Phil feels warm and solid pressed against his body. Dan likes it. He likes the way Phil so easily throws his arm around his shoulder in public now. A year ago, that would not have been possible. Phil was so afraid of coming out. Afraid of what people would think of him, especially if it was Dan he ended up with, since they're so different. Phil has tattoos and wears leather and dyes his hair and Dan... well, Dan appears to be innocent. He wears pink sweaters and flower crowns and talks like he's Winnie the Pooh. Back when they were in High School, he never failed any tests, either - not even that one time two years ago when he was so sick that he started seeing things that weren't there.

He's not as innocent as he looks, though. He never has been, but it got worse when he met Phil. Phil's like a drug to him. One that he can't seem to quit no matter how many times the other boy cheats or gets in trouble. Of course, there's a limit, and Dan can't help but feel that he's close to reaching it – especially since his mental health isn't doing so well – but he tries to ignore it, because he loves Phil. He really, really does.

They're both drunk, walking in the dark to some unknown destination. Dan's aware that they're all over the place, swaying from one side to another and, to be honest, he's faking most of it. Phil drank a lot more than him, but Phil isn't quite as cold when he's drunk, and Dan likes it when Phil peppers kisses all over his face or holds his hand.

"I love you," he says out of nowhere, just to remind Phil of the fact. He feels that he should, even if Phil has never said it back and will not say it back now.

He doesn't. His answer is to press Dan against a streetlight and kiss him. It's passionate; Dan's hands cradling Phil's face, Phil pressing their bodies together like they can't be close enough, and it feels like love, but it isn't, and somewhere in the back of Dan's mind, it hurts.

A car drives passed behind them and honks, breaking the spell, and Phil pulls back. His blue eyes twinkle like stars as he stares at Dan and smiles. Dan knows that look. That look means lust, desire – sex. Phil is eyefucking him right in the middle of the street and Dan loves it.

"There's a motel over there," Phil says without looking, and alarm bells ring. They've never been in this town before so Phil shouldn't know that, but he calms himself down by thinking that Phil must have seen it while they were walking earlier. "I can get us in."

Dan breathes in, nods, and then breathes out, a smile appearing on his face, as well. "Sounds perfect."

They find a room that seems unoccupied, stopping every few seconds to peck each other somewhere on the face again. Lips are a popular spot, but Phil seems to like pecking Dan on the head, as well – probably just to remind Dan that Phil's taller than him. Dan doesn't mind. He likes being shorter. He fits into Phil's arms so easily.

Phil uses a debit card and a paper clip to open the door, fitting the paper clip into the lock whilst doing something with the card that Dan can't even begin to understand. Phil tried to teach him once, but Dan ended up breaking his library card and having to get a new one, and he didn't try again.

"Welcome!" Phil says with a wild gesture of his arms as he opens the door, stepping into the room and flicking on the light. "Home sweet home... for tonight, at least."

"Looks nice," Dan comments as he kicks off his shoes. He looks around the room, which has white walls, a big bed and a small TV. "Cozy."

Phil hums in answer, turning on the TV. Nothing comes on but static, though, and he soon turns to Dan. "Looks like we'll have to entertain ourselves."

"Like you have a problem with that," Dan says, stepping closer to Phil. Dan pushes Phil's jacket off of him slowly, a seductive gleam in his eyes, but then turns away and flops onto the bed, sighing contently. "Hmmm, soft."

"Tease," Phil mutters under his breath, then falls onto the bed right next to him. "I need a smoke, want one?"

"Sure," Dan says. He never smoked before Phil, but he thinks that at the rate he's going these days, he might actually develop lung cancer. Not that he minds. He'd literally die for Phil, even though he has to admit that sometimes he really hates him, especially in these last few weeks.

