A/N: my updating schedule is SO BAD honestly i'm so... irresponsible but pls there's this thing called School who loves getting in the way of things so that's one excuse but i'm here now and i'm actually updating so that's good right (even though it's pretty late over here oh, my)

summary: Dan Howell had just started college, and he's roommates with someone named Phil Lester, who at first ignores him. They soon realize that they like the same things, listen to the same music, and they even have matching fringes. They're also basically polar opposites, but that's what makes them attracted to each other, even if they don't know it themselves yet. Phan College AU.

VIII.

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adore you

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As the days crept closer to Christmas, Dan began to feel more and more anxious.

Two weeks before, Phil had told him that there was something important that he needed to tell him, but he couldn't say it earlier because supposedly the "timing wasn't right." When Dan tried pressing the subject onto him a couple of times, Phil had refused to give the information away—which slightly annoyed the brown haired teen, but well, what can you do? Phil was quite stubborn with these kinds of things, so he just figured that he needed to wait things out... just for a bit longer anyway. He hadn't really mentioned this to Chris and PJ—maybe they knew what it was Phil was keeping from him?

The weird thing was, whenever Dan tried to hint it to him—Phil seemed kind of sad when he did. If they were cuddling or whatever before, the black haired teen would've tensed up and bit his lower lip in response. When Dan asked if he was okay, Phil just gave him a small smile and exhaled softly. And Dan knew that expression. He's seen it so many times now. The light in Phil's blue eyes always dimmed a bit whenever it was brought up. Eventually he'd playfully push Dan aside and mutter an "I'll tell you soon." afterwards.

Dan didn't really understand that. He wasn't sure what to expect at all.

Maybe this is what Chris and PJ meant when they said that Phil would eventually open up to him soon? Dan's extremely grateful that he's gotten much more closer to Phil—well, close enough that they were now dating—but he's not sure if he wants to encourage Phil on telling him whatever it was he wanted to tell him. Dan didn't want to hurt him; the little information that Chris had shared with him before was enough for him to know that his past wasn't a good one.

He sighs as he looks down at his English paper.

Write down your thoughts on Romeo's feelings for Juliet. Is it an unrequited love? Explain both sides of the question in the space below. Don't forget to use quotes from the passage to support your answer. Hint: Examine the emotion in Romeo and Juliet's words when they speak/call to each other.

Dan smiles at the words on the page. It seemed like only yesterday Chris was reciting the play, drunk. He can't ever forget that moment; in his head he begins to imagine Chris as Romeo and PJ as Juliet. He begins to write on the page, laughing quietly to himself—analyzing things like these were much easier if he could relate the concepts in real life. He turns around slightly—looking over at Phil's bed. The black haired teen is quietly scribbling on his notebook, his legs crossed and his expression focused. Dan can't help but smile at the sight; Phil looks cute focused like this.

His thoughts shift around as he turns back to his English assignment.

A smile tugs at Dan's lips as he realizes that this situation Romeo and Juliet are going through can be the same thing for both he and Phil as well. He taps his pencil lightly on the desk, nodding slowly as he begins to write his response. Romeo's feelings towards Juliet aren't unrequited. He scribbles. The way that they talk to each other can prove it, in these following lines...

After a while he finishes his homework, and puts his pencil down at last. He yawns as he turns his head to look at the clock—8:34 pm. Ah, for once he didn't finish quite so late—he tried "not procrastinating" for once, and this time it worked out quite well for him. Dan looks over to Phil, who was now staring at him back. A small smile appears on Phil's face, and Dan grins back at him as he does so.

"Are you done too?" Dan asks, angling his chair so it would face Phil.

The black haired boy wrinkles his nose in response, and then shrugs afterwards. "Not really." He says, as he watches the other boy get up from his chair and sit on his mattress slowly. The two of them stare unblinkingly at each other for a while—Phil's blue eyes glancing into Dan's brown ones. Eventually Dan has to look away; the intensity of Phil's stare still manages to intimidate him somehow.

He imagines Phil smiling, and once he looks up at him again, he's right. The black haired boy's mouth is formed into some kind of smirk, he brushes some of his fringe aside before reaching out for Dan's sleeve. Dan looks at his left hand, and then back up at Phil—who had raised his eyebrows. "What?" Dan smiles, as he scoots closer. "I'm here with you, isn't that enough already?" he adds jokingly, as the other male rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." Phil mutters, and Dan laughs in response.

