"Does it sound like they're having fun without me?" Phil wheezed, gazing to the door of Dab's bedroom and listening to the muffled laughter from inside.

He was currently leant back on the arm of the sofa, still mildly dizzy and way too warm, with his arms folded behind his head.

He couldn't perceive much of what was happening in the other room because the door was closed, and his hearing had been slightly subdued from his temperature, but he could still tell that neither Dan nor Dab needed him.

Tabitha wasn't one to lie, so she scratched the back of her neck, turned around from where she had been practicing her programming at the computer and heaved an awkward sigh.

"Kind of," she replied.

Phil nodded, slowly and thoughtfully.

"It's not that I care," He put in, as if he needed to justify his asking.

There would be nothing wrong with it if he did care, either, but he did a very good job of convincing himself that he didn't.

"At least you had a great week so far, right?" Dil smiled, nicely, looking around to face Phil, still drying a plate with a slightly damp dishcloth.

Phil gave a sarcastic laugh and closed his eyes. He knew the Howlters had no idea about what had been happening, and he wanted to tell them, but at the same time he also really, really didn't want to tell them.

"Am I wrong?" Dil asked, sounding concerned, and Phil heard the sound of the plate being put away and the cupboard door being shut.

Phil opened one eye slightly, staring across to Dil. He couldn't see his face because he wasn't wearing glasses, but he could tell that Dil was worried.

"I… don't know…" Phil breathed eventually, realising he couldn't remember exactly what had been happening since Friday except Summer's party and shoving the childminding responsibility over to the Pancakes.

"Pretty uneventful," Phil carried on in a hoarse tone.

"Not stressful, then?" Dil hummed.

Phil didn't reply, just averted his eyes, sat up straight, feeling himself go woozy as he did, and put his head in his hands, tiredly.

"I'm taking that as a 'yes, it was very stressful', then?" Tabitha put in. Clearly, she had been listening and watching, too.

"It wasn't… stressful," Phil stuttered, struggling to find the word he wanted, but eventually gave up, "Dan handled most of looking after Dab. Dab doesn't like me much I don't think."
"What would make you think that?" Tabitha asked, and Phil saw her stand up from the corner of his eye.

He really didn't want to get into a deep and meaningful conversation right now. This was definitely not the time, especially when his mind was so jumbled he couldn't form proper sentences more than 5 words long.

"It's not him, it's me," he said before pausing for a while, "I've been too strict," he explained after a while.

Tabitha's face fell and, without his glasses, Phil couldn't tell whether her expression was one of sympathy or disappointment, so he went for option two.

"I'm sorry," he croaked, looking down to the floor, but even the floor was slightly pulsating still.

"No, don't be. Tell me a bit more; let's talk about it," Tabitha insisted, kindly, taking a seat on the armchair near the front door.

Phil frowned and shook his head,

"You'll have to talk… to Dan about it…" he managed to say, steering himself out of a conversation he really didn't want to have, but as he saw Tabitha start to stand back up again, he hurriedly rushed to add, "No – not now!"

He didn't want to disturb Dan and deprive Dab of his socialising time just so they could talk about their issues. The kid sounded like he was having the time of his life.

"Not as bad as February," Phil added, under his breath, mostly talking to himself, but not realising that Tabitha could hear.

"What about February?" She asked, eyeing the patch of Phil's skin where he'd had a scar on his cheek back in February. It was long gone by now, though, and there wasn't even a hint of a blemish to mark where it had been.

Tabitha had been curious about last time ever since laying eyes on that scar, and she was itching to know what had happened. Dil hadn't seemed too bothered after Dan's half-hearted explanation that he 'accidentally pushed him into the table', but Tabitha had stayed inquisitive.

"Ask Dan about that, too," Phil huffed.

"Why?"

"I…" he stammered, completely conflicted by this simple question, "I… don't want to paint him in a bad light."

Though his response only increased Tabitha's curiosity.

"Did you get into an argument?" She inquired, politely.

"You could put it that way," Phil replied, giving up on hiding anything and instead deciding to tell the truth.

And he was going to put it as blatantly as he could.

"More like a fight, actually," he said, bluntly, "Dan got mad at me. He thought I'd downloaded something… that got us stuck here… he wasn't happy."

Tabitha listened intently and quietly, not wanting to seem like she was judging or assuming that Dan was a bad person. After all, she didn't want to put Phil off reciting the rest of the story.

"He left for a while," Phil swallowed, painfully remembering looking up from the floor and watching his best friend walk away. He'd seen it again in his weird flashback last night, too, and hated to talk about it.

"He went to the park… to think, I believe. He came back eventually, though. It- it's not his fault, though!" He stuttered, hurriedly attempting to justify everything that Dan had done, "It was a misunderstanding, I- we- it's – we're over it- and-"

Noting how flushed he was getting, Tabitha gestured for him to calm down and nodded to the water glass on the table.

Phil shakily took it, unsteadily sipped the smallest amount of water possible and put the cup back down before rubbing his eyes and heaving a sigh.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Dil asked, seriously.

"I… didn't want to make it out that Dan was a bad friend," Phil managed to say, honestly, without faltering, "Because he's not, and it was an honest mistake that he made, and we're fine now. But I didn't want to make it seem like we weren't friends and that Dab had been scarred by it and that we'd done a bad job," he swallowed, and before he could go on, he was cut off.

"Phil?"

Looking up, he saw Dan standing by the bathroom door, wiping sharpie off his face with a white flannel, looking a little bit concerned.

"Were you talking about February?" Dan asked, under his breath, and received a nod in reply.

He wandered over, pink marks in his skin where he'd scrubbed off drawn-on cat whiskers, and took a seat on the sofa beside his friend, putting an arm around his shoulders, reassuringly.

"Guess we had to tell them sometime, right?" He smiled, wanly, and to his surprise, Phil seemed completely fine; only leaned against his shoulder and relaxed a bit.

Maybe finally telling the Howlters about February was all that was needed to let it go in the end.

There was an air about that felt a little bit… new. Like this was finally the point where they could forget about February, start again and begin June.

Here goes This Time.