Chapter Text
Prologue
I sat at the table away from everyone else, my short legs swinging and my arm around my Winnie the Pooh stuffed animal. It was just before our kindergarten class would start for the day, and as usual I was sitting alone coloring. I would often hear the other kids calling me weird, because I would talk to my Pooh bear. It's not my fault that it's rude to ignore people when I was talked to.
I was humming to myself when he first came over. "Hi! I'm Phil, I'm new! Who are you? Why are you sitting all alone?" I looked up to see a tall boy with black hair looking at me.
I looked back down. I didn't really like talking to people I didn't know. "I'm Dan." I muttered. "I'm sitting alone because everyone else thinks I'm weird."
"Oh." Phil said. "Why?"
"Because I talk to my Pooh bear."
"Does he talk back?"
I nodded. "Sometimes."
Phil waved to my bear. "Hi! I'm Phil." He waited a couple seconds. "Why isn't he answering?"
"I think I'm the only one who can hear him." I said, coloring a bit more.
Phil came and sat next to me. "Tell me if he answers, okay?" He picked up a crayon. "Do you want to be my friend, Dan? I don't have any friends yet."
I nodded. "Yeah."
I was eight years old when it first happened. I tugged on my mum's jacket. "Mum, why is that man standing in the middle of the road? We should go tell him to move so he doesn't get hit by a car."
My mum just looked at me. "Dan, what man?" I pointed to the street. "Right there! He's wearing a black jacket."
"There's no one there." I didn't want to argue, so I just kept walking, but then I saw a car coming, and I saw the man get hit.
"NO!" I screamed, starting to run towards the road.
"Daniel! Come back!" My mum grabbed my hand before I could go far. I looked up at her and started crying. "Mum, the man got hit by a car! Why didn't we say something. He's dead, and it's all our fault."
I think that's when my mum knew something was wrong. Most people don't develop the symptoms of schizophrenia until they're older, but I was not one of those. It started young.
My mum at first thought I was pretending; I always spent time in my own make believe world. After it happened a couple more times, however, my mum knew something was wrong. She took me to a psychiatrist, and I was diagnosed as schizophrenic.
High school was hard. The hallucinations got worse, until I was finally put on a medication that calmed things down. I was constantly made fun of, but Phil was there through it all. When he asked me if I wanted to be his friend back in kindergarten, he really meant it. I had three friends in all of my school years: Phil, Chris, and PJ. They were always there to remind me that the voices I heard weren't real, to help me distinguish reality from hallucination.
Phil. I sometimes caught myself thinking about him, and I would always push it aside, telling myself that he was my bets friend, of course I thought about him. Then I realized that I saw Phil as more, and I eventually found out that he felt the same.
Our first kiss was incredible, and it was the thing that started everything. We have been together since we were 16, and I wouldn't have it any other way.
Chris and PJ went to a different university as Phil and I, but we all live in London now and I've made great, supportive friends here. Most importantly, I have Phil. My everything. As long as I have him, I know I'm going to be okay.