The two of them don't say anything for a while again. It's a comfortable silence, and now both Dan and Phil's hands are intwined together on the mattress—Dan's still in awe on how their fingers seemed to go together; like a lock and key, like two jigsaw puzzle pieces connecting together without any trouble. It made him feel extremely giddy and ebullient. Phil's fingers are soft—Dan enjoys the feel of them.

He looks up at the other teen. "I feel like I'm distracting you."

"You are, but I don't want you to stop." Phil says bluntly. He grasps Dan's hand tighter at this, and the brown haired teen rolls his eyes in response. He tries to tug his hand away—but fails, as Phil wraps his hand tighter around his, and trailing his grip up so it closed around his wrist lightly. He pulls Dan's arm closer to him, earning a small yelp of surprise from the other teen—and plants a light kiss on Dan's forehead as he does so. Dan feels his face warm up instantly, and curses silently under his breath. Phil still manages to make him flustered, even after they've become an object.

In return, Dan quickly sneaks a small peck on Phil's cheek before withdrawing from him, smirking. "Distracting you is fun, but you've got homework to do." He says, as the other teen slowly touches the spot where Dan had kissed him, his expression full of surprise. "I'm going to go over to Chris and PJ's for a bit. I've never really visited them that much anyways." He bites back a laugh as Phil stares at him, incredulous. "I won't be gone for long, plus, you need to finish whatever you're doing."

"I swear you've never said that before." The black haired teen grumbles, as Dan stands up and pulls on a coat. Phil watches him as he then tugs his converse on, swiping a hand through his hair. "Well, I have now." He smiles at Phil's still slightly irritated expression. "Don't worry, I'll be back. I'm not going to be gone forever, okay?" He says, now sitting closer to Phil—close enough that he could interpret all colors of his eyes.

He raises his eyebrows. "Make me believe that."

Dan sighs, but leans forwards and presses his lips onto Phil's gently. The familiar feeling in his heart starts to come back once he does so—that familiar, flustered feeling. It makes his heart sing and his face turn darker shades of red, but Dan loves it. After a few seconds, he lets go of the kiss and stares right back at Phil, his eyebrows raised this time. "Is that good enough for you?" He smiles, as he witnesses the other teen try not to smile.

He's interrupted once more by another short kiss—there's slightly more force in this one; but coming from Phil, it's not much of a surprise. Dan finds himself grinning through it, the feeling of their lips colliding is complete bliss and he enjoys every second of it. They let go eventually, the brown haired boy standing up. "I'll be back soon." He promises, as he walks to the door. He waves his hand in a goodbye as Phil does the same, smiling at him from across the room.

He locks the door behind him, before stuffing his hands in his pockets and walking off to room 538.

Dan's eyes shift from door to door, looking at the numbers on them.

523. 527. 531. 535.

He stops immediately once he reads the number 538, straightening his posture as he looked up at the numbers in interest. It didn't seem like much on the outside, for all of the doors in the boys' dorm looked all the same. Dan knew that on the inside, it was completely different. He frowns a bit before raising an arm to knock on the door, hoping that he wasn't intruding on anything. He exhales a bit before knocking three times on the door lightly.

No response. Were they not home? Dan raises an eyebrow.

He knocks harder, and yet, still no response. Annoyance rises inside of Dan's stomach, and he looks around to see if anyone is around. No one's in the corridors, and there really isn't anything that Dan could use to possibly get Chris or PJ's attention. He pounds on the door now, not really caring if it was extremely loud. Still no response. He frowns slightly, staring at the door in front of him. He glanced down at the key—should he open it? It'd be rude to go in without their permission—but then again they weren't responding to his knocks.

Then again, Chris and PJ were always barging in on them anyway.

Dan shrugs, and before he could regret it, he placed the key in the keyhole and twisted it, unlocking the door. He nearly slams it open, but once the door had opened just for a second, it slammed back at him—scaring the shit out of the brown haired boy. He yelled as the door ran into his foot, which was wedged in between the door and the small space where he'd put his foot in. Intense pain shot through his body as Dan shouted out a string of curses—mainly directed towards Chris and PJ.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT FOR?" Dan shouted through the door—he removed his foot from the space and bent down to massage it, wincing. "CHRIS! PJ! OPEN THE DAMN DOOR RIGHT NOW!" He shouted, using both of his fists to pound on it extremely loudly. "OPEN UP!"

