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One of Dan’s first memories is a fuzzy one, blurred with age and the odd forgetfulness that comes along with growing up--some distant aunt, or cousin or whatever telling him “You’ll grow into such a handsome lad, the girls will just be lining up, wanting to marry you,” and he thought nothing of it..
Because, Dan was young and the concept of fancying someone, of falling in love was something he didn’t quite grasp yet.
In his young mind, wondering how he’d get out of playing football in P.E. was slightly more important than settling down and starting a family. He was a child for christ’s sake, the entirety of romance and love was above him, just out of the reach of his tiny, child’s hands.
Later, as he grew older and suddenly his friends were starting to take girls from science behind the shed after school and showing up the next day wearing the smug look of a twelve-year-old who’s just snogged his first girl, and sneaking looks at websites and magazines, which would have earned all of them the title of “grounded until university,” Dan didn’t think anything of it.
Because, he liked girls, he thought they were pretty. He wanted to hold their hands and whenever they talked to him and laughed at his jokes he always blushed and imagined being able to kiss them all over.
However, there was something slightly wrong with his family telling him their dreams of attending a beautiful wedding bonding him and some woman for life,because he couldn’t quite see fancying standing at an altar and promising to spend forever with a pretty pretty girl.
The thought was fuzzy at best.
Trying to imagine spending the rest of his life with a girl was like trying to picture a scene from a book that you’re hardly into reading.
Dan could see the scene; a chapel in the morning, filled with golden morning light and himself standing proud, and nervous, in front of an altar. He couldn’t ever quite focus on who exactly was up there with him. The image bent and fuzzed out, like the picture on the old television in his grandparents’ basement with the coat-hanger antenna.
The thought stuck with him for eight years, and then in year seven he found himself staring across the classroom in maths at the new kid and wanting nothing more than to introduce himself and hold his hand. His hair was blonde and his eyes were sea-foam green and when he looked back and smiled at Dan, tongue poking out a little bit and cheeks dimpling, Dan swears his heart beat right out of his chest, leaving a heart-shaped mark on his pressed, white shirt and filling the room with a comical badump, badump.
Dan thought then that he finally understood why the image of a woman at his wedding was so hard to envision.
Maybe he was gay.
The thought was then squashed when the following week when Sarah sat next to him during lunch and laughed at his attempts at making jokes and slipped her fingers between his and told him that she thought he was cute.
Dan wondered if anyone else could feel how quick his pulse became.
He didn’t give it another thought since when wasn’t it okay to get flustered over pretty people?
In all the movies the hero always fell in love with the prettiest person on the set.
***
Another memory, although later, and more somber, still sticks with him.
He was in year ten, and spending the night at a friend’s house. They had stolen a couple of wine coolers from his friend’s parents’ liquor cabinet and snuck back up to his room to delve into their prize.
They downed a few and Dan was starting to feel a pleasant buzz and already losing control on what he was saying when he confessed, “I think that I fancy John, you know?” he mumbles, a pair of green eyes and careful yet messily styled blonde hair flashing through his vision for a moment filling his stomach with a happy, warm feeling.
“What are ya?” laughs his friend, already down three bottles of sugary alcohol, “You're not fuckin' gay are ya? M' I gonna have to make ya sleep in the hallway or are you gonna try something on me while I sleep”
Dan doesn’t remember too much about that night other than how the question hit him like a ton of bricks to the balls.
He remembers telling his friend to fuck off and shouldering his overnight duffle and walking home at one thirty in the morning.
Surprisingly, he remembers how his family said nothing about how they found him asleep in the house that morning, they shrugged it off. Teenage boys have arguments right? This kind of thing happens?
A lot of his younger years are a blur of the good things outshining the boring, and the bad things forming a cling-film coating over everything.
He could look through them and see the good things, he could look through every single time someone called him a slur or tripped him in hallways or cornered him outside of the school and let him know how much he obviously didn’t deserve to be there.
He could look through the shit and see good things too.
For example he could remember his first kiss; too much tongue and way too short and to the prettiest girl in his year.
He doesn’t remember her name but he remembers that he told her he thought she looked beautiful and she leaned in and snogged him.
He can remember finally finding the balls to talk to John.
Nothing much came out of it, but a few good nights of extremely competitive Mario Kart tournaments and watching him sleep and then holding his hand for a few brief moments as he slept, SNES controller dropped haphazardly to the side,dangling off the end of his bed.
Dan can also remember how fucking confused he was.
