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Dan can’t tell if it’s pain anymore, or if it’s numbness. Because that hurts too. But it doesn’t count if it’s the lack of everything that hurts. It’s not real pain.
It starts in his head, behind his eyes. He feels it in his throat, too. Most of it settles in his calves and his ankles and his feet. Because he hasn’t gotten off the sofa all day today. Or yesterday. He’s forgotten how to move at all. So his feet just ache. From disuse or - something else.
If he thinks about it too hard, then everything starts to hurt.
Everything, everything, everything.
And the place in his chest. Something he should maybe be concerned about. But he’s ignoring that.
There’s everything - until there’s nothing.
Nothing in his fingers. They twitch for his phone, his laptop, for Phil. But moving them feels like something his body isn’t fit for. Sometimes it's all tingles - starting in his fingertips. He thinks about all the ways his body might be shutting down - first goes his circulation.
It’s too much to think about. He phases it out again, before it can take over.
Phil keeps laughing in the other room. He doesn’t know why, would like to get off the sofa to go find out and talk to him - his voice, he’s not sure that’s still there either, hasn’t used it for a few days, or. He can’t remember.
Phil’s laugh sounds nice. Sounds like something that could pick Dan up and make it all less numb. Make his stomach go warm. It usually works, or Phil’s dumb face.
There was a time when Dan was 19 and Phil was 23 and their responsibilities were so much less than they are now. They got drunk one night just because they could. And every time Dan looked at Phil’s face, he started laughing. Not in a mean way. He’s not exactly sure why. It bubbled up in him and spilled over before he had any say.
And there were bad days then, too. Days when the crumbs in the carpet stuck to Dan’s sockless feet and all he could think of for the rest of the day was hoovering so the fucking carpet didn’t have fucking crumbs all over it. He stayed in bed anyway.
Days when there was no food in the cupboards for him and eating Phil’s felt wrong and the shame of his laziness set the darkness into place further and further - like his heart might grow tight enough to fit through a pinhole.
Going out to the shops is worse than going hungry. He could deal with the hunger. Eat crackers and milk for dinner. Use his last eleven pounds to order in. For today, at least. The next day, maybe, he’d make himself get out of bed.
Phil buys their food now, on days when Dan can’t fathom it. They share a bank account. Dan doesn’t feel guilty about it anymore.
Except he does. He’s not supposed to. But he does.
He feels guilty about everything.
No one should have to worry about him. He’s glad Phil isn’t. Glad that he’s able to laugh at the video he’s watching around the corner at the desk.
He used to sit next to Dan, leg bouncing and lips pressed together in a silent anxiety that Dan could feel. He used to bring him food that Dan would leave on the coffee table, letting it go cold. Phil mothered him in a way Dan had never had before. He never let Dan suffer alone in the darkness, no matter how much Dan wanted that.
He couldn’t tell Phil, but it all made him feel guiltier, ruining Phil’s perfectly good day, adding to Phil’s already worry-filled head.
They both know better now.
--
If Dan could see how many tabs Phil has open, he’d have a fit. It’s the distraction he needs, because Dan is unconscious on the couch and Phil is always the most bored on Dan’s bad days.
It isn’t Phil’s responsibility to make Dan better. He has to remind himself every time. All he can do is wait. There is nothing to do in the waiting, hold his breath, except that only awakens the worry.
He doesn’t worry so much anymore. Dan would tell him if he needed to be worried. Dan wouldn’t have chosen the lounge to fall asleep in if it was something he didn’t want Phil to see. He’s cautious, watches how long it’s been and keeps his normal routine, makes food for the both of them and leaves Dan’s in the fridge for when he gets his appetite back.
He tries not to push. Doesn’t ask all the burning questions. He watches the reality tv Dan hates and episodes of Buzzfeed Unsolved that Dan always takes the fun out of.
“I don’t trust anything with a jumpcut,” he always says.
He’s bored and every activity sounds like a chore and there’s nothing on Netflix he hasn’t already seen. Except the stuff he’s waiting to watch with Dan.
He’s useless without Dan sometimes.
He clicks over to the search tab that’s hidden in the pile.
“how to best support loved ones with depression”
It makes his head hurt. He should know how to support Dan, it’s been years of this same merry go round. Part of him is curious to see what people have to say, if there’s anything new, anything he hasn’t thought of. The old routine gets old. The mechanisms get rusty.
He stops asking the questions, stops pushing, but he never stops wondering if he could do more. Turn on the blue colored lamps in the lounge to make it more relaxing, put more lavender in the diffuser, make popcorn and order domino’s to peak his interest.
Watch Dan slowly burrow further under the blanket to get away from Phil’s loud, anxious energy and need for him to be better. It doesn’t work like that. Dan can’t be better for Phil. Phil can’t ask him to.
“Sometimes… I wish me worrying meant enough that you didn’t do stupid shit. That you wouldn’t hide away from everything. I know it doesn’t work that way, I’m sorry,” Phil mumbled one night when he felt overwhelmed by how helpless he is to whatever takes over Dan - the stuff Phil will never know and desperately wants to understand.
It doesn't help to think like that. Today is just another day.
He closes the tabs and shuffles his slippered feet over to the couch. Dan’s head peeks out from under the blankets, curls a mess on his head. His eyes are closed, dancing behind the lids like he’s dreaming. A little creepy, he never stops thinking. Phil leans over and presses a kiss there, hidden in the curls. He stops himself from giving more, and tiptoes downstairs to start working on a video, leaving Dan to come out of his cocoon when he’s ready.