#edit: muting notifs now. goodbye <3 | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bubblyhoney · 3 years

Note

sarah i have thought of another fic request or like a cute idea i guess! i didn’t have anyone in mind when i thought of it so you can write it for whoever you want honestly :)

okay so the reader is a streamer but streams games like animal crossing, standew valley, etc. then (insert who you’re writing for) says they don’t like that game, but later ends up buying it and the reader is like “i thought you said you didn’t like this game” and they’re like “well i like you” and they confuses their feelings and they end up playing the game together and reader gives them a tour of their island or farm

i feel like this request isn’t good, but the scenario seemed cute and i wanted to share it. sorry if this is confusing or just too specific cuz i know it can be hard to write requests like that! but yeah i hope it gives you inspiration and you like the request <3

new horizons

warnings: language, a Marvel reference (hint: natasha said it about tony), stupid idiots who don’t realize they like each other, use of pet names, Uno rage, Hasan Piker's presence

words: 1473

tags: sapnap x gn!reader

A/N: i’ve been trying to catch up a little on my requests (i’ve only got a couple so i’m not super overwhelmed) but school and outside life has been taking up most of my time so this one took me a while to make! tbh— ive never played animal crossing so i did google some of the game mechanics and i apologize if anything is inaccurate about the game…. but i liked relaxing and writing this cute one so thank you for requesting hails :3

requests/inbox status: open

“This game is trash.”

Your head quirks, fingers stopped on the screen. You’re in the process of giving your character a cute new nickname; it’s kind of hard to decide between “awkward dude” and “elderly skater”.

“Excuse me?” Your chat comes alive with emotes and ‘KEKW’s, obviously entertained by you and your almost-more-than-friends-friend.

There’s a story for that later.

Sapnap’s rough laugh comes through your headset and he audibly swallows, the sound of a water bottle dropping onto his desk echoing.

“I’m just saying—it’s boring. It’s like Minecraft but you don’t like… do anything.” The grainy image of his bearded face shifts and you see him pull out his phone.

“It’s— you can’t even compare it to Minecraft! It’s a completely different game system—you actually interact with other people live in the game.” You huff out a dramatic sigh, slumping in your chair with a pout. “Just because you go into this lucid state where all you know is ‘touch block, hit George’ doesn’t mean this game isn’t fun.” (He scoffs at your awful impression of his voice. Your viewers love it.)

“Jeez,” he mumbles, fumbling with the cap of his water bottle. “Touched a nerve there, bud.”

You roll your eyes, getting back to the village in the game.

“Don't ‘bud’ me.”

The call falls comfortably quiet, the sounds of him tapping obsessively on his phone and you clicking away filling the silence. A gentle bedroom-pop YouTube playlist remains in the background, prompting you to hum along and glance at the chat to see a flood of “check twitter” and “Y/N TWITTER!!”.

“What happened on Twitter?” You mumble, confused, and pull the website up on another monitor. Sapnap just makes a curious noise, swinging back and forth in a circle. “Oh my God,” you say to yourself, fingertips brushing your parted lips.

“What?”

“Hasan Piker just followed me and retweeted one of my not even remotely political old tweets. Like from a year ago.”

“That’s— wow. Congrats?” Sapnap’s voice cracks, and his ears flush pink the tiniest bit when you glance at his face on Discord.

“I’m gonna go on record and say that he could get it.” You shake your head in disbelief.

Sapnap falls uncharacteristically non-hyper-verbal, so you look past the frenzied chat and to his screen— wait. He muted and turned his camera off.

“Um,” you start, furiously typing question marks in your private chat. “Where’d you go?” You mute and turn screen share off for your stream, concerned that he might’ve fallen off his chair and broken his neck and needs you to call the ambulance.

The characteristic ding of a twitter notification sounds through your bedroom, and you look at your phone quickly.

“That’s where I went.”

Sapnap Tweeted: “all Y/U stans can choke on my dick”.

“Jesus, Sapnap,” you say, and rapidly refresh to read the replies. This tweet was deleted. “That’s so— that barely makes sense, bro. Why— literally what?”

His snicker floods your ears and you relax in your chair. Crisis: averted. “Don’t fucking— what’s wrong with you?”

“I thought it would be funny,” he offers, shrugging, and fiddles with the straw in his water bottle, smile fading. “And also Hasan pisses me off.”

“Why, ‘cause he wants a piece of this? Jealous?” You think back to your viewers, knowing they’re probably spamming question marks and coming to ludacris conclusions about both of your absences. No offense to them. You remember your stan days very vividly.

“I mean, kinda.” He rubs once at his nose, glancing at the camera (and what feels like you) before taking a sip from his water bottle.

“Wow.” You watch one strand of his hair fall from beneath his hat and brush against his full eyebrows. “I’m uh—I’ll get back to my stream. You coming? Or is it time for a Sapnap-snack?”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” He snorts and leans his chin onto the balance of his arm.

“That means you like to take a little snack break mid-stream and come back approximately nine hours later and you didn’t even eat.”

“You know what— fuck you.” He flicks the camera as you laugh at the look on his face.

The teasing mood is easily kept as you switch games from Animal Crossing to Uno, all the while slamming Sapnap with +4’s and skipping the newly-arrived BadBoyHalo at any chance you can get. It unironically pisses him off and he has to take a Sapnap-snack break midway through (only a fifteen minute break this time, during which you and Bad take a “What Kind of Bread Are You?” quiz). The rest of the night is filled with devious cackles (you), loud and sudden bangs that sound suspiciously like someone hitting their desk in anger (Sap) and the stupid barking of Rat, AKA Lucy (Bad). She’s cute but a menace to the sound quality of Bad’s microphone. You sign off stream around 2 a.m. with various forms of thanks and kisses blown to the camera. It’s been a refreshing night, actually; you’ve been busy organizing a partnership stream all week and all your friends have been busy filming or editing or what-not. Quackity had time for a little Roblox every couple of days, though. He’s got your back.

The next time you see Sapnap is after a two hour stream of him try-harding in Valorant and you finishing responding to an email from your partnership in the VC.

“Okay, I’m back.” You hear him shift in his chair and click a couple more times on his keyboard. You perk up in your chair, closing the email browser you’d been looking at.

“Do you want to play anything else? I’m down for anything.”

“Absolutely not Uno. You can go to hell for giving me 6 cards that one time,” he jabs. You scoff, crossing your arms and leaning back in your chair.

“Okay, the +4 was on me but it’s Bad who gave you the last two. That’s not my fault, sweetie.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he mumbles, trailing off as the clicking of his keyboard stops. “Hey, um—Guess what?”

Your heart beats loud in your ears at the tone of his voice. He sounds nervous; that’s never good.

“I’m scared to guess,” you try, playing with a little Minecraft dog figurine you have on your desk with fidgety fingers. “What?”

“I bought Animal Crossing.”

Silence. You stare at his discord icon blankly, trying to reroute the wires of your brain.

“Tell me you love it.”

“Well… I haven’t actually played it— but you said you liked it, so.”

“So,” you repeat him, ears warming but continuing on. “Is that what you tell all your friends when you buy something they like? That it's because of them?”

He seems to choose his next words carefully, pausing a beat to consider your questions.

“Well, I don’t have a crush on all of my friends.”

“You—what?” You stutter, caught off guard and stumbling. What did he just say? “Don’t tell me you mean you have a crush on me.”

“I’m almost positive I just did.” His discord icon stares right back at you, taunting.

“You know, you’re very casual for someone who just admitted they like-like me.” Your cheeks flush pink and you have to press a hand to your chest to keep your breathing sounding stable.

“Yeah, I’m kind of cool like that,” he offers, a huff of a laugh punctuating his statement. The conversation moves into a lull that you can’t help but know is because of you. He must expect you to say something about it, right?

“You are very cool, Sapnap.” You tilt back in your chair, sucking in a breath to prepare yourself for your next words. “And—Isortakindofhaveacrushonyoutoo.”

He must understand you, for you can hear the grin in his voice when he asks “Really?”

“Y-yeah.” You feel like a preteen again, all shaky and giddy in front of the boy you just asked to a middle school dance.

“Um, alright. What do we do now?”

“I don’t know,” you answer genuinely and swing in a happy little circle in your chair. “We could play Animal Crossing.”

“I’m down.”

You swear you’ve never heard more beautiful words.

He keeps his camera off for most of the time you two play, too focused on creating his island and asking you questions about how to fish to turn it on. He silently flips it on when you help him decorate his lawn, needing to show you in real-time the decorations he has bought and where you think he should put them. He looks cute. I mean, of course he does. He always does.

You tell him goodbye late in the night, eyes saying a little more than just “see you tomorrow”.

You like him. He likes you.

It’s even better when you two have matching gardens.

A/N: anybody and everybody (especially my precious hailey) let me know what you think!! :]

#sapnap #mcyt #sapnap x gn!reader #sapnap x reader #sapnap x you #sapnap fluff #sapnap drabble #sapnap oneshot #bubblyhoneyfics #honey answers #mcyt x reader #🥚except small

303 notes · View notes

honey-coloured-passion · 3 years

Text

Surprise! (Sapnap x Reader)

Request: “Sapnap X Reader where he surprises the reader while she’s streaming”

Words: 1.5k

“Hello chat how are your days going? Good, bad? Finals!? Oh my gosh I hate finals dude I’m so sorry f to pay respects,” you paused to stretch and adjust your headset as you had just started your stream. “I’m kinda just bored today chat so what should we do? Mods can you all run a poll or something?” You glanced at your discord and saw messages from Sap.

