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Phil isn’t exactly sure what wakes him up; whether it’s the sun streaming into their room, the grumbling of his stomach, the conspicuous empty space in the bed next to him, or the sound of piano wafting upstairs. Whichever way, he’s not complaining. He follows the music, up to the little room that they had built just to house Dan’s piano, and leans against the doorframe in a stance so casual that it can no longer be casual.
For a minute or two, Phil doesn’t think that Dan notices him standing there. He doesn’t say anything, and his attention is fully on his sheet music as he works through a tune that Phil recognizes as Stars from Les Miserables. Dan’s expanded into certain showtunes, mostly ones from forty or fifty years ago. One of his resolutions for the new year is to learn how to play the main theme from Pirates of the Caribbean. He's still mostly focused on classical music, though. He says that he finds music more relaxing when he can get fully lost in it without worrying about lyrics. He’s been working on Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, but just then, he switches into Clair de Lune, which has become his comfort peace as of late, the one that constantly resides at the tips of his fingers because he’s become so familiar with it.
Phil just watches. He watches Dan’s easy posture, how swiftly his fingers move across the keys. He’s still wearing his pyjamas, which means that he probably woke up with a sudden inspiration to play and came straight here.
If someone had asked Phil two years ago why he loved to watch Dan play the piano – and forced him to give an honest answer, which he often did not do back then – he would have said that the music made Dan relax like nothing else. To watch Dan play was to watch him disappear into a world of his own, a world of harmony where Dan could exist with the ease that the real world never afforded him. Except, he can’t really say that anymore, because these days, Dan is just like that most of the time. His smiles are wider and more frequent, and the layer of irony that he hides behind is almost transparent, barely even a hiding spot at all. And yet, here Phil is, still swooning at the sight of his partner playing piano. At this point, it’s probably just because he’s attracted to creativity.
When Dan speaks, Phil is the one to jump out of his skin, despite the fact that he’d snuck up on Dan in the first place. “Good morning, rat,” he says. He doesn’t stop playing, but plays softly enough that Phil can hear him over the piano. “How’d you sleep?”
“Squirrel,” says Phil, “I slept fine. Woke up without my personal heater, though.”
Dan chuckles. “Your personal heater was struck by a sudden bout of inspiration.”
“I can see that,” says Phil, “You’re like Schrodinger. From Peanuts.”
“Does that make you Lucy?” Dan asks.
“I guess it does,” Phil answers, grinning, “Though you’d probably get annoyed if I hung off your piano like she does.”
“Nah,” says Dan, hitting a combination of notes that Phil believes is called a scale, “I’d be okay with that. Though, if you started doing Benson Boone style cartwheels off of it–”
“Phivorce,” Phil finishes for him.
“Homicide, I’m afraid,” says Dan.
Phil is somewhat in awe of his ability to banter without losing his place in the sheet music, but he stops playing then, and turns to face Phil with that secret, soft smile that he reserves just for him.
“Come over,” Dan says.
Phil’s heart skips a beat as he merrily makes his way over to the piano bench. They’ve done this a few times before. The first time, when Dan first noticed Phil’s staring, he misinterpreted it as a desire to learn. Phil didn’t mind the way that ended, with his hands resting on Dan’s, skin against warm skin as Dan told him something about cows and boys who deserved fudge. It became clear rather quickly, though, that Phil’s interest was more in watching Dan learn, and less in learning himself.
Maybe that’s the reason. For as long as he can remember, Phil has loved watching Dan pick up new interests. It seems to him like every few years, Dan shifts slightly, never quite becoming a new person but always building on what was already there. Or maybe he’s not finding anything new, really, just finding things that are locked away and letting them out. He’s chaos, a constant cliffhanger, and Phil has always been thrilled to be along for the ride.
Phil’s personal favorite time that he sat at this bench was two months before Terrible Influence, when they had every piece of the puzzle ready except the finale song. Three in the morning. Both of them running on fumes and sweetened coffee. Dan tried his best to properly adapt what they both wanted to be hyperpop to a piano version so that they could workshop it on their own time. Phil muttered into the early morning darkness, writing lyrics by hand in a beat up notebook and scratching them out just as fast. They were both barely keeping their eyes open. That was one of the best nights of Phil’s life.
Today, there’s no attempt at instruction, nothing dramatic or high stakes to get done. He leans his head against Dan’s shoulder, close enough to hear his heartbeat and smell the cinnamon shampoo on his curls. He wraps his arms around his waist and half expects to be told to move, because having a 6’2” twink wrapped around your body like a sloth can’t possibly make it convenient to play an instrument, but if anything, Dan just pulls him in closer.
“Do you take requests?” Phil teases, prompting a scoff from Dan.
“I want to watch you go up to a classical musician, nuzzle into their neck, and ask them to play Origin of Symmetry.”
Phil laughs, and presses a kiss to Dan’s cheekbone. “Even if they did, I still would ask them to move over and give you a turn. I like you better.”