Chapter Text
When Dan initially floated the idea of a solo tour, Phil was totally on board. A way to distance himself from danisnotonfire even more, to stand on his own as Dan without the addition of andPhil, taking charge of his future after years of feeling caught in a painful bear trap of fame. He looked so happy, too, more free than Phil had seen him in years. From the sidelines, Phil watched it all. The planning and preparation with minimal input, the endless logistics handled by professionals because they had money now, dammit. Excitement and nerves flared their familiar twin head until Dan had to take an emergency Xanax to calm the fuck down. Still, he was completely on board. Until the tour actually started.
Beginning in the UK was the natural move. Close to home in case shit went haywire and benefitting from home court advantage while the kinks were worked out, plus it meant Phil could attend most of the shows. He could sit in Dan’s green room and scroll his phone, or wait in the wings and beam with pride. When the first show had ended and Dan walked off stage dripping with sweat and flushed from exhilaration, Phil was free to kiss him in the darkened corners of the backstage. Their joint tours had been too hectic for such indiscretions, always rushing to VIP experiences or cramming into the bus, and the freedom of being a silent observer was intoxicating. Not intoxicating enough to result in green room sex, sadly, although Phil gave a half hearted attempt at initiation before they slumped together at the mirror and smiled in fatigue. Yes, the We Are Doomed tour was a brilliant idea.
Until Dan left the island for two months.
And Phil realized the full implications of his absence.
See, the thing is, the thing is, when you’re virtually joined at the hip with someone for thirteen years, separation is a bit difficult. When you’ve slept in the same bed for over a decade, including on cramped tour buses and swanky hotels, when you’ve not been apart for longer than a few hours because you both fucking hate leaving the house and share the same goddamn job, separation is really fucking difficult. When you can’t complain on social media about the house being too big and rattling about like a fucking ghost and whimpering like a consumptive maiden because then your fans would have proof of romantic intentions, separation was almost the ninth circle of Hell. An aching hole was left in his chest and he hated the cliched pain almost as much as he hated going to sleep in an empty king sized bed. Almost as much as he hated not having Dan around. He’d wake up in the morning and expect to see him in the kitchen or bathroom or living room or office, expect that any second Dan would come waltzing in with some stupid fucking idea for a video until he remembered that Dan was halfway around the world having fun without him.
It sucked.
A lot.
Phil was bad with words despite his university education. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered, really, although he still plastered a smile on his face for the camera and sent Dan a series of increasingly unhinged texts. A grey haze had descended over his vision and a weight sat in his chest. He almost laughed when he realized the feelings matched Dan’s description of depression, then immediately felt remorse at the comparison.
Things reached a crisis point when he started dyeing random shit green, and when he sent a photo to Dan of moss-green trainers, Phil received a call.
“What the fuck are you doing?”
There was noise behind him, and Phil checked the time. Eight o’clock in the UK, which meant anywhere from noon to three PM depending on where Dan was on his tour. He didn’t want to check the list because seeing all the dates yet to come would make him even sadder.
“Dunno, guess I’m bored.”
“So you dyed your fucking shoes green?” Dan sounded incredulous but also on the verge of laughing, his expression excruciatingly clear in Phil’s mind’s eye.
“Well, yeah, why not?” Phil wasn’t sure why he felt defensive, although perhaps he felt a bit put off by the judgement. “I guess I don’t know what to do when you’re gone.”
“That is both incredibly adorable and really fucking depressing, dude.”
“Dude? Did you really just call me dude?” Phil aimed for humorous and landed somewhere around pitiful. “What an excellent thing to call someone who you’ve been fucking for thirteen years, Howell.”
Now Dan really did laugh, and the sound sank into Phil like a dehydrated plant. “God, you are really pathetic. Look, I’ve got to go, we’re about to do a sound check. But I’ll call you later, ok?”
“Yeah, whenever you can make space in your busy schedule.”
The sound of Dan chuckling rang in Phil’s ears the rest of the day. Dan didn’t call back, although he sent a text of himself in bed that night. Shirtless, the barest hints of stage makeup still lingering on his eyes, covers barely covering his hips.
Miss you, too.
It was the hand over his crotch and the sly smile in the grainy photo that made Phil jerk himself off in the shower, wishing he wasn’t alone.
They finally talked days later during a rare alignment of time zones and busy schedules.
“It’s stupid.” Phil was laying on the bed in a towel, cold despite the temperature being set to 22 degrees.
“It’s not stupid, I miss you too.” And Dan did sound fond, even through the static.
“I feel like Bertha Mason, just wandering Thornfield Hall and scaring everyone.”
“You do look a bit ghostly as a blonde, I’ll admit.”
“Bertha Mason wasn’t a ghost, Dan. Didn’t you ever read Jane Eyre?”
“If I did, I didn’t pay attention. Look, this is good for us, my therapist has been worried we’ve become codependent.”
“Worried we’ve become codependent?” Phil laughed. “Dan, we’ve been codependent for years, that isn’t gonna be fixed by a tour.”
“Obviously not, but I wanted him to think he’s done some good. Therapists need affirmations themselves, you know.”
“Don’t therapize your therapist.”
“Yeah, alright. What are you up to?”
“Just had a shower. Trying to summon the motivation to eat lunch, although it would be dinner now.”
“God you’re not eating, this is depressing.”
“Hey, I don’t have a team devoted to my well being right now!”
