Archive of Our Own ^beta

Phil wakes up with his hands tied together in front of him with dirty shoelaces.

He blinks for a moment. Then he rolls over, sits up, and hollers, “Dan!”

Dan wanders into the room, Phil’s laptop held in front of him. “I told you I wanted to use your computer.”

“You can’t just tie people up,” Phil says, scandalized.

Dan looks unimpressed. “It’s not my fault you’re a heavy sleeper.”

Phil’s normally a pretty light sleeper. He huffs. “Well, it’s not my fault that you never sleep!”

Dan rolls his eyes and sits at the end of Phil’s bed, settling the computer on his lap. “Should’ve let me borrow your computer.”

“First of all, it’s mine,” Phil says. “Second of all, I was working.”

“You were on Youtube,” Dan scoffs.

“That’s work!”

Dan makes a disparaging noise.

“Dan,” Phil says again. “I can’t feel my hands.”

“Ugh,” Dan says, and leans forward to yank the shoelaces off Phil’s wrists.

“Ow,” Phil says pitifully. Then he grabs for his laptop.

“No!” Dan yelps. “This is why you were tied up, Phil!”

It’s a good thing Dan can’t lock him in his bedroom. “It’s my computer!” Phil says fruitlessly. Dan has already retreated, laptop clutched defensively to his chest.

“I never get to use it,” Dan says.

“Because it’s mine,” Phil says, but he doesn’t really have the heart to keep arguing. Dan just looks so protective. He sighs. “You can use it until I have to work.”

“Wow, thanks,” Dan says, but his posture relaxes.

“And you have to stop tying me up,” Phil adds.

“Then stop breaking our other deals,” Dan says.

“Fine,” Phil says, though he maintains it’s not a proper roommate agreement if one of you doesn’t pay rent and technically doesn’t even live there.

That must’ve been Dan’s actual motive, because he looks pleased and sets Phil’s laptop down on the bed like a peace offering. “I made coffee,” he says.

He makes coffee every morning, which is nice, considering he can’t drink it. Phil feels a little guilty for his earlier thought about Dan’s lack of contribution. He contributes where he can, really. “Thanks,” Phil says.

“Hurry up,” Dan says, twitching his shoulders a little like he’s brushing off Phil’s sincerity. Then he goes downstairs.

Through the floor. Phil sighs.

Phil had always considered himself to be fairly open-minded, and had tried to culture that aspect of his personality. As such, he always would’ve hesitated say that ghosts didn’t exist, but he couldn’t have said he’d devoted much time or thought to it.

And then, four months ago, he got his dream job at Radio 1 and chosen in his new London flat.

He’d moved in, unpacked the essentials, and been pretty comfortable the first night, if a little unnerved by how large the place felt with just him in it. Then he’d woken up the next morning to the sound of the TV and cupboards banging, and there had been a guy sitting on his sofa.

“I’m Dan,” the guy had said, looking at Phil with an expression that said he was judging those pyjama pants. “I live here and I’m not leaving.” He’d paused to consider, and then said with overdramatic effect, “Or, I don’t live here. I’m dead.”

Phil had gaped.

“I would’ve done the whole haunting, ghostly, screwing with your shit thing,” Dan had added, “but you’re the sixth resident since I’ve been here and that’s a lot of work.”

“So you’re a lazy ghost,” Phil had said. He hadn’t been sure whether he was dealing with a crazy person or someone with a great sense of humor.

Dan had given him a dirty look.

“That’s nice!” Phil had said hurriedly. “I’m lazy too.”

“Fine, I’ll prove it,” Dan had said with a belabored sigh, even though Phil hadn’t asked for anything of the sort.

Then he’d sunk through Phil’s couch.

Phil had stood there frozen until Dan reappeared about three feet in front of him. “See?”

“Wow,” Phil had said. “Fuck.” Ghosts were real?

“Nobody will ever believe you,” Dan had said. “If you even say something—”

“Everyone will think I’ve gone crazy, sure.” This was the greatest thing to ever happen to Phil. “Wow. Hello!”