“Hey angel!”

“Oh you’re streaming!”

“You look cute on stream”

You rolled your eyes but chat caught you blushing and saw that Sapnap was viewing the stream, and immediately lost it. They’d been shipping the two of you for months, but little did they know you guys had been dating for three months, since you met up in person for the first time. It hadn’t felt like the right time to announce to the world and you’d wanted to establish your relationship privately before telling the fans, but that didn’t mean you’d had a couple slip ups leading the fans to theorize.

This included you calling Sapnap various forms of babe, bubs, Nick, love etc. Same went for Sap who gets teased for endlessly rushing to your defense on the SMP and responding casually when you call him a pet name, almost like he does it all the time... yeah, chat was on to the two of you.

“Shut up guys and tell me what we’re doing today! We could go grind netherite tools and chill? How does that sound?” the SMP always got a resounding yes, and just like that you were off, the SMP had won the poll anyways.

You messaged Sap in discord, “wanna call for the stream?” and quickly he was on the call with you.

“Hello Mr. Sapitus Napitus, how’s your day going on this fine Friday?” you laughed as you ran through the nether, having just collected enough wool and planks to make beds. “It’s going, I was bored as heck so I wound up here, what about you?” You knew the longer end to that story, his family was out and he thought editing would take longer but now he was stuck at home. “Same same, I’m chillin and got bored after scrolling on Tiktok for like two hours so now I’m here!” You moved on, blowing up the nether hunting for netherite scrap while talking with chat.

A familiar notification went off, “water check from, um ,GogySupremacy420,000, oh my god what a username. Alright everyone drink some water! This is good I haven’t drank water since like breakfast.” you heard Sap pipe up, “you’ve eaten since breakfast right?” you rolled your eyes, “nope I’ll eat after stream don’t worry Simpnap” tacking on the nickname earned a scoff from the simp himself. “Not a simp,” he answered, giving you a punch in the game making you hit him back. After a mini fight ending in you threatening to place a bed and effectively kill the both of you, you were back to mining.

“Hey I’ve gotta go drive and grab something want me to stay on call though?” your head whipped to discord to look for another message, knowing Sap didn’t have anywhere to be tonight. But there was nothing. “Oh I don’t mind, chat and I enjoy your company!” you said with a grin. You’d made it to enchanting now, having found all the netherite you needed.

As you sat on the spider spawner you heard Sap get in the car, the familiar beep of him unlocking his car and the revving of the engine making you laugh, “you’re car is literally so old I’m surprised it starts,” you heard Sapnap scoff, “old?! don’t you dare speak to her like that, she’s beautiful,” you rolled your eyes, Callahan who must’ve been on your stream quickly piped up in the game chat “Y/n is jealousss!” now it was your turn to be offended, “you think I’d be jealous of a bucket of rusty bolts and oil? No chance,” you laughed, checking chat as they were spamming JealousChamp. “Whatever you say ba- Y/n,” Sapnap played it off with a cough and you quickly changed the subject to how much XP you would need for all your tools.

“Hey I’ve gotta go on deafen real quick be back soon!” Sap’s voice flooded your mic, he must’ve brough the mic close to his mouth because his smooth and deep voice curled around the mic perfectly, sending shivers down your spine as his warm tone filled your headphones. “B-bye” you choked out, pretending to adjust your headset as you continued killing mobs. “So chat, got any questions to pass this alone time?” you watched the chat speed up, hoping your mods would filter out poor questions. “Favorite. color? Easy who knows? Yup! You guys know me too well. Ooh favorite fast food place? This is hard cuz I don’t wanna say something you all don’t know but I can tell you guys my McDonalds order because it’s immaculate. Do I know Sapnap’s order? This is a good test you guys, I’m pretty sure it’s like an ungodly amount of spicy McChickens and a Dr. Pepper but I swear he changes it like every day.” you laughed, reading out other people’s orders then moved to debating if the icecream machine is actually broken or if the workers are just lazy. They’re lazy, confirmed by workers in chat apparently.

“I’m back but I have to go in like five minutes, did you miss me?” Sap’s voice flooded your headphones again. As you adjusted his volume you teased, “hmm nope!” to which he began pouting making you laugh at his “baby rage”. Just as you were finishing with enchants on your axe he had to go. “Don’t miss me too much I’ll talk to you later, chat behave yourself I know you all will miss me but just leave y/n open in a muted tab,” he teased making you roll your eyes, “whatever we’re gonna have a super secret conversation after you’re gone about how we only let you on the stream out of pity right chat?” you couldn’t stop smiling and laughing through the teasing. “Okay okay, I actually gotta go, see you soon,” you bid Sapnap farewell and returned to joking with chat, turning on media share to pass some time as you reacted to animatics, hilarious compilations, and the occasional y/n x sapnap video making chat light up as you laughed through the videos.

As you watched the videos and killed cave spiders you got a text from Sapnap.

You still streaming?

Yup! Where’d you end up going? you replied.

Open your door and find out

Your breath hitched. “One- one minute chat,” you pulled your headset off and heard a small rustling in your hallway. As soon as you tabbed out of the game you stood up, rushing off camera to fling your door open and,

There he was. His smile was infectious and you couldn’t help yourself from screaming and running into his open arms. As he held you, rocking back and forth, you heard him mumbled. “I missed you” Into your ear while you clung to him. “I missed you more,” you whispered back, Finally, you released him enough to peck his lips, unable to wipe the grin from your face. “I got food cuz you said you didn’t eat and I figured if I had time I wanted to spend it with you!” your heart practically melted, taking a bag of food in one hand and holding Sapnap’s hand with your other you realized you forgot to mute or end stream.

“Um, so I’m still streaming... what do we do?” you glanced up nervously but Sapnap just started laughing, “oh my god I guess I can say hi so chat doesn’t lose it’s mind,” you swallowed nervously, glancing down at your phone you had been tagged in endless clips of you running off camera then screaming about 15 seconds later. “Yeah better give them an answer,” you giggled.

Rushing back to your setup you saw chat blowing up as you put your headset back on. “Heyyy guys! So yeah, um I guess I can just show you that, we have a special guest!” You gestured to Sapnap to come into frame, pulling up a chair as he sat down next to you. “Yeah I gave y/n a visit cuz I was bored. Hi chat, hello, hello! You guys are going really fast dang,” Sapnap gripped your hand under the table, you squeezed back, leaning into his embrace. “So um, I think Sap and I are gonna hangout, right?” you glanced at him and he nodded, he really hadn’t stopped smiling since he got to your place. “Yup! Maybe if there’s time we’ll go live again I’m not sure! Kinda spur of the moment yeah?” you finished your thought. Saying goodbye to chat you ended stream just a few minutes later.

“We’ve really gotta tell people soon, I wanna be able to hold your hand on camera not just off,” Sapnap said between bites of food. “Yeah, I think it’ll be okay right?” You had always been nervous about stans hating you or people trying to get in between your relationship. “As long as I’ve got you I’m more than fine, I’m- I don’t know I guess I’m pogchamp,” you shook your head, “god you are such a dork,” Sapnap scrunched his nose with a laugh, “I’m your dork though so I’m so special!” and you couldn’t agree more. <3

#sapnap #sapnap x reader #dream team x reader #dream team fanfic #sapnap fanfic #mcyter fanfic #dteam fanfic #sapnap cute #sapnap x you #dream x reader #georgenotfound x reader

460 notes · View notes

smooshjames · 4 years

Text

forget you not (iii)

uh-oh, uh-oh, here i go again (or: interviews and old friends)

word count: just under 4k

a/n: part 3 of forget you not! i was gonna post this yesterday and then i totally forgot, but it’s here now! once again, the band in this story is based on little mix and i didn’t write any of the songs referenced (this chapter’s songs can be found here, here, here, and here). at the risk of sounding annoying, i have a ko-fi if you’d like to donate, but don’t feel obligated to do so!! if you can’t or don’t want to that’s totally fine, thank you for taking the time to read my work regardless of if you can spend money on it or not. i hope you enjoy!!

warnings: angst (again)

previous parts: one, two

Sunday morning brought with it more Twitter notifications than you’d gotten in a long time. Your alarm went off obscenely early yet again; you had a full day ahead of you. The band was recording a new single which would be released sometime later in the year (the date was still up in the air) and you had decided to do it while you were in LA since you could work with a few producers that you’d never met before.

So, at five o’clock in the morning, you rolled over in your hotel bed and groped around on your nightstand for your phone. You shot upright when you saw how many notifications you had, a bolt of panic going through you at first. What the hell could’ve happened to result in so much activity?

You scrolled through a couple of your mentions before you got to a tweet from some gossip site. There was a photo of you from the concert the night before, probably taken by a fan if the quality was anything to go by. You were mid-note, your mouth open around a word, and it was pretty obvious that you were crying. The tweet read: “‘You never brought me flowers’! Y/N Y/L/N tears up while singing her band’s hit song Towers. Could there be a mystery man that caused her to get so emotional on stage…?”

Carly mumbled a good morning from the bed next to yours. You didn’t reply. You barely even noticed her leaving the main area of the room and heading into the bathroom; you were too busy looking through the replies to the tweet. They were all pretty tame, but you still felt a pit opening up in your stomach. You didn’t have any press that day since you were recording the new single, but the next day was chock-full of interviews and other promotional shit. Your Twitter feed was showing no signs of slowing down, and you really didn't want to have to explain to some random interviewer that you'd been crying because you still weren't over a breakup from five years ago.

