Dan hadn't spoken to Phil since that day at Starbucks, but he seemed nevertheless to have taken up permanent residence in the younger boy's thoughts. Even if he was still unsure of how, or even if, he wanted to proceed with Phil, this latest development forced Dan to face what he'd been trying hard to ignore. As much as he tried to act otherwise, Dan was emphatically not over Phil.

Having been dragged by his emotional turmoil to this realization, Dan figured that it was probably for the best that he break things off with Matt. He felt a little silly "breaking up" with him, since they weren't properly dating, but Dan didn't want to lead him on any more than he already had. He knew that feeling far too well to want to inflict it on anybody else, especially somebody as good-natured as Matt.

Dan called him that night and suggested that it might be better if they didn't see one another for a while. He explained, in the vaguest of terms, that he was still kind of hung up on the last person that he'd been involved with and didn't want to make things more complicated than they already were. Matt seemed a touch confused at this seemingly abrupt shift in Dan, and a little disappointed, but all things considered, he took it quite well.

It was just over a week later - the time having been swinging between the two extremes of lying on the floor over-analysing his complicated feelings and Phil's actions versus ignoring everything in favor of video games while he rationalized not reaching out to Phil with the simple fact that he hadn't tried talking to him either - that Dan found a plain white envelope pushed under his door. Inside was a handwritten letter:

Dear Dan,

I know this is probably too little, too late, and I'm probably the last person you want to hear from, but, if it's not too much to ask, I just wanted to tell you something.

I know I haven't been very good at showing it, and there was a while there when I completely forgot everything that was actually important, but you really were my best friend, Dan. My first best friend, to be honest. And I guess part of me thinks hopes that's still true, which means that you were the first person that I wanted to tell and to celebrate with, but since I screwed that up so royally, I have to content myself with writing it down and hoping that you might be so kind as to read it.

So I finally did what you said. What I should have done six months ago.

Oh, I know you didn't actually tell me to, but I could see you thinking it. I still know you well enough for that, even if you were trying so hard to stay stoic.

I came out. Properly. I told all my friends, or at least all the people that I go to parties with and who I used to work so hard to impress. And you know what? It was fine. Nobody really cared and most of them probably already suspected. It wasn't a replay of all my nightmares from secondary school. Sure there are a couple footballers who are probably going to avoid me now, or even make a few stupid comments, but I realized that it doesn't matter. Screw them.

I know not everybody I meet is going to be ok with it, and I'm sure I'll have more crap to deal with, but I'm strong enough to handle it now.

I literally feel lighter. I'm so massively relieved to not feel like I'm playing the part of a movie character anymore. I can just be Phil, even if maybe he is a little rusty from disuse. I'm determined to make him somebody worth something.

So thank you, Dan, because I really don't think I would have made it here without you, even though I certainly didn't deserve it. The only thing I can offer now is to try to make it up to you. If you give me the chance, I swear I can do better, as a friend, a boyfriend, or whatever you want from me. You name it and I'll do it.

But if not, I understand. And I just hope you believe me when I say I'm so very sorry and thank you so, so much.

Love,

Phil

XXX

"You fucking asshole!"

Dan slams the door behind him, and Phil reflexively takes a step back but doesn't try stop the tirade beginning to pour from the younger boy's mouth. Whatever momentary gleam of hope had entered his mind when he opened his door to find Dan was eradicated when he took in the enraged look on his face.

"You come swanning into my life, all smiles and charm. And I know that type," said Dan derisively, his frustration briefly turned inward.

"I knew I should just forget your stupidly perfect face. But then you had to go and like cool bands and video games and anime, and you made me think you were different! It was torture for me, do you know that? Watching you and wanting you and knowing I couldn't have you," he said, narrowing his eyes at Phil. In a state of shock, he could do nothing more than return Dan's stare as he felt his heart drop to the pit of his stomach.

"Except, then I did," Dan continued, turning on his heel.