He remembers the time he thought he was gay in year seven when he thought he fancied John. Immediately after, he’d suddenly remember how his first kiss was a girl and all the other girls he’d fancied...
He’d spent a lot of time staring off and thinking too.
Maybe he was gay, maybe the girls were only there to put up a model son front for his parents?
He didn’t know what his parents would say if he told them he was gay, maybe they’d be okay with it, who knows?
But Dan would always end back up at the beginning of the cycle when he remembered how Sarah made his heart race, and cheeks flush…
When an aunt asked why he hadn’t had himself a pretty girlfriend yet, he didn't’ tell her that it was because he’d been trying to get some gorgeous boy to talk to him, he told her that he’d been focusing on his studies.
When he was asked about if he ever thought about marrying, now, images of a handsome, tailored man standing at the altar always flashed through his mind’s eye.
He tried sometimes to envision a pretty, veiled woman, eyes sparkling with happy tears and promises of starting a family standing before him, just to entertain the happy ending his parents always envisioned for him, but the thought felt as wrong as his younger brother suddenly speaking fluent Mandarin Chinese.
He could always see himself kissing a pretty girl, however, one hand fisted in long curls and the other feeling her breasts and curves, shrill moans filling the air. He could see her sprawled on a bed in front of him, eyes dark with want and ready for him to be inside of her, and the thought sometimes filled his mind as he came rocking into his hand some nights.
However he came just as hard when he saw himself with a man, strong hands holding him down and stroking him off.
He wasn’t gay.
He’s already been over this.
He’d tried to find roundabout ways of asking his friends, not quite asking about himself, but rather, “What if say,” he would stammer, teeth starting to worry at a spot on his lower lip, “someone were to fancy both, girls, and boys,”
His friends would laugh and say something about this person being greedy, since, it isn’t quite fair to have both now is it?
Dan wasn’t selfish, was he?
***
He finds himself one night, eyes burning from sleeplessness and the too-brightness of his laptop, staring down the search results for “what does it mean when i like both boys and girls,”
This is the first time he comes across the word bisexual.
“Bixesual,” Dan whispers, rolling the word around in his mouth, letting it spill into the quiet air around him.
He decides that he quite likes it.
The word puts a nice little label on everything and tells him that this is normal, that people are out there who feel the way he does.
He’s not gay, but he’s not straight either, he’s a class of his own and it feels odd to finally put a name to it.
Dan says it again, louder, just because he can and then closes his computer, blanketing his room in a heavy darkness.
He sits there for a while, the word milling around in his head for a bit and yet, he doesn't feel different. If anything the tiny constant anxious flutter in his chest is a smidge faster tonight.
***
Dan tries it out.
He’s never been one for labels, often suffocating under their constricting, collapsing roofs and walls that seem to close in on him from all sides.
But, labels are being thrown at him from all angles, from everyone and anyone who has an outlet to do so.
First, there’s his family, splattering him with “straight” from any and all angles, paint splatters that seem to stick everywhere as they paint messy conversations around him, sending him wishing for a drop-cloth to shield him from the whole unnecessary matter of their heteronormativity.
He doesn’t exactly blame them though, you can’t blame paint for splattering, it’s just what it does. They’re uneducated on the matter, following the norms that they’ve all grown up knowing. They don’t know any better, of anything else, and maybe that’s part of the problem.
There’s people online who feel the need to try and pin labels on him in formspring questions; “are u gay or something?”, “you like a lot of guys pictures of myspace, what are you like gay or smth?” , “i don’t believe any of the comments ive seen, ur totally straight right.”
Their world is so horrifically black and white, and the fact of the matter is it just makes Dan sad.
Sad that they’re so unknowing of all of the gray area in the middle, of all the things that you can be instead, of what you are. The world isn’t monochrome, it’s filled with color. There’s no need to turn down the saturation, society isn’t an “all-the-world’s-your-sad-emo-blog.”
***
He tries being with a boy.
He figures since he spends so much time staring from afar and wishing only to have his hands all over them and kissing the breath right out of them, he wants to try.
There’s a cute one one in his physical science class and tries chatting him up. He’s all curly blonde hair and coffee-brown eyes and year above him, and his name is Evan.
He laughs in all the right places and places a light hand on his arm, staring into soft brown eyes before his teacher calls their attention back to the front of the room.
After class, Dan’s stopped by the boy, all nervous twiddling fingers and looking everywhere but Dan’s face. His shoulder, his chest, the no smoking poster behind him, but not where Dan quite wants.