Dan had looked disbelieving but soldiered on. “Since I’m not leaving, let’s discuss the terms of our coexistence.”

“We should get to know each other first!” Phil had said. “How long have you been dead? Wait, sorry, that was rude. I’m Phil.”

Dan stared. “You’ve got to be kidding,” he had said wonderingly. Then he’d smiled.

“It’s nice to meet you too,” Phil had said, and meant it.

The roommate agreement is as follows:

1. Phil will not ask Dan questions about his past.
   • Dan is not upset by questions about his past, he just doesn’t remember anything and no, asking him repeatedly will not jog his memory.
   • Additionally, Phil is terrible at remembering what he’s already asked Dan, so Dan often has to answer ‘I don’t know’ to the same question multiple times, even if Phil isn’t doing it on purpose.

2. Phil will not disturb Dan’s room. Phil will knock before entering Dan’s room.
   • Phil will not ask what Dan is doing alone in his room that makes him so concerned about privacy.
   • Phil was very lucky he chose the other room as his bedroom, even if by chance.
     • All the guest room furniture in Dan’s room is now Dan’s furniture. Permanently.

3. Phil will share his electronics.
   • In return, Dan will not ruin Phil’s electronics by pulling out important pieces or otherwise shorting them out that weird way he can.
   • The sharing schedule shall be decided by the following method:
     • Is Phil using an electronic device to work, including preparation for the radio show, or to communicate at that exact moment with family members?
     • If not, it shall be considered up for grabs and Dan is allowed to undertake any measures he decides upon to annoy Phil into handing it over.
     • Or into storming out of the room in a huff, relinquishing his laptop in favor of sulking on his bed with his phone.
       • In which case, Dan is to give him at least fifteen minutes to calm down before coming in to demand that Phil return to the lounge and provide him with company.

4. Dan will not abuse his position.
   • This includes any and all invasions of privacy and space.
     • Of Phil’s. Phil’s privacy and space. The neighbors and anyone who comes to visit are fair game, so long as Dan shares his findings.
     • The bathroom is an exception and is always, under every circumstance, a private space. Dan is not allowed to show up in the shower ever again, no matter how funny he thought Phil’s shriek was.
       • Phil will never again accuse Dan of trying to murder him so he can have company in the afterlife. It was tasteless, offensive, and genuinely hurtful.
         • Also, Dan does not like Phil that much. If he were going to murder someone for company, he’d find a better candidate.
       • Dan is not allowed to steal Phil’s things.
         • Dan is not allowed to steal Phil’s things without asking or unless he returns them when asked.
       • Phil is not allowed to hide things from Dan.
         • Phil is allowed to hide things from Dan. It just doesn’t work and it makes Dan retaliate.
       • While guests may not be afforded much privacy, particularly while they are staying in Dan’s room, Dan is not allowed to torment them.
         • Half of Phil’s friends believe his apartment is haunted.
           • A few more think he has a really awful sense of humour.
             • Phil is a nice person, he doesn’t deserve this treatment.
               • Neither do his friends.
             • Dan’s extreme boredom and jealousy at someone else having Phil’s attention is not justification for making all the lights flicker and scratching a fork against the windows. His behavior is juvenile and he knows better.
               • Phil does not care that he was apparently a teenager when he died, he’s been around a bit longer than that now and he knows better.
               • Even teenagers would know better. Dan really needs to stop using his apparent physical age as an excuse. Phil does not care.
             • Dan may not show up on camera, but Phil can definitely still see him. Dan is not allowed to fuck with Phil while Phil is filming.
               • Not outside the bounds of reason, at least.
               • Phil has a weird enough reputation as it is, he doesn’t need Dan exacerbating it.
               • Phil will admit that it’s easier to have fake conversations with someone who’s not there when there is in fact someone there and the conversation isn’t exactly fake.
                 • Dan will have to admit that the conversation is still a little fake, since Dan refuses to stay on script.
                 • Dan likes making Phil laugh, okay, it’s the only social validation he gets anymore.
                   • That makes Phil sad.