There was silence for a moment, then Dan turned on his camera. Phil could see the interior of the tour bus bedroom, not so different from their first tour all those years ago, and the sunlit windows reminded him of the time difference. Seeing Dan’s face, even broken into tiny pixels and marked by frown lines, was enough to make his heart lighten by a full stone. God he was pathetic.
“You’re being pathetic. Are you ok? You could always fly out to join me.”
“I’d make a shit groupie, Dan. Besides, I have content to film, and my absence would be suspicious. No seriously, I’ll be fine!” He added, when Dan’s expression didn’t change.
“Right.” The suspicion was heavy in his voice, but Dan moved on. “Did you like my photo the other day?”
“Which one? The garbage can with googly eyes or the insane pizza toppings?”
“The sexy one.”
Thirteen years of operant conditioning had done wonders on Phil’s cock. All it took was three simple words and a rather intense stare to make him instantly hard. He could feel a flush travel up his neck, and by the curl to Dan’s lip, it was obvious through the screen.
“That’s what I thought.”
“I don’t like confident Dan, I miss when you were an awkward virgin who needed a blowjob tutorial.” Phil whined, remembering those early days of eagerness and teeth and fidgety hands.
“Oh yeah? So you don’t want me to tell you what I thought about last night when I couldn’t fall asleep…?”
“We are not having phone sex, Dan.”
“Technically it’s a video chat so it’s different.” He moved the phone, then, propping it up on some mysterious object so Phil could see his whole body and the sight made him light headed. Dan was stretched out on the bed in a t-shirt and briefs, which did nothing to hide his erection.
“Oh my God.”
“Yeah, you’ve missed me.”
Thirteen years. Phil had seen Dan in every possible state, from fully nude to dressed to the nines, puking and dying of the flu, and every iteration of seduction. Apparently, however, that could be undone in two weeks of separation. Because Phil wanted nothing more than to crawl through his tiny phone screen and run his hands all over Dan, to suck his dick until they both panted and screamed.
“Fuck.”
“Phil Lester! I can’t believe you said fuck!” The laughter was almost enough to kill the mood, but not quite.
“Touch yourself.”
Phil heard the words and for a moment, he thought Dan had given him an order. Then he saw the shock on Dan’s face and realized the words had come from him.
Without saying anything, Dan ran his hand down the black t-shirt until he was cupping himself, and Phil felt the saliva pool in his mouth. A few slow strokes left them both short of breath, then Dan pulled out his cock and began rubbing himself in earnest.
They’d never done this before, sex over a phone or a video chat or whatever the fuck Dan wanted to call it, because they’d been too awkward in those early years then never left each other’s sides. But now, as Phil watched Dan masturbate, he wasn’t sure what they had been so afraid of. The little pants he could barely hear, normally so loud in his ear, made him prop his own phone up on the nightstand and drop his damp towel. Dan caught sight of him fully naked and seemed to bite back a moan.
“Fuck, Lester, fuck fuck fuck.”
“What did you think about last night?” Phil was speaking without thinking now, reaching down to his own neglected dick and watching Dan’s thin fingers move with delicate speed.
“What? Fuck, I thought about us in the shower.”
“And?”
“And I sucked your dick.”
“That’s not creative.” But the image was enough to fill Phil’s mind with the familiar feeling of Dan’s warm mouth, the memory increasing the tempo of his strokes.
Dan paused for a half second, staring incredulously at Phil. “You’re going to argue with my fantasy while we’re jerking off together, are you fucking kidding me?”
“Right, sorry. Yes, I would like you to suck my dick in the shower.” The words were hot in his mind but sounded lame when they dropped from his lips, but from the way Dan reacted, it didn’t matter. Dirty talk was nothing new, but the distance between them made the words feel stilted and forced. Still, he kept going. “If I was there right now, what would you want me to do?”
“Oh that was straight out of a bad porno, come on, Phil!”
“Um, I’d like to suck your cock so deep into my throat that I can nestle my nose in your pubic hair?”
“Yeah, that’s better, but maybe mean it a bit?” Dan’s eyes were closed now, a flush creeping up his cheeks and settling in lurid blotches on his pale skin.
“If I was there with you,” Phil started, letting the false confidence of a decade in entertainment suffuse his voice, “I’d put your hand on my cock and use my cum to jerk you off.”
That was, apparently, sufficient for Dan. Phil saw the familiar hitching of his shoulders and the tension peaking in his groin until he came with a stifled shout. Dribbles of cum oozed over his hand and thighs, and Phil wanted to lick them.
Dan raised his sticky hand. “If only I could reach through the screen and use this on you.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah, although I’d rather use my mouth. Wish I could taste you right now, Phil, you look so hot right now in our bed.”
Phil came faster than he had in years, nearly whiting out from the electricity zapping along his spine.
“Fuck, that went better than I expected.” Dan’s voice sounded muffled through Phil’s orgasm-plugged ears. The distance which had faded in their arousal now came roaring back, all those miles of land and sea separating them.
“Nice that we can still learn things even in our 30s.”
There was a lengthy pause while they looked at each other, the loneliness settling like a black cloud.
“You should go eat dinner.”
“And you should go do whatever you need to do today.”
Neither moved to end the call. They just looked at each other as they had for thirteen years, at the face they knew almost better than their own, lives so deeply intertwined their separation felt like a butcher’s cleaving.
“I miss you.”
“Yeah, me too.”