“Everything okay?” Carly asked. You looked up, startled, and realized that she had come back from the bathroom. “You seem… distraught.”

You beckoned her over to your bed and showed her the original tweet from the gossip site. Carly gasped and took your phone from you, beginning to scroll through the replies. “Jesus,” she said. “This’ll be a shitstorm.”

“I know,” you replied. You glanced over at the clock on the nightstand and sighed; you needed to get up and ready for the day. Carly gave your phone back to you.

You muted your Twitter notifications for the time being, not wanting to be distracted while you were recording the new single. If an interviewer brought it up you’d just find a way to gloss over it.

You shuffled into the bathroom and did your usual morning routine. You decided to forego makeup for the day since you’d just be sitting around a studio all day, anyway. You dressed in comfortable clothes for the same reason. You figured it would be a little bit hard to focus on recording if you were in heels or tight jeans or something similarly uncomfortable, and you wanted to save your remaining nice clothes for the following day, anyway. Sweatpants and an old t-shirt it was.

Once you were dressed and somewhat ready to face the world, you and Carly grabbed your bags and went out into the hallway. Alexis and Piper were still in their room next door, but they let you and Carly in so that you could all sit and talk while they finished getting ready. Once you were all good to go, you met up with Michelle in the lobby and got into the car that would take you to the studio.

It was a pretty cool space; chill, with couches and chairs spread out around the mixing board where the producers would work their magic. You met the audio engineers as you were walking in, and everyone shook hands and went in to get to work. They seemed nice, and they definitely had a lot of cool ideas for what might enhance the song’s sound. You and the rest of the band had already worked out the lyrics and a basic melody, but the recording technicians had some ideas to really make the song pop.

The day passed in a blur of singing and listening and revising, and then repeating the process all over again. By the time you left, the sun was touching the western horizon and the song was almost finished; just a few final edits before it would be perfect and ready for release. “We’ll get it to Michelle in the next couple of days,” one of the producers said.

You were exhausted as you collapsed back into your hotel bed, but it was a good sort of exhaustion; the kind of sated tiredness that comes with a good day’s work.

You were flying so high, in fact, that you’d almost forgotten about all the Shayne drama. You fell asleep with a slight smile on your face, and your sleep was peaceful and dreamless.

***

That pleasant warmth of a job well done was ripped from you almost as soon as the next day began. Your first interview was with a local radio station, and it went alright for about five minutes; you exchanged pleasantries with the hosts, Joe and Maggie, and sat down between Carly and Alexis for your interview.

The hosts did their intro, introduced the band, and explained that you were currently in LA on the west coast branch of your current tour. Once that was done and the band had all said hello, Maggie turned to you, and the smile she flashed you was… strangely apologetic.

And then you remembered. Shayne, Towers, crying onstage. That apologetic smile hit you so fast it practically gave you whiplash.

“So, ladies,” Maggie said. “There was some interesting news about your concert on Saturday. You guys sang your song Towers -- beautiful song, by the way -- and Y/N… there were a couple of tears there, huh? Anything you can tell us about that? Is everything okay?”

From beside you, Carly opened her mouth, probably to say that you didn’t want to talk about it, but you stopped her with a hand on her arm. Her willingness to defend you meant a lot, but if you didn’t address it, it would just keep getting brought up. At least if you answered this you could do some damage control. “Yeah,” you said. “Um, I actually lived in LA for a while before meeting these lovely ladies and starting up the band with them. And while I was here, I was in a pretty serious relationship with a guy -- I won’t say his name for privacy’s sake -- and we broke up. I guess being back in LA and singing that song just… brought back some memories. But that was all; no new mystery man or anything like that, I’m afraid.”

There, that was a good enough answer. It held enough of the truth that you felt confident they wouldn’t press you for any more information, but you hadn’t told them the exact real reason. They didn’t know he was in the room, and they didn’t know who he was.

Maggie smiled and nodded, and Joe asked another question about the band that was unrelated to your love life, which brought a wave of relief sweeping over you. You smiled and laughed through the rest of the interview, chiming in with answers whenever it felt appropriate, and then said your goodbyes as the hosts transitioned into the next song

All things considered, that hadn’t been so bad.

Once you were out of the radio station headquarters and into your car, Michelle got back to business. “Alright, next up… another interview which won’t be broadcasted live. You guys are performing Think About Us while you’re there. Then we have an hour for lunch. After lunch, you’ll film a video with Smosh, and then another radio interview after that, and then you’re free for the day. Assuming everything goes to plan.”

You nodded and settled into easy conversation with the girls during the car ride to your next venue. You were pretty excited to film with Smosh; you hadn’t seen any of their recent stuff, but you were familiar with them in that you had heard of them and you knew they primarily made comedic content. You figured that would probably mean it would be a fun time to film there.

The next interview went just fine, and the performance went even better. For lunch, you and the rest of the team got food at a cute little bistro near Smosh’s offices.

When you arrived after your lunch break you were greeted by Ian Hecox, the president of the company. He was super friendly, greeting you all with handshakes and a warm smile. Once you’d all been introduced he began to lead you through the office space, explaining that you’d be recording an episode of their ongoing Try Not to Laugh series. As he launched into an explanation of the rules, a hand on your shoulder made you tense and whip around, surprised. This brought you face to face with…

“Damien?”

Your eyes widened almost comically as you saw the man standing before you. He looked a little different since you’d seen him last; his hair was longer and streaked with blue, and he carried himself a little taller, a little prouder. But he still had that same boyish smile, those same brown eyes. He was still Damien, and he was here.

“Hey, Y/N,” he said.

You laughed, shocked and joyful, and threw your arms around his shoulders, practically launching yourself onto him. He hugged you back tightly. When you pulled back, you punched him jovially on the arm.

“It’s so good to see you!” you said, a little breathless. “What are you doing here?

“I work here. I’ll actually be filming with you guys this afternoon,” he replied

“No way, that’s crazy!” You leaned back and perched your hands on his hips, surveying him, half disbelieving.

He nodded and opened his mouth to speak again, but Ian’s voice interrupted your reunion. “You two, uh… you two know each other?”

“Yeah,” you said, glancing over your shoulder. “I knew Damien… God, ages ago. We were really good friends.”

Carly’s eyes now widened in recognition. She smiled at Damien and raised her hand in greeting to him.

“Hey, Carly,” he said. He put his hand on your forearm and you turned back to face him again. The look on his face made your smile fade a little bit; he seemed nervous and a little sad. “Y/N, I should warn you --”

“Holy shit!” another voice interrupted you two, this one distinctively female. And also… strangely familiar. You turned toward the source and what you saw felt like two consecutive throat punches.

Courtney, Shayne’s new girlfriend, was standing across the room. She seemed to have just entered, and judging from the wide-eyed look on her face, she was just as surprised as you were. Standing directly next to her, staring at the floor by your feet… was Shayne himself.

You heard Damien mutter something under his breath, but your brain didn’t fully process what he said. You were too busy looking at Courtney and Shayne and wondering why the hell they were here. Before you could say anything, though, Ian stepped forward.

“Sweet, we’re all here,” he said. “Y/N, Alexis, Piper, Carly, this is Shayne and Courtney. Shayne’s gonna be filming with you guys this afternoon --” of course he was “-- and Courtney is --”

“Your biggest fan!” the girl interrupted him, and even despite the resentment you couldn't help feeling toward her, you had to admit that she was really sweet. She seemed like someone you might be really good friends with were it not for the fact that she was dating your ex, which made you feel even worse; she hadn’t done anything to deserve your hatred, but here you were hating her anyway. “You probably don’t remember, but I was at the concert on Saturday. It was super good, you guys crushed it.”

“I remember,” you said, because you didn’t know when to shut up. Courtney’s jaw dropped onto the floor. “Yeah, I remember. You guys came together, didn’t you?”

The accusation was clear, at least to those in the know; Carly went pale, Piper inhaled sharply, Alexis started coughing, Damien shuffled his feet nervously, and Shayne opened his mouth to speak. Before he could say whatever he wanted to, though, he seemed to think better of it and closed his mouth again.

Courtney didn’t seem to pick up on anything unusual, though, because she just nodded happily and went on talking.

“Yeah, we did!” she said, slinging her arm around Shayne’s shoulders. If you didn’t know any better, you would’ve said that he stiffened as she pulled him into her side. His face tightened into a grimace, but you couldn't possibly imagine why. It was obvious that they were together. He didn’t need to hide that for your sake. “I was so fucking pumped when you guys sang Towers, you don’t even understand. That’s one of my favorite songs by you guys and you crushed it, especially you Y/N. Your part always hits a little different for me.”

Yeah, you and me both, you thought. But you smiled and nodded happily. “I’m glad you liked it!” you said. You turned back to the band and made eye contact with Michelle. She raised an eyebrow. You inclined your head just slightly toward Ian. She nodded; she knew what you needed.

“I hate to interrupt,” she said, “but we should probably get this show on the road. The girls have got a packed schedule today.”

“Of course!” Ian said. “Courtney, maybe you can harass them more if they have time when we’re done filming. But for now, Shayne, Damien, ladies, follow me.”

You hurried to catch up to the rest of the band. Carly and Alexis fell into step with you while Piper started walking behind you, obviously trying to shield you from Shayne’s gaze. You had another moment of profound gratitude for these girls; they took care of you when no one else would, they loved you when you couldn’t love yourself, and they always seemed to know what you needed without having to ask. That shared strength and love was one of the reasons the band had stayed together for so long.