After graduation, Dan was in a funk, unsure of where his life was going. He knew his parents wanted him to study law, but he couldn't bring himself to apply to college and when graduation rolled around, he realized he would have to take a gap year as he hadn't signed up anywhere. Phil, having planned against going to college at all, had one night suggested that they take a road-trip together. They'd left town the next day in Phil's car – which it turned out he'd stolen. They got arrested after three days, but Dan bailed them out and that was the end of their money. By then, Dan has just wanted to go home, but Phil convinced him that they could continue their trip – even without money.

It turned out Phil came with more surprises than Dan bargained for, though. When they came upon a little town in Colorado, they stayed with Phil's 'friend' Lacey for a bit. Dan and Phil shared a room, but on many nights Phil wouldn't come to bed, and the sounds coming from Lacey's room told Dan all he needed to know about the why. When confronted about it, Phil had raised an eyebrow and said: "You didn't think she was letting us stay with her for free, did you?"

Dan had been so angry, leaving on foot towards the bus station. He had no money, though, which was the main reason he eventually came back to Phil, who had waved of his half-baked apology for leaving with a muttered "to be fair, I probably should have told you".

They'd continued on to the next town, and the next, often breaking into empty rooms like this one to spend the night. Sometimes, though, Phil left and didn't return, and while he tried to deny it... Dan knew what Phil was doing.

Phil lights up a cigarette and hands it to Dan, after which he lights one for himself. Dan's expression is carefully neutral, not a trace of his suddenly negative feelings showing on his face. He doesn't want to fight with Phil. Not tonight. He's been wanting to go home for a while now, but the fact of the matter is: he can't bring himself to leave Phil yet. He's going to at some point, but he loves him and right now he just can't.

"Hey, look at this!" Phil says, producing an old camera from beneath the bed. Dan hadn't even noticed him get off it. "It's a Polaroid camera! Do you reckon it still works?"

"Let's try it!" Dan says, sitting up a bit straighter as he exhales smoke through his nose. He loves Polaroid pictures. No matter how stupid you look in them, they always seem pretty somehow. He supposes it's the aesthetic.

Phil sits down next to him and holds out the camera, making a silly face as he snaps a picture. It rolls out quickly, and Phil waves it around. Dan wants to tell him that you shouldn't do that – the whole 'the picture will appear faster' thing is just a myth and it actually just makes it uglier – but it's already done, so what would be the point? Instead, he rests his head on Phil's shoulder and looks at the picture with him, laughing.

Phil's silly face – crossed eyes and a grin where his tongue's poking out – seems even sillier on the photo than it did in real life, and Dan's startled smile – he hadn't expected Phil to take the picture so soon – fits the situation perfectly. He notices his flower crown is askew on his head and moves to take it off for the day, but then Phil's already doing it for him, putting the Polaroid and the camera to the side as he faces Dan fully.

"Hey," he says, putting out his cigarette on the bedside table. Dan follows his example. "Have I mentioned how beautiful you are?"

Dan giggles. "Only about three hundred times..."

"Well, you are," Phil says seriously. "Dan, you're the most beautiful person in the world."

Dan wants to tell Phil not to lie, but instead he just kisses him because, again, he doesn't want to fight. He just wants to have fun and forget that there are others. He wants this to last.

Phil is careful with him – more so than usual. He pushes Dan back against the bed slowly, pressing their foreheads together as he drags his hand through Dan's hair. Their lips find each other again, then disconnect so Phil can pull his black-and-white striped shirt over his head. Dan hurries to pull his sweater off as well, wanting skin on skin contact as soon as possible.

Phil has so many tattoos. Dan has always been in awe of them, and he can't help but let his hands trace over them now, barely there touches that must tickle, even if Phil doesn't show it. He leans down again, hovering his lips over Dan's for just a few seconds before letting them touch, their tongues brushing together slowly. Dan used to think it was a weird feeling, especially because of Phil's tongue piercing, but now he likes it. It makes him want more.

"I want you," he breathes out when they pull apart again, brushing Phil's blue fringe out of his face. "You're so – damn it Phil..."

