Best Friends (phanfic)

Prologue

"Dan?" Phil called out to an empty apartment. That's right. He was out with Louise celebrating her 3 million subscriber milestone.

Why had Phil refused to join all his friends as they had a good time without him? He regretted his decision, but at least it gave him some time to think about how he was going to break the news to Dan.

Phil hadn't told Dan about her. He wouldn't mind, right? It wasn't like they were attached or anything. But it seemed cruel to leave his best friend alone in their apartment, especially when Dan relied on him so much.

Text message from: Dan
Hey Philly I'm gonna be out late tonight so don't worry about staying up for movie night. So many strangers. So much awkwardess.

Text message from: Dan
👦🏻

His best friend's happy texts didn't reassure Phil at all. All they did was weigh down Phil's subconscious even more. How was he going to tell him?  He had managed to keep it a secret for this long, but he didn't know how his best friend was going to react when he told him.

With a heavy heart and a guilty conscience, Phil drifted off to sleep without changing out of his clothes.

The raven-haired boy woke up with his glasses causing a searing pain on the bridge of his nose and Dan gently nudging him awake.

"Phil. Can I talk to you?  It's important."

"Dan?" Phil mumbled in that raspy morning voice that Dan loved so much. "What is it?"

The brunette's usual bubbly and slightly sarcastic tone had melted away, and had been replaced with an important, almost concerning seriouness.

Once they were in the living room, Phil asked once again, this time with a shade more urgency.

"Dan? What's wrong?"

"Phil." Dan was blushing slightly. Was it too hot in there? Phil had forgotten to turn off the heating because he was so preoccupied with telling Dan...

"Dan, is it too hot? D'you want me to turn off the-"

"Phil no. It's not that. I wanted to say... I-I think I'm in love with you."

"Dan...?"

"Phil, ever since the day I met you I've felt a connection to you. I feel like you're my soulmate. I thought it was just friendship, and that we had a 'bromance' kind of thing. I've been lying to myself, Phil. I... I'm gay. And I'm in love with you. I have been since the day we met. Phil Lester, I'm in love with you."

"Dan..."

"Thanks to Louise, I realized that I never want to lose you if you ever find someone special. I want to be your special person."

"Dan..."

"Phil, will you go out with me? I want to spend the rest of my life with you. We could adopt a child, we could get a dog, we could move to a bigger apartment. "

"Dan..." Phil sighed for the fourth time, his eyes glistening with tears and his mind swimming with dread and fear of letting Dan down.

"Phil, I'm so happy that I've finally told you, " Dan breathed. He radiated happiness, "Will you say yes?"

Phil took a shaky breath and blinked back the salty tears that threatened to overflow from his aquamarine eyes.

"I'm sorry, Dan." He could see Daniel James Howell's ecstatic expression dissolve into dissapointment and sadness. He was usually always in a good mood.

"I-I wanted to tell you something as well. I was going to tell you last night, but you were out with Louise." His best friend would not look at him. He stood slumped towards the window.

It was a grey, standard-English-weather day. It was as if a thick, miserable blanket of dark cloud had enshrouded the sky; as if they would never see the sun again.

A tiny ray of hope began emerging from the miserable blanket of thick, dark cloud that had just enshrouded Dan's heart.

He began praying for his lion-loving crush to say that he returned his feelings. He prayed for him to love him, he prayed for him to hug him and never let go, he prayed for him to kiss him in just the way that he had imagined all those years but had shaken the image out of his mind.

He wished that Phil would say yes. But wishes don't always come true.

"I-I met a girl. I was going to move in with her on Monday. It's been gnawing away at me all week. I was so worried about telling you, Dan. I'm sorry."

Dan had two options. He could either get angry and hurt and storm out, exposing his weaknesses and insecurities and possibly ruin his relationship with Phil; or he could play it off as a joke and bottle up all of the post-rejection depression building up inside of him, like a road quietly caving in, waiting to snatch its victims' lives unexpectedly.

"Dan? Please respond." He could see Phil's once-stunning bright blue eyes fading guiltily into watery grey as they filled with crystal clear tears.

He couldn't bear to look at them. He couldn't stand Phil being sad, and making him happy was his priority, whether it be at his expense of not.

"Phil, you dingus! I was only kidding! You took me seriously for a second, didn't you?"

His crush's face instantly lit up, and he began to do that adorable little laugh that Dan loved so much. Dan, on the other hand, laughed halfheartedly back, and had to glance away from Phil for a second to prevent himself from breaking down in front of him.

He couldn't be seen as weak. He didn't want Phil to feel even remotely as terrible and heartbroken as himself. He hoped that girl treated him well.

"Dan, you idiot! You scared me for a second!" the older boy chuckled.

"So, tell me about her, Philly." Dan winced at the nickname he called Phil; he no longer wished to show him the unrequited affection that he had been giving him for all these years.

It had gone unnoticed by Phil, who began pushing every detail of that girl and how wonderful she was on to Dan.

He managed to edge in a halfhearted 'mmhmm' or a sickly 'awwwhh' every so often, and endured his one-sided lover's gushes about kissing her at the cinema, holding hands with her down the street, cuddling with her until dawn. It seemed like that girl had been living his fantasies as a reality, and he hadn't even noticed. He hated himself for it.

Dan went to bed with a roaring ache in his heart, screaming to be felt. He guessed that this was what having a broken heart felt like. Sighing sorrowfully, he turned over the picture he had by his bedside of him and Phil at the first TATINOF show, and shut his eyes.

Except he couldn't sleep. This feeling. It kept gnawing away at his heart. It devoured him within seconds, and soon he began pouring his heart out through his eyes.

Dan cried himself to sleep that night, knowing that the next day his one and only love was going to move out of his life forever to be with someone who wasn't him. Dan cried again in the morning and again in the bathroom. He cried until he felt hollow. Empty.

He went back to bed and waited for his alarm to go off. 8:30. They were coming to take his things away. He didn't say goodbye to Phil. He didn't want the last word to be goodbye.

He heard the door click softly. Phil had left without saying goodbye. He leaned, with his forehead pressed against the smooth wooden surface of the door, and whispered three barely audible words.

I love you
--
"I love you" breathes Daniel to the pot of nutella as he begins dancing like a cringey grandad to 'Never Gonna Give You Up'