Illuminated // Phan (boyxboy)

Chapter 18

Credit to fictionalyf on twitter for another amazing lock screen for illuminated!

An: because I missed Wednesdays update because I was at a fall out boy concert I'm going to do a couple of little chapters to keep you hanging until next Wednesday when certain events happen in the illuminated world.....

Tw for chapter: self harm, suicide, bullying, mentions of depression.
****

His feet scurried across the trails of the ever down of the forest floor slowly. Never had his body felt so weary and beaten down with the exhaustion that had started to rack him.

For once, Phil was hungry. No - he was starving, his sight was constantly blurry and hazed as he stumbled infinitely through this isolated world he had caused for himself.

A small, dainty - "feminine" to his father - hand clutched around the twenty pound note that seemed to burn in his pocket.

He needed to buy food.

His wrists ached with a damaging pulse; dying for him to do something to eliminate the sadness- anything- everything. He'd constantly been clawing at his arms, his nails scraping down the soft flesh with a supple ease until it left a bloodied trail of burst blod clots and bruises.

Eating wasn't his strong point; no. But something now about how far his brittle ribs stood out potroufing from his pale paper like skin sated him. It screamed eating disorder, bulimia - anorexia. It was right. Cable thin legs stumbled across the floor of the forest; anxiety knotting him his stomach when he took in the sight of the town bustling through the gap in the trees.

Crouched down, his legs burning from what he had done to them when he ran out of space on his arms he waited somewhat impatiently for the town to break even into a more peaceful hum. By the time the opportunity came, he was sat on the floor - a lonely wave washing over him. Crushing down upon him like a huge weight that suffocated him. More than anyone he needed Dan Howell to be sat beside him, his arms around his shoulders warm and inviting to tell him it was all going to be okay. That he was fine and he was safe. Phil never felt safe; but when he was with Dan - he was the closet thing to being safe that he had ever been before. Dan had been a placebo - a fake supplement of calmness and security at first but now he was more than that. The security that Dan gave him wasn't a placebo anymore - it was genuine, it was affection. It was like being loved for the first time.

Dan probably wasn't even missing him. The reason he'd been so anxious when Dan had walked into his room - aside from the social anxiety was that he knew Dan before.

Dan Howell. Self assured, confident; gay. One of the more popular boys that was in the school year, which essentially meant that Phil was invisible to him, as good as dead. Though, that's all he had ever been to anyone. A space filler, another faced, useless, pointless, a sign may as well have been placed on his head that screamed; W O R T H L E S S.

Apparently; Dan Howell must have seen that too.
****
"Kill yourself, faggot," Oli spat at him, his hand twisted so far into his school shirt that he was twisting not only the thin material but his skin in his tight fist too.

A firm hand wrapped around his wrist, nails digging in exactly where his darkest secret lay. A wince shuddered across his whole body and it was picked up on immediately. The hand that was wrapped around him tightened and he knew he was done for - Oli knew what lay beneath his sleeves.

"Little faggot likes the pain then does he? Can't get enough of it from so he goes home and slits his wrists does he?" Oli sneered, his eyes narrowed in anger before dragging him into a nearby cupboard for cleaning supplies. Outside the door a boy with laughing brown eyes talked animatedly with a small group - each of them smiling and chatting passionately about the last episode of the anime they were watching.

Their heads turned to watch the tall year ten shove the tiny year seven into the cupboard. "Please help me," he mouthed to the boy whose brown eyes shadowed over with hurt as he took in the sight Phil's sleeves rolled up, the boy's tiny wrists held in a death grip by some cunt who obviously thought he was better than everyone else.

"You say nothing about this, alright Howell, don't look at him with those pitiful eyes. The freaks going to get what's good for him, teach him a few lessons about manners if you will. Unless you want to help that is? Couple of my mates are coming in to help me sort the little freak out now, probably won't even be able to recognise the stupid faggot once we're done with him!" Oli demanded and Phil watched as the boy sent him to his fate - his depression screaming out to him that of course the boy wouldn't step in and save him - freaks like him didn't deserve to be saved - they deserved to be punished, hit, touched, punched, cut - everything.

That had been when he had realised that every that had happened to him - he deserved. That night he'd gone home and locked himself in the bathroom, his mind and skin crawling with what Oli had done to him - what Dan Howell had practically let Oli do to him.

That was the first ever time that Phil Lester had tried to end his life.

An// as requested on tumblr the next chapter will be character asks - so you comment a question and for what character Scott, Dan or Phil and they'll answer it ;)