"The night of that stupid storm. I wasn't even upset that I couldn't go home because it meant I got to hang out with you, which then turned into the hottest fucking make out of my life, and I finally allowed myself to hope that you might feel the same way," he admitted, still in a frenzy.

"But then the next morning, it was like nothing had changed at all."

Dan couldn't help but throw his hands up in remembered frustration.

"Only it did, but not in a good way. You started blowing me off and acting like a jerk, and I was never your first choice. And the sick part is that I took it. I let you treat me like crap because I wasn't ready to let you go, and I probably had shitty self-esteem and all that crap."

Dan was pacing back and forth across the room now, barely seeming to realize that Phil was still present, watching him through an expression of self-disgust and despair.

"I actually convinced myself for a while that I was the problem, not you. And just, just when I was starting to get my shit together and I found a nice boy and I thought I was getting over you, you had to come and fucking apologize! And then that letter! Jesus. And I'm probably the world's biggest frigging fool, but you convinced me maybe you weren't just an emotionless prick, and made me realize just how fucking in love with you I still am, asshole."

The fury and the disbelief in Dan's voice faded into sincerity as he wound down his rant, leaving the last epithet imbued with more fondness than scorn.

For the first time since he'd entered the room, Dan looked up properly at Phil's face. He was able to watch the first tentative flicker of hope and then confusion cross his distraught features as his brain struggled to get caught up with the abrupt change in Dan's tone and his final admission.

Being confronted with a violent reminded of just how badly his poor decisions and self-involvement had affected Dan, juxtaposed against the confession of love that he was still more than half-convinced he had misheard, was enough to bring tears to Phil's eyes.

"I'm so, so sorry, Dan," he choked out as he instinctively flung his arms around him in a tight hug before he could think better of it. He kept murmuring the apologies that he couldn't seem to stop from tumbling off his tongue as he realized just how deeply he had longed for some kind of physical contact from Dan.

"I know," Dan said, calmly now, sounding a bit tired out after his outburst.

"Stop it, or else I'm going to start crying too. You know what I'm like," he tried to scold, but the slight waver in his voice alerted Phil to the fact that it was probably already too late. As he tried to gather himself, they clung together, surely looking like two sappy goons as they stood in the center of Phil's concrete block room with tear tracks down their cheeks.

Finally, Phil pulled away and took a deep breath to ask the question that was still reverberating around his mind.

"Did you mean it?" he asked tentatively. "When you said...when you said that you loved me?"

"Yes, you idiot. If I could have stopped, believe me I would have, but that's not going to happen any time soon," he said, a smile beginning to form on his lips.

"I love you, too," Phil said quietly, pouring as much sincerity as he could into his words. He needed Dan to believe that, no matter what had come before.

"Good," announced Dan, breaking the emotionally charged tension a bit. "Now just promise me you're going to act like it, jerk."

His tone was joking, but it was clear to both boys that his deeper meaning was emphatically serious, and Phil responded in kind.

"I promise you that, Dan. I can't say I'll never make another mistake, but I can promise that I will do everything I can to show you just how important you are to me."

Any lingering doubts Dan may have been having melted away as held Phil's gaze. Feeling oddly liberated by finally having everything out in the open, Dan let himself press up towards Phil, bringing their lips together in their first honest, non-intoxicated, kiss.

And god did that make all the difference. If Dan had thought their raw physical chemistry had been exhilarating, that combined with an emotional connection left Dan slightly panting and fuzzy headed when they broke apart a few moments later.

Not wanting to lose all contact when this thing between them was still so fragile, Dan left a hand resting on Phil's chest as he made an offer.

"So what do you say that we just forget about this whole last year? Put it behind us and start over."

"You have no idea how much I would like that," Phil said, relief and happiness swelling inside of him until he felt sure he would burst. Or start crying again.

But instead, he tipped his chin up meet Dan's mouth once more with his own, pouring every feeling of apology and promise and joy he had into the first kiss of this new, and far more auspicious, chapter of their lives.