It's been three days since Dan got taken to the hospital. His best friend, heartbroken and terrified, made a promise never to leave his side. He has left that room only for coffee and bathroom breaks. Mrs. Howell was here at one point. She sat next to Phil and cried into his shoulder for hours on end. She didn't blame Phil for any of it, either because she didn't know or she was too nice to say anything.
Dan lies in bed, not moving, with a breathing thing (a nasal cannula? Is that what it's called?) in his nose, an IV in his arm, so many wires coming out from God knows where. They took the stomach pump out of his nose a couple of nights ago. The breathing tube came out last night when the doctors were certain that he wasn't going to randomly stop breathing. No one knows if he's going to wake up and be okay. The doctors said that he took three quarters of the entire bottle of super potent painkillers in a "most definite attempt at suicide". But, Phil already knows that. There wasn't a letter, but Phil was smart enough to install an app that records calls and had it enabled when Dan called that night. He's propped up at a 45° angle in bed, pillows piled up behind his head.
Phil sits in a chair, adjacent to the bed. He hasn't slept more than two hours over the three days that Dan's been stuck in here. He's been drinking coffees, Red Bulls, Monsters, anything that can keep him awake. The heart monitor beeping 24/7 has made it all the easier. He needs to be alert when Dan wakes up so that he can apologise. In the beginning, he wondered if Dan would take him back after everything that he had done to him. Now, he knows that Dan won't wake up and say that everything is magically okay. That assumes that Dan's going to wake up and not be brain damaged. The doctors said that he might have short-term memory, balance, judgement and blackout issues, and that would be the best possible option. "The good thing," one of them told Phil, "is that you found him not long after he passed out. Any longer and he may have died right then and there." THAT'S how you're trying to make me feel better? he felt like screaming at the man in the white coat. Instead, he nodded his head and tried not to lash out.
What's going to happen when he wakes up? Rehab? Therapy? Counseling? Him never wanting to see me ever again? All of the above? That's pretty likely, in all honesty. I wonder if he remembers what he said that night. I wonder if he remembers anything at all. Phil picks up his cup of coffee off the floor by his feet and takes a deep drink. He usually doesn't like black coffee, but his entire body is numb so he doesn't taste anything. He looks down at his hands. His nails are bitten back all the way and his knuckles are still bruised from knocking on the door so hard. His hair has started to curl up at the edges from not having time to straighten it. Right now, it hangs down in his eyes, partially obscuring the dark circles under his eyes, a sharp contrast from his very pale skin.
His head pounds as he thinks back to the phone call. "You don't need me, but I need you more than anything." Phil presses his hands against his temples to see if that would quiet the voices. "I'm sorry that you'll think of me when you see little things that remind you of the time we were together." Dan was right. Phil sees him in everyone. In the brown eyes of the head nurse that comes to check on him every few hours. In the smile of Dan's mum. In his own reflection. Everytime he walks past a mirror, he sees the black fringe and half expects Dan to be looking back at him. But, no. Phil still just sees Phil. Dan's still laying in bed, unconscious.
Phil leans back in his chair and starts talking.
"Dan, I know that you can't hear me, but you were wrong. I need you more than you know. I don't know where I'd be without you. I certainly wouldn't be in London, having a massive career and I wouldn't have such an amazing best friend. I depended on you for more than just companionship. I needed your honesty on what I've been doing and your smile to validate everything that I've done. I need you as a best friend, as a co-host, as my other half. It's been like walking around without trousers on. I mean, it feels wrong not to have you by my side all the time. When you told me that you loved me, I was so scared of what that meant. I wanted to say it back more than I've ever wanted something else in my entire life. I couldn't do it because I was scared to break your heart. I didn't want to say I love you because I knew that it someday, I wouldn't be able to say it anymore. But I ended up breaking it anyway so my intentions didn't really matter. And when you kissed me before I left, I knew it and wanted to scream it off of the top of Big Ben. I just couldn't. I can't rationalize any of this to you because it sounds like bullshit, and I agree that it is. I was afraid of the future and afraid of you and afraid of myself and afraid of everything that saying the word 'love' would entail. I know that I messed everything up and that all of this is my fault. You can't blame yourself for any of this. I made one big mistake and it ended up with you in hospital, hooked up to so many damn machines that I don't know where you end and the wires and needles and tubes begin." Looking down at his lap, he sees a few little wet spots. Reaching up, he feels his cheeks. They're wet and salty with tears that have started pouring from his eyes.