Phil smiles, leaning down to suck and nip along Dan's neck as he works on the button of his white jeans. Dan has to wonder if they'll be able to pull apart long enough to take of their socks. They usually just don't. If anyone saw them, that must be a strange sight.

"P – Phil!" Dan says when Phil reaches into his pants, palming Dan's dick through his underwear. He's already hard, a result of the attention given to his neck a few seconds prior. It's a sensitive spot, which Phil knows and likes to make use of excessively. "Fucking – you need to get inside me. Like, ASAP."

Phil chuckles, pushing Dan's jeans and boxers down in one go and pulling back a little so Dan can kick them off. One of his socks disappears with them, the other one remaining on his right foot. Dan knows the feeling will annoy him later but he can't bring himself to care right now, dragging Phil by the hair back towards him for a kiss that's considerably rougher than their earlier ones.

"Jesus Dan," Phil breathes, gripping the boy's arms. "Somehow you keep surprising me with stuff like this."

"It's all in the looks," Dan says with a wink, then pecks him one last time and commands: "Jeans off."

"Yeah, okay." Phil stands up and watches Dan with half-lidded eyes as he undresses, his cock jumping up towards his belly as soon as it's freed. For a moment, they stare at each other like that, both completely naked, and then Phil's on Dan again, their breathing more erratic as they kiss and touch.

"Shit," Dan realizes. "Do you even have a condom?"

Phil groans, "give me a second", and stands, reaching back for his jeans and producing a condom and a packet of what must be lube. Dan can't help but wonder where he keeps getting these things. He must be stealing them like he steals food.

"Do you need stretching?" Phil asks as he straddles Dan again, tracing his hand over Dan's hip. Dan shakes his head, even though he probably does need it. He knows it's going to hurt, but he also knows Phil doesn't have a lot of patience and to be fair, neither does he, himself.

"Just fuck me already."

"Okay, okay, don't attack me," Phil mutters, rolling the condom on and pouring all of the little lube they have onto his hand, after which he strokes himself a few times. "Gonna fuck you so hard."

Dan hums in agreement, then hisses when Phil starts pressing in, causing the punk to still instantly. "Are you sure you don't need preparing?"

"I'm fine, Phil."

"Just saying, if you – fuck!"

Dan grabs Phil by the hips and forces him in all the way, and yeah, it hurts like a bitch, but the look on Phil's face tells him it at least feels good on one end. Phil draws back, pushing in again, clearly searching for a certain angle. Dan knows when the pain mixes with white-hot pleasure that Phil's found it.

"Ah -" he moans. "Phil, don't stop."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Phil mutters, drawing back and pushing in again. Despite his promise of 'fucking Dan hard', his movements are slow and precise, breath coming out labored every time Dan clenches around him. "So good, Dan, so – fuck, I love you. I love you so much."

Dan freezes, which Phil doesn't seem to notice as he hides his face against Dan's neck, continuing his pace. He's working up a bit of a sweat, and even though Dan suddenly feels cold as ice, his hair is beginning to curl at the edges, as well. He knows his body is still feeling pleasure – and pain – but he isn't registering any of it.

Phil just said he loves him. Phil loves him, and that changes everything, because how can Dan ever leave if it won't just hurt him, but Phil as well? He can't hurt Phil. He can't hurt him.

Phil let's out a string of curses as he comes, hand working over Dan's cock until he orgasms as well. It shuts Dan's mind up for a few seconds, but then his brain is instantly working on overdrive again, and he can't bring himself to do more than stare up at the ceiling as Phil rolls off of him and then gathers him against his chest.

"Do you really?" he finally asks.

Phil knows what he's talking about instantly and doesn't even open his eyes to answer him. "Of course I do, Dan. I thought you knew that." A few seconds later, he adds: "I need a smoke."

"Cliché," Dan teases him. "A cigarette after sex."

"Shut up," Phil mutters, but he's smiling as he produces his pack from somewhere – how the hell does he do that? - and lights up.

