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The weekend trip to Brighton had been planned for weeks, but the decision to drive had been entirely impulsive. Neither of them own a car, for one thing, and for another, they both rather enjoy the train ride between between the cities. Dan feels at peace on train journeys, lets the impermanence of it all wash over him in a soft wave, and Phil likes the way he's going somewhere different, likes the sparks of excitement that fizz under his skin.
But it's becoming harder and harder for them to go anywhere, nowadays, without being spotted by viewers. They enjoy meeting people, of course, enjoy putting faces and voices and glimpses of personalities to the twitter handles and tumblr urls that make up their fanbase, but it can be exhausting sometimes.
So when Phil, two hours before they're meant to leave, says, “what if we rented a car,” Dan grabs at the idea in midair, jumps on board with alarming alacrity.
“Fucking yes,” he says, vehement. He's feeling a bit worn out, was positively dreading the almost-certainty of running into at least one subscriber. They're usually lovely but he couldn't sleep last night and he's tired today.
“You think?” Phil says, his eyebrows furrowing slightly. He pulls his lower lip into his mouth, peering at his laptop screen with narrowed, focused eyes.
“Why not?” Dan asks. He sits up straighter, rolling his head to crack his neck and shifting so his legs are crossed on the couch. His fingers drum nervously on his left shin. “We just get the car and go, there's car parks in Brighton, and we won't have to worry about being seen at the station. We can just go, have a relaxing little private holiday, why shouldn't we?”
Phil keeps worrying at his lip, a wrinkle appearing in the centre of his forehead as he types something into the search bar.
“We've never driven to Brighton, what if we get lost? And we've already bought our train tickets,” he says slowly. Dan shifts impatiently, the idea gaining sentience inside his head. It sounds more and more appealing by the second – driving down the M25, windows cracked if weather permits, music playing. A private space for just them.
“Hired cars all have satnavs, we won't get lost,” he says. His fingers are still drumming away on his leg. “And train tickets are, what, a few pounds? We can spare it, we're not exactly poor, Phil.” Phil nods, conceding Dan's point, but his frown doesn't fade entirely.
“It still seems a waste,” he says, but Dan can tell he's being won over.
“No, but it's such a good idea!” Dan presses. “We can blast music and eat crisps and no one will take creepy pictures of us from across the compartment, please, Phil, it'll be so perfect. And the drive is only, like, two hours I think?” He pulls out his phone and holds down the home button. “Siri, how long is the drive from London to Brighton.”
His phone beeps, and then Siri's robotic voice chirps out, in its strange automated Australian accent, “Getting directions from London to Brighton.” Dan watches as Apple maps opens and shows him the route highlighted in blue.
“Yeah, it's like two hours and a bit, come on, Phil, it'll be fun.” He opens his eyes wide, a trick he could pull off at eighteen when he still had a baby face but that might not work now that he looks like an actual adult. Phil looks at him sternly, then sighs, his face melting into a rueful smile.
“You can't do that,” he says, voice dripping with fondness. “You can't make that face when we're debating, that's cheating.”
“I don't know what you're talking about,” Dan replies, grinning. Phil rolls his eyes but he doesn't stop smiling as he types something into his internet browser. “What are you doing?”
“Looking up car letting agencies,” he says, and Dan lets out a loud whoop.
::
They end up getting a little Mazda from the Enterprise near King's Cross, boxy and painted sleek black. It's small but they don't really need anything bigger, and their bags fit neatly in the boot with space for a cooler full of chopped fruit and vegetables and water bottles and a tub of hummus.
“It matches my aesthetic,” Dan laughs, running a hand over the space-grey interior. Phil snorts and starts the car, grips the steering wheel tightly for a moment before grinning over at Dan.
“Shall we have a bit of an adventure?” he asks, and Dan grins back, glances around to make sure no one's looking at them from the street before leaning in and pressing a quick kiss to Phil's mouth, his hand scritching through the short hairs at the back of Phil's neck.
“Always up for one of them,” Dan breathes against Phil's lips, and they lean their foreheads together and smile.
The car drives well, quiet and smooth, and Dan reaches up to put on the radio, twists the volume knob up when he hears that it's Years & Years playing. He bobs his heat to the beat of Worship and reaches across the gearshift to run his hand over Phil's thigh and give it a gentle squeeze.
“Ready?” he asks, and Phil grins, nods, and pulls out of their parking space onto the street.
