Work Text:
Dan Howell knew three things in life for certain. He liked wearing hoodies in summer, loved his grandma, and never wanted to do another law paper for as long as he lived. If Hell existed he was sure it would just be a two-and-a-half-hour exam on a law paper that he did absolutely no studying for until the morning of the exam.
And maybe in retrospect, completely flunking one exam was probably not the best excuse to pack up all his belongings, book a last-minute flight to the furthest place he could think of, and drop out of university.
But now, here he is, three months into living in his grandmother's guest room in New Zealand, not having left the house in weeks and eating a plain bagel with cream cheese for lunch every day. Dan was the happiest he’d ever been.
Of course, his grandmother wouldn’t see it this way. Dan loved his grandmother dearly but she didn’t understand that he wanted to spend his days mastering Guitar Hero and websurfing until two in the morning.
“Dan, you need to stop lounging about and go outside once in a while! Go for a walk, make some friends! Get off that bloody computer,” She says picking up the dirty clothes he’d left on the floor. Is it embarrassing that his Grandma was picking up after him at his big age of nineteen? A little, yes. But is he ashamed? Also, yes.
“Going on walks is something only old people and fitness gurus do, it’s not real.” He replies, groaning as she opens his curtains.
“You know, Daniel,” his full name was never a good sign, “you could try and help out around here, instead of letting your frail old grandmother clean and dote after you like a toddler,” she feigns a sad face.
“I do help! I…put away the groceries! And you’re not frail, you’re hardly even seventy.”
“Oh that must be so very difficult for you, I’m so sorry you have to put away food into the fridge once a week,” She scoffs and sits down on the edge of his bed.
“Dan, I’m worried about you.”
“You don’t need to, Gran.”
“But I do. I have a friend who can give you a job, he’s looking for new hires and you’ve worked at that hardware store! You’d be perfect for it.” She says. She didn’t know the reason he was fired.
“Alright, fine. Tell him I’m interested then.” He’d burst out so she would stop, and just like that, his Grandma had won once again.
Truth be told, he isn’t interested. The only thing he’s interested in is staying inside, watching a shit ton of movies, and going to the occasional music festival. He’d only been to one but no one needed to know that. He’d really only told his Grandma he was interested so she would get off his back.
After his job interview with Mark, he forgot about the job entirely. He honestly thought he had blown it. But when he received a call from an unknown number telling him he got the job he was shocked, were they really that desperate for work? Despite how unqualified he was?(the answer was yes, yes they were.)
Now there he was on his first day at a hardware store where the uniforms were probably the ugliest thing he’d ever seen.
A disgusting dark green apron with bold white text was displayed on his chest which read ‘BUNNINGS’ and a bright red polo underneath. What an eyesore.
His first week was a stressful one, learning which aisles had which items and having to help out the middle-aged dads figure out what kind of wood they wanted to use for their deck. Not that he was much help anyways. Most of his time was spent at the cash register and moving boxes from the warehouse and shelving them. It was probably the blandest time of his life. Dan was not having a good time. At the very least he’s making money, and Mark is actually pretty cool for how old he is. He lets Dan take longer breaks than he should and lets him play games on his phone when work is slow.
Donna was okay, She had bright red hair and was a bit of a spiritual ‘hippie’ but they got on well, so he spent his breaks with her.
“You working tomorrow?” She asks him, muffled from her bite of her sandwich.
“Nope, why?”
“You think you could cover for me tomorrow? My auntie’s birthday is tomorrow and I can’t get out of it.”
“Where are you working?”
“The sausage sizzle, you should be working with Scott, and you’d be doing me a huge favour.” She said.
“Yeah, alright, how hard can it be?” Dan replied.
Dan got to work early in the morning to help set up the sausage sizzle, he saw Scott by the gazebo setting up and opted to help.
“Mōrena, Dan! How are we this morning?” Scott bumbled. Scott was about forty years old and a pretty gruff guy, he was bald and had a very distinctive mustache and a load of tattoos. He honestly scared the shit out of Dan when he first met him but he’s a lot nicer than expected.
Truth be told, Dan had never done any grilling in his life. He had hardly any idea how to turn on the stove let alone barbeque. He was utterly hopeless.
“Dan, I’ve gotta go see Mark for a bit, you’re alright here aren’t you?” He’d asked and before Dan could even get an answer out, Scott had bolted.
Dan was now left alone at a grill with no supervision and no clue what he was doing and at the center of it all was an eager line of toddlers and their parents waiting for their sausages.
So Dan did what most rational twenty-year-olds would do in this situation: dump sausage onto the grill and pray he won’t burn down Bunnings. The sausages either seemed to not cook at all or burn entirely, he was in a panic and the line seemed to be getting longer and more antsy.
He could feel tears welling up in his eyes, he was about to cry over a sausage sizzle. That was, until a knight in shining armour showed up and saved the day.
“Do you need any help?” A voice asked him, a British one nonetheless.
He looked up to see a coworker he’d not had the pleasure of meeting yet. Dark black hair in a messy side part fell from his head with the bluest eyes he’d ever seen.
Dan nodded his head anxiously and the boy took over, flipping sausages left and right, handing them out to the people in line as Dan nervously put tomato sauce and mustard on them. Once the line died down, Dan finally got a chance to thank him.
“Thanks. First time doing this, I’m a bit of a nervous wreck.” He looked down at his feet awkwardly, overly aware of how obvious it was.
“No problem! I’m sort of a pro at the sausage sizzle. You’re from the U.K.?” He asked, ah yes, they’re both British, something they can bond over.
“Yeah—yeah from Reading. I moved here a few months ago.”
“Oh wow! I’m from Rawtenstall! I moved here in 2007, so been here a couple years. I’m Phil, by the way.”
“Dan. Nice to know another Brit,” Dan joked and Phil smiled at him.
“You’re new right? How long have you been working here?” Phil asked.
“Oh just for a week, I’m mainly on the register but I’m covering for Donna today,” He said bashfully.
“Oh, that makes sense. I’m usually in the garden corner, I don’t really know why, I’m terrible with plants. I think I’ve killed almost every one I’ve owned!” Phil said, Dan wasn’t really listening to him, too busy staring at the others' faces, he couldn’t believe he was working with someone who was this attractive and his age!
Regretfully, Phil had to take off back to the garden centre, but not before having a nice get-to-know-you yap session with Dan.
This was probably the highlight of Dan’s week.