A Hundred Days | Dan Howell x Reader

Chapter 25.

The drive back from Tuscany was deathly quiet. Everyone aside from you and Dan was asleep, and you didn't know what to say to him after you'd run from him the night before and slept on a sunchair outdoors in order to avoid speaking to him. And the silence that filled the car wasn't one you'd come to enjoy. The silence present was not the comfortable sort that made you feel perfectly content enjoying your own thoughts, at least not to you. No, it was the silence that made you want to open the window and feel the strong wind whiz past the car and hit you like a pillow to the face when you stuck your head out the window to feel less claustrophobic.

You were in the middle of Germany, so basically, as faraway from both Italy and England as was possible on the journey. The scenery was beautiful, but you felt nothing. It was like last night's kiss had left a big, gaping hole that had formed when you had realised that you were expecting such things to happen again. Like your heart needed to be near him. And apparently, watching him from the passenger seat whilst he drove simply wasn't good enough.
You needed to be closer than that.

Snap out of it.

But no, for once, your heart and mind seemed to agree— you wanted him, not some statement that conveyed that he was distracting and that a relationship, as such, would never happen because it could never work with your job, with his, with the way your lives worked.

And you tried, you really did, to push away the feeling eating at you, but it was no use. So that was why you felt immense relief when he spoke into the silence of the car,

"I can't do this anymore".

"Pull over", you replied.

"What?" he frowned.

"Pull. Over", you repeated through gritted teeth.

And so he did, onto a field.

He got out of the car, slamming the door in the process while you climbed out gingerly, hoping he hadn't woken the others.

"You can't park here!" you said incredulously him when you were a safe distance from the car.

"Says who?" Dan glared. "No one's here to stop me and you and I obviously have to talk". He ran a hand through his curls; you were tempted to step forward and ruffle them.

You clenched your jaw to keep from speaking your mind. But you found that you already had—

"No, no talking".

"Then what—"

You'd rushed forward and pulled him to you, covering his lips with yours. This was no gentle kiss, you realised as he held you tighter, pressing his hips against your own. It was not a tender kiss, and certainly not chaste; you dug your fingers into his hair as your lips parted. He deepened the kiss, sending little shivers down your spine and as you obliged to his touch, your hand tracing idle circles across his collarbone, he whimpered in a way that made you want to kiss him harder.

You fingered his top buttons.

He pulled back, but did not let you go.

"Not here, not now", he murmured as you gripped his collar.

You couldn't stop yourself, "Then when?"

"Lust is not the same as love".

"Who ever said this was either?" you whispered, running your thumb over the space between his collarbone and chest. "Why can't it ever be just like?"

He grasped your wrist, smiling gently as you looked up at him. "Because I don't want this to be just like, and I don't want this to be just lust".

A smile crept up on your lips. "Ah" you said, toying with the curl at his forehead, "that's why".

He sighed softly, but it was a content noise, not one of impatience. And then he tilted your chin up with his hand and kissed you again, this time, tenderly, like he was saying goodbye, as if he was taking you in for the last time, as if he'd never see you again. The kiss was sweet instead of passionate; it made you think of lavenders in the spring, a cool breeze beside a sparkling ocean, a warm waterfall beside an orchard of weeping willows.

And this kiss, it made you remember him. His little smiles, dark eyes and hair and lashes, his cocky sense of humour, the way he'd drum his fingers to a forgotten tune when he was nervous or concentrating, and of the first time you'd watched him on the internet, the first time you'd met, the second time you'd met, all the times you'd seen but not placed him, and everything in between. It was like he'd always been there.
Coming to think of it, he always had.

You were dependent upon him, you realised with a start, jerking away from his pale hands and his face patterned with freckles.
You couldn't be dependent upon someone. You'd never been, and that wasn't going to happen now, not after you'd stuck it out for so long. The depence always gave you a sickly feeling that bubbled in your stomach, like you'd hit a bumpy spot of air on a flight; it crawled as red acrylic up your skin. He was distracting. And it was dangerous.

You stumbled back, tearing your fingers away from him.

He frowned softly, but you pressed a hand to the side of his face, caressing slowly.

"Later", you said. He leaned down and kissed your cheek lingeringly.

"I'll wait for you".