“Hey, uh, Dan?” he asks, reaching forward to grab Dan’s wrist as soon as the last student leaves the room, “Would you like to uh, maybe come round after school and help me revise for the test Friday?”
Dan runs his free hand through his hair, and replies with a smirk, “Of course,”
He snogs his first boy that day in a room that’s unfamiliar to him, and it’s someone he doesn’t quite know.
They’re sat on the bed, bags and blazers discarded somewhere and Evan has a hand tangled in Dan’s hair, the other set at work trying to unbutton Dan’s shirt. It’s all tongue and hands, and there’s a Green Day album playing in the background. Dan wouldn’t want it either way.
Dan doesn’t quite know what to do with his hands, they’re both kinda laying at his sides, and with a surge of confidence he brings one up behind Evan’s neck and the other on his hip, when Evan’s hands travel lower and begin palming at the growing bulge in Dan’s trousers.
There’s a tiny voice in Dan’s head that’s screaming this is too fast. But he decides that he kinda likes it, and doesn’t say anything when Evan pushes his back on the bed and straddles his hips, he just clings a little tighter to his shirt.
Soon, Evan moves from Dan’s lips to his neck, trailing down to his collarbone, sucking marks into the soft skin there and grinding down into Dan.
This is all too much, he feels like he’s going to explode into a thousand little pieces as Evan pulls back.
He opens his eyes to find the other boy fumbling with his belt. Suddenly, he’s not ready, he needs space, he needs to get Evan off of him right now, he can’t breathe.
Dan sits up and scooches so he’s leaning against Evan’s headboard. Evan sits back on his heels and lets out an annoyed huff, “What’s your problem?” he asks, accusatory tones riding up in his voice, sending uncomfortable shivers up Dan’s spine, like he’s done something wrong, “Don’t you want me to suck you off or,”
Dan’s hands are shaking, he pushes one through his hair, to hide it and shakes his head, “I, I don’t know,” he stammers, fumbling to button up his shirt and pick up his blazer.
Evan shrugs and lays down, head hanging off the end of his bed, “Suit yourself,” he sighs, “bye Dan,”
Dan shoulders his bag and rushes out, nearly tripping over his own shoes as he struggles to slip them on and get out of the house. Suddenly he can’t breathe and,
“Hey, are you alright? Are you a friend of Evan’s?”
Shit.
Fuck.
Apparently, luck so has it that as he is trying to go home, he managed to run into the guy who he was about to hook up with’s dad, shirt half undone and untucked, and with a pretty visible semi.
Holy shit fucking hell.
Dan pushes past Evan’s father, mumbling an almost inaudible “no” under his breath.
The next day Evan, thankfully, pretends that the whole of last night’s situation never happened, however he also conveniently pretended that Dan wasn’t actually sitting next to him either.
***
Every single person he’s “tried to be with” threw him right into a box.
There were girlfriends who had tried to convince him that everything was just a phase, and others who stuck “bi” right on his chest like a bright christmas bow.
Boyfriends, who threw him under a bus, the label “gay” spraypainted on the side in bright neon tag.
It was exhausting,
It made him tired down to the roots of his bones and sat on his shoulders like a weight.
He’s long had his profiles void of any indication of sexuality hoping for a “don’t see, won’t ask,” sort of thing, but it still fills his inboxes and sends another sigh escaping from his mouth, still too tired to really care.
***
This thing with Phil is new.
This thing with Phil is nice.
For starters, Dan’s never talked to someone at nearly the degree he does with Phil.
He wakes up to a good morning text and goes to sleep with his thumb still resting on the send button, a cheesy good-night message already sent. They skype in the afternoons and sometimes at night, but never able to beat their four and a half hour record.
Also he’s never really flirted with someone quite like him and Phil do.
It started with cheesy pick up lines simply to make the other laugh, and quickly resolved into borderline Skype-sex, the more comfortable they got with each other. It wasn’t until Phil had spent ten minutes waffling on about just how he was going to mark Dan up all pretty when he finally got his hands on him, that Dan realized that they had left the box clearly marked “friends” and stumbled into the much more general, grey area, “something else” scrawled half-heartedly across the ground.
He hardly noticed since they had clicked so fast that it left Dan in a daze, walls down, open and vulnerable. He wants to talk to this boy forever and he’ll talk about anything to keep him with him. Dan talks about his family and his life and not knowing what to do about university. In return Phil tells him about the odd woman he met in the Starbucks trying to buy an extra extra extra small iced coffee to give to a squirrel and his time at uni and his brother.