::
It's maybe 18 degrees, grey sky with a bit of sun hinting through and making everything weirdly bright. Dan has his window down slightly and it's ruffling his hair and he thinks maybe it should bother him but he can't bring himself to mind, somehow. His phone is plugged into the sound system and he's got The Shins on, New Slang playing quietly as they pull out of the edges of London and start heading south towards the coast. Phil's bobbing his head slightly, his fingers tapping along to the easy beat of the song, and he's wearing a black t-shirt under his rust-red bomber jacket and he's beautiful, breathtaking in the grey midday light.
Dan sighs happily, tilts his head back against the headrest and closes his eyes, the fingers of his right hand tracing slow, lazy circles across the outside of Phil's left knee. He feels very floaty and warm, pleasantly content and calm the way he always is when he's going somewhere with Phil at his side.
“This was a good idea,” he says. Phil huffs out a tiny exhale of laughter.
“Yeah,” he agrees. Dan feels satisfaction curl sweetly through his stomach and chest. “Glad you talked me into it.”
They sink into a comfortable quiet, the kind of friendly simpleness that Dan only knows how to create with Phil. It's one of the best things about their friendship. They can sit together and not say anything for hours, just read their books or browse the internet or answer emails, do things separately whilst still being together. It's never awkward or uneasy and Dan has only ever had that with Phil, so he holds those pockets of time close to his chest like tiny treasures. He's so calm. He wishes they could hire a car for every trip they take.
The road stretches away in front of them, long and leading towards adventure. It makes something behind Dan's solar plexus spark to life and he sits up straighter, rolls his window down and sticks his hand out of it to feel the cool air zipping by. A grin grows on his face as memories from his childhood come crashing into his head.
“I stuck my head out a car window when I was a kid,” Dan says. Phil lets out a bright burst of laughter, quicksilver and involuntary, and Dan laughs too.
“You didn't,” Phil giggles. When he glances over at Dan his eyes are shining behind his glasses and Dan's heart flips over a little. “Oh my god, Dan.”
“I did, we had a dog who'd always do it so I said, wow that looks fun! and I stuck my head out the bloody window,” he snickers. Phil's smile is making the laughter lines at the sides of his eyes go deep and crinkly and Dan loves him.
“What happened? I can't believe you've never told me this,” Phil asks. He sounds so happy, lost in the moment, endlessly amused by yet another one of Dan's ridiculous anecdotes.
“Nothing!” Dan laughs. “My dad grabbed me by my jacket and pulled me back into the car, yelled at me a bit about how dangerous it was. I can't believe I didn't get decapitated, honestly, the road was quite busy.”
“Well,” Phil says, glancing over at him again and grinning widely. “Try not to do that now then.”
::
Half an hour into their journey the clouds go gunmetal grey, dark and ominous on the horizon, and Phil rolls up the windows when the sky starts to spit rain. The water droplets land with gentle tapping noises on the windscreen and bead up there, vibrating with the movement of the car, and Dan feels serenity settle over him. He loves rain, loves storms, and the way the raindrops sound on the roof is immensely satisfying.
A few minutes pass and the rain keeps falling harder, until the windscreen is nearly opaque from the sheer amount of water on it. Phil drives slowly, overly cautious, his lower lip caught hard between his teeth.
“You doing okay?” Dan asks, glancing over at Phil, whose eyes are trained on the road with incredible focus.
“Brilliant,” Phil mumbles, his jaw tight. He lets out a nervous exhale through his nose. “Would you mind if I pulled to the side though? Don't feel safe driving in this, honestly.”
“Not at all,” Dan assures him, and Phil nods and taps the breaks so the car coasts to a slow stop on the side of the road. He slumps back on his seat, removing his hands from the steering wheel and shaking them around a bit to relax his joints, then looks over at Dan with a small smile and a sigh.
“Sorry,” he says. Dan shakes his head and reaches out to thread his fingers in with Phil's.
“Don't need to be sorry,” Dan tells him. Phil tips his head back and closes his eyes for a few seconds before they pop back open.
“Sunroof!” he cries, his voice bright and loud and sudden. Dan stares at him in confusion for a split second before looking up at the roof.
Sure enough there is a sliding panel directly above their heads, and Phil reaches up to push it away, revealing a rectangle of glass that's being pummeled by the rain. He grins.