"You know, I'm pretty sure it's against the rules to smoke in here," Dan says upon realization, but to be fair: neither of them care about rules all that much, and they're not about to start, now.

"Hmmm... pretty sure it's against the rules to break in here and then have sex, too."

Dan grins and looks up at Phil's face, craning his neck awkwardly to do so, and that's when he notices.

"Phil," he begins. "Have you been here before?"

"No," Phil says, looking down at him with a frown. Dan can tell when he's lying, though, and even if he couldn't, the evidence is right there on the headboard, glaring at him angrily. How did he not notice it before?

Never forget summer 14'. It's right there, written with sharpie in what's obviously Phil's handwriting, and Dan and Phil already had a thing in 2014, even if they didn't call each other 'boyfriends' yet. They had been in their second-last year of High School, fooling around in bathroom stalls and abandoned corridors whenever they could. Phil often disappeared on strange 'family trips', though, sometimes being unreachable for weeks on end.

Now Dan knows why.

"How long?" he asks, untangling himself from Phil and getting off the bed abruptly. "How long have you been fooling around with others behind my back?"

Phil looks up at the spot Dan has been staring at and curses, getting up off the bed as well. Dan is pulling on his jeans, jumping up and down to get into them, and Phil tries to stop hum but he skillfully moves away. "Dan, c'mon, don't get dressed."

"How fucking long, Phil?!" Dan asks again, not meeting Phil's eyes as he bends down to pick up his sweater. His mind is whirling, the most prominent thought being I'm not good enough I'm not good enough I'm never good enough, and it takes him a while to register Phil's answer.

"Since the beginning."

Finally, Dan turns around to stare at Phil.

"Since the beginning?"

"Yes."

Dan is speechless for a moment, then steps backwards, towards the door. "And you have the fucking nerve to tell me you love me?"

"But Dan, I do lo – please don't leave, Dan, please."

Dan, in the middle of reaching for the doorknob, pauses, then heaves out a sigh. "No. I'm not leaving."

Phil breathes a sigh of relief. "Good. We can work this out, I promi -"

"You leave."

"What?" Phil's eyes go almost comically wide. In a different situation, Dan might have laughed, but now he's glaring. "Dan -"

"Leave." Dan repeats. "And don't come back."

Phil stares at him for a moment, and then nods, turning away to gather his clothes and pull them on messily. "Okay." He says. "If that's what you want."

Dan can feel the tears in his own eyes and fuck, he does not want Phil to leave at all, but how can he be with him now? Even if Phil promises never to do anything like this again and keeps to it, it's always going to stand between them, and the worst part is, Dan chose this. Even if he didn't know this was happening since the beginning, he's known things have been going on for a while now, and still he stayed.

He should have left the first time he noticed. Money or not. He should have just walked, or hitch hiked, or whatever the fuck was necessary, because Phil is and has always been poison.

When he's dressed, Phil turns to him with a sad look, stepping forward a bit. He reaches out as if to touch Dan's face, then pulls back, sighing. "I love you, okay?" he says.

Dan slaps him as an answer.

"Go. Away."

Phil sits down on the bed, pulls on his shoes and does as requested.

Dan heaves out a breath he didn't know he was holding, but halfway through it turns into a sob. His mind is slowly turning into a haze of questions and hateful exclamations, most of them aimed at himself rather than Phil. He doesn't understand where he went wrong. Why couldn't he just be enough?

Next thing he knows, he's in the bathroom, spilling a bunch of antidepressants – he's been taking them for years – as he tries to swallow as many as he can. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he knows it's stupid to do this over some guy, but it's been a long time coming and honestly, this is just the last straw.

As things become comfortably blurry, he slumps against the wall and cries until he no longer has the energy.

It's Phil that finds him.

After leaving, he stands outside for a long while pulling at his hair, cursing himself for doing this – messing up something good.