Sometimes at quarter past twelve they start to get deep. Phil likes to talk about the future, now that he’s graduated while Dan stares off, trying to not get too spaced out about all the talk on what he’s going to do with his life later on. Later on is too far away a concept yet.
When he’s too far off in his head worrying exactly how you pay your taxes and when he should start writing off a will to leave off all of his belongings to, Phil notices. He smiles and digs around on his bedside table and brings out this new keychain he found at Poundland; “Look Dan,” he exclaiming, squeezing the green silicone pod, “it’s a pea pod and when you squeeze it,” he pauses a moment, as he drops the toy, fumbling around to retrieve it, “little plastic peas pop out!”
Dan smiles, shaking his head, barely hears what Phil says after that, already too taken aback at just how wonderful it is to have someone to talk to who just understands him.
“It’s just like us isn’t it?” Phil wonders aloud, “two peas in a pod, Dan and Phil.”
Dan whips his head up, sputtering. There’s a warmth crawling up his neck and he doesn’t want to look at the window in the corner of the screen because he does not want to see his seamless imitation of a cherry tomato. “Ah, uh, yeah,” he manages to spit out, the words dribbling out of his mouth and straight onto his keyboard.
Phil laughs and rests his head in his hands, a dopey grin splaying across his face and Dan is filled with the bubbly feeling in his stomach telling him that Phil was planning this all along.
***
They’re together now, face to face.
It took a month of planning and way more encouraging phone conversations to get the two of them to this point, the two of them finally standing in each other’s personal space like they are.
There was no dramatic leaping into each other’s arms and crying. . . They had already become so much like home to the other with so much distance, being here, right now felt like coming home after a long holiday.
They both kind of stood there for a moment, drinking in the realness of each other.
“So,” Phil laughs, breaking their silence in the crowded station, “I guess this is really happening, do we need to reintroduce ourselves or,”
Dan closed his eyes and laughed as he wrapped his arms around Phil’s waist. “Of course not you spork, that would be stupid.”
Phil stood, frozen for a moment, before reciprocating the hug, his arms naturally wrapping around the younger boy’s neck and rocking them back and forth gently. “Yeah, It kind of would be,”
***
They could hold hands if they wanted to, they could go out and grab a coffee or go shopping or just lay around the house and enjoy each other’s company.
So they do all of those things.
Being with Phil is a lot like what everyone tells Dan falling in love is like. Phil makes him feel warm and safe and like he’s the most important person in the entire world.
Looking at Phil makes Dan’s eyes go all soft and his heart to contract for a moment and sometimes he forgets how to breathe but that’s okay because it always makes Phil laugh a little bit and fills his eyes with the fondest look.
And Phil is even easier to talk to in person. Dan used to think that Phil had some sort of superpower, such that made it made words just fly off of your tongue, talking with him was so easy. But, in person, the power is somehow magnified.
They don’t have to worry about waking up anyone or about dodgy connection, conversations are suddenly so real time and in the now that it’s slightly overwhelming. Dan finds himself laughing harder than he has in years, it’s unashamed, uncensored. He stops worrying so much about him mumbling and Phil not being able to hear over his camera’s microphone, while still a tad bit difficult to understand, he’s still heard.
Conversations suddenly get deeper at a much quicker rate. Without the fear of someone overhearing them in their separate houses, now, sprawled about Phil’s lounge in his otherwise empty house, the fear is completely gone.
Dan’s lying on the carpet, running his fingers lazily through the coarse threads, his legs propped up on the couch cushions. Phil’s on the couch, one leg dangling off the edge and dangerously close to kicking Dan in the thigh with every inattentive swing. He’s staring at the ceiling and staring at the ceiling fan through his black frames--he’d retired from his contacts for the night--with half lidded eyes, like he’d fall asleep any minute.
“So,” Phil starts, running a hand through his black hair and letting it fall away from his face, “don’t take this the wrong way but,”
Dan freezes. Suddenly his mind is going a hundred miles an hour. He looks away from where he was staring at the other boy, choosing instead to take a look at the fan as well, and choking out a meek, “What is it?”
Phil sighs, pushing his glasses up to his forehead and letting his eyes go out of focus, “What are you?”
Oh.
Oh.
He figured this was coming. Some sort of talk like this. Dan isn’t surprised, not after all their adherent flirting and whatnot. Phil’s listen to Dan talk about past relationships, past girlfriends, past boyfriends, past crushes. . . Dan sighs.