“This is amazing,” he says, looking over at Dan with a bright smile that turns his eyes to slits. A wave of fondness crashes over Dan, heavy and warm, and he leans forward and cups Phil's face with his hand, brings him in for a slow kiss that makes his breath catch.
“Mm,” Phil hums when they pull away. “Hello.”
“Hi,” Dan whispers. Their noses bump together gently and Phil breathes out a giggle that's nearly lost amidst the pounding of the rain on the top of the car. “Wouldn't have been able to do that on the train.”
“No,” Phil agrees, then closes the space between their mouths again, soft and sweet. “Was that your entire motivation to get a car?”
Dan snorts and leans his head on Phil's shoulder, their hands twisted together. Sea of Love by Cat Poweris playing quietly and he hums along for a few bars, then tilts his head up and kisses the underside of Phil's jaw.
“Maybe it was part of it,” he admits. Phil laughs. “It's nice, though, I like car rides.”
“Yeah,” Phil agrees. He squeezes Dan's hand and as he does the rain abruptly slacks off. Dan is suddenly aware of how loud it was, drumming against the car and the road. “I can drive in a drizzle, shall we carry on?”
::
At the one hour mark Phil requests some old-school Muse and they sing along to Supermassive Black Hole at the top of their lungs and it's ridiculous and fun and Dan can't stop laughing. He feels limitless, like nothing outside of the car matters. He feels infinite and when he looks over at Phil, grinning and singing along ( and oh baby I'm a fool for you) that feeling increases, grows tenfold in his chest. He rolls down his window and sticks his hand outside, watching raindrops land on his arm and letting cool air whip into the car.
“This is amazing,” he half-shouts over the music, and Phil smiles even wider, his head bobbing to beat the music and his hand moving to twine around Dan's own.
::
They're an hour and a half in and Dan is dozing off, the movement of the car lulling him slowly to sleep. He and Phil are holding hands over the gear shift and everything feels very soft and golden, the sun starting to peek back out from behind the clouds as they continue driving south. They've got maybe twenty-five minutes left until they're meant to reach Brighton, thirty-seven to get to PJ's house according to the satnav, and Dan thinks that he hasn't felt this calm and happy in a long time. There's no pressure to stay vigilant inside this little car. He can hold Phil's hand without having to worry and that's a wonderful feeling.
Phil lifts Dan's hand to his lips, presses a kiss to his knuckles and then another to his fingertips, and Dan smiles and lets himself sink into this moment, the gentleness and the sweetness of it. A Bright Eyes song is playing and it reminds him of 2009 and the way it felt the first time Phil held his hand all those years ago.
“I love you,” he murmurs, and Phil looks away from the road for a moment to smile softly.
“Thought you were asleep,” he says. The tips of his ears are going pink. “Love you too.”
Dan yawns and lets go of Phil's hand so he can take his jumper off. He folds it up and places it between his head and the window, then leans against it and closes his eyes.
“I'm sleeping now,” he mumbles. Bright Eyes shifts into something lovely with a lot of cello, and the sound of the drizzle on the windscreen is enough to knock Dan right out.
::
He wakes up twenty-five minutes later when the car stops moving and his nostrils fill with the scent of the sea, and when he opens his eyes he's immediately confused.
“Phil,” he says slowly, looking over at his boyfriend, who's nibbling a slice of apple and looking utterly unconcerned with the fact that they most certainly are not in Brighton. “Why are we in a car park by the ocean instead of at PJ's?”
“Thought we could manage a quick stop,” Phil says happily. He finishes off his slice of apple and grins. “No one's around, we could do that thing from The Notebook. You, obviously, are Rachel McAdams, as I am much more manly than you.”
“I'm Rachel McAdams!” Dan protests. “I'm taller than you!”
“Barely,” Phil teases. He unbuckles his seat belt and pokes Dan in the thigh. “Come on, I just want to look at the water.”
It's still drizzly so the shore is nearly empty, only one other pair of people walking across the rocky beach. Dan tugs the hood of his jacket up over his hair but Phil leaves his down, tilts his face up towards the clouds and breathes deep, and Dan wants to kiss him.
“I'm glad we did this,” he says instead. Phil looks over at him, his eyes shiny and bright. “With the car and everything, it's been nice.”
“Yeah, it has,” Phil agrees. The air smells of salt and rain and Dan feels light and buoyant with contentedness.
“Reckon we could do it again?” he asks. Phil grins and nods.
“Definitely.”