wake up, phil - [phan]

{ 37.5 } - Seconds

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For some reason, as I head to... the place... I start thinking of the more recent years of my life. I can't withstand thinking without remembering the good memories, so I think about them anyway. I think of the highlights of every year. I think of the worst points of every year.

2009.

When it all began. The year that makes our true viewers smile or even tear up. Well, our old viewers. They don't belong to us anymore. I know most of them were incredibly emtionally invested in Phil and I, but when the news hits them, they just have to take it and move on. Move on, whether they were persistent members of our audience, or just casual viewers who watched out videos once in a while. Our videos will always be there, so those of our audience who think they will struggle without Phil and I to help them in whatever way, we will always be there via the screen. Just not in reality.

2012.

I came so close to making so many horrendous decisions in this year. From January onwards, our smiles and humour and contact with each other in or videos and normal life decreased drastically. The pressure got to my head, to my heart, and returned me to my old habits.

23:14, sometime in February 2012.

"Dan? I saw your YouNow just then."

"Why? Phil, you see me literally everyday. Why do you need to watch my liveshows? Isn't that a bit creepy?"

"What? You watch mine! We always watched each others, since we both first signed up to that website!"

"No... Not anymore, Phil."

"Why?"

"It's weird now. Look, Phil, I'm busy. Could you kind of... leave?"

"Oh god, Dan."

"What?"

"You've changed so much."

"What the hell?"

"You seem to want to cancel me out of your life. You don't ever come into my bed, sit next to me on the sofa, eat dinner and breakfast with me... Why? What is that has changed you? Is it our viewers?"

"Oh shut up, Phil. Nothing has changed. Stop being so fucking clingy."

"It's the viewers, isn't it? I know they're pressuring us a lot about stuff, and I know that all of a sudden there are a lot of them. I know you don't want them to know our secret, but-"

"Secret?"

"Yeah."

"There is no secret."

"Yes there is! You know... the secret about... us being... together?"

"Get real, Phil."

"What?!"

"It was just a thing... that happened in 2009. I was lonely. That's all."

"Yeah, a 'thing' that also continued into 2010 and 2011 as well."

"I was lonely, Phil. Fuck off."

"Dan."

A tiny little droplet appears, darkening the colour of the carpet beside my foot as I sit, spread out on the sofa with my laptop on my legs. I look up at the ceiling, expecting to see a leak. The only leak is coming from Phil's blue eyes.

"Cut the crap, Phil."

"No."

"Why not?"

He takes a shaky breath, his pale hands trembling as he grips the ends of his plaid shirt.