“I’m not gay,”
“I never said you were, Dan,”
“I, I know, just, I’m not,”
“There’s nothing wrong with bein--”
“I know, but also I don’t know?”
“You don’t know what you are?”
“No, I just,” he doesn’t know how to say it. He doesn’t want to sound like a prick, he just, doesn’t know what to say.
They’re both silent for a few minutes, the silence tearing through the room and filling Dan with an uneasy feeling in the pit of his gut.
“Is it the labels?” Phil tries, finally filling the room with, something.
Fuck. Yes.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck, he’s hit the nail on the head.
Dan nods, smiling and cursing himself for ever, ever doubting this guy who knows him so well, “Yeah,”
He lets himself look back over at Phil, who’s also smiling, and decides everything is going to be okay.
***
Phil doesn’t bring up their conversation again for the rest of the week, and it wasn’t totally a conscious effort since they were busy for the most part.
Busy.
Really, really busy, with a bit more emphasis on the really, really.
On their first day, they flitted around the city drinking overpriced and sugary coffees and window-shopping for things they really couldn’t afford and then spending money they really didn’t have on cheap wine and expensive dinners. It’s at dinner at the Skybar, when Dan looks up from his meal to see Phil staring at him with the softest eyes he could ever imagine, not even looking away when he realizes Dan staring back. It’s then that Dan realizes quite quickly that they’ve wandered quite far out from their confusing grey area and close to another one marked with hues of red and warmth, and it seems natural in a way, Dan wants them to be there.
They stumble home buzzing slightly from the champagne with dinner and also with the high that follows being young and in love.
Inside, they share the bottle of wine they bought on their way to the house, over a game of truth or dare.
Phil laughs at Dan’s suggestion of the game, arguing that they’re not thirteen year old teenage girls, but Dan just laughs and pulls Phil down on the bed so he’s lying down next to where he’s sat, legs crossed. “It’ll be fun,” he counters, taking a sip from the bottle he’s holding.
Phil sighs, “Fine, as long as you’ll let me ask first,” he complains, making grabby hands for the bottle as he sits up and scooches back so that he’s leaning up against the wall. He rolls his eyes at Dan’s toothy grin at his participation in the game. “So,” Phil asks, “truth or dare?”
“Truth.”
Phil leans his head back and laughs as he hits his head against the wall, “Pussy! Of course you picked truth first!”
Dan scowls and snatches the bottle back from Phil, “What would you have picked then?”
“Dare. Of course.”
“You liar!”
Phil says nothing, just closes his eyes and grins, sticking out his tongue at the other boy. “Do you want your truth or not?”
“Yeah, fine, give it to me,”
Phil’s silent for a moment, thinking, and then, “Why did you really want to come out here today?”
Dan looks taken aback, brown eyes wide, and stiff as a board, “I, ah, uh, I wanted to be with you, of course!” his eyes are darting, searching Phil’s face for an answer, did he say the right thing? “Why do you ask?”
Phil’s eyes are still closed, his grin stretching ear to ear, “Oh, I just wanted to hear you say it yourself,”
Dan lets out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding, “Thank god, ” he breathes, “you had me so fucking worried Phil!” voice cracking at the end, his cheeks flush crimson and he slugs a pillow at Phil.
“You almost made me drop the bottle!”
Dan sticks out his tongue and Phil sets the bottle down on the floor next to the bed before properly tackling Dan.
He shifts around until he’s properly straddling him and relishes in the breathy laugh Dan lets out as he stares up at him. “Truth or dare?” Dan asks,
“Wait what?”
“It’s my turn to ask you doof,”
“Oh my god,”
“You have to pick one,”
Phil sighs, “Fine, uh, dare,”
Dan’s silent, as he smirks and leans up to capture Phil’s lips in his own.
It’s like a fire is set off inside of Phil and he immediately kisses Dan back, placing a hand gently on his chest, pushing him back down on the bed.
Dan hooks his arms around Phil’s shoulders, and tugs him down until he’s laying flush on top of him.
Phil pulls away a moment, and Dan turns his attention to the hem of Phil’s shirt, tugging it up until it’s up and over Phil’s head, “Is this my dare?” Phil mumbles against the skin at the join between Dan’s shoulder and neck.
“Hmm, maybe,” he laughs, tilting his head back, giving him more access to his neck.
“I thought you hated people touching your neck?”