Impressively enough, you managed to keep your shit together until you got to Carly’s. You didn’t bother texting her to let her know that you were coming. She’d let you in if she was home, and if she wasn't home, you knew her building code and where she kept her spare key.

Luckily, she was home; she let you up to her apartment without question.

Only once you’d crossed the threshold of your best friend’s apartment did you allow yourself to cry. You crumpled like a piece of paper against her and let out a sob so loud it bordered on a scream. Carly maneuvered you back onto her couch, sat down with you, and held you until you could talk. You were still crying when you pulled away from her, but you’d gotten out the full-body sobs.

“Honey, what happened?” Carly asked. You could hear the concern in her voice; it was rare that you showed up at her place unannounced, and even rarer that you started the visit by scream-crying into her shirt. She probably thought somebody was dead.

“Shayne got home from work and ended things,” you said. “Just… no warning, no ceremony, nothing. Three days ago he asked me my fucking ring size and today he told me that we aren’t working anymore. And I don’t understand because I thought he was happy! I thought we were good! I thought that we’d be fucking picking a date for our wedding, not for when I’m gonna come move out the rest of my shit!”

Before Carly could respond, your phone vibrated. You took it out and couldn’t help your tearful, almost-manic laugh at what you saw there; a text from Shayne, apologizing, asking if you would come home and talk. You went to reply, but Carly grabbed your phone and held it away from you before you could.

“Hey!” you exclaimed, lunging for your phone. She was an expert at keep-away, though, and you couldn’t even get close. You cursed yourself for all the nights out where you asked her to keep your phone away from you if you got too drunk. “Carly, give me my phone!”

“Promise me you won’t text him back and you can have it,” she said.

“That’s ridiculous! Of course I’m gonna text him back!”

“Is that a good idea?” she asked. She cocked an eyebrow. “If you can honestly tell me that you think it’s a good idea for you to say anything to him right now, I’ll give you your phone back.”

That knocked some sense into you. Immediately, the fight left your body and you sat back on the couch. She studied you for a moment and then leaned forward to set the phone on the coffee table. When you didn’t go for it, she relaxed and leaned back.

“Sorry,” you said. “I’m all over the place.”

“I know. It’s okay. That’s what I’m here for, right? Now, walk me through what happened.”

“He came home and he was being weird, and he was like ‘hey can we talk’ and then he basically just said that it isn’t working anymore and that he can’t be with me. He didn’t give me a reason besides that and I didn’t ask him for one. I just packed a bag and came here.”

Carly nodded, considering. “That’s really fucking weird.”

“Honestly, I’m surprised it took this long,” you said. At her shocked expression, you shrugged. “I’ve always said that he’s out of my league, right? It was only a matter of time before he got tired of me and realized he could do better. He probably realized that if we got married, he’d have a hell of a harder time getting away from me.”

“Were it not for the state of emotional peril you’re in right now, I would slap you,” Carly said. You let out a startled laugh; of all the things she could've said, you weren't expecting that. “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard you say, and I’ve known you for a long time. If that was true -- which it isn’t, by the way, you’re the sexiest, most beautiful, smartest, funniest, greatest person I know -- it wouldn’t have taken him three years to ‘get bored.’ This is one of the dumber stunts he’s pulled, which is saying something. But this isn’t your fault. He’s the asshole here, regardless of his reasoning. If you want to talk to him and try to work things out, that’s your business. But whether or not things work out, this will always be on him. And I’ll be here every step of the way, buttercup.”

You nodded gratefully, even though you didn't believe her. You’d never been good enough for Shayne. This was always inevitable. Still, you put on a brave face for Carly. Better she didn’t know what you were really thinking. “You’re right,” you said. “Thanks, Carly.”

You could tell from the look on her face that she didn’t completely believe you, which wasn’t surprising. Carly always knew when you were lying. But she also knew when to let an issue lie. “Good,” she said. “Now, Bridesmaids or Legally Blonde?”

Ian led the group to a colorful sound stage. To the right was a partition, and behind it a bunch of strange props and costume pieces. To the left was a single stool, a piano, and some bongos.

The room was swarming with activity as crew people moved around getting everything set up and ready to go. Shayne and Damien led you over to the set. “Y/N, why don’t you sit in the stool for the intro?” Shayne said, the first words he’d said to you since you had broken up. His voice was professional and upbeat, betraying almost no emotion. “And then I’ll stand to your right, Damien will be behind me, and the rest of the band can be to your left.”

“Sounds fine to me,” you said, and you hoped your voice sounded less forced to him than it did to you. You sat on the stool, glad to be off your feet; your balance was suddenly fucked now that Shayne was next to you, and you were afraid you wouldn’t be able to keep yourself upright if you tried to stand for much longer.

Shayne went to go check something with a cameraperson, and the girls formed another huddle around you. Carly stood right in front of you, Piper to your immediate left, and Alexis just behind you. “Are you alright?” Carly asked.

“I’m sorry,” Damien said, cutting into the conversation before you could even think about how to answer Carly’s question. He was standing to your right, though he was a little farther away than your bandmates were. “I wanted to let you know before you saw him. I thought maybe it would be easier that way.”

“It’s okay, Dames. It’s not your fault,” you said. You reached over to squeeze his bicep, hoping to ease his mind a little bit, but the guilt didn’t leave his face.

“How did you know we would be here today?” Carly asked. You gave her a stern look, but she either didn’t see it or just didn’t care.

Damien fidgeted, nervous. You didn’t blame him; Carly was a force of nature when she wanted to be. “Um,” he said, “what do you mean?

“I mean that you had enough foresight to know that you could surprise Y/N and warn her about Shayne. So you knew we would be here.”

“We get a filming schedule at the beginning of the week,” Damien said. You looked at Carly as if to say There, see? A perfectly good reason. Now back off and let the poor boy breathe. But then Damien continued: “and Shayne told me about seeing Y/N on Saturday, so --”

He cut himself off, clamping his mouth shut as he seemed to realize what he’d said. Your gaze flew from Carly to Damien. For a moment, you felt thoroughly like a middle schooler; the he-said-she-said was something you thought would get left in sixth grade, but here you were nonetheless. Still, you couldn’t help the way your heart rate accelerated at Damien’s words. If Shayne had mentioned you specifically…

“What?” you asked.

You didn’t want to get your hopes up. You couldn’t get your hopes up. Shayne mentioning you didn’t mean anything. Besides, he had a new girlfriend now, anyway. He’d probably just done it since you and Damien were friends before shit hit the fan.

Damien didn’t get the chance to answer your question before Shayne returned from his conversation with the cameraperson. You were pretty sure he knew that you guys had been talking about him; it was pretty obvious by the way the conversation stopped short as soon as he got within earshot. But if he knew, he didn’t comment on it. He just walked over and took his place next to you.

Carly flashed him a look colder than the south pole and moved to stand on your other side, and then she plastered the brightest smile you’d ever seen on her face. You did the same.

“Alright, everybody ready?” one of the crew people asked. You nodded your assent. “Three, two, and… action!”

#shayne topp x reader #shayne topp #eliza.txt #forget you not

82 notes · View notes

imnotinclinedtomaturity · 6 years

Text

Love Yourself (Chapter 19 )

title: Love Yourself summary: A lot of things about Dan’s life are pretty great. He gets to make the music he wants, he’s got a great fanbase, and his manager is his best friend. A few things about his life suck a bit more. He’s currently lacking inspiration, he’s rather lonely, and he’s stuck in a rut. Dan’s been going to the same coffee shop for years. It’s quiet, it’s quaint, it’s near his home. Most importantly: none of the employees give a shit that’s he a world-famous singer. Things change when he meets the new barista. chapter words: 8k story words: 148.2k (so far) chapter: 19/? rating: m warnings: language, alcohol, sex mentions, some bi/homophobia, eventual explicit smut genre: singer!dan, coffee shop au, barista!phil, slow burn [[ao3]] [[first chapter]] [[previous chapter]]

a/n: i’m too tired to write a proper author’s note because @auroraphilealis just got another 2k out of me at one in the damn morning when i have work tomorrow but i love her for it <3

**********

As it turned out, Dan was too busy on Sunday and Monday to hang out with Phil again. If it weren’t for the fact that Dan and Phil were almost constantly texting, Phil would have been worried that the near-kiss had messed things up between them. But Dan hadn’t brought it up, and his messages still had the same hint of flirtation, so Dan and Phil must be fine.

Their meeting with the producers at the BBC on Tuesday went fantastic — everyone loved the ideas that he and Dan presented, and the producers were confident that the plan for the show was a good balance between segments that would be interesting for Phil’s regular audience, and pieces that would draw in new listeners.

By the end of the meeting, they’d picked a date for the show — the day before Dan left for Germany. It would be a Thursday, which was different than Phil’s normal slot, but the producers thought it would be an ideal night for the special and that, with adequate promotion, Phil’s regular audience would still tune in.

As they left the building and made their way to the tube stop, Phil could barely contain his excitement, and judging by the way Dan wouldn’t stop talking about the meeting, Dan must be excited too.

They were hovering in the grimey entrance to the tube, both refusing to turn down their own corridor to wait for their train, because they were too busy talking.

“I think they really, really liked it,” Dan gushed.

Phil smiled, shuffling forward a small step to be just a little bit more into Dan’s space. “Of course they did. It’s exactly what they wanted!” he replied.