5. Dan is not allowed to tie Phil up or do other things to his person while he is sleeping. If Dan disagrees with something Phil has done, he is welcome to talk to Phil like an adult. Tying him up or doing things to his person while he is unconscious and unaware makes Phil uncomfortable.
   • If Phil is refusing to listen, Dan is allowed to take any and all avenues available to him. Also, Phil’s kinks are not Dan’s problem.

6. As the only currently alive member of the household, Phil’s physical needs as a living creature outweigh Dan’s spiritual emotional needs as a ghost.
   • That means he needs to sleep. Yes, every day. Yes, for more than four hours at a time.
   • He will acknowledge that his schedule is flexible, so Dan is allowed some leeway in influencing said schedule.
   • It is not Dan’s fault if he distracts Phil and accidentally keeps him awake for twenty hours.
     • It is Dan’s fault if he deliberately gives Phil caffeine or turns the stereo on and off or otherwise physically prevents him from falling asleep.
   • Phil apologizes for the terrible pun he made, but that is what Dan gets for keeping him awake for a day and a half.

7. Phil apologizes in general for all the bad ghost jokes.
   • He will not stop making them.
     • Dan can’t make him. 

8. The roommate agreement is a constantly evolving entity and may be amended by verbal argument at any time

All in all, the agreement is a bit lopsided.

Dan is just a lot more persistent than Phil. Also he’s dead, so Phil feels sorry for him.

Phil has asked the management company, ignoring all the uncomfortable looks he received—he knows Dan lived here more than two years ago, and he lived alone. They didn’t know what he did or who he was, really; he had his parents listed as guarantors on the flat but the woman Phil spoke to had never met them or Dan. She also didn’t know what happened to him, just that the lease was terminated early.

Phil just wants to know why the best place for Dan to spend eternity, if Dan’s right about that and this is his permanent afterlife, was in an apartment alone for two years.

“I was only alone because I managed to get rid of everyone else before you came along,” Dan points out.

“Still,” Phil says.

“I probably came to London for uni and died somehow,” Dan says, shrugging. “Maybe this was the closest familiar place. It’s not like I remember anything else.”

That doesn’t comfort Phil much.

Dan listens to Phil’s radio show every week.

“Super awkward today,” he greets Phil on Phil’s return, but he’s also cleaned up the lounge, so Phil forgives him.

It had taken Dan a while to get the whole Youtube thing, not because he hadn’t known what Youtube was, but because he hadn’t been able to believe people like Phil made a living doing it. Since Phil barely believed it himself, he’d been mostly patient while Dan pestered him with questions about it.

Now Dan watches Phil and almost every other major Youtuber, which Phil finds cute and somewhat flattering, though he’s not stupid enough he’ll ever say that to Dan. He’s pretty sure Dan listens to his radio show each week out of a sense of obligation and unrelenting boredom, though.

“I can’t believe you didn’t even mention the twitter fight,” Dan adds.

Or maybe he listens because he’s judging Phil’s choice of content. As if helping Phil plan the show each week isn’t enough input, honestly.

At month seven, Phil starts introducing Dan to his friends.

They were all starting to wonder if he was imaginary, since Phil talks about him a lot but none of them had ever met him. Since Dan can’t leave the house, Phil brings over a friend or two at a time. Dan’s kind of abrasive at first, but Phil figures he’s forgiven. It’s been a while since he’s had practice with anyone but Phil.

“I’m not out of practice,” Dan snaps.

The worst thing about Dan being a ghost, on a practical level, is that Phil can’t force him to do anything. Dan can disappear whenever he likes.

Phil reflects on his life as he waves down a taxi. He thinks there was probably some point in his and Dan’s relationship where he could’ve taken a step back and thought about the logistics or even sanity of all this.

However, seeing as he’s currently transporting a £2000 computer home in the hopes of ending the constant war over Phil’s poor little laptop, that point has undoubtedly past.

