Paper Hearts (Phan)

125 days

Cat had been running around in a frenzy, searching the entire campus, phoning in the police, calling him nonstop; but Dan never came home for the 3 days he was missing.

"Don't let them see me dead." He'd told me and PJ before storming out, and immediately we all feared for the worst.

"His body's probably in some ditch somewhere," Chris sighed regrettably. He'd been refreshing some sketchy website for at least an hour, trying to find some news on recovered but unnamed dead bodies. Which didn't help, especially when he searched up 'morgue unidentified body list' in front of everyone.

"Can we just call it a night?" I insisted for the 14th time for the past half hour. We'd been awake for at least 42 hours; we'd went searching for him, gone to our classes, and headed straight back home to look for him again. I'd barely gotten any time to start my homework, let alone check the school sites for the homework schedule.

For the 23rd time I told them they looked tired as hell, and for the first time they actually listened to me and trudged to bed, rubbing their eyes and already drifting to sleep mid walk.

"We'll find him tomorrow!" I yelled after them, but Cat grunted angrily and slammed Dan's guest room door shut.

So I sat at the kitchen table in the corner, fingers positioned on the keys of my laptop, waiting for something to pop into my mind I could actually use to write my unfinished thesis. The due date had for some reason been extended to March, which was still months away. I thought it was stupid, but it did mean I got the chance to write it out now and tweak it later. Of course I'd submitted my topic choice without any knowledge of what it was, so I was up the creek without a paddle on this one. Nearly an hour after everyone fell asleep and my fingers had only twitched from lack of movement.

The front door swung open, violently slamming the door frame as it shut. If everyone wasn't so tired, they'd all be up in a flash.

He stumbled out into the middle of the room, dropping to his knees and sprawling out across the floor on his stomach.

I lowered the brightness on my screen to 25%, as low as the stupid thing would dim, and kept quiet. Maybe he wouldn't see me and take off again for who knows how long.

Dan did a half assed push-up to his feet that would've made gym teachers everywhere weep for humanity, hanging on to the arch from the living room to the hall where the 2 bedrooms were. He cursed under his breath a couple times and grabbed his thigh. I couldn't see clearly, but the moonlight seeping through the window made it looked like he'd been drenched, like he'd fallen into a lake or something.

"Your breathing is really loud." He muttered and wandered carelessly into his room, bumping his shoulder on the way in. "And I'm not mad anymore" he added in a defeated whisper and inched the door shut so it was only open as little as possible.

I hoped he meant that he didn't mind having his cuddle buddy back, because that's what I assumed he meant. When I got to his room he was already passed out, and getting closer to him the scent of alcohol on his breath felt like a tsunami wave that could wipe out London.

The cast still moulded around his wrist was soaking wet, something Chris would be pissed about, and every inch of his face was covered in either dirt or some type of drink stains running down his cheeks like waterfalls of tears.

"How did you get back home," I whispered to myself, the words brushing through his hair settled under my chin already. His hand found my shoulder and squeezed like if he let go he would fall for eternity. "How did you get here?"

"How did we get here?" Dan mumbled halfway to sleep already, a slight smile settling across his lips. A sour alcoholic scent poured from his mouth, spiralling up through the air and setting the room ablaze, burning through the walls and sending the simplicity of himself up in flames.

__________

He was gone when I woke up, and my mind immediately thought up the particular thought of 'it was a dream and he's dead' and 'he left you because you weren't good enough', which I hoped wasn't true. And it wasn't, because a couple seconds later I heard Dan mumble something inaudible from the other room and an object smash to bits on the poorly cleaned tile nobody had figured out how to clean properly yet.

Another loud crash made me terrified to open the door and go into the conjoined kitchen and living room, but I did it anyways for the sake of possibly calming down whoever was breaking everything.

Cat was surprisingly the one swiping things off the table tops to the floor while Dan stood unmoving in the centre of the room, his whiskey eyes following his friend but never turning his head.

"3 days," Cat yelled "3 whole days! I thought you were dead!"

Dan blinked slowly like he was still trying to process everything.

"For fucks sake, you couldn't have told us where you were either; no phone call, no text, nothing!" PJ scolded from the couch, which I couldn't see from the corner unless I wanted to be noticed and be dragged into the conversation. And for the record, I preferred to stay out of this fight.

"I was busy." Dan said simply and stuffed his hands into his pockets.

"What were you doing that was so important you couldn't even say a word to us?" Chris shouted angrily from the kitchen, another spot in the semi-apartment where I didn't have a clear view of.

"Walking."

"It took you 3 days to walk?" PJ scoffed, as did everyone else. Dan nodded and continued.

"I walked as far as I could before I got cold, and when I did, I walked back."

"How far did you go?"

"72 hours worth."

"Did you sleep?"

"Couldn't."

Cat rolled her eyes and crossed her arms over her chest sceptically. "I'm going out, and you'd better be here when I get back." She grabbed her keys from the table next to the door, closely followed by PJ and Chris who were equally pissed off.

So it was just Dan and I.

"I know you were listening the entire time." He said to the empty room.

I stepped out from around the corner and stood embarrassed in the arch way. "Sorry I-"

"I would've done the same thing." He told me blankly and settled down on his couch, holding a pillow to his chest and closing his eyes. I felt awful; I could've stepped in and saved him the heart crushing feeling that his friends didn't want to be near him. If I had been with him they might've gone a little easier on him. But it was my fault they all left.

"Where did you go?"

"I don't know."

"What do you mean you don't know?" I asked and he turned on the couch to face me. His eyes were filling with tears that threatened to spill over any second.

"I shut the door behind me, and I started walking. I don't even know where I went, but then it got really cold and I turned around and came back home. 'M so tired I can't even remember how I got back here."

He flexed his hands, a few feet away from his face, eyes following the pale skin still recovering from 3 days exposure to the cold.

We kept quiet, not sure what to say, and stared at the wall in miscellaneous thought for about half an hour before everyone finally returned to Dan's dorm room.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Dan sit up hopefully, an apology lingering between his lips. He didn't get a chance to say sorry though, because as soon as he tried to stand up, Cat had wrapped her arms around him for a full bear hug, followed by PJ and Chris. Tears and all, nobody moved for a good 10 minutes.

"'m sorry."

"I fucking hate you and don't you ever try some stupid shit like that again."

"I won't"

He was lying.