Not On Fire (Phan AU)

-02 | extended summary

Dan Howell is not on fire . . .

Dan doesn't do friends. He hangs out with Louise because it makes his parents happy, sets fires in his free time to keep his anger at bay, tries his best to go unnoticed, and dreams of the day when he'll go off to college in a completely different state with new people. Phil Lester, the new guy with a police officer for a father, is definitely not, in any way, a part of his plan.

But Louise has a different plan for him, one with befriending Phil Lester at the top of Things He Absolutely Must Do, despite how he feels about the situation. And every single time he turns around, it seems she has a new idea to help the budding friendship.

Now, Dan's struggling to please Louise and his parents, maintain good grades that will get him into a good college, and find time to do the one thing that actually calms him down.

So maybe being an arsonist in high school wasn't one of his better ideas.

. . . but everything around him is.

note

There are a shit ton of plot holes and an insane amount of mentions of The Perks of Being a Wallflower—I started writing this when I was fifteen and it shows. You don't need to point them out. This is a rough draft, and while I do plan to do more with this idea, I'm more likely to completely rewrite it with new characters than to revise and improve this one. Any rude comments will be deleted.

And yes, this takes place in America—I don't know that much about England and it was just easier to place it where I'm comfortable writing about. I don't need you to point out to me that they're American in this. I don't think it affects the story that much, but if it bothers you, this probably isn't the story for you.

Furthermore, a lot of this isn't realistic. I like to think the characters and the development are, but I know not everything is. I had an idea and I ran with it without pausing to think about the logistics. I know this does affect the story but bear with me. This is a rough draft. It is not perfect. There are a lot of things I would change, but I keep this up because I know a lot of people like this story and I don't think the inaccuracies make it an unreadable story.

If, after all of that, you're still interested—I really hope you enjoy this story.

-Alyssa