The computer helps the atmosphere of the battleground that is their apartment recently; Dan will hole up with it for days. On the other hand, it’s very definitely not portable, so if Dan wants to use the internet while elsewhere in the flat, it’s still Phil’s phone or laptop he uses.

Phil gives in and buys him a phone.

Dan steals his bank card and orders about eight cases.

“Dan,” Phil says after carrying the box upstairs and watching Dan upend the contents on the sofa.

“You can pick one too,” Dan says magnanimously. “No, not that one.”

Phil puts it down obediently. “I’m not made entirely of money, you know,” he says. “I don’t even have a flatmate to share living expenses with.”

“You make enough to keep you in socks and takeaway,” Dan says dismissively, which is true enough.

At month eight, Phil’s parents ask straight out if Dan’s living with him. Phil says yes, and then tells all his friends, too, because it’s easier to explain that Dan’s always around because he’s a roommate than a ghost or a homeless friend, which is probably what it really seems like.

Phil can’t believe he didn’t think of this earlier.

When he tells Dan, Dan gives him a look like he’s monumentally stupid and then refuses to tell him why.

At month nine, Phil realizes all his friends and relatives think Dan’s his live-in boyfriend.

He also realizes that part of the reason he’s been getting strange looks from all of them is because Dan looks at least six years younger than him.

“You could’ve told me,” he complains to Dan.

Dan laughs in his face. “Just think what it’ll be like when you’re old and people assume I’m your son.”

Phil blinks. “You think we’ll still be living together in twenty or thirty years?”

Dan’s face goes blank. “No,” he says. “Of course not.”

Something bubbles up through Phil’s chest. Not for the first time, he wishes he could touch Dan; for real, skin against skin, instead of the weird empty pressure he feels whenever one of them forgets and tries to touch or shove or lick the other one.

(The licking was all Dan, and he’d looked terrifically embarrassed as soon as he’d realized what he’d tried to do. It wasn’t even that bad; in context, it kind of made sense. Phil just wishes Dan showed up on film, if only so he could’ve had a picture of that expression.)

“I hope we are,” Phil says impulsively. It’s true, and not just because he never plans to leave Dan alone.

Dan scoffs. “Please,” he says. “You’ll have a wife and kids or something. What am I supposed to do?”

“Be like the worst older sibling ever?” Phil suggests, though he can’t imagine a wife. Kids, though. But he’s got a long time before he has to worry about it.

“I won’t ever age,” Dan agrees. “No responsibilities. Young and pretty forever.”

“Right,” Phil says, but the lightness he puts in his voice falls flat.

Dan turns his face away. He looks, for maybe the first time ever, incredibly sad.

It’s by sheer luck that Phil finds it.

He’s digging through the coat closet because Dan got angry and hid his slippers, and he’s checked everywhere else. There’s a cardboard box in the back corner that has been there since he moved in, he’s pretty sure, and it’s got nothing in it except some shreds of packing paper and a pair of chopsticks. He shrugs and tosses the chopsticks down the hall, because they’re still sealed in the paper wrapper so he figures he can use them at some point.

He takes the box out, resigning himself to asking Dan where the slippers went, and underneath he finds a scrap of plastic. He picks it up to throw it away too and realizes it’s a hospital bracelet.

He sits down, cross-legged right there in the middle of the hall.

They knew Dan’s last name was Howell, not because Dan remembered, but because that was one of the few things Phil had managed to learn from the management company. It hadn’t helped much, because googling him didn’t bring back any results. Phil had thought there might’ve been an obituary at least, but Dan must’ve lived in a small town or had a very private family. Too much searching made Dan uncomfortable, and at least so far as Phil knew, that was all the research either of them had ever done.

But this is a hospital bracelet, which means it has Dan’s full name, the dates of his hospital stay, and the name of the hospital on it.

Phil pulls out his phone and checks, but yeah—that’s the nearest hospital to the flat.

“Dan,” Phil calls, standing up and grabbing his coat. “I’m meeting a friend, I’ll be back in a bit.”