“It’ll be fun, I think,” Dan continued quickly, practically bouncing on his toes in excitement as he stared out at the people rushing around them. “I’ve never gotten to interact with fans like that before.” Through thick eyelashes, Dan finally turned and properly looked up at Phil. “Plus, I can’t wait to see how you are on the radio.”

“It’s really not that big of a deal,” Phil said bashfully, ducking his face away in embarrassment.

Dan shook his head with a soft smile. “I’m sure you’re wonderful at it.” His eyes drifted away to the screen flashing the current train schedules. “My train’s gonna be here in just a few minutes,” he frowned.

Phil followed Dan’s gaze. “Mine too.” Even to his own ears, the remorse was obvious in his voice. “I’ll see you soon?”

“Of course,” Dan promised. “When are you working this week?”

“The usual shifts.” Phil drifted a little closer. He wanted to do something — anything — to tell Dan goodbye properly. His hands were itching to reach out and hug Dan, his lips desperate to press against Dan’s temple. They were in public though, in the middle of the busy London underground, and that wasn’t an option.

“Good,” Dan replied.

He must have been wanting to touch Phil just as badly, though, because his hand swung out, deliberately brushing against Phil’s. Their fingers touched just the briefest of minutes as Dan stared into Phil’s eyes. “I’ll see you soon, Phil,” he promised.

Unfortunately, both Dan’s and Phil’s lives were both growing more and more hectic by the day. With the added responsibility of planning the radio special, and doing all the necessary work to promote it, neither Dan nor Phil really had any free time left. Dan was in full musician mode (or at least, that’s how he described it to Phil), and spent almost all of his time either holed up in his music room at home, or at the studio across town working on his mysterious concept album that he’d yet to tell Phil the fucking concept of. Phil, for his part, was doing his best to stay on top of his youtube channel, his normal radio shows, his liveshows, and his hours at Beans and Grind. Finding time to plan the radio show together was hard enough, let alone finding time to hang out.

Still, though, they both made as much time for each other as they could, in whatever capacity they could manage. Whenever Dan was working from his music room in his flat, he’d always text Phil and see if he was available to skype and be co-productive from the comfort of their own homes.

The first time it had happened was two days after their meeting at the BBC.

Phil was filming a how to video for his channel when his phone dinged loudly, completely ruining a decent take of his current line. Disgruntled, Phil switched it onto silent and slid it across his dresser, forcing himself to maintain his cheery persona as he re-said the line for the millionth time.

Nearly two hours later, Phil pressed the stop button the camera and picked up his phone. There were dozens of notifications that he’d missed while filming, but one in particular stood out.

Dan [6:14PM]: come be productive on skype with me

It was a cute little order — one that Phil was happy to comply with, and he felt his stomach flip over just thinking about it

But when Phil glanced at the clock and saw that it was nearing eight already, his heart sunk. Dan had messaged him ages ago, and Phil had missed it. Phil hoped that Dan still had his phone with him, that he was still doing whatever it was he’d been doing, and was still willing to skype Phil.

Phil [7:52PM]: I just finished a video! I’m free now :)

Much to his dismay, however, Dan didn’t respond — not then, and not any time that night. It wasn’t until the next morning that Phil got a new message from him.

Dan [9:02AM]: sorry i got wrapped up in what i was working on and didn’t see your message. next time? xx

The loss of a chance to spend any kind of time with Dan left Phil determined to never miss another message from Dan — or chance to see him — ever again.

So Phil made it so that his phone made a unique noise whenever Dan texted or called, and Phil started always, always dropping whatever he was doing to answer when he heard that noise. Maybe Phil was clingy or pathetic or — according to PJ — whipped, but he didn’t care. The new method meant that he got to have many, many co-productive skype calls with Dan.

During most of their calls, Phil worked on editing his videos or planning a different radio show, while Dan worked on his new music. Phil noticed that sometimes Dan played his guitar, sometimes his piano, and sometimes he just stared intensely at a small notebook in his lap, occasionally scribbling something down.

Although Dan never called attention to it, Phil noticed that sometimes there were large periods of times where Dan would mute his microphone so Phil couldn’t hear whatever Dan was working on. A few times, Phil thought about asking why, but he was terrified that Dan would realize that Phil had caught on, and would instead start hanging up during those moments rather than muting himself — or worse yet, canceling their skype call time all together — so Phil just pretended not to notice.

Outside of their co-productive skype calls, Phil only got to see Dan at Beans and Grind. Those visits were never long — or private — enough for Phil to feel satisfied. And from the way Dan lingered at Phil’s side when he said his goodbyes, Phil guessed the visits weren’t enough for Dan either.

On one such occasion, Dan fiddled with his coffee cup, sliding it back and forth between his hands. It had been empty for almost half an hour — and for almost all of that time, Dan had been saying he needed to leave. His jacket was still slung over the nearby stool, though, and he wasn’t making any moves to pull it on.

“Louise is probably waiting for me,” Dan grumbled for the sixth time.

“It’s fine,” Phil also said for the sixth time. This time, however, he reached out and grabbed Dan’s mug as it swooshed towards Dan’s other hand. “You should go, we can find time to do something this weekend,” he added in an attempt to push Dan to get out of here before Phil changed his mind.

“Yeah, definitely.” Dan nodded eagerly, seemingly placated by the offer. His hands slid further across the bar and knocked into Phil’s. For a moment, they both lingered there, lightly brushing their fingers together for a few minutes before Dan finally pulled away with a sigh.

“See you soon, Philly,” Dan promised, a wide grin and two big dimples shining on his face as he turned and walked away.

They tried to find time to watch more Buffy together as well (or, really, just properly see each other), but life just kept getting in the way. They’d made plans for Dan to come over again the weekend after their BBC meeting, but Dan ended up having to cancel last minute because Darcy and Louise had gotten sick and apparently Louise’s boyfriend was out of town. Dan, being the complete softy that he was, had dropped everything so that he could play nurse for them.

The weekend after that, Dan was stuck in the studio rehearsing for the concert that was less than a week away. He texted Phil during every break, and even sent Phil a sneaky studio tour video (which just so happened to include a snippet of him rehearsing), but Phil couldn’t help but be a little disappointed that the constant rehearsals meant no time with Dan.

It wasn’t until the night before their radio show that Phil finally got to see Dan somewhere other than a grainy skype screen or at the coffee shop. On Wednesday evening, Dan texted Phil to inform him — not ask, inform — that he was on his way over to Phil’s flat right now because he’d just finished packing for Germany.

The text message completely made up for Phil’s dull and boring day so far, and even if Phil had been planning to do something tonight, he would have happily dropped it to spend the evening with Dan. He was glad Dan had decided to come over whether Phil liked it or not — because Phil definitely liked it.

His flat was a mess, though, and Phil wasn’t quite comfortable enough with Dan to let him see the state he lived in sometimes. Phil barely managed to collect the dishes that had been scattered around his lounge, bedroom, and office and pile them into the dishwasher before the doorbell buzzed, however, announcing Dan’s arrival. Phil knew it would have to be enough.

Phil rinsed his hands off, frantically rubbing them dry on his jeans as he raced to the door. Not bothering to ring down to make sure it was Dan, Phil jammed the door open button and opened his front door, too impatient to see Dan to wait for him to knock.

Perhaps Dan was impatient too, because he came out of the stairwell a few minutes later, not the lift. Dan’s pace as he crossed the hallway to Phil was quick — maybe a little too quick to be really considered a walk — and he practically launched himself the last few steps, throwing his arms around Phil’s neck and burying his head in Phil’s shoulder.

“Oof,” Phil grunted, briefly steadying himself on the doorframe before wrapping his hands around Dan’s waist and pulling him in closer. The light, cottony scent that was just so Dan overwhelmed Phil. He was just so, so happy to have Dan — actual real life Dan — in his arms. Smiling, Phil pressed a small, chaste kiss to Dan’s shoulder, unable to stop himself from showing just a bit more affection.

After holding Dan tightly for a moment, Phil unwound his arms and tried to step back, only for Dan to tighten his grip and make a small noise of protest.

Phil chuckled and wove his arms back around Dan with a smile. “Missed you too,” Phil said, his lips accidentally brushing against Dan’s ear. Phil shuffled backwards, not letting go of Dan, and pulled him into the flat with him. Dan giggled, but let himself be pulled along.

As it turned out, two intertwined six-foot tall giants didn’t make for the most graceful walking; Dan accidentally stepped on Phil’s toes, and Phil accidentally smacked Dan into the doorframe before they’d even made it three steps. But neither of them minded, and they ended up laughing into each other’s shoulders, the sound muffled but somehow still loud and happy enough that Phil worried his neighbors might pop their heads into the hallway.

It wasn’t until they were all the way into Phil’s flat and Phil had managed to kick the front door shut that Dan relinquished his grip on Phil.

“Hi Phiw,” Dan said warmly, smiling up at Phil through his eyelashes, his dimple prominent on his cheek.

“Hi Dan.” Phil grinned back, his hands naturally rising to the buttons of Dan’s coat — well, more a jacket, really. The frigid chills of winter seemed to have mostly passed. Unwilling to let Dan out of his embrace just yet, Phil took his time on the buttons of Dan’s coat, pushing each one through its hole as slowly as possible.

“Want something to drink?” Phil offered as he hung Dan’s coat on the hook.

“Hot chocolate?” Dan suggested, a childlike excitement seeping into his voice.

Phil nodded. “Okay. Go settle on the sofa and I’ll put the kettle on,” Phil instructed, content to finally have someone that shared his love for sweet drinks and easy nights in.