A few pounding later, the door finally swung open. Chris and PJ were standing in the doorway, both with matching looks of horror on their faces. Dan's eyes widened at the sight of both of them—they were in pajamas, Chris wearing his shirt backwards and PJ wearing his inside out. Their hair were both disheveled and stuck up at odd angles, their eyes nervously darting to and from Dan to each other.

"Uh, hello." Dan mutters awkwardly. "Did I—did I interrupt something?"

PJ looked like he wanted to melt into the floor, but Chris responded instead. "We were just going to bed early and I thought there was an intruder at the door, considering on how hard they were pounding." He said, his green eyes widened. He looked at Dan with a smile, knowing that didn't fool him. "Okay fine, I'm kidding. You nearly walked in on us, and it scared the shit out of me. So I slammed the door on your foot. Sorry about that, by the way. Come in!"

Dan stares at PJ, wide-eyed, and the curly haired teen shrugs back. "You guys are a thing? Since when?"

"Er, since a while ago. We assumed that you thought that this was a joke, the fact that Chris likes to drool over me sometimes. I can't really blame him though, I'm pretty irresistible. Also it's okay, we were just getting sta—"

"—I do not want to know what you two were up to, thank you."

It was a good thing that their room wasn't as messy as Dan thought it would be, considering what had been happening before he had gotten in. Dan stood awkwardly in the corner as both Chris and PJ sat on their own mattresses, PJ's legs crossed and Chris staring at Dan with a curious expression in his eyes. "So, what's up?" He said casually, swiping a hand through his already messy hair, making it even messier.

"Um, I kinda wanted to talk to you guys about something." Dan replies, nervously fidgeting with his jacket sleeve. As he looked up to see the expressions on Chris and PJ's faces, both of their eyes were widened slightly. They looked at each other, and then back at Dan, who had acknowledged their behavior. He raised an eyebrow in response. "It's about Phil."

Chris frowns, crossing his arms. "What about him? Relationship problems?"

"Sexual frustration?" PJ chimes in.

"Weird desires?"

"No, none of that!" Dan says, massaging his temples in exaggeration. "I don't really think that I should be asking you two this, but..." he bit his lower lip and avoided their gaze. "Has he ever told you two something about Christmas? He's been keeping something from me and I'm not sure if I want to know what it is, every time I ask him about it he always seems so—"

"—distant?" Both Chris and PJ said in unison. They didn't sound surprised at all.

Dan blinks. "Yeah. Distant."

Chris and PJ glanced at each other, and then back at him once more. PJ sighs, shaking his head lightly. "Honestly, I think it's best for him to tell you himself. I don't think he'd appreciate us telling you about it." He said, his light green eyes serious. "I think the only thing that we can tell you is that it's pretty serious, and it's why he's the way he is today, if that makes any sense." PJ mutters, running a hand through his curly hair.

"For once, I agree with Peej." Chris says, nodding. "He should tell you himself."

The brown haired teen frowns, pulling his sleeves over his hands. "Alright... do you think it'll hurt him if he tells me, though? I think that I'll feel really bad if it, you know, opens a new wound or anything like that. I just... I don't want to hurt him. From what I know, his past wasn't really a good one, right? I just..." Dan sighs, finally taking a seat on one of the chairs in the room. He places his head in his hands, staring at the floor. "I don't want to hurt him. He means a lot to me."

Once he looks up at the two other teens—both of them have matching expressions of sympathy on them.

"Hey, it's okay, Dan." PJ says, understanding in his tone. "I actually think that Phil would feel better if he told you what was wrong. Well, nothing's wrong with him right now, I'm sure—but usually getting things off your chest is one of the things you could do to get something off of your mind. Don't worry, he's told us already a while back—and I can tell he'll feel loads better once he tells you."