“Mmm, but it’s so nice in this setting,” mumbles Dan, letting out a soft moan as Phil noses up his neck and nips gently at his jaw and starts to tug at the hem of Dan’s shirt himself.
Dan sits up a bit, lifting up his arms, allowing Phil to lift the shirt up and over his head as well. He reaches back up after he lays back down and pulls Phil’s face back up to his and giggles as Phil noses at his cheek and drops a soft kiss to the corner of his mouth before moving fully back on and licking into his mouth.
Suddenly there’s hands in his hair and his hips are rolling deliciously up, searching for friction. He groans as Phil rocks back down into him.
“Let me take care of you,” Phil mumbles into his mouth, and Dan finds himself nodding,
“Yes, please,” he’s almost begging, which is ridiculous, they’ve barely gotten started and yet, he shivers as Phil sits fully up and grabs one of his hands, rubbing the pad of his thumb across the back of Dan’s hand before settling between his legs and fully going to work at removing his jeans and boxers.
Phil leans in again, breathing down Dan’s length and smirking as he shivers before licking at his slit and taking the head in his mouth. He hollows his cheeks as he moves down, taking in more and more of Dan until he reaches the back of his throat.
Dan’s got both of his hands in Phil’s hair and is resisting every urge to push him fully down until he gags but settles for just incoherently mumbling Phil’s name like his life depends on it as Phil wraps his hand around the base of his cock, pumping as he bobs up and down, cheeks hollowed.
Phil swallows him down as he comes, pumping his fist up and down as he watched Dan ride out his high.
When Dan can form a coherent sentence again, his hands fly immediately to cup Phil’s face and pull him back up so he can kiss him again.
***
On their second day, they’re both sort of hungover, and also were really busy, so they opt to instead stay in bed all day.
If they stayed in bed all day, more interested in trying to see how long they could make out before they ran out of breath, then that’s just another thing for them to whisper about at 3 in the morning over Skype when Dan has to go home.
***
Maybe if they do the same thing on the third day then that’s really no one’s business but theirs.
***
On the fourth day, they actually venture out of the house again, Phil suggesting to show Dan around to every inch of the city they hadn’t already held hands in.
Their venture leads them from Starbucks, to cafe, to finally the Eye, Phil going soft again as he watches Dan stare up in awe at the huge wheel.
“Are we really going to go all the way up to the top of this thing?” Dan asks, the lights from the wheel reflecting like stars in his eyes,
“Of course, why else would we queue for it?”
“I was being rhetorical you know,”
“Uh, yeah, of course,” he bluffs, the younger instantly catching on and laughing as he hides his face in Phil’s shoulder as they move up a few paces in the queue.
When they finally make it into the carriage, they’re also accompanied by a young couple, both of which seem to be in high school. Dan rolls his eyes as the two crowd themselves in the back of the carriage on the bench and immediately begin sloppily making out the second the door closes.
“Ah, young love,” Phil whispers, just soft enough their other passengers don’t hear, making Dan snort.
Dan grabs onto Phil’s arm, turning his attention to the city, slowly growing smaller as the wheel begins to turn. “You’re terrible you know,”
“I know,” Phil laughs, “I’m just the worst,”
They watch the city beneath them in (almost) silence, save for the gross smacking of the two high schoolers behind them and Dan assumes that this is as close to perfect as they can possibly get.
When they finally reach the top, their two friends pull apart and oggle loudly at the view as Phil leans down and captures Dan’s lips sweetly in his own.
As Phil pulls away, the words work their way out of Dan’s mouth before he really has a say in whether or not he wants to or not, and he’s saying “I love you,” and Phil’s pulling him hard against his chest as he agrees,
“Yeah, I think I love you too.”
***
Days five, six, and seven are all a blur of filming and packing and fitting in each and every opportunity to be disgusting and in love. Before Dan knows it, he’s standing on the station platform again and clinging to Phil like he’ll blow away if he lets go.
And maybe he will, the whole week played out like a dream and he still can’t tell if it really happened.
“I’ll text you as soon as you get on the train,” Phil assures, rubbing a hand soothingly up and down the other’s back, “and we can skype as soon as you’re home, and don’t forget there’s the party on Halloween and we’ll be together again before you know it,”
Dan nods, still silent against Phil’s chest.
“Also,” Phil adds, hooking a finger under Dan’s chin to make him look up, “every day we’re spending apart is another closer until we don’t need to anymore.”
***
Dan’s tired.
He’s tired down to his bones and he’s tired to the point that he doesn’t even notice how exhausted he is until Phil says something.