"Dan, I miss you and I need you and I want you and I... I love you. I love you and I have loved you since Japan. I've loved you since we went to Ghibli and you put your arm around me and kept it there. I've loved you since we posed for the picture in front of the huge Laputa statue and you hugged me around the waist when Duncan put the camera away. I've loved you since we went to the temple and I accidentally walked through the gates and you teased me for it. I've loved you since we got coffee and you sat across the table from me and looked me in the eyes the whole time. I've loved you since I saw the smile on your face when you won the rigged claw machine. And I'm never going to be able to see that smile again. The thing is, Dan, I'm never going to be able to move on. Not totally, anyway. I might meet someone else in the future if you won't take me back, and I understand if you won't. But, when they laugh, I'll only hear you. When they put their hand in mine, it'll feel like yours. When we kiss, the only person on my mind will be you. I'm never going to forget you, Dan, as much as you might want me to. Dan Howell, I love you and I'm too late."
Phil leans over, puts his elbows on his thighs, and buries his face in his hands, trying to muffle the wails and hide the tears.
"No, you're not too late." A soft voice croaks from somewhere in the room. Phil whips his head up and, wiping his eyes, searches the room for whoever said it. It
couldn't have been Dan; he's been asleep for the past 72 hours straight. Maybe I'm hearing things because I haven't slept in three days. Or I just need food or something. He leans against the back of the chair and runs a hand through his hair. Being here means that he hasn't had time to shower. He thinks that's the first thing he's going to do when they get home. If they get home. He's got to start using "if" instead of "when" because "when" means that they're going to go home together for sure.
"Phil, you're not too late." There it is again. It really sounds like Dan, but it's not. He's probably not coming back. "You're not too late, I swear. Please, look at me, Phil." Phil opens his eyes and looks over at Dan, expecting him to be in the same place he had been for three days.
Instead, Dan's head is turned in Phil's direction. It's the first time Phil's seen those beautiful chocolate-colored eyes open in more than two weeks. "Wow. You look like shit," Dan says quietly.
For the first time in weeks, Phil smiles. It's the strangest mix of emotions; he's elated at the fact that Dan isn't dead, but terrified what is going to happen next, along with still being miserable because he is the catalyst for this series of most unfortunate events. The miserableness and depression take over as he stares at the ceiling, tears running from his eyes, down his face, and either flowing down his neck or dripping from his chin or nose. "I'm so sorry, Dan. You have absolutely no idea how sorry I am, more than I could possibly tell you in words. I am so sorry that I caused all of this. It's all my fault because I was a selfish, self-centered, supercilious, and super stupid boy who couldn't accept what was right in front of him. I had no idea that my idiocy would lead to me almost losing you. I know I don't deserve you and that I don't deserve being your friend and that I don't deserve your forgiveness. I'm so sorry." He leans over and puts his forearms on his knees. "It should have been me in the hotel room. The one thing I know I deserve is to be the one dead. I'm the worst human being to ever walk the earth and I don't care if you don't think it's true. I almost killed you. You were basically dead. Almost no pulse. Almost no air in your lungs. Almost no oxygen in your blood. I will never forgive myself for what I did to you. And I don't expect you to, either." Sitting up and wiping his eyes on his sleeve, Phil looks at the shell of what used to be his best friend. So thin, so pale, so bony, so weak, so fragile. He finally looks Dan in the eyes for the first time since they opened.