On the other mattress, Chris nods solemnly. "That's right. You know my ex-girlfriend? The one that ripped my poster in half? Before we got to that yikes stage, we were actually going on pretty well. Whenever she had drama with any of her friends that I thought that were irrelevant, she would always come to me, usually crying. Being the caring boyfriend I was, I always asked her what was wrong. Sometimes it backfired. Sometimes she'd scream at me and tell me to leave, but other times, when she wasn't hardheaded or anything, she told me what was going on. I cheered her up, and she felt better. It went on like this, well, until we broke up."

Dan stood up at that moment, and pat Chris on the back as he did so. "I'm really sorry, man."

"It's fine, she was a bitch anyway." Chris shrugs, swiping a hand through his hair. His green eyes glinted with amusement. "I'm much more happier with PJ now. He's such a sweetheart, and I get money from him from all the bets we make." PJ makes a sour face at the last sentence, scrunching his nose in disagreement. Chris smiles in response, but slings an arm around Dan for reassurance. "Phil's a good guy. He loves you, you know? I've never seen him like that ever since—"

He stopped mid-sentence, and looked extremely worried—an expression that Dan's not used to seeing on him. "Uh—I mean—"

"You're talking about Sarah, aren't you?" Dan then mutters softly. He looks at Chris, and then at PJ. When he saw the surprise on their expressions—he knew that he was right. "I already know about her. I kinda, ah, ran into her one time when I was visiting Phil during his shift. Phil told me about her, I'm sure that they were close before they had broken up, right?"

PJ looked kind of uncomfortable. "Well..."

"I guess you could say that." Chris said, frowning.

Dan gave them a confused look. "Why do you two seem so uncertain?"

"We kind of... had a bad feeling about her from the start." PJ muttered, placing a hand under his chin in deep thought. "The first day we met her, I knew that something was wrong. She had seemed like she knew us from when Phil introduced us to her. You know at the time, Phil was the sun. He was the literal sun, and an angel. He was always smiling—always cheerful—always happy. You might not believe us now, considering the fact that he's not as nice as he was before, but it's true."

"He was still like this when he was with Sarah. I guess he didn't know that she was actually pretty evil. He had a girlfriend before Sarah, I'm not sure if he told you that, what happened to her was really... well, it's not something someone would like talking about. Phil's girlfriend before Sarah had gotten into a car accident, after Phil had took her out on a date. The next thing he knew, he was wearing his date night outfit to that girl's funeral. No one knew who did it, supposedly the driver wasn't even in the car when it happened. I say it was a load of bullshit. Everyone knew that Sarah had the biggest crush on Phil. The next day, Sarah comes acting all innocent and everything—of course Phil gets attracted to her right away." Chris finished, his expression dark.

PJ nods. "She never liked us, by the way. She always thought we were bothersome. I was so happy when they finally had broken up, and I think Phil was too, in all honesty. He was still his happy self after that—I don't think he cared once the two of them were over. I think it bothered Sarah more than it bothered him, which is saying something. She was the one who had said it was over, and personally, I'm glad that it wasn't Phil who decided that. Who knows what would have happened to him if he did?"

Dan pursed his lips in concern; Phil hadn't mentioned this to him at all. But inside, he was glad that he didn't. Phil seemed pretty shaken up already—like he said before, Dan didn't want to make it worse. The expressions on both Chris and PJ's faces were extremely grave and serious. Imagining Phil as a really happy guy... it was kind of hard for Dan to do, even though he still was quite sweet today.

"And then, well..." Chris sighed. "The thing that made his happy nature disappear—it happened."

It was silent for a while, and Dan's head couldn't stop spinning.

He had no idea that Sarah could be this sinister. It made his worries about her increase, and Dan found himself staring at the floor—not sure on what to say. "That's so horrible. I didn't know that any of that happened... oh, hell." Dan said, placing a hand over his forehead. "I just ran into her a couple of weeks ago... if she's back here, then that must mean trouble. Phil was right. She might do something."

"She might do something to you, Dan." PJ said, his tone grave. "You'll need to be more cautious these days."

The brown haired teen exhaled. "Yeah..."

It was quiet for a couple of moments, and then Chris removed his arm from Dan's shoulder. "You should get back to your room, Dan. I'm sure Phil might be worried about you, even if he did know that you came here to visit. It was nice of you to come see us though, I'll give you that. Nice talk." He smiled, as Dan stood up from his mattress. He smiles at the two of them gratefully—before heading towards the door.

