems to have started with a weird "teaser" post on techrights.org wherein an anonymous source claims that "many others" can confirm that [redacted] was close to Nat. That of course doesn't even come close to establishing that either of them considers the other their "best friend", if it's trustworthy to begin with.
Then techrights.org cites their own teaser in other posts as saying that [redacted] claims Nat is his best friend (not true, or at least not supported by the source).
Now you are, I guess, using that as your basis to claim that they ARE in fact best friends.
I realise it's possible you're entirely honest and have sources I don't, but this looks like a pretty cynical smear job to me, especially given that none of the sources I've managed to find asserting that the two were close date from before this domestic abuse case. I don't have any insider knowledge, but the superficial appearance of all this is that a handful of activists with something against Nat have cooked up this "best friend" narrative for some reason, gradually escalating the claim each time they cite each other, and ultimately it all hinges on an anonymous source saying that other anonymous sources say that the two were close once.