Those Who Trust (Phan)

Part 25

Thank you for liking the story and the comments. Here are 5k words for you, and if you ever feel the need to talk to me, you can find me on tumblr (link in my description). Hope you enjoy! :) x

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Dan was crying. There were tears streaming down his face that he tried to rub away with the sleeves of his sweater, and sobs tumbling over his lips that he couldn't suppress, and this entire situation was so fucking stupid. Phil had been looking sideways at him for quite a while now, he must have noticed the change in Dan's mood, and the second he heard Dan's whimper, he was up from the couch and next to him at the dining table in seconds, a hand hovering over Dan's shoulders as if he was not sure if he was allowed to touch, and asking what was wrong.

It was stupid, because Dan was crying over dogs.

He took off his headphones and shook his head, tried to swat Phil away, but the older man had already looked at his laptop screen and confusion was drawn on his face.

"What are you watching?" he asked, and Dan could see the second Phil's eyes scanned the title of the video and his eyebrows raised. "A brave little dog gets rescued from the river. His recovery will inspire you. Please share. What is that?"

Phil looked between Dan and the laptop screen in bewilderment. "Are you crying because of a dog video?"

Dan shrugged his shoulders helplessly and took a deep breath. The tears were dried now, but the sleeves of his sweater were still uncomfortably damp.

"It's a very emotional dog video," he tried to justify himself, blushing despite his excuses. But then again, his face tended to get red when he cried anyway, so Phil would probably not notice the blush.

"What's it about?" Phil asked, and he pulled over a second chair and sat down next to Dan.

He looked in surprise as Dan closed the laptop quickly and stood up, gathering the object and pressing it close to his chest as he made his way out of the room.

"It's really not that important. Maybe I'll show you another time. I'll have to go and do some work for uni now." With those words he stumbled out of the room and pretended not to have seen the pure confusion written all over Phil's face.

Dan had discovered this genre of videos online a few days ago, shortly after the night he had held Phil's hand for the first and only time. There were many of them, showing animals - mostly dogs - that were hurt and malnourished and scared, cowering away from human touch, or even worse, having already given up, too tired to care about the possible hurt those hands coming near them could produce. And then the weeks would go on, and the months would pass, and at the end of the videos, Dan would see healthy dogs with their tongues dopily hanging out of their mouths, their eyes sparkling and them seeking out the attention of the people that saved them with excited wags of the tail. And Dan loved those videos, he loved and hated them so much at the same time, because how could dogs that went through such horrible treatment by humans find the courage to trust them again after only a short period of time? For him it's been more than a year, and although he knows there's been progress, he still feels like he's at the beginning of his recovery and that he might never get to his goal.

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"So she screamed at me - and I swear, Dan, the entire building must have heard her - before running out of the flat. It was ridiculous!"

"You guys fight like once a month. At this point I honestly think you can't have a proper relationship without fighting."

PJ glared up at Dan from his current position, his head resting on Dan's lap and his feet crossed at the ankles where they dangled over the sofa. He had invited himself over just after lunch time and brought pizza with him. Dan noticed the bags under his eyes that PJ usually had whenever there was a fight with his girlfriend, but he knew that they would be gone within the next few days again as soon as he made with her, because that was always how it worked between them. They were a happy couple, although admittedly with a fairly unusual relationship, then there would be a major fight and once both of them got over their egos they'd be a happy couple again. For the time after the fight, however, Dan had always had the questionable honour of playing PJ's therapist and listen to all his rants. The first time that had happened, he had known PJ for less than a month, and his way of dealing with the issue had been to take his friend to the nearest pub and they'd both gotten wasted. Dan had absolutely no recollection of that night, and it was probably better that way.