Phil Lester paces back and forth in his bedroom, his hands in his already tousled black hair and every so often, his gaze flicks to the email on his computer screen; it's not been sent yet.
'Arghhh, why is this so hard?'
He came back into his and Dan's new apartment after a few drinks to see Daniel Howell's tweet, telling his followers to send emails in for the internet support group and Phil has drafted an email because he's in desperate need of help and he's drunk. But now, he can't decide if he can follow through with sending it. He walks over to his MacBook sat on his desk and proof reads it one more time.
The email is fine, at least grammatically, there's no typos it reads perfectly fine, but still, he can't help himself from delaying sending it.
He heads into the kitchen and hunts around for the vodka that he's sure he left in there. Somewhere.
Three vodka shots later, he's managed to work up the drunken resolve to send the god dam email and he feels good. The alcohol has fogged up his senses and he feels light and floaty but somewhere in the far reaches of his mind he knows that this is soon to come tumbling down.
He lays around, sprawled out on his bed for a bit longer, before he decides he's hungry, so he ventures down the stairs to the kitchen.
Of course, though, he's drunk, so he drops the knife when he tries to cut up the peppers for an impromptu stir fry. And of course, Dan hears the loud clang against the tiles and Phil's signature cry of fright as he jumps out of the way of the falling implement.
The younger of the YouTube duo storms into the kitchen, 'Phil!' Dan calls, 'Are you okay?!' He observes the situation and realises that his friend is fine, he's just been spooked out. Dan smirks and shakes his head subtly from side to side. 'You're so clumsy, I swear more of the cooking needs to be left to me, you're going to seriously injure yourself one of these days.'
'I'm fine,' Phil manages to get out without too much slurring, 'it's not my fault the knife has a mind of its own.'
'Phil,' Dan reaches down to pick up the offending implement, 'we've been through this, knives are inanimate objects.'
'No, they're not,' Phil protests, puffing out his cheeks in a Kirby fashioned pout. 'It attacked me.'
'I love the way your brain works.' Dan says this offhandedly and it catches the older of the duo off guard.
'W-what?'
But Dan doesn't answer and swiftly changes the subject, 'don't worry, how was hanging out with Chris?'
'I might be a little tipsy.'
'You mean drunk, Phil.'
'No!' Phil shouts out in denial. Dan looks taken aback so he curbs and softens his tone, 'sorry, I'm fine.'
Dan just chuckles, 'I saw you take the bottle of vodka into your room Phil, I'm not judging you, chill out. You're a grown man, you can do what you want.'
'...Fine, I'm drunk and I got hungry.'
'You were trying to cook stir fry, right? Go sit down and set up Buffy, I'll sort out this.'
'How did you know I was trying to do stir fry? And I wanna help.'
Dan laughed, not just a chuckle, but a proper laugh this time, it comes from his chest and bubbles up over his lips and he creases his eyes in that way unique to him as he does so. 'I know you Phil, you seem to forget that. And you're gonna be useless in the kitchen, but you're gonna be stubborn about it.' Dan lets out a reluctant sigh, 'I guess you could fetch the ingredients.'
'Yay!' And with that, Phil bounds off to the cupboards, sliding and nearly falling across the tiles as he goes, more than content with his task, even if it was only small.
'You are so excited by the little things in life.'
'It makes life so much better when you can appreciate all the little things, like your flatmate cooking you dinner, for instance.'
After dinner was all done and they'd got through three episodes of Buffy, Dan stands up and stretches. 'Guess it's time to film the new episode of 'Internet Support Group,' catch you in a bit Phil.'
'Y-yeah sure,' Phil waves his friend off. He was feeling anxious now, he'd sobered up a bit and was promptly regretting the email he'd sent. 'No point fretting over it now, its sent, I'll just have to deal with the consequences.' He proceeds to his bed, where he knocks himself out with a herbal sleeping tablet and is out for the next nine hours or so.
He awakes to a notification on his phone that states that 'Daniel Howell' has uploaded a new video. Phil shrugs his shoulders, grabs his glasses and hits play. He laughs and cringes along with Dan in the video as all the emails get narrated out. Until something has his laugh catch in his throat.
'And this next one is Phil, 30 from London,' Dan narrates.
'Dan,
I have a problem. I'm in love with my best friend, but I don't know how to tell him or anyone else.
What should I do?'
Dan goes to respond, but then he realises something and just stares into the camera for a moment before saying, 'You should tell him, Phil. Chances are, he might be in love with you too.'
Dan ends the video in the same deprecating fashion that he's ended all the ones previous, but Phil has long since stopped paying attention.
Wait what? What the hell? The phone falls out of his hand and he barely registers as it hits the floor. He dives back under the covers, really struggling to process what had just taken place.
He hears a soft knock on his door, 'Phil, are you okay?' Phil hears another soft thud as Dan's forehead hits the door that's currently separating them. 'I may have messed up in doing it in that way, the fandom's gone nuts.'
Phil still hasn't processed it properly so he decides to play dumb. 'W-what?'
'The video, Phil. I know you've seen it, you've always been a shit liar.' A pause, 'can I come in?'
'I-I'm not dressed yet, I'm in bed still, I'm a bit of mess.'
'You think I've ever cared about something so superficial?' The door softly clicks open. 'I need to see you.'
The door opens and Phil and Dan just stare each other down, Phil in his bed, Dan in the doorway.
'I assume you have something to say to me.'
Phil breaks eye contact first. 'You saw the e-mail, you already know.'
Dan chuckles that laugh of his again and walks over to join Phil on the bed. 'Don't get all shy on me now,' he takes Phil by the chin ever so gently and turns Phil's face to meet his. 'I need to hear it from your lips Phil, please.'
Phil blinks owlishly from behind his black rimmed glasses and takes the hand on his chin into both of his own hands. 'I love you Dan, I know you're my best friend, but I've loved you for a while now, I couldn't help myself.'
'You muppet,' Dan squeezes Phil's hands in his own, 'You've seen the video. You've seen the advice I gave to you. I gave you that advice, because I feel the same way. I love you, Phil.'