He needs Dan, he knows he does. He can't just leave and never come back as requested. He'll spend his whole life regretting this but – stupid as it sounds – he really didn't realize he was doing anything wrong. Not in the beginning, at least. They never established that they were exclusive and when Dan got angry, just a few weeks ago when he noticed for the first time, it started dawning on Phil.

Still, he didn't stop, and now he's lost Dan.

Except he can't let that happen. He can't.

Turning back around, he strides back over to the door of the motel room and pushes it open. Peering inside. It's dark, now, and at first Phil thinks it's because Dan decided to go to bed, but the bed is empty and cold.

"Dan?" Phil asks, walking over to the door of the bathroom – because Dan didn't leave the room and if he's not here he has to be there. "Dan, are you in there?"

No answer.

"Dan, listen, I'm sorry. Can we please just talk about this?"

There's still no answer, and now Phil is beginning to get worried.

It might be nothing, he tells himself. You're gonna walk in there and make things awkward because he's taking a shit or something.

But when he walks in – the door unlocked – he finds Dan slumped against a wall, his bottle of antidepressants clutched loosely in his grip. A few pills are scattered on the floor and in the sink, but most are simply gone... Dan's taken them.

"No..." Phil mutters, mostly to himself, kneeling down besides Dan. He suddenly realizes the gravity of the situation and starts looking for a pulse frantically, breathing out a sigh of relief when he finds one but still unable to hold back a sob. "Dan, please, wake up!"

He lifts the boy from the floor and carries him into the room, the pill-bottle clattering onto the floor as it escapes Dan's hand. Placing him on the bed, Phil cradles Dan's face his his hands for a second and then runs over to the phone placed in the corner of the room, dialing 9-1-1 with shaking hands.

"Nine one one, what's your emergency?"

"My boyfriend," Phil explains in a surprisingly steady voice, "he's tried to kill himself and I don't know what to do..."

"Alright sir, and where are you at?"

"At the Pink Motel, uhm... I don't know the address, room 93."

"An ambulance is on it's way."

Phil hangs up before the lady can ask anymore question and walks back over to the bed, feeling for a pulse again – it's still there but a lot slower – and then laying down on the bed with Dan. He clings to him like Dan is his lifeline, hiding his face against his shoulder.

"Please don't die, Dan," he begs. "I'll leave you alone forever, or I'll stay and never even look at anyone else ever again, or whatever the fuck you want from me, just don't die..."

It's a police officer that comes into the room a few minutes later. Apparently, the owner of the motel called when he saw Phil running inside despite the fact that the room wasn't rented out, and now there's police cars as well as an ambulance outside. They drag Phil away from Dan despite his frantic calls of "please, please don't take me away from him!" and force him into the back of a police car as they strap Dan on a bran card and hoist him into the ambulance.

Phil's praying for the first time in years.

Please, God, he thinks, I'll gladly go to jail. Please just let Dan live.

He's not allowed to visit Dan in the hospital, and nobody gives him any information whatsoever, no matter how many times he asks, but about a month later, he's informed that he has a visitor.

He thinks it might be his mom or dad, or even his brother – if he's lucky.

It's not any of them, though. Through the glass separating them, Dan stares at him with sad eyes.

"They told me you're in here for three months."

"Just two left now," Phil answers, looking down at his hands. "I got lucky."

"They gave me community service. They didn't want to send me to jail on grounds of my 'fragile mental state', or some shit like that." Dan shrugs. "I wanted to see you, though."

"Why?" Phil asks. "Why would you want that after everything?"

"Because I love you." It sounds dead, like something said out of habit more than genuine feelings, "and no matter how much I want to I can't leave."

Phil sighs, looking away for a moment. "I'll leave, if you want me to."

"I don't."

"Then what do you want?"

Neither of them are looking at each other now. Dan thinks he might not be able to look Phil in the eyes for a while, but he's realized that no matter what, he needs him. They need each other.

So he looks at Phil. "I want you to tell me everything, from the beginning, no lies."

So Phil does as asked.