the broken

Chapter 11

MARCH, 2009

Dan

The light of the horror movie playing on the screen in front of me is bright and casts shadows across Phil's face next to mine. Every time the strings get heavier and the lighting flickers, I can feel him jumping next to me, gradually scooting closer and closer until our shoulders are pressed up against eachother.

Phil, as I've learned, is a horror movie junkie, whereas I am just a Phil junkie, hence the reason I was perched on the couch watching bad actors get stabbed with fake knives at one in the morning.

Every single bone in my body aches to collapse into hibernation but I keep my eyes trained on the screen and my body relaxed because nothing, not even the burning sensation in my ribs and lungs, could keep me from keeping Phil company while he scares himself with dumb movies. I look over at him and smile the tiniest of smiles when I see he had brought his long legs up onto the couch to hide behind.

"Phil, how could you possibly be scared, this is the dumbest movie I've ever seen."

"Well.... that's just because you're not watching it right," he protests defensively.

"Phil."

He starts to argue back when yet another knife wielding murderer jumps out from behind a tree on screen, and he is cut off mid word, grabbing my arm and hiding his face in my shoulder.

"I'm going to have nightmares for weeks now."

His voice is pouty and muffled by my shirt, and his hands are warm and trace tiny patterns on my skin.

"The knife man is under your bed right this minute."

"Dan!!"

With a straight face, I shrug.

"Not my fault."

He shakes his head against my arm, sighing before picking up the remote and clicking off the screen, and although he unburies his face from my arm, he still rests his head on my shoulder as he begins to chatter endlessly about the plot of the movie.

My heart is in my throat and I'm surprised that the whole city hasn't woken up from the sound of it pounding. I know he can feel my heartbeat, because I can feel his too, but luckily, the scary movie in front of us excuses the way mine flutters much too fast.

Our movie night had turned into dozens, nights filled with flickering blue light and hands brushing and bodies pressed up against each other, the sound of his laugh, the happy feeling in my stomach.

Slowly, the ball in my throat from that night had tied itself in knots around my heart. I didn't understand the way my stomach flipped over when he rested his head on my shoulder, didn't understand why the sound of his laugh made me happy, couldn't grasp why I was always tracing every feature of his face with my eyes, why I thought he looked so pretty when he smiled, and when he didn't. I started loving, more than anything, the dozens of conversations we had, the way he always looked at me like what I said mattered. I think maybe, I didn't want it to be a thing, or maybe I didn't know it could, but eventually, I had to face the fact that I wanted, more than anything, to kiss Phil Lester.

Love has always been foreign to me, untouchable, woven in thorns, but now it was here, in the soft touches and pretty smiles, and every time we touched, it got a little harder to breathe.

All of a sudden, the sound, or lack thereof to be more accurate, of Phils voice breaks me out of my head.

He had fallen asleep on my shoulder.

I can actually feel myself melt.

I study his face silently, eyes tracing every curve and line on his face. His hair tickles my neck and his breath whispers across my skin and God I've never seen someone this beautiful.