As Phil turned into the kitchen, though, he heard Dan’s light footsteps puttering behind him rather than turning into the lounge. Phil glanced behind him and saw that Dan had followed him.

While Phil was filling the kettle, the cabinet next to him swung open, Dan’s delicate hands reaching in and rummaging through its contents.

“Jesus,” Dan mumbled. “You’ve got a lot of mugs, Phil.”

Phil’s eyes flickered to the dishwasher sheepishly, where he knew there were at least another five or six mugs hiding. “Sorry, I like mugs a lot…” he shrugged, a little embarrassed, as he set the kettle on the counter and turned it on.

Dan leaned back, poking his head around the door so he could see Phil. “I love it,” he said with a sincere, fond smile. “I used to drink almost everything from a mug.”

“Used to?” Phil questioned, tipping his head to the side.

Dan’s face clouded for a moment — with what, Phil couldn’t quite tell — before fading back to normal. “Long story.”

Eager to hear each and every one of Dan’s stories, Phil started to assure Dan that had he had plenty of time, but Dan cut him off before he could saying, adding on, “I don’t wanna get into it right now.”

With a note of finality, Dan turned away from Phil, and pulled out two mugs — a lion shaped mug that Phil had received from a viewer years ago, and a corgi print one that was actually a sample for some new merch — and sat them down next to the kettle.

Dan waited in the kitchen with Phil while the kettle heated up, asking Phil if he’d seen any cute dogs or met any weird people since they’d hung out last. Phil was having trouble concentrating on his answers, though, because Dan was hovering so, so close to him. Phil had a feeling nothing he was saying made any sense, but Dan didn’t call him out for it. Phil was glad, because he was still adamant that everything between them was to happen on Dan’s terms, and it was taking all of Phil’s energy to resist the urge to wrap his arm around Dan’s waist, to pull him into his arms, to press a kiss to his temple.

To say fuck the kettle and fuck Dan instead.

Fucking hell, Phil needed to keep it in his pants. He shook his head a little, trying to force that thought away and focus on the moment at hand.

Once the kettle finally finished boiling, and the hot chocolate was made, Dan picked up the corgi mug with both hands, wrapping his long fingers around it. That left Phil to pick up the lion one, and he was secretly pleased when he realized that Dan had probably intentionally picked out which mugs he wanted for each of them.

Dan followed Phil into the lounge, his mug cradled close to his chest, but when Phil turned around to sit down, he found that Dan had stopped to hover by the coffee table.

“Sit down, silly.” Phil laughed, nodding to the sofa behind him. Dan simply nodded, but didn’t move to take Phil’s invitation. Confused, and not sure what Dan was doing, Phil sat down, hoping that Dan would follow.

Dan didn’t sit immediately; he waited until Phil was situated before crawling onto the sofa as well and immediately settling against Phil’s side. Dan rested his cheek on Phil’s shoulders and let his knees tip into Phil’s lap and — Oh.

That’s what Dan wanted — to curl up next to Phil — and that’s why he’d been waiting.

A light blush rose to Phil’s cheeks as the realization dawned on him, and this time, he didn’t hesitate to loop his arm around Dan’s shoulders. If Dan was cuddling into him, that was permission enough for Phil.

The entire premise of Dan coming over had been to watch more Buffy, but the remote was lying on the opposite armrest, well out of both of their reaches, and neither of them were making any move to get it.

Not then — and not for the next hour, either.

The tv just wasn’t necessary, or even wanted. They were content to just be in each other’s presence and be able to talk — talk about their lives, what they’d been watching on netflix recently, and the trivial mediocrities of life. It didn’t feel pointless or boring, and the conversation never stalled. Phil savored having Dan with him in his flat, in his arms, again, and Dan seemed equally happy to just enjoy the moment without any distractions.

“What are you planning to do in Germany?” Phil asked as he absent-mindedly trailed his fingers up and down Dan’s arm.

“Hopefully raise a lot of money for mental health services for youths,” Dan chuckled, his laughter interrupted by a small shiver shaking his body when Phil’s fingers drifted to his inner forearm.

“Well, yeah, but that’s work stuff.” Phil rolled his eyes and grabbed Dan’s bicep, jokingly shaking Dan a bit. “I meant with your sister, like what are you guys planning to do?”

“Oh!” Dan sounded surprised by Phil’s question. “Sorry, Louise and I have been going over every fucking detail of this trip, but we haven’t talked at all about what I’m doing for fun, so I just…”

“Went straight to work stuff?” Phil supplied when Dan trailed off.

“Yeah, exactly.” Dan tipped his head back on Phil’s shoulder and smiled widely at Phil. Staring up at him with beautiful, chocolate eyes, Dan looked absolutely beautiful and Phil couldn’t help getting lost for a moment.

“Have you thought about it, though? The fun stuff, I mean,” Phil said, shaking his head, trying to get Dan to focus on the personal bits of his upcoming trip, not just work.

Dan settled his cheek back onto Phil’s shoulder. “Obviously!” Dan replied, rolling his eyes. “There’s a really cool, super old beer hall I went to last time I was there that I want to take Addie to.”

“Hofbräuhaus?” Phil suggested, the name jumping into his mind from his drunken exploits in Germany.

Unexpectedly, Dan excitedly shot up, nearly knocking his head into Phil’s chin. “Yeah! Do you know it?” he asked, turning to face Phil properly.

“I went there with PJ!” Phil replied, grinning wide. He couldn’t believe he and Dan had been to the same place, even if it wasn’t at the same time. Somehow, that made him feel just a little bit more connected to Dan.

Dan tapped his hands eagerly on Phil’s thigh. “That’s so cool! When did you go to Munich?”

Without thinking, Phil reached out with his spare hand to still Dan’s hands on his thighs. “Gosh, it must have been… the summer after we graduated uni? I think?”

Dan flipped his hand over, threading his fingers betweens Phil’s.

“Did you go to that church with all the big figurines that dance and stuff?” Dan asked.

Phil smiled, and nodded his head. “Rathaus-Glockenspiel! That was so cool! I didn’t expect them to be so big.”

They seemed to talk about Munich for forever after that, excitedly exchanging stories of mischief they’d gotten up to and great food they’d eaten. The conversation spiraled from there, and Phil learned all about what Dan did on tour when he wasn’t performing. As it turned out, Dan had the same go go go mentality that Phil’d had when he’d done his own mini tour. They’d even prioritized a lot of the same sights and experiences.

The more Phil got to know Dan, the more amazing Phil thought Dan was purely from just how similar they were.

It wasn’t until Phil got up to go to the bathroom that they started actually doing anything with their evening. When he came back from the loo (with a glass of ribena for them each), Dan was sitting upright in the middle of the sofa, remote in hand and Buffy queued up on the tele. His prim posture didn’t last long, though; as soon as Phil sat down, Dan curled back into him.

Phil chuckled quietly when he realized that Dan’s head was conveniently low enough for Phil to comfortably rest his hand in his curls and, sure enough, Dan let out a soft sigh when Phil’s fingers tangled in his hair. With a small smile, Phil twirled the locks between his fingers, letting his eyes fixate on the soft boy in his arms rather than the pretty girl on the screen.

It was a good thing Phil had seen the entire series a dozen times, because he wasn’t paying a damn bit of attention to the show tonight. How could he when he had a gorgeous, soft boy in his arms?

They made it through three and a half episodes before Phil realized that Dan’s eyes were growing heavy. With all that they both had on their plates right now — especially Dan — Phil could hardly blame him. After a certain level of tired, sleep won out over just about anything.

Phil gently tugged at the locks that were still knotted around his fingers. “You’re free to spend the night here again,” he said, blushing as he realized how it sounded, and hastening to add, “but I won’t be offended if you want to call an uber and sleep in your own bed.”

Dan’s head nudged at Phil’s chest once, twice, before slipping down a few centimeters to rest more on his stomach. “Here’s good. I’ll just wake back up if I go home.”

A rush of affection hit Phil. He’d adored the fact that Dan had slept over last time, but it hadn’t exactly been a conscious decision on Dan’s part. But tonight — tonight Dan was deciding to stay at Phil’s, and the intimacy, the domesticity of that, warmed Phil from the inside out.

“Okay.” Phil pulled his hand away from Dan’s hair, pushing lightly on his shoulders. “You can take the bed and I’ll sleep here. Budge up so I can get you settled.”

“Noooo,” Dan whined petulantly, and stubbornly pushed his head into Phil’s lap. Phil bit back a laugh; Dan could be such a child sometimes and it was endearing in the silliest of ways. “I slept in some this morning so I’m okay for a few more episodes.”

Phil leaned forward and peeked at Dan’s face. His eyelids were heavy, and he was clearly fighting to keep his eyes open at all. Like hell would Dan make it through a few more episodes — Phil would be luckily if Dan stayed awake for ten more minutes.

And truthfully, Phil was feeling fairly tired himself. If he was going to watch (or sleep through) a few more episode, he didn’t want to be wedged upright against the back of the sofa.

Phil bumped his leg up slightly, lightly pushing at Dan’s cheek. “Can we move positions at least? That’s great that you got to sleep in, but I didn’t,” he teased.

Wordlessly, Dan rolled off Phil’s lap, hauling himself into a standing position. “Lay,” he ordered. Dan looked sleepy, his face soft and his hair a tangled mess. His clothes were rumpled from being curled up, and his cheek had a faint imprint of the stitching on Phil’s jumper.

