"'It'll be fine'," Phil scoffed, under his breath, mocking Dan's words from earlier as he knelt down on the damp, cream floorboards, shakily sweeping tiny blue bits of gravel off the floor.
He heaved a sigh and frowned, irritably. This house was his now that the Howlters were away, and he found it highly inopportune and thwarting that something like this should happen the day before he had to hand back his responsibility.
He'd taken good care of everything until now – in fact, he'd hardly done anything but clean and make sure everything was tidy – yet, of course, it had to be today that this happens.
It wasn't just the house care that he'd been appointed with; it was the child care as well. He felt like he'd made a mess of that, too, when he'd left Dab to Eliza for two nights. The rest of the childminding, Dan had taken care of.
Phil couldn't tell whether it had been easier when the kid was younger and mostly had no clue what was going on. Now, though, Phil felt that he had to think of something for him to do all the time, though Dan had taken that challenge on board instead, and usually spent his time hanging out with Dab.
Dab seemed to like Dan more than Phil anyway.
Whenever he'd created a new drawing, he'd never eagerly show it to Phil, but rather skip up to Dan and enthusiastically bare it to him instead.
Phil sighed and wiped his forehead with the back of his hand before standing up, balancing the contents of the dustpan in his hand. He tipped it into the rest of the gravel, which he had collected and emptied into a bowl on the coffee table. He'd have to put it all back in the new tank later, so he tried to collect every last piece.
He laid the dustpan and brush down on the table, too, and wiped his hands on the side of his pastel blue shirt.
His knees were slightly damp, too, from kneeling on the floor for so long, though after putting down an abundance of tea towels and kitchen paper, the moisture seemed to be almost all gone.
It'd been tiring picking up every tiny pebble, but Phil was pretty sure he'd gotten them all, and the ones that he hadn't had probably just fallen down the cracks between the floorboards and couldn't be seen anyway.
The time was nearing 11:30 and Phil was starting to get a tad jittery, like a cat on a hot tin roof, seeing as Dan and Dab weren't back home yet and Dil and Tabitha would be coming back in only half an hour.
He swallowed and rubbed his eyelids, tiredly. Where had his housemate gotten to? It'd been an hour already, why wasn't he back yet with the kid and a new fish tank?
He gritted his teeth and stared to the minnow, swimming around, merrily, in the glass on the breakfast bar.
"You don't have to worry about disappointing people," he frowned at Jonathan.
Jonathan did not reply.
What a shock.
Dil and Tabitha would be home any minute now, and if Dan didn't return soon, they surely wouldn't be happy. Or at least, that's what Phil held.
It was at this very moment that he heard the key turn in the lock and he hurried to stand in front of Jonathan's glass to hide the evidence. Not that the Howlters wouldn't notice the absence of the tank on the table.
Phil straightened his collar, brushed his shirt down, put his hands behind his back and cleared his throat, preparing himself for the awkward interaction that was sure to follow.
Yet, to his surprise and slight relief, it wasn't Dil and Tabitha who walked through the door, but Dan, with Dab close behind.
"Where have you been, Howell?" Phil growled, impatiently, folding his arms.
Dan stared back to him, nervously, and scratched the back of his neck.
"Sorry, pal – it took us a while to walk all the way there and back," he apologised, noticing on his phone that the time was almost mid-day, "You've done a great job of cleaning up, though, I must say…"
"Yeah, right," Phil huffed, "You can sort out the rest, I'll put away the shoes and coats that you've left on the floor, and make sure everything's sorted again before the Howlters get back," he sighed, tiredly.
Only, he needn't have been as fussed as he was, because the Howlters didn't come back as they were due.
In fact, they didn't really come back at all.
Both Phil, Dan and Dab waited as patiently as they could, hanging around and doing nothing in particular; Dab playing in his bedroom as Dan killed time laying on the sofa and Phil hunched over the breakfast bar, tapping his cold fingertips on the work surface.
He gazed down to his phone beside him and tapped the home button to turn it on and stare at the time.
3:30.
How could they be three and a half hours late?
Phil chewed his lip in thought, shakily picking up the phone and scrolling through his contact list.
"I'm going to call them," he coughed, speaking up for the first time in a very long while.
Dan half jumped back in surprise at the sudden announcement, then turned around to face his friend.
"I'm sure they won't be long," he said, "But if that's what you want to do, go ahead."
Phil nodded to him, assuredly, and slowly raised his phone to his ear.
Dan watched him and listened to the faint sound of the call dialling, along with the rhythmic tapping of Phil's fingers.
They waited for around half a minute before Dil answered.
Dan couldn't hear his voice, but he sure heard Phil's responses, and they weren't reassuring, especially not the taken aback yelp of 'WHAT?' and the worried expression on his face.
"I… I'll be right there…" Phil stuttered, clearing the lump in his throat, uneasily.
Dil must have refused at first, as the next thing Dan heard his friend say was 'no – I'm coming', accompanied by a frustrated frown.
There were few more words spoken before the call was ended and Phil restlessly put his face in his hands and tapped his foot violently on the kitchen tiles.
"What's wrong?" Dan asked, standing up and heading over to attempt to console him.
"I…" Phil swallowed, looking upwards and refusing a comforting hug, "I'll call you later, I have to go-"
"Where?" Dan stammered, "Is something wrong?"
Phil stood up straight and fixed his glasses,
"I just said I'd call you later," he repeated, moseying past Dan and disappearing into the bedroom to get a coat and shoes. He reappeared a second later and unsteadily unlocked the front door as Dan watched him with a mystified expression.
"Phil!" Dan called as he opened the door, hoping to get at least some different words out of him.
Phil looked back to him, waiting.
"Be… be careful, alright?" Dan reminded him.
And for the first time that day, his friend gave a smile; even if it be a melancholy one.
"Don't worry, I will," he said, confidently, and as Dan saluted him, he slunk away.