"Phil. Please listen to me. You were the best thing that's ever happened to me. I knew that. I also knew that everything was crashing down around me and that it was all going to be over for me soon. I needed to tell you before it was too late." Dan turns his head away from Phil and stares straight ahead. "I guess I should thank you. You made it easier to let go." He exhales one big shaky gust of air. "I thought we were over for good and I didn't expect you to answer the call. I didn't want you to because if you did, it would have made you come after me. I wanted you to put me through to voicemail so that it would be too late to save me. But I guess we can't always get what we want, now can we," Dan laughs painfully, like it hurts to move his chest.
"I could never let you go, Dan. Not ever. I know that now. But if that's what you want, I will." Phil stands up. "If you want to be happy, I'll do anything to make that happen for you. If that includes never seeing me again, I'll do it. You are the most amazing person that I've ever had the privilege of getting to know. But, I'll do it. You take the apartment. I'll take my stuff and go." He wipes one final tear from his cheek. "I love you and if you love someone enough, you learn to let them go."
Dan turns his head again to look at Phil. "I don't know what I want anymore. I can't tell you what I want to do with my life." Dan grimaces, trying hard not to burst into tears. "The one thing that I can tell you is that I need you in it. I told you that I need you more than I need to breathe. And I do. Your face, your beautiful and glorious face, is what keeps me around. I can't tell you how it's all going to turn out. But please be around to find out." Dan shakes his head and a strand of hair falls in his eyes.
"I can't let you walk away again. But if that's what makes you happy, go ahead."
"No. It's whatever makes you happy," Phil mutters, still crying.
"Damn it Phil. If you'd be happy without me, leave."
"I can't leave unless you tell me that you'd be happy without me."
"Will you stop being an amazing and super sweet boy and let me tell you to leave?" Dan's tear-filled eyes look deep into Phil's. "Who am I kidding, you're never going to think of yourself over me. I still need you now, just like I needed you before all of this."
"Then, I'll stay." Phil slowly sits back down in the chair. "I won't go anywhere until you say the word." The tears still haven't stopped streaming down Phil's face and raining off his chin. Looking at the man in the hospital bed, he notices that Dan's face has morphed into a sad smile, but a smile nonetheless. Dan's left hand twitches under the sheet and lifts up. Shaking the sheet off, it reaches out over the side of the bed. It stretches out toward Phil. He takes it as a sign. Standing slightly, he moves towards Dan and drags his chair behind him. Sitting again, he grasps the thin fingers that used to play the piano, the palm with a thin scar running down its length. The two men lace fingers and hold the other's hand firmly, telling each other that they're never letting go.
Dan's thumb traces little circles across Phil's knuckles. "Phil. I'm so sorry I put you through this."
"I'm sorry I made it happen," Phil responds.
"I'm sorry for having so many existential crises."
"I'm sorry for being depressed."
"I'm sorry for not talking to you more."
"I'm sorry for not picking up the phone."
"I'm sorry for being a prick."
"I'm sorry for not realizing how much of a prick you were before this all happened and for not knowing
how much I could love a prick."
They compete like this for a while, trying to out-apologize the other person, until Dan starts laughing because Phil apologized for singing in the shower. "I love your shower singing!" he cackles as he leans back in bed.
"Why do you yell at me for it then?"
"I'm jealous, you spork!" That sets off Phil and before they know it, they're both laughing hysterically.
This ends after a few minutes. Still holding Dan's hand, Phil curls up in the chair and falls asleep.
"That's why I love you. Because you'll never let me admit that I am wrong without you being wrong-er," Dan whispers as he leans over the side of the bed. Bringing his
and Phil's hands to him, he kisses the back of Phil's lightly. "I love you, present tense." He smiles at the sleeping figure, still attached to him by the hand. He himself drifts to sleep, quite like he fell in love with Phil so many months ago: slowly and peacefully, then all at once.