“Take a break,” he offers from his spot on Dan’s floor, cross-legged and leaning against his plain university-issue bookcase. “Just a day for yourself couldn’t hurt much,”
Dan sighs, glancing at the pile of work that’s accumulated on his desk, he’s not even sure when all of it’s even due, and that’s not helping his stress. “I’ve got a lecture tomorrow,”
“You look like you’re about to drop dead, Dan,” Phil’s voice is firm, but gentle. He doesn’t want to upset the other, he’s just trying to help a little.
Dan closes his eyes and leans back against the wall, almost defeated, “I do not, I’m fine.”
Phil sighs, thinking back, “Dan you fell asleep while we were out on Tuesday, the waitress thought that you had had a heart attack, you passed out so fast,”
“It wasn’t that bad,”
“The other night,”
“Oh my god,”
“You literally fell asleep in--”
“Don’t, do not bring that back up again,”
“We had barely even started,”
“I couldn’t help it,”
“Dan,”
“I’m just,” he pauses, breathing in deep through his nose, “I’m just tired.”
Phil rolls his eyes, “I could see that much, so it’s decided,”
“Decided what?”
“That tomorrow is your day off. You need it.”
Dan sits up finally, crossing his legs and leaning forward until his elbows rest on his thighs, supporting his head as he looks at Phil. “And what exactly would we be doing on my day off?”
Phil smirks as he stands up and reaches a hand out to Dan, “We’re going to start by heading back to my place so that you can sleep on an actual bed and not one that some kid probably died on,”
Dan laughs, breathy and quiet through his nose, as he grabs Phil’s outstretched hand to pull himself off of his bed, “That sounds really nice actually,”
He stands up, face to face with Phil and lets out a breathy laugh as a set of arms wrap themselves around his waist and lets his eyes fall closed as another nose brushes against his, butterfly-soft and then hes suddenly left cold as the arms leave him and he reaches out blindly for Phil’s hand.
He smiles, eyes opening finally as Phil grabs hold of his hand and tugs him lightly out of the room.
There’s a level of trust between them, they’ve known each other for a while now, and feel comfortable enough around each other to tell each other almost everything. They’ve both been there for each other for so much already. Dan’s immediately reminded of the time that he needed to go to A&E and Phil had come immediately to take him when he was called. He’d stayed for the night there with him in the room and kept him company, made sure everything was okay. Dan trusts Phil.
There was no real denying it though.
So Dan blindly lets Phil drag him out of his grimy student housing and out into the city.
It’s just barely beginning to sprinkle outside, but the sun’s out for the most part, making everything weirdly warm yet prickled with the cold of the rain at the same time.
The two of them run through the campus, trying to get to shelter before they get thoroughly soaked, but by the time they make it to the main path leading out of campus, the sprinkling rain has turned to a full on downpour.
Phil stops, causing Dan, who was still running, to slam into him, knocking them both onto the pavement.
Dan immediately scrambles up and onto his heels; he’s mortified. Phil, however, seems totally fine. There’s a smile splaying across his face, he’s grinning ear to ear, eyes closed and looking up, like he’s trying to soak in the rain. Dan’s heart swells with something warm and unfamiliar. He wants to stay here forever, but the rational part of his brain is telling him that maybe it’s just the person here he want’s to spend forever with.
He shakes his head, clearing it of his thoughts of forever. Jesus fuck, he’s barely twenty. He can’t be thinking about forever right now, especially with someone he’s only been with for two years.
Dan stands up and puts his hand out, sighing as Phil takes hold of it and pulls himself up, and then they’re off and racing towards the warmth of Phil’s apartment.
***
They’re sitting together on Phil’s couch. It’s early, the sun’s barely begun to rise over the buildings outside of the windows; Dan’s got a lecture in an hour and in his effort to actually make it out of the house in time, knocked over at least 14 bottles of shower gel in the shower, thus effectively waking Phil up for the day.
He’d tried to get him to go back to bed after he’d gotten out of the shower, but Phil had insisted. He was up, and now at least they had time to be together before Dan had to leave for class.
Dan couldn’t say no to spending a little extra time with Phil.
They settle on the couch, each of them balancing a way too full bowl of Shreddies on their knees as Phil switches on the TV.
Friends is on. Dan doesn’t remember ever watching this episode, but Phil definately has. Dan can tell from the way he mumbles the jokes to himself as they happen, and nodding in time just as Ross pipes in with some clever quip.
Dan’s still got about twenty minutes before he needs to be out the door, he should be able to finish the episode.