“Who?” Dan asks, popping his head around the corner. Thankfully, for all that he can do it, he doesn’t stick parts of himself through walls and doors very often. He says it freaks him out, and Phil privately agrees. It wouldn’t be so bad if he looked like a ghost, but he just looks like a normal teenager and Phil doesn’t want to see disembodied teenage heads.

“None of your business,” Phil says testily.

“Excuse me, god,” Dan says, getting testy back. Good. He’s less curious when he’s angry.

Phil makes sure the hospital bracelet is tucked in his pocket and everything is put back in the closet before he starts down the stairs.

At the hospital, he hesitates for a moment before going up to the desk. He’s not sure what to ask for—he knows hospitals don’t just tell you the history of their patients, at least. And it’s not like he can pose as a friend of Dan’s while asking what happened to him. Phil knows a lot about Dan, but he knows almost nothing about who he actually is or, even, maybe, what he was like.

He still hasn’t decided what he’s going to say—He’s a cousin? He has some of Dan’s possessions and is trying to contact his family to return them?—when the man at the desk glances up at him and asks, “Can I help you?”

Phil blurts out, “I’m looking for someone.” Which, while true, feels very dishonest. He knows where Dan is, he’s trying to find out where Dan was.

Fortunately, the man doesn’t find anything strange about it. “What’s their name?”

“Um,” Phil says. “Dan Howell?”

The man starts typing, and Phil braces himself for the inevitable disappointment. He’s pretty sure morgue results don’t show up in normal hospital records, and that’s if there is a record, when Dan died two or three years ago, and possibly didn’t even die at this hospital. The hospital bracelet being at home may have meant that Dan had returned safely from the hospital during that particular trip. Maybe Dan was chronically ill.

“Daniel?” the man asks.

Phil has no idea if it’s actually Daniel. “Yes?” he hazards, surprised.

“Fourth floor, 4012.” The man looks up expectantly.

“Um,” Phil says blankly. “Thank you?”

There are two Dan Howells? Phil heads toward the bank of lifts and supposes it’s possible. It may not be that uncommon a name.

The fourth floor is almost silent. 4012 is halfway down the hall, and there’s two beds in it. On the first bed is an old man, sleeping, in his eighties at least. Phil feels a slap of disappointment—even though, what? He’d been expecting to see Dan? Dan is dead.

Except then he sees the second bed. That is definitely Dan. And the heart monitor next to the bed says that Dan is definitely not dead.

Phil sits on the bus and tries to get himself out of his panic. He has to talk to Dan about this, and that will go so much better if he isn’t about to pass out himself. He can only imagine what Dan’s reaction will be if he’s having this difficult of a time. They’ve just been going off this assumption that Dan is dead and now, in retrospect, that seems so horrible to Phil; like he didn’t care enough to even try to find out the truth.

What will Dan think, when he’s been dealing with it even longer? He doesn’t remember his life, but now it turns out his life’s not over, they can—

Phil doesn’t know what they can do. It’s always possible there’s nothing they can do, and Dan’s functionally dead even if he’s still alive. This may be worse than anything. But it’s coming up on his stop and Phil has to tell him. How would you keep something like this a secret?

Dan could, he thinks, and that’s an idea he hasn’t even been able to consider yet. Has Dan known this whole time and been lying to him?

“How was your friend?” Dan asks, snide but not snide enough Phil could call him out on it.

“Fine,” Phil says, prepared to brush off the question and figure out how to broach the subject, but his mouth keeps going without him. “Better than I expected, really.” Has Dan been lying to him? Why would he? Phil knows Dan, surely Dan would tell him— “Surprisingly alive.”

Phil hates himself sometimes.

Dan’s face screws up, half confusion and half amusement. “What?”

“I was seeing you,” Phil says. “It turns out.” He manages to keep his voice even.

“What,” Dan repeats, all humour removed from his voice. He gets up off the couch.

Phil takes a slow breath and pulls the hospital bracelet out of his pocket. “I found this in the closet.” He gives Dan a second to read it over, then says, “So I went to the hospital.”

“Right,” Dan says faintly.

