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Phil's been in this situation before.
He's been stood shoulder to shoulder with a boy he likes, a boy whose face he knows from the internet, whose laugh makes his skin tingle with promise when he hears it over a phone line from hours away.
But there's always been something else; some element to temper it, some sense that what he feels might be real but it might not be. It might be something that flourishes online but withers face to face, and he's grown to hate that feeling so much that he could hardly sleep the night before for dreading it.
It's the same feeling that's led him to almost cancel Dan's visit no less than three times - the knowledge that opportunity and risk go hand in hand and they've already passed a point of something more than friends - to the extent that if they met and felt no chemistry it would likely smother the friendship underneath it.
But there's none of that here, and that's what makes this situation different. He feels like he’s in freefall waiting for a snap of reality that hasn’t come yet. He’s beginning to think that it might not come at all.
That's what makes Dan different.
*
Phil's never felt this exhilarated by another person.
He has to keep looking over to make sure that Dan is real.
Of course Dan's real, though; he's real enough to have laughed at Phil when Phil spilled part of his coffee on the sofa and real enough to have helped him try and mop it up even while still laughing.
Dan is flesh and blood, slightly too loud and slightly too eager to seem confident and slightly too bold (in just the right way) with how he keeps staring at Phil's mouth and all of that feels... very, very real.
*
"We're going up there?" Dan says. His eyes are wide and he side steps around to get a better view of the massive, looming wheel.
"If you want," Phil says.
"Do you?" Dan reflects the question back on him.
Phil shrugs. "If you do."
There's a moment of stalemate and Dan rolls his eyes. "Well, then I guess we are."
*
They stand too close in the lift up to the skybar, even though there's no one else with them.
"You'll like it," Phil says. He's rambling. Babbling, even. He can't think straight right now, there are jumping beans in his head and his heart and his stomach. "It's a beautiful view."
"First the wheel, now this place..." Dan looks around. Even the lift is a bit fancy. Phil didn't plan this, he didn't plan for this to be a date, but the urge to show Dan nice things and impress him overrides. "You like pretty stuff, don't you?"
The words bubble up inside of Phil even as he knows how completely ridiculous it is. He ducks his head and bites down on the tip of his tongue before he says, "Guess so. I like you, after all."
"Fuck off." Dan punches him in the arm but he also grins ear to ear so Phil doesn't think it's all that bad.
*
"What are you thinking about?" Phil asks.
Dan jumps slightly, then looks sheepishly down.
They've almost finished their drinks. They'll go back home soon; back to Phil's big empty house. It's scary and exciting and Phil's not sure which of those feelings is winning.
It's just a friend he's having around, he tells himself. It's just a boy he met on the internet. Just a boy he gets on well with. Just - just a person that Phil looks at and feels more intensely for, more hopeful about, than maybe any other person he's met in his life.
He's very bad at talking himself down in moments like this.
Dan half-shrugs. "It's dumb."
“No it’s not,” Phil says. He doesn’t know what Dan was thinking - that’s why he asked, after all - but he is absolutely sure that it’s not dumb. He thinks every thought Dan has is fascinating, even while recognizing the silly kind of giddiness that leads him to believe so.
"This is just." Dan pauses, then finishes his drink in one smooth swallow before he looks at Phil. "This is just a really nice night. Things have been so weird and confusing and shit lately in my life, I forgot what having a good time felt like.'
Phil has the wild thought that he wants to give Dan every nice night that he can. The thought is much too much, much too soon.
"Ask me what I'm thinking about," Phil says.
"What are you thinking about?" Dan looks at him curiously.
Phil copies Dan, finishing his drink before he speaks. Maybe this bravery comes from the bottom of his glass, but if so he'll ride it out. "I want you to kiss me again."
Dan sucks in a breath. "Maybe it's your turn to kiss me."
"Okay," Phil says, and then he doesn't do anything, because they're sat in a swank bar surrounded by people. What he does do is reach across the table and take Dan's hand. "Let’s go back to mine, then."
“Oh my god,” Dan says under his breath. “Well, that’s a line.”
Phil’s face goes red. “Shut up. It is not.”
“It totally is,” Dan says. He pauses then adds, “But it worked.”
“Oh.” Phils face is definitely still red. His cheeks are hot. But now maybe for another reason, because he’s about to actually take Dan back to his house, where they’re going to stay, and they’re going to be alone-
And he has no idea what it means. He doesn’t know what’ll happen but the weird trapped-bird fluttering in his heart tells him that it’s going to mean something big.