They eat their breakfast in relative silence, save for the occasional laugh-track on the show, and the white buzz of the conversations from the characters.
“Hey,” Phil says, interrupting the peaceful quiet, causing Dan to jump a little, “Dan,”
Dan looks over finally. Phil’s abandoned his bowl on the coffee table and he’s turned so he can look right at Dan. He’s twiddling his thumbs in his lap, a nervous tick he’s always had whenever he’s tried to confront someone. Dan sets down his bowl as well so he can turn and grab one of Phil’s hands, thumb rubbing over his knuckles reassuringly. “What is it?” he asks, voice low.
“I, uh,” Phil starts, drifting off as he searches for the right words, “I was looking for a new place and was wondering if you’d like to move in with me,” he smiles at the end, looking right at Dan as he waits for an answer.
Dan’s speechless, which is ridiculous. He drops Phil’s hand. He feels stupid for not seeing this coming before. He spends more nights a week here, than in student housing and he’s already taken over part of Phil’s wardrobe and he’s got his own things scattered everywhere throughout the apartment.
“You, don’t have to answer me right now,” Phil says, interrupting Dan’s train of thought. He’s still smiling. It’s almost as if he knew exactly how Dan was going to react. “It’s a big decision, and I’m obviously not going to be moving any time relatively soon right now. Take your time,” he offers, grabbing hold of Dan’s hands in his own, and Dan’s filled with a brief hint of deja vu, “just let me know when you’re ready.”
He gives Dan’s knuckles one last reassuring swipe across before turning back to the television.
Dan stays, rooted to his seat. His heart is pounding and it seems a little too big for his chest right now. For starters, Phil just asked him to move in and also, he knew exactly how he was going to react. He feels a little overwhelmed and a lot a bit like the only thing that he wants to do today is be here with Phil instead of going to his lecture.
He’s got about ten minutes left before he needs to go. He should probably get up and gather his notes and phone, but instead he scootches over on the couch until he can rest his head down on Phil’s shoulder. Phil leans into the touch, leaning back against Dan.
“Yes,” Dan mumbles, just loud enough for Phil to hear.
Phil smiles, twisting his head around so he can plant a tender kiss to Dan’s temple as he snakes an arm around his shoulders.
The next episodes starts.
Phil turns to Dan, pulling away for a moment, “Aren’t you going to be late for class?” he asks, genuine concern spreading across his face and creasing his brow.
Dan rolls his eyes, reaching up and smoothing out the lines on Phil’s forehead as he shrugs, “Yeah, but I’d rather stay here right now, I’ll just get the notes from someone else,”
Phil smiles, pulling Dan back in again and onto his lap so he can curl more into his chest.
Friends eventually turns into Seinfeld reruns as the sun’s made it’s way to the peak of the sky, soft white light filtering in through the windows. Phil doesn’t seem to notice though, Dan notices, as he’d fallen back asleep a doofy grin plastered on his face.
***
Dan’s happy.
He’s doesn’t show it in the way he slams the kitchen cabinets closed with a shouted reprimand into the next room over, or in the way he complains to anyone who will listen about how he’s roommates with the worst roommate on the face of the Earth.
His mother notes it when he visits home for a weekend and she finds him in the kitchen one morning humming some cheesy pop song while fixing himself a bowl of cereal--something she hadn’t seen him do since he was young, only seven or eight. She hadn’t seen him this happy in years. This peak of happiness, what she was experiencing, was definately building up, anyone could see that. There was security in this, a maternal instinct that maybe she didn’t have to worry so much about him anymore. Maybe he’d be happy a while longer after this too.
It was in the way that he didn’t dread waking up in the mornings anymore, in the way he started to let himself laugh more, be outwardly happy; laughing too loud at jokes he found genuinely funny and smiling, for real, just because he wanted to.
She confronts him about it one day with a simple “Dan, you seem so happy lately, what’s gotten into you?” leaving him blushing and sputtering behind his mug of tea.
He writes it off, saying it’s because he’s doing well in uni right now, but that’s bullshit. She saw how his face paled when his father asked how his law courses were going. She smirks as his face brightens and he excuses himself to take a call, a familiar name lighting up his phone screen.
Oh, she knows the real reason, but watching Dan squirm under her watch is much more fun than actually getting an answer out of him.
There’s a warm feeling fluttering in her heart at the sight and there’s a voice in the back of her mind whispering, a motherly instinct, that everything’s going to turn out okay for him in the end.