“And you were there.” Phil watches Dan flip the bracelet back and forth between his palms and then, as if driven by a morbid sense of curiosity, fold it around his wrist.

“I was there?” Dan asks. He’s staring at the bracelet, eyes unfocused.

“You’re not dead!” Phil says, then tries to modulate his tone. This will definitely be worse for Dan than it is for him. “You told me you were dead.”

Dan’s head jerks up, and suddenly he’s back with Phil. “Well, I suppose when I woke up a ghost, I just assumed, Phil!” he snaps.

“Dan,” Phil says, throat tight with nerves and a fierce, sharp hope. “You’re not dead.”

Dan looks down at his hands like he’s realizing his existence for the first time in his life. In his life. “Oh,” he says stupidly.

They sit in the lounge for a long time before Dan’s ready to talk about it. Then they make a plan.

Phil wakes up the next morning after an incredibly restless night, hope lodging in his throat.

Dan’s waiting for him right outside his bedroom door. “Nope,” he says, half defiant, half fearful.

“Okay,” Phil says, blowing out a slow breath. “It was worth a try.”

It had been Dan’s idea. Now that he knows he has a body, he thought maybe he just needed to try to put himself back in it.

It didn't work has left them with now what.

“You won’t disappear,” Phil says.

“I might!” Dan says, and his angry tone is belied by the way he’s trying his hardest to clutch at Phil’s elbow.

It’s extremely unfair, Phil long since decided, that Dan can touch any physical object except Phil.

“Even if you do, you’ll probably go back to your body,” Phil says, which is the wrong thing to say.

“You don’t know that!” Dan’s voice reaches an hysterical pitch. “I could just be gone.”

“No,” Phil says stubbornly, because he’s sure of this. He has no reason for it, he just is. Maybe he needs to believe that nothing in the world could be that unfair. “You’re alive. There’s got to be a way to get you back to your body.”

Phil thinks that the apartment is trapping Dan somehow, keeping him stuck in a limbo of teenage-ness and boredom. And now, terror.

“I’m not doing it.”

“I’ll go to the hospital,” Phil says. “I’ll text you when I’m there. Then when you step outside and wake up in your body,” he emphasizes that part, hoping to get his conviction across, “I’ll be there already.”

“I don’t want to do this,” Dan says, mouth pulled sharply down. “Please don’t make me do this.”

Phil feels sick with nerves and indecision. He cannot imagine how Dan feels.

Turning, he grabs Dan’s shoulders, then his face. He’d shake him if he could, but as it is, it takes all he has to be able to hold on without moving. Dan will jump away like static if he doesn’t concentrate.

“You can’t stay here,” he says, blunt and unfair. “Am I supposed to take care of you forever? And what happens when I’m not here?”

Dan’s face crumples. “Phil,” he says.

“I’ll go to the hospital,” Phil promises. “I’ll be there.”

okay Dan sends in response to Phil’s two paragraphs of prompting and encouragement.

The heart rate monitor screams. Dan opens his eyes.

For a second, before the panic starts, Phil has a hold of Dan’s hand, his real hand, his warm, dry, living hand.

“Hi,” he says profoundly.

Dan opens his mouth.

“Told you I’d be here,” Phil says.

The hospital staff rush in. Phil is pushed back.

It takes Dan’s family six hours to arrive.

In that time, Dan passes most of the tests for cognition and motor control. There are no noticeable effects of the prolonged coma or the traffic accident that landed him there in the first place, besides what is to be expected so far.

Phil says, “Dan?” and reaches for his hand again.

Dan says, “Who are you?”

It takes Dan’s family six hours to arrive.

For half of that time, Phil sits out in the hall.

Just in case. Because he promised.

Phil is lugging boxes downstairs when the buzzer goes off.

“Hello! Coming!” he yells towards the front door, then struggles to put the box down without killing himself or breaking anything.

The buzzer goes again, and Phil almost trips coming down the last step. “Impatient, aren’t you,” he mutters, and reaches the door.

“Hello,” says Dan.

