If you're reading this story, please go listen to the song first. Like, listen to it without reading the story yet and just listen to the words. I'm begging you. It's the most perfect phan song in my opinion and whenever I listen to it I become a mess of feels. Seriously. But then, I could rant for 10 pages about the song but that's not what I'm here for is it? (and yes, if you follow me, yes I do still have exams and yes I should be revising but I don't care.)
Dan was in my arms. His thin frame moulding so easily against mine, as if we were two pieces of a puzzle. The only two pieces. When we were holding each other like this, we were joined in so many ways more than just the physical contact between our bodies. It was a promise, but alas, a promise that would not last.
These were all just memories now. I wouldn't hug Dan anymore, I wasn't that weak. He wouldn't hug me, he wasn't that stupid. But it was for the best, it was definitely for the best - or so I'd managed to convince myself. Then why was I laying in bed, not sleeping, replaying the old days in my head over and over? Why couldn't I just let it go? For Jesus Christ Phil, you're not a fucking baby. You can move on. But how could I? How could I just be expected to forget everything when his perfect face was right there in front of me, every day, mocking me because I couldn't touch it? It was for the best, Phil. I had to keep reminding myself of this, even though hidden tears and aching hearts and faked smiles seemed a strange definition of 'best'.
Neither of us dared to play Final Fantasy any more, despite it being one of our favourite games, in fear that we'd hear the song. Our song. The one that had been playing the first time we kissed, the signing of the unspoken contract to stay with each other forever. And even if the current situation was one that neither of us would have seen coming in a million years, at least he was still there to cook dinner, to buy groceries, to tell me jokes, to be my friend. But only my fucking friend.
The new London apartment - well, it wasn't really new anymore - was much bigger than the one we'd previously shared in Manchester. It was really too big, in my opinion. But despite having the space, we still sat just a little bit too close to each other on the sofa, and always chose two seats next to each other at the huge dining table. Because the closeness, despite the promise, was the only thing that kept me going, the only thing that kept me alive. So much that sometimes I even wondered why we'd bothered with all the extra space that we didn't really want to use, and eventually concluded that the space was a fallback, somewhere we could step into if somehow the closeness was no longer okay.
Of course, at night, my false exterior would fall away and I'd be reduced to a complete mess. Some nights there were tears, and some nights it would just be the memories. Sleep didn't always come, and when it did, my dreams were plagued with the past. It kills me inside every time I bitterly remember that the best thing that ever happened to me would only exist in memories inside my head. No, that's wrong. Dan was the best thing that ever happened to me, and he was still here. Just not in the same way, not in the way I so wanted him. And now that I knew what it felt like to lose some of him, I held on to what I did have with all of my strength.
I had to be grateful for what I still had, of course. For the holidays together. For the apartment we still shared. For the times when we were filming a Phil is not on fire and we'd get so caught up in each other's laughter that I'd almost forget that I couldn't lean over and kiss him if I wanted to. But he didn't even want that anymore. And although we were still best friends, and it didn't really show on the outside, in my heart it felt like we were gradually slipping away from each other. For I'd lost so much. I'd lost his sleepy morning cuddles, his giggle when I pecked his nose, the feel of his skin, that sparkle in his eyes, his hugs, his tickles, the feel of his hair against my face. Maybe the reason it hurt so much was because we were so close, it would be so painfully easy to reach over and touch him.
It was even worse when he snapped. The 'phan' asks in his tumblr inbox would build up and one naive fan message would be his tipping point, and he'd spiral into a rage. I can never be quite sure who he was angry at, but it was most likely himself for letting this happen. Because as much we tried to cover it up, there was already too much proof out there. I think we both knew that in the back of our minds, and it made everything we were doing to try to hide it seem pointless. So much that sometimes, we almost dropped this stupid fucking pretense and went back to the days when it didn't matter what people thought. Almost. But everything was hidden now, the emotions were buried in blankets at 4am, and even the jokes on our radio show were scripted.
Then, all of a sudden it seemed, we were standing on a stage of people having won an award for that scripted shit that I still somehow loved almost as much as my YouTube. And despite the small voice in the back of my mind that told me that we'd won because we had over a million subscribers to bribe into voting for us and not because we actually had the best radio show, winning the award felt amazing. It gave me a huge sense of accomplishment, one that was somehow bigger than achieving any number of views or subscribers on YouTube. It felt so amazing that I just wanted to jump into his arms and celebrate this thing we'd done together, celebrate us, celebrate just how far we'd come, but I couldn't. Because of that promise that not even alcohol could break. Sure, a few glasses of wine could bring us closer to that line than we'd dare to go otherwise, but never close enough.
And maybe we could go on like this. I don't know how long, but maybe it was possible to be happy, eventually, with the knowledge that he wasn't completely gone. He never had to know about my secret hard drive containing all of the footage we'd cut out from the first Phil is not on fires and Amazingdans. He thought it was all deleted. He'd never read the hundreds of letters I'd written that sat in my drawer, but I think was because all of those words didn't really need to be said. He already knew. And he didn't care. No, that was wrong - he did care, he just didn't show it. I knew he cared because sometimes his hand would twitch as if it was going to hold mine, and sometimes his eyes would almost light up the same way they used to when I'd forget to cover up my stupid tongue-laugh. And if I looked just that little bit harder, I could see that he wasn't really doing any better than I was.
We'll stagger out of our painfully separate bedrooms too early in the morning, each pretending that we hadn't spent the night sleeplessly crying silent tears. Seeing his unwashed scruffy hair and red-rimmed eyes that mirrored mine just deepened the ever-present ache in my heart. The urge to run into his arms and be his forever intensified, and the fresh wave of tears was so close to escaping. But they didn't, no, they couldn't. I wouldn't let them.