Lists | Phan

Five: Dan's Control

"No, he's just walking the corridors of the science block, carrying his science textbooks because it seemed like a fun fucking thing to do."

On second thoughts, maybe he could just punch him in the face.

Phil's eye twitched.

Ignore it. Ignore him. You're above this.

He silently sucked air in through his teeth to calm himself down and mentally prepared to reply but a hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"Just ignore Dan, he can be a bit of a dick sometimes." Joey offered him an apologetic smile.

Phil laughed it off,

"Oh no, don't worry. I guess it kinda was an obvious question." He took a sip of his beer, willing his heartbeat to return to a normal pace.

Phil distantly registered Shane replying, telling him that he majored in Chemistry, but really Phil was too busy trying to convince himself that Dan's gaze wasn't boring into him, that the corners of Dan's lips didn't twitch upwards as Phil struggled to compose himself, that the attention wasn't exciting him.

Suddenly Joey was speaking, and looking at Phil and fuck, he was speaking to Phil – oh Jesus dicking Christ he hadn't listened to a word he'd said, and now he was looking at him questioningly. This had never happened before, Phil had never lost control over himself like this before. Panic began to rise in his chest and his breath began to come out in short puffs. Fuck. How could he let his guard down like this, Joey was going to think that Phil was an asshole, and then he'd tell other people – and then people would stop loving him, and everyone would leave him; and fuck, he couldn't breathe-

There was a hand on his arm and he flinched away, his attention violently ripped back to the current situation.

It was Dan – his face unreadable as ever. Dan turned to Joey,

"Looks like the dumbass's had too much to drink, just look at him space out."

Joey and Shane nodded at him sympathetically, seemingly no damage done. Phil's breathing evened out and he offered an apologetic smile.

"Yeah, sorry..." His voice came out breathy and he felt Dan's fingers twitch around their hold on his jacket. "I'm gonna go back inside and find somewhere to sit down and take it easy for a while." Joey and Shane waved him off cheerily, reassuring him that it was fine. Dan, however, tugged him in the direction of the house.

"I'll escort the idiot, make sure he doesn't maim himself."

And with that, Phil found himself being dragged back into Zoe's house, upstairs, down a corridor and into an empty bedroom. Dan must have been here before. Phil felt his body heat raise as he thought of what reason Dan could possibly have had to know where the bedrooms of all places were in Zoe's house.

Phil forced himself to look Dan in the eye and plastered his smile back onto his face.

"Thank you, Dan." He could have sworn he just saw Dan's eye twitch. What the-?

"You're such a little shit." Dan's voice came out in a growl, and Phil couldn't understand why he's being so hostile – didn't he just help him?

Come on, Phil, you can tolerate this. Just put up with him. Smile.

"I'm sorry for taking you away from the party, but I'm sure I'll be okay once I just sit down-"

Dan cut him off with a fierce glare, steely brown eyes slicing into him like swords.

"You clearly haven't been okay in a while."

Alright fuck this.

Phil let his fake smile drop off his face in a split second, face twisting into a glare that he hadn't let out in public for a long time. It felt right on his face. No more pretending with this asshole.