Well, first of all, a cat does not want to eat where the litter box is! The food should be in another area. Think about eating your dinner on top of the toilet in your bathroom, especially if you've just used it and didn't flush it!
If you have a larger home, then you need to have additional litter boxes, especially if your house has more than one level. Cats insist on a clean litter box. In most cases, the cause of a cat not using the litter box is caused by stress. Perhaps the fact that additional people come into the household every couple of weeks. The main thing is to rule out anything medically wrong.
It seems he does use his litter box at times .... so this could be behavioral. However, as I said before, if the litter box is clear across the house or on another level, he simply may not want to travel that far to use it. Set up another litter box closer to the area that he is using. I know for some people, they don't even want ONE litter box in the house, much less more, but if you want to solve the problem and have him use a litter box, then you have to place another one in that area.
If there is a lingering odor in your mattress, then the cat may return there over and over again. There are a lot of websites that deal with this problem and you can use Google to seek out answers that have worked for other people. Good luck.
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