Phil blinks. Phil blinks up at him. It’s been so long since Phil’s seen him, and even then, he’d hardly seen him in a lot of functioning detail. He’d forgotten that Dan’s body had aged during the years his baby-faced spirit hadn’t. “Dan?”

He almost reaches out, but keeps his hands to himself just in time. Phil spent a month visiting Dan in hospital and another month stopping himself from visiting, because it unnerved Dan to see him, for all that Dan would never quite tell him to go away. He’s spent the four months since then convincing himself there was no way Dan would remember him if he hadn’t already, and there was no point hoping. Dan’s unease with Phil when he first woke up guarantees they’re not likely to ever become friends again the normal way.

Belatedly, realizing Dan is staring at him uncomfortably, Phil says, “Hi. Hi!”

“Hello,” Dan says again. “Um.”

Phil takes a hurried step back. “Do you want to come in?”

Hesitantly, Dan nods. Phil steps aside and watches him step over the threshold like he’s expecting something to jump out and grab him.

“Do you—” Phil hesitates. Remember me? “—want to come upstairs?”

Dan nods wordlessly, still staring around. Phil leads the way up. He hates how uncertain Dan seems, but he hates how distant he is even more. He’d begun to forget, in the last four months, how awful it was to look at him and not see Dan looking back.

“So, this is the lounge,” Phil explains needlessly.

“It’s like I dreamed,” Dan says absently.

Phil has to bite back an entire mess of words. He makes a strangled noncommittal noise instead. Does Dan—

Except it’s been six months. Of course not. But it seems like Phil might be in there somewhere, in his unconscious if nothing else. Phil tries to be glad he’s left some sort of impression, besides the obvious one of making sure Dan went back to his life.

Dan runs a hand over a box. “This is going to sound crazy,” he says abruptly, “but I think you’ll get it, so.”

“Yeah?” Phil prompts, as gently as he knows how, once Dan goes quiet.

Shaking his head almost angrily, Dan doesn’t answer. He goes over to the window and looks out, then looks back over his shoulder. He doesn’t quite look at Phil but Phil takes a few steps closer anyway. “I was terrified of growing up,” he says abruptly. He looks up at Phil, stubborn. “I would’ve done anything not to.”

“Oh,” Phil says. His chest hurts, because that makes so much sense. It makes more sense than anything he thought of in over a year, and he would’ve said he knew Dan better than anyone else in the world.

“Didn’t want to grow up,” Dan continues. “Get a job, meet someone, have kids, grow old.”

Phil’s tongue feels clumsy. “Do you remember me?”

“I remember a lot of things.” Dan walks slowly towards the sofa then furrows his brow at the corner where the TV used to be. “Almost.”

“Oh,” Phil says, because what else does he say to that? He finds himself apologizing because it seems like the polite thing to do. Dan is technically a guest now, after all. “Sorry about the mess, by the way. Packing, you know.”

“Sure,” Dan says automatically. “You’re moving?” Then he jerks around to stare at Phil and demands, “You’re moving out?”

He sounds fiercely betrayed.

“I, um,” Phil says, taken aback. “Yes.” Dan continues to look as if Phil has personally wounded him. Sheepishly, Phil adds, “It’s too big for one person, I guess.”

“Stay,” Dan says, and chews briefly on his lower lip. He’s still frowning intently. “You belong here.”

“Too late,” Phil says, forcing lightness. “Lease is up. They’ve already got another tenant.”

“Yeah,” Dan says. He breathes in sharply and turns to look at Phil. “Before we go into that, there’s something I kept forgetting.”

Phil nods hesitantly.

Dan takes two steps forward and kisses him.

His fingers dig in behind Phil’s ears, sharp and grounding. Dan’s skin is hot and his breath is a little sour and Phil hasn’t showered in three days because he’s been sad. He sighs and kisses back until his mouth feels like static.

“I’m not sure what was real,” Dan confesses after releasing him. His voice comes out in the angry rush that means he’s scared.

“All of it,” Phil promises. He hasn’t let go of Dan’s arm and he won’t, probably, for a very long time. “All of it was real.”