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Phil fumbled around for his keys outside the front door to their flat. It was ridiculous, really, how his clumsy fingers always seemed to grab the wrong key time and again, to get stuck in the key ring, to put it in upside down. Dan usually unlocked the door. When he and left left together, that is. Which usually they do.
It had been more odd than Phil expected, leaving the flat and traveling across London to collab without Dan. He leaves the house alone all the time, but today it just seemed too far. Empty. He finally heard the key move the tumblers to the unlocked position, and he gripped the knob and quietly entered the room.
It was late now, after all. Not too late, Dan would surely still be awake, but likely in his bedroom curled up in bed with his laptop, the glow of the blue light washing his face. He slipped into the hallway, trying not to make a sound.
That is when he heard it, the faintest whisper coming from the stairway. Odd, he thought. Who would Dan be talking to at this time of night? A pang of jealousy shot through Phil, and in an instant it was gone. Dan’s not a cheater. But who is here?
He crept up to the rail as sneaky as his tall body could muster. He knelt down, listening for Dan’s voice. Yep, definitely him.
“So I grabbed the pizza from the guy, and he gave me this weird look. I swear I thought he’d recognized me, but turns out he was just waiting for me to pay. I could have sworn I hit the ‘pay online with account’ button, but guess not! Anyway, so I guess the location of the Dan and Phil’s secret lair is still secret to the internet stalkers!”
Phil chuckled lightly under his breath, peeking his head around the corner. He didn’t know what he expected to see, really. Maybe Dan leaned up against a wall, on the phone with his mum. Maybe him face down on the hallway floor mid existential crisis.
But he certainly did not expect to see Dan, sitting cross-legged in front of Phil’s house plant, telling it about his day. He instinctively snapped his head back around the corner, cover his grin with both hands. His eyes crinkled at the edges in the way they do when he’s laughing so hard he isn’t thinking about what he looks like. Phil presses himself to the wall, listening harder.
“The pizza was delicious, as always, and so I just kinda sat around after that answering e-mails and waiting for Phil to get home. Which,” Dan looked at his phone, “why isn’t he home yet?” Dan’s voice sounded mildly shocked. Phil’s breath hitched. Suddenly his listening in felt invasive. He should reveal himself now. But the lump in his throat keeps him from saying anything, and it felt too quiet to cough to announce himself.
“I know it’s silly to miss him when he’s only been out for about 10 hours. But I do. I’m a sap!” Dan said, throwing his arms up in the air. “What can I say? I’m a clingy sap, totally dependent on his boyfriend for entertainment. Not to say you aren’t good company,” he lied. “Just that I could talk to you all day, but you won’t talk back.”
Phil’s heart was pounding. His feet were planted firmly where they were, and despite his best intentions, he could not make them move. Every overheard word was like another weight, keeping his physical body in place, but pulling his mind deeper into the conversation like quicksand beneath him.
“Phil is just really good to talk to. He’s funny, he’s bright.” Dan looked towards the ceiling as the list continued in his mind, quicker than he could get the words out. “An incredible debater, though he’s always wrong and I’m always right, of course,” he chuckled, obviously kidding. Phil rolled his eyes in the darkness. “He’s so sweet, Phil is. He’s really like the best person. I love him so much.”
“Oh, Dan-” Phil said. Then he slapped his hand over his mouth violently.
See, Dan had never told Phil he loved him before. Neither of them had said it, really. It was more of an understanding between them. An unspoken agreement that it didn’t need to be said. Not that Phil really agreed, wholeheartedly. But the last thing he’d want is to pressure his boyfriend into something he didn’t want to do.
Or to overhear him reveal his feelings while talking to a plant, and then thoroughly embarrass him by opening his mouth and letting him know he heard it all.
“Phil?” Dan whispered, still unsure he heard anything at all.
Phil pried his foot from the carpet and rounded the corner, climbing the first step and waving awkwardly at the adult man on the floor talking to a bonzai tree. Dan bolted upright and out of the room. Phil took the steps two at a time to catch up to him.
“Dan, wait!” he called out. “You don’t need to hide, come on.” Dan stopped just short of the bedroom door, realizing he couldn’t hide very well in their tiny space anyway. He dropped his hands from his hips and turned to face him.
“How long were you there?” he asked. Phil searched his face for any emotion, anger, sadness, embarrassment. Nothing tipped him off about how to proceed.
“Err.. Since the pizza guy came,” he squeaked out. Dan spun in place, hands running through his hair, and over his face, and into his pockets, as if he were suddenly too aware of them and couldn’t find a place to put them.
“Fuck, Phil.” Dan bent over slightly, resting his palm on the bridge of his nose and covered his eyes. “And you heard..?”
“Everything after that, yes.” Phil wanted to go back in time and fix it. Whatever it was. He still wasn’t sure exactly what was wrong. “I’m sorry Dan!” he blurted out. “I just came home, and I wasn’t sure who you were talking to, and then when I saw, well, I didn’t want to embarrass you! And then with every passing moment it just seemed to get more embarrassing..”
“Thanks for that, Phil!” he said, a twinge of humor to his voice. “Oh, what is my life?”
“Look, it’s fine! So you like to talk to plants, no big deal!” Phil took a shot in the dark about what the problem was. He may have been wrong, but it made Dan laugh.
“That’s not the point, you spork! That was the first time I said I loved you out loud, and I didn’t even say it to your face! I said it to a fucking tree. With you listening from the foyer. Oh my god.” Phil felt a crisis of sorts building.
“I love you too,” he said simply. Dan perked up at that, cocking his head to the side to look Phil in the eyes. Phil ran his hands down both of Dan’s arms, ending at the hands and he grasped them then. He raised their laced fingers into view. “I love you, Dan. Very much,” and he pressed a gentle kiss to Dan’s knuckles. Dan was tearing up, just a bit at the corner of his eye.
“I’m sorry I fucked this up,” he said.
“You didn’t,” Phil answered immediately.
Dan untangled his hands from Phil’s, only so he could wrap his arms around his neck and curl his face into his shoulder. “I love you so much,” he mumbled into Phil’s collarbone.
“I know,” he said. “I’ve always known.” Phil pulled him away and pressed his forehead to Dan’s, breathing the same air, inhaling it deeply. Keeping each other alive. They kissed softly. Slowly. And even as they finally parted, it was as if they were closer than ever.
Phil bit his lip as they pulled into a smirk involuntarily. Dan looked at him, questioningly.
“It’s just that-” he started. “Why were you talking to my house plant to begin with?”
Dan laughed out loud then.
“Oh shut up!” he played. “I saw a Wikipedia article and it said that plants live better if you talk to them. Something about the carbon dioxide. I thought I’d try it out.” Dan shook his head gently, sighing at the momentous dweeb that he could be at times.
But Phil pulled him close, and they were chest to chest, swaying gently from side to side.
“You’re really sweet, you know that?” Phil told him. Dan only hummed in response, wrapping both arms around his lover’s waist. He let the feeling wash over him completely. Not fighting it at all, for the first time.