Unsure of what Dan exactly wanted, Phil obediently laid down. By this point, Phil had known Dan long enough that he was accustomed to his slightly bossy tendencies and found them cute rather than annoying. He tried his best to only take up half of the length of the sofa, but he tall and lanky, and wasn’t particularly successful. Dan seemed to have a different idea, though. He pushed and pulled at Phil, manhandling him until his back was pressed all the way against the back of sofa, and he was stretched out from armrest to armrest.

With a final adjustment, Dan shoved Phil’s arm to the side and crawled back onto the cushions, before finally joining Phil on the sofa. Wordlessly, he laid down with his back pressed against Phil’s stomach, and pulled Phil’s arm around his body.

This. This was magical, Phil thought. Their bodies, pressed almost entirely together as they squeezed together on the narrow sofa. Phil could lay like this for the rest of his life and be satisfied.

Phil reached passed Dan to grab the remote off the coffee table and resumed the episode.

It wasn’t long before he felt Dan’s breathing slow, and Phil knew that his eyes had to have drifted closed again by now. It was getting late — or at least, it felt late because he’d had a long day and he finally felt relaxed — and Phil felt himself nodding off, too.

Phil was startled out of his half-sleep by a sudden hand on his chest pressing him backwards. His eyes flew open, immediately meeting Dan’s warm brown ones just centimeters from his face.

“On your back,” Dan mumbled.

Phil’s brow furrowed as he tried to blink his brain back into proper consciousness.

“Really, Dan, I don’t mind if you go to bed,” Phil protested quietly, all while rolling onto his back like Dan instructed, once again giving into his bossy tendencies.

“Shhhh,” Dan reprimanded as he settled back down and his head found a comfortable place on Phil’s chest. “I’m still listening to Buffy.”

Phil couldn’t contain the laugh that bubbled out of his mouth, his chest rumbling and jostling Dan’s head. “Are you now?” he teased.

“Yes. I’m just resting my eyes.” Dan’s hand clumsily found Phil’s mouth, clasping lightly in an attempt to stop him from talking. “Now be quiet, I think David Borateezey is saying something important.”

Phil pressed a small kiss against Dan’s palm. “Whatever you say, darling” Phil mumbled. His words were barely audible to his own ears, but Phil couldn’t be arsed to care at the moment.

With the warm weight of Dan’s head on his chest, Phil drifted back to sleep.

Sometime later that night — how much later, Phil couldn’t be sure — Phil woke up to find the tv off and Dan cuddled even more securely into him. While they’d slept, Dan’s arm had moved from its place wedged between them to loop across Phil’s stomach, his hand lightly gripping the hem of Phil’s jeans.

In the morning, Phil’s body would surely resent the fact that he’d slept on the couch, and his legs would probably hate having been confined to tight skinny jeans all night, but Phil knew that nothing could make him regret a night of Dan sleeping on his chest.

And hopefully, this was the first of many nights just like this.

*******************************

“Ha! Victory is mine!” Phil exclaimed when Dan failed to name seven Canadian provinces in seven seconds. “As the winner of the Seven Second Challenge, I get to play you whatever I want, so here’s a nice throwback to two thousand — um… five?”

“Four,” Dan corrected, flashing Phil a quick smile that everyone watching the livestream of the radio show could probably tell was filled with fond.

“Okay, then, Mr. Music,” Phil rolled his eyes playfully. “Here’s a throwback to two thousand four,” Phil conceded with mock-annoyance and a pointed look at Dan. “Enjoy Helena by My Chemical Romance!”

“Phil!” Dan squealed as soon as Phil had turned off their microphones. “You can’t just spring Helena on people like that! People need warning!”

“Oops!” Phil shrugged and flashed the live camera a guilty look. He grabbed the whiteboard from the table on the other side of Dan and scrawled a message.

Dan’s making me feel bad for springing mcr on you guys :(

Dan took the board from Phil’s hands and erased his message with the stuffed lion on the desk. He scribbled a reply, his left-handedness causing the ink to smear a bit, while he talked to Phil, moving his lips as little as possible.

“How d’ya think the show’s going so far?” Dan mumbled.

Phil eyed Dan’s writing, reading the message just before he turned it around.

i’m still a 2000s emo on the inside let me live

Phil dramatically shook his head at the camera, taking the whiteboard from Dan to say something — although he wasn’t sure what — back to their audience.

“Good,” Phil murmured back. “Really good, actually.” He nodded discretely towards the laptop they had pulled up to twitter. “Internet seems happy and,” Phil glanced towards the producer observing them, “Matt looks pleased.”

Dan smiled wide, first at Phil, then at the camera. “I’m glad,” he said through his grin.

For the rest of the song, and the song after that, Phil continued exchanging whiteboard messages with Dan to entertain their video audience, occasionally referencing tweets from the #AmazingDan trending hashtag.

When the music ended, Phil tabbed over from twitter to his google doc of notes. They’d reached the part of the special he was most nervous about — the music segment. As much as Phil enjoyed music, he wasn’t particularly confident in his knowledge about the current scene (ironic, considering he was a bloody radio dj). He’d spent the majority of this week prepping questions for Dan, and researching artists and albums that might come up during their conversation so that he’d feel less unsure.

“Hi guys and welcome back to Internet Takeover with AmazingPhil! I’m here with the Dan Howell to talk about everything music, both his and his fellow artists’!”

“Yikes, I’m not an expert or anything, but I’ll do my best,” Dan chuckled in his signature self-deprecating fashion.

“I hate to break it to you, Howell, but you’re a professional musician. I think that makes you an expert.” Phil playfully shook his head at the camera in exasperation. Fleetingly, Phil wondered if calling Dan Howell on live radio had been too flirty.

“If you say so…” Dan laughed again. “So, Philly, hit me with your questions.”

Well, if Dan didn’t consider Philly too flirty, then Phil was probably safe with Howell.

Phil’s eyes flickered back to his computer screen, despite the fact that’d he’d already memorized all of the questions he had for Dan.

“So, Dan,” Phil noticed that his voice had switched into Interviewer Mode, and he wasn’t sure how to shake the professional edge to his tone. “Everyone’s very excited about the fact that you’re working on a new album. What can you tell us about it?”

“I don’t have a release date yet, but it’s coming along well. Cheeky spon, but anyone who is coming to my performance on Saturday night just might get to hear a sneaky preview.”

“Ooooh, lucky people! I wish I was going!” Phil said, playing up his jealousy for the camera. Realistically, whatever Dan felt ready to share with the public was probably something Phil had already heard — and Dan’s eyeroll and playful shake of his head only confirmed Phil’s suspicions.

“Rumor has it you’re doing a concept album this time. How has working on this album been different from your previous music?”

Dan’s head whipped around to face Phil, completely ignoring the camera. Phil glanced over, only to find a mixture of amusement and shock on Dan’s face.

Dan quickly composed himself and flashed Phil a smirk, a twinkle of mirth in his eyes.“Rumor has it, does it Phil?”

Phil’s brows furrowed as he tried to place what Dan meant. “Yeah…” he said uncertainly.

“Phiiwww, there’s no rumor about it!” Dan whined indignantly. “You heard that from me, you spoon.”

“Fu-udge,” Phil caught himself just in time. He had a perfect track record of not swearing on live radio — or any place his viewers could hear him — and he didn’t want to ruin it now. “I’m so sorry! I forgot that no one knows that yet!”

Phil’s cheeks were flushed red, and his eyes were wide. He truly did feel bad for spilling what was apparently still secret information about Dan’s album.

“It’s fine.” Dan shrugged. “I was going to talk about it when I introduced the new song in Germany, but…” Dan trailed off and eyed Phil contemplatively.

“But…?” Phil asked hopefully. If Dan was considering talking about it more on air, then he must not be too annoyed at Phil for bringing it up. But, more importantly, if Dan talked more about it right now, Phil might actually learn something new for fuck’s sake.

Dan’s eyes flickered to the camera and back to Phil. “But, now that you’ve brought it up anyway, I might as well talk about it now.”

Phil bounced excitedly on his toes, not even needing to exaggerate his emotions for the camera. He’d been dying to know more about Dan’s album for weeks, but the only thing he knew was that Dan was proud of it and hoped that Phil specifically would like it.

A fact that Dan had told him numerous times, and each time it just made Phil more and more and more curious as to what in the actual hell Dan was working on.

Doing his best to retain some inkling of his radio host persona, Phil turned to his microphone. “You heard it here first, guys! Dan Howell is making a concept album and the concept is…” He trailed off, making a drumroll noise with his mouth.

Dan bumped his hip against Phil’s playfully, giggling. “Enough of that, you dork.” Dan’s laughter died down as he turned to face Phil, completely disregarding the main instruction that Matt and Phil had given him: always talk to the camera!

“It’s a really special album to me.” Dan sounded far more sincere than he had just seconds ago. “I feel like it really reflects my life in the past few months and… well, I hope you - I mean—” His eyes flickered to the camera for a split second. “ —um, everyone, likes it.”

There it was again, the pointed comments about Phil specifically liking the album concept.

“I’m sure it will be great,” Phil assured him. If they weren’t on camera, Phil would have reached out to touch Dan, maybe rub his arm or squeeze his hand — anything to show Dan his support.

“The concept is about a process,” Dan continued. Even though he was staring intensely at Phil, his hands were fiddling with the hem of his shirt, giving away how nervous he was about sharing this. “It starts off being about not being happy, about hating what you have and wanting something different.”

Phil’s heart stopped, and hope swelled in his chest. But Dan was being so fucking vague, that Phil wasn’t willing to give into it yet.

