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Staying closeted to his parents all these years hasn’t exactly been a challenge for Phil. Sure, it helps when he gets to uni and simply isn’t at home most of the time. And it absolutely helps that they aren’t on the internet, unaware of all social medias except the very basics of Facebook. When he’s home for a visit he has to endure some ribbing about the nice girl they want him to meet and settle down with, but it’s not difficult to shrug that off and change the subject.
He never had that luxury with Martyn.
He could have. If he really felt he had to, he could have been more subtle online, cut the twitter flirting out entirely, tried for some dailybooths that ooze heterosexual aura or something. Considering the internet is Phil’s escape, of course, that would’ve ruined the point.
So he was loud, in sight of his big brother. His big brother he loved very much but feared disappointing.
They were both home on a visit for their mum’s birthday, Phil’s first year in uni and therefore still unsure of his new wider boundaries, when he worked up enough courage just to tell him. They were playing Bubble Bobble in the pink-wallpapered playroom far too late, both their parents asleep and neither of them the least bit tired. Martyn’s reaction was so slow that, at first, Phil didn’t think he had heard him.
Then, between levels, Martyn turned to him and said, “Alright, Philly, the offer for dating advice still stands.”
Martyn had been offering Phil dating advice ever since Ian stole Phil’s primary school girlfriend. Sometimes Phil wondered if Martyn suspected the truth even then, because he commented on how Phil really didn’t seem too beat up by the whole thing, and later teased him for becoming best friends with Ian despite the whole tangle. But if Martyn ever suspected anything about Phil’s sexuality before Phil actually told him, he never said so aloud.
Besides, Phil always had the good sense to remind Martyn that his track record didn’t bode well— it would be a while before Martyn allowed himself to be pinned down, as he put it.
But all these years later, Phil is sitting in his cramped uni bedroom which won’t even be his anymore in a matter of weeks, and he thinks brotherly advice is actually something that he needs. It’s not just because Martyn has a really, really good thing going with that lovely Swedish girl. It’s more that Phil can’t get a certain someone off his mind, and if his internet activity is anything to go by, he doesn’t think Martyn will be surprised.
He rings him up. Martyn takes so long to answer that Phil is almost expecting the call to go to voicemail. But instead he hears his brother’s voice saying, “Hello?” over a cacophonous background of music and what sounds like too many people.
“Martyn?” Phil asks, “you got a minute?”
The sounds get a little more muffled. Phil hears what sounds like a door closing. Then Martyn says, “Hey, yeah, of course. You alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” Phil says. He looks at the clock on his bedside table. It’s way too early for Martyn to be DJing right now, so Phil assumes he must just be watching some other people. He feels less like he’s interrupted something. “Just fancied a chat.”
That isn’t all too unusual; they do chat often. But Martyn must’ve picked up something in Phil’s tone, because next he asks, “About anything in particular…?”
Phil sits up. He had been laying on his bed with his feet propped up against the wall. Now he’s sliding off his bed to sit criss-cross on the floor. “About, er, a boy,” he says. He can feel the blush on his cheeks and is sure Martyn can hear it in his voice.
“It’s not that twitter boy you’ve been obsessed with for weeks, is it?”
“Hey!”
He hears Martyn laughing. “Well, is it?” Martyn asks.
“Yeah…” he says. “Dan.”
“Thought so.” Martyn’s teasing isn’t unkind. In fact, part of Phil almost delights in how this teasing feels the same as the teasing Martyn has done all his life— gentle, and never too far, and like they’re both equally in on the joke. “Well, Philly, what kind of advice are you looking for?”
“I guess, uhh, I just,” Phil sighs, and runs his fingers through his fringe, and tries again. “I don’t know what I’m doing. This doesn’t feel like other guys I’ve flirted with. He’s so funny, and smart, and fit. But he’s also like so young, and all the way down south, and sometimes I’m so worried that this whole thing between us is just all in my head. I just don’t know what to do.” It all came pouring out of Phil so fast. He didn’t realise how deeply he felt all of it until his hands began to shake.
“Been holding that in a while?” Martyn asks.
“I mean, your advice has been questionable in the past, Mr. Girls-Have-Two-Willies.”
Martyn laughs. “Fair enough.”
Phil sits up a little straighter. He feels his spine pop. “I really really like him, Mar.”
His brother is quiet for a moment. Maybe only half a moment. Then he sighs and says, “Tell him,” as though it’s the simplest thing in the world. “No games, don’t try to be clever. Just, you know, tell him how you feel.”
“Yeah,” Phil says. He shrugs even though he knows Martyn can’t see him. “Do you have any advice I couldn’t just get from a newspaper column?”
“Hey, that’s genuine advice! That’s how I got Cornelia to look twice at me.”
“Any advice on how not to pass out in terror when I do it?”
“A little liquid courage? Some, er, other form of relaxation right before?” Phil can practically hear the waggling of Martyn’s brows.
“Hanging up now,” he threatens.
Martyn laughs again. “You’ll let me know how it goes, Philly?”
“Keep an eye on my tweets,” Phil offers. “If they get hopelessly emo, you’ll know it went poorly.”
“It can’t go too poorly, he’s clearly obsessed with you too.”
Phil wants to refute it, but he likes that someone else sees Dan’s tweets and thinks it means what Phil thinks it means. “I should let you go,” he says instead.
“I’m in no hurry, if you want more advice.”
“One for the road,” Phil allows.
“Don’t open with an animal screech. Maybe close with that, but it’s a bit strong right off the bat.” Martyn laughs and hangs up. Phil doesn’t think he’ll bother following that second bit of advice. The first, though, the first he thinks he’ll manage.