"See you guys tomorrow." Dan says, nodding at the both of them.

PJ smiles at him from his bed. "Goodnight, Dan. Sleep well."

"Sorry about your foot." Chris grins, as the other teen scoffs and leaves the room.

Dan ends up arriving at the room a bit later.

He knocks lightly on the rough surface before inserting the key, turning it and unlocking the door. Dan comes in, not surprised to see Phil already in his pajamas. He's wearing blue, gray, and white checkered pants—along with a loose, light blue t-shirt that showed his collarbones. His head was bent over a book that he was open on his lap, he was tapping the pages of the book lightly with the tip of his fingers.

Dan clears his throat lightly before closing and locking the door behind him, and this time Phil looks up at him. His blue eyes are bright as always—they're widened with slight surprise and amusement as well. "You're back." Phil says, with a small smile on his face. Dan has to admit that he looks unbelievably attractive like that—now he was the one that was distracting him.

"Yeah." He replies, his voice surprisingly dry. He unbuttons his coat and throws it onto his dresser, as he begins to remove his shoes. He's already wearing the clothes that he was planning to wear to sleep, which was a plain white t-shirt along with gray sweatpants. He smiles at Phil as he begins to clear his desk, stuffing his English homework into his backpack.

"Did you walk in on them?" Phil then said—it was clear that he was still smiling. "You look pretty shaken up."

"That's true." Dan smirks, looking back at him. "You do know everything, don't you?"

"Of course." The black haired teen replies. He shuts his book and puts it aside, standing up and walking over to Dan's side of the room—taking a seat on the other boy's mattress. Dan knows that he's watching him put away his things—Phil's staring at him once he turns around, patting the space next to him. Dan sits down on his mattress, laying down so that his head was on Phil's lap.

He looks up at Phil—remembering the things that Chris and PJ had mentioned about him earlier.

An angel. The actual sun.

Staring at him now, it wasn't hard to believe. He guessed that whatever that had shook Phil up was pretty serious if it made him change his whole personality. Although he was showing signs of his sweetness before, Dan still could tell that he was pretty rough around the edges. He could see the angelic side to him—when he was previously very happy. Dan felt his heart aching. Phil didn't deserve any of the crap that was going on in his life. First it was losing that girl to the car accident, then Sarah, and then whatever happened to him that made him extremely sad.

Dan felt bad for him. But it only made his liking towards Phil increase even more.

"Phil—" The brown haired teen whispered, glancing up at him. He raised a hand and gently cupped the other teen's cheek, massaging it lightly. Phil's skin was soft—Dan really liked the feel of it. Dan liked him a lot. Scratch that—he loved him. He loved him to bits, and Dan knew that his love for him would continue to grow every passing day that the two of them were together.

"Yeah?" Phil whispered back, bringing his face closer to Dan's.

Gosh, he's beautiful.

"I love you so much." Dan mumbled, smiling sleepily up at him.

In response, Phil's blue eyes glinted. His expression had pleasant shock all over it, his blue eyes widened. His hand was covering his mouth, and it was trembling slightly. Confused, Dan looked back up at Phil, who hadn't spoken for a bit. Wait—were those tears? Dan was sure that he could see tiny pools of water forming in the other male's eyes. Seeing the sight of that made him want to cry, but he held the tears back. He didn't want to make Phil cry even more. Instead, he smiled as he felt Phil's tears fall onto his face.

"Dan... I..." Phil exhales, his voice shaking slightly. "I love you too."

He bends his head down even more, connecting their lips together. At this point, Dan can't hold back the tears any longer—but it's one of the best kisses that he's had with Phil before, and that's saying something. After a while, the two of them separate—their faces tear-stained. The two of them laugh at the sight of each other; it's the first time they've seen each other cry, but it's quite funny.

"I'm guessing no one's ever said that to you before?" Dan asks, wiping his tears away.

Phil smiles down at him. "It's not that no one's ever said that to me, it's just that..."

The two of them gaze at each other before he finishes.

"You're the only person who's ever meant it."

A/N: yELLS I'M DONE & THIS TOOK ME SUCH A LONG TIME I HOPE U ENJOYED

next update should be pretty soon! this is my favorite story to update tbH LMAO

-choco