“Something different,” Phil repeated, his voice carefully controlled and devoid of emotion.

Dan’s lips twitched into a hint of a small smile. “Yeah, something different.”

Phil’s heart was pounding against his ribcage as he waited with bated breath for Dan to continue.

Dan cleared his throat softly, his eyes searching Phil’s face for something. “It’s about wanting what you don’t have and fucking going for it.”

Phil’s heart may have been pounding before, but now it was completely stopped. Phil couldn’t be sure, not when Dan was speaking in these loose and vague terms, but he was almost certain that he knew what Dan was talking about —

Isabella.

And, well, Phil.

And if that was what Dan was saying, then going for it must mean —

Fuck.

Phil couldn’t think about that.

Not right now, not while they were on live radio, streaming their faces online to a massive audience. If Phil thought too hard about what going for it meant, about what Dan essentially making an album — or at least part of one — about him must mean, Phil wouldn’t be able to stop himself from swooping in and finally, finally, kissing Dan.

“I’m, um, happy for you,” Phil choked out after a few too many seconds of silence. “Going for it — that’s, um, that’s good.”

Dan’s eyebrows rose, his playful smile returning. “It’s good, is it Philly?”

“Y-yeah,” Phil stuttered, completely failing at managing to seem poised and not socially awkward on live radio, which had been his one goal for this special. He’d known he’d be an awkward mess if he did this with someone he didn’t know, but he hadn’t anticipated that Dan would make him this flustered on live air.

“I’m glad you feel that way.” Dan smiled sincerely and, out of sight of the camera, nudged Phil’s foot with his own. The little touch of their feet felt like a promise, a promise that they’d talk, that this meant something, that Phil wasn’t crazy for reading into what Dan had said.

Phil smiled back, shifting his foot so that the outsides of their feet were pressed together under the table.

The rest of the show, Phil was barely able to keep himself together. Dan’s announcement had completely wrecked Phil’s composure, had derailed all of the conversation points that Phil had meant to hit, had utterly fucked with Phil’s head — and heart, for that matter.

As much as Phil loved doing the radio shows, he needed this special to fucking end already. He needed a moment to process what Dan had said without thousands of eyes and ears trained on him. He needed a moment alone with Dan.

And, most importantly, he needed to figure out exactly what going for it meant.

What seemed like days, weeks, maybe even months later, they were finally saying their goodbyes to their listeners, and Phil was ready to rip his headphones off and pull Dan into the nearest conference room, supply closet, or loo stall he could find. He wasn’t picky at this point.

His plan was thwarted, though, when Matt motioned for them both to follow him because he apparently wanted to debrief. Whatever the fuck that meant.

They were led into one of the small meeting rooms just down the hall. Phil perched himself on the edge of the table and faced the wall of windows that looked into the hallway, trying his best to look like he was listening to Matt.

Dan was hovering far away, all the way at the other end of the table, and was eagerly nodding along with whatever Matt was saying.

Phil looked at Dan a little closer, though, and saw that his eyes looked glazed over, like he wasn’t really listening. This feeling, this energy — Dan had to feel it too.

Hell, Phil was surprised that Matt hadn’t caught on to it.

While Matt raved about how great the show had gone, and how grateful he was that Dan had let Phil be the person to break the story about his concept album on BBC Radio, all Phil could think about was that damn concept.

That damn concept and all of the implications that it might carry.

Nearly an eternity later, Matt said goodbye and gave them one last congratulations before he rushed out to another meeting, leaving Dan and Phil alone in the conference room. As the glass door swung shut, Phil’s eyes met Dan’s across the room.

There was a look in Dan’s eyes that Phil couldn’t place — a look that carried weight that Phil could barely fathom, that he didn’t know how to describe.

Phil pushed himself off the table.

Whatever this was going to be, it didn’t feel like a conversation he wanted to have sitting down.

But even though Phil had been desperate to be alone with Dan, desperate to ask Dan a millions of different questions, now that the moment had finally come, Phil couldn’t find the words. Instead, he stared and stared and stared, waiting and waiting and waiting.

Time dragged on as Phil stared at Dan and Dan stared back, this distance between them both massive and nothing at all.

Dan shifted back and forth on his feet, looking equally as lost for words as Phil was. Phil could feel the charged energy between them, waiting for someone to break it, for them to finally allow themselves to be. He was tempted to say fuck it, to cross the room and grab Dan’s face between his hands and forego words entirely. But that wasn’t how mature relationships started, and the whole point of waiting, of taking their time, had been maturity.

So Phil had waited. So Phil continued to wait.

“So…” Dan broke the silence, his tongue darting out to lick his lips.

“So…” Phil repeated. He shifted his weight to his other foot and shoved his hand into his pocket, twisting it around into an awkward position.

They were still just looking at each other, holding the other’s gaze with half a room between them.

Someone needed to just say it.

Phil took a deep breath, steeling himself to just do it. Phil didn’t look away from Dan’s warm, intense eyes when he finally spoke. “That’s some concept.”

“Mmmm,” Dan agreed noncommittally, a stoic tone to his voice. His eyes scanned over Phil’s face though, clearly looking for some sort of reaction from Phil.

It was now or never.

Phil took a small step towards Dan. His hands were shaking at his sides, so he clenched them into tight fists. “Especially the going for it part.”

“Yeah?” Dan’s lips were tilting up, betraying his calm facade. His voice was betraying him, too — there was an undercurrent of hope and anticipation in his tone that was a stark contradiction to the neutral look his face was so clearly trying to maintain. “What do you think of it?”

The hope and the happiness that had been thrumming just under Phil’s skin for an hour now finally broke free. No amount of anxiety could convince Phil that going for it didn’t mean exactly what he’d thought.

Phil couldn’t hold back his smile anymore. It spread across his face so widely that his cheeks were positively aching, but he didn’t care. “I fucking love it.”

“Yeah?” Dan asked quietly, his voice higher pitched this time. Hope was radiating from him, his eyes lighting up, and his dimple coming out.

Phil couldn’t believe it — Dan was writing a fucking album about him, and it had taken him this long to realize that yes, Phil absolutely loved it. That Phil was so unbelievably happy that Dan was going for it.

“Yeah,” Phil whispered, taking two large steps towards Dan, closing some of the absurd space that was currently between them. There wasn’t an audience of thousands of people now, and Phil really, really wanted to kiss Dan.

Dan mirrored Phil’s actions, moving closer and closer until their bodies, their faces, were just centimeters apart.

Phil wet his lips, his gaze flickering from Dan’s eyes to his chapped pink lips. When he looked back up, Dan’s eyes had fallen almost completely closed, his head already tipping slightly. Phil followed Dan’s lead, closing his eyes, and tipping his head to the right and —

“Fuck,” Dan exclaimed, stumbling back half a step from Phil and fishing his vibrating phone out of his pocket. “Sorry, Adaline’s travelling and…” His hands were noticeably shaking as he swiped and answered the call. “Hey Addie.”

Phil’s heart was still in his throat, and his body had gone numb with disappointment.

Dan was still so close that Phil could hear Adaline through the phone.

“Hey Dan, I’m at your apartment, but the doorman won’t let me in because apparently you don’t have me down as a permanent visitor, loser.”

“Shit, sorry,” Dan apologized, his eyes flicking up to Phil and giving Phil the sense that the apology was as much for him as it was for Adaline. A deep, disappointed frown was etched on Dan’s face. “The producer wanted to talk for a minute, but I’m leaving now,” he rushed to add. “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

“Hurry up, my phone’s nearly dead and I forgot my charger at home.”

“Okay, okay, I’m coming sis.” Dan hung up, frowning apologetically at Phil. He tugged his lip into his mouth, his bite strong enough to turn his lip white. “I need to go,” Dan said with a disappointed sigh.”Besides,” he added, glancing anxiously over to the glass wall separating them from the public hallway, “We aren’t exactly alone here.”

As if on cue, the intern that worked on Phil’s show came out of loo and walked right past the doorway Matt had dragged them through.

“Shit, yeah,” Phil muttered, his eyes following the intern down the hall. He knew Dan wasn’t out, and didn’t want to be out — this was the wrong moment. When Phil finally got to kiss Dan, he wanted everything to be perfect. “You’re right,” he agreed.

He didn’t make any move to step back though.

“I really do need to go, though,” Dan murmured, not stepping back either. He almost sounded like he was apologizing again, or trying to tell Phil that this wasn’t a rejection.

Silence descended upon them and they stood, just a few centimeters apart, staring into each other’s eyes, stuck in the reverie of each other.

“That’s okay,” Phil managed eventually. He swallowed thickly as he tore his eyes away from Dan, knowing that unless he did, he was never going to be able to walk away from this moment. “I’ll see you when you’re back.” Phil managed eventually. “Monday right?”

“Yeah,” Dan nodded slowly. “I’ll text you as soon as I get back to my apartment.”

Offering Phil an awkward half smile filled with regret, Dan reached for Phil’s hand and gave it a soft squeeze. Reluctantly, he turned and ducked out the door.

Exhausted from such a rollercoaster of emotions, Phil slumped backwards against the table and dropped his face into his hands.

They’d been close. So, so, so close to finally going for it.

While Phil would wait for Dan as long as he had to, he’d been right there. Now, Monday seemed like an eternity away.

#phan #phanfic #phan au #phanfiction #barista!phil #singer!dan #coffee shop au #love yourself #ly #iminclinedtowriting #mine

86 notes · View notes