/ @ tøp fans, pls don't spam about chapter number also wow I've updated again in less than two months /

phil

Phil doesn't see Dan the next day at school.

Usually, the boy will run straight over to Phil, or at least text him when he isn't coming to school, so Phil finds his mind slowly seeping into 'panic! panic! panic!' mode and he can't seem to relax at all. His fingers are relentlessly tapping an out-of-time beat which is driving the person next to him slowly but steadily insane, his eyes are darting everywhere, seeking a distraction for his brain...

"Hey, Phil, will you please stop tapping?" this girl, Dodie, asks from beside Phil, pushing large glasses up her nose before frowning slightly at him, "your mood looks worried, are you oaky?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," Phil replies, "my friend just didn't show up today, and I'm worried about him."

"Well, you should call or text him, make sure he's okay, which I'm sure he will be," she says with a smile, her eyes shining behind a layer of dark, mascara coated eyelashes.

"Thanks, I will," Phil replies, watching as her mood changes to a smile, and later a musical note as she writes in the back of her book and softly hums an unfamiliar tune.

Phil then proceeds to watch the clock, each time the second hand ticks a little more around the face of the clock, it seems to move a fraction slower. This is making it almost agonising for Phil, as he feels his mind basically wanting to jump out of his skull and scream - that is, if brains could physically do that. Instead, Phil looks up to see his mood is going basically insane. It's a large, attention drawing exclamation mark which is bouncing up and down above Phil, causing him to be a distraction for the other students in his class, more specifically those located behind him.

"Phil, I know that ancient history is not the most exciting subject, but could you please try to not be so distracted that your mood is distracting others? If you need to, you can sit outside for a while," the teacher says to him, turning around and looking at him with a concerned-but-professional look painted on his features; one which he would've used often in his lifetime of teaching.

"Okay, I might just... Step outside," Phil says, getting up quickly and walking towards the door, his shaking fingers grasping the cold metal handle and soon he's out in the empty corridor, breathing out a sigh of relief.

He doesn't know why he's so worked up and worried, he would usually be fine in this situation. But deep down, Phil knows that he isn't the same person he used to be; something has changed inside of him. Maybe it's because he no longer sees the world as this wonderful place full of happiness and smiles, maybe it's because there's this small piece of darkness trapped inside of him which no amount of light can seem to get rid of, or maybe he's just terrified of himself.

Phil walks to the bathroom, where he pulls out his phone and scrolls through his contacts until he finds Dan. He clicks call and lifts the phone to his ear, begging for Dan to pick up every time the empty, agonising sound of a phone ringing echoes inside his ear. He begins to pace around the grimy bathroom, underneath the flickering fluorescent lights.

After the seventh ring, Dan picks up and Phil sighs in relief.

"Dan! You're okay!" Phil says happily, closing his eyes.

"Y-yeah," Dan replies, his voice crackling and muffled through the phone, "I just s-slept through m-my alarm. N-nothing to worry about b-but I think I-I will just stay home t-today."

"Oh, okay," Phil says, "well I'd better head to class, I'll talk to you later. I love you."

"I-I l-l-love you t-t-too," Dan replies softly before the line goes dead and Phil is left with nothing but the sound of the light flickering at random intervals.

Dan is okay, Phil tells himself as he walks back towards his classroom, everything is okay.

But that little path of darkness inside of Phil is screaming that something is wrong;

And it's right.

***

dan

Dan blinks his eyes open to see his floor is littered with fragments of what used to be part of his mirror.

He left quite an indent in the thing, however he luckily didn't completely obliterate the whole mirror, only part of it. There's minuscule pieces of shattered, reflective glass littering his carpet, and also still pieces he is yet to wash out of the graze on his knuckles.

He places his phone on his bedside table and sighs, unable to stare at anything besides the mess of glass on his floor. He is an idiot, that's undoubtable, however what is scaring him is that he doesn't even remember when his fist made contact with the mirror; it's all blurred and blank. He just remembers this pain.

Not the pain from where the skin on his knuckles split from the force and sliced by bits of shattered glass, but this pain that started as a small ache in his chest and then it got bigger, and bigger, and bigger and Dan wants it out of his chest.

The small patch of darkness which resides inside of him, Dan wants it all out of him, because that small piece has the ability to morph into a black hole and consume him from the inside out. Despite the fact that he knows that he isn't enough for Phil, he needs to hold onto Phil and pray that he doesn't realise that he can do better than this crumbling, moodless small child trapped in the body of a teenager.

Dan eventually manages to push himself out of bed. He steps delicately around the pieces of mirror on his floor and saunters to his bathroom. The tiles feel cold under his bare feet, and as he remembers when he also broke his fist on one of the tiles which line the wall, he wants to shrink in on himself.

No, Dan thinks, I can get over this.

Dan stands in front of the sink, looking into the grubby drain, which obviously hasn't seen a clean in a while, before he forces his head upwards. He stares at his reflection, and winces as his mind begins to deconstruct every one of his flaws in front of his eyes.

Sickly pale skin.

Bloodshot eyes.

Hair is a mess.

Smudges of purple beneath his eyes.

No sharp edges anywhere.

No.

Dan shuts his eyes, ignoring the way his mind is calling for him to reopen them, so he can continue to see every tiny thing which is wrong with him. He shuts it out, shuts it all out, shuts it out until there's nothing but space, empty space to fill inside of him.

Then he fills it with Phil. Phil's eyes, Phil's face, Phil's smile, Phil's hugs, Phil's kisses, Phil's kind words, Phil's love.

Dan opens his eyes again, and the voice remains silent. Mind temporarily defeated. He stares at his reflection and the darkness inside of him stays small. He's controlling it, thwarting it as it attempts to seep over his heart, because his heart is full of light; full of love.

And then Dan notices, that there's nothing above him. No mood, but no black line either. That line which gave him so much grief, so much hate, is gone. He may be literally moodless now, however he's free of the line; the weight which would always hang over and hold him down.

Now, he's free of it, now he can shed the weight off his shoulders.

He's learning to let go of the darkness, and surround himself with love.

***********

an/ shorter chapter yes but I updated again omfg who is this person.

sorry if this doesn't make much sense, I wrote it whenever I had spare time and now I'm on a school bus lol hope no one looks at my phone.

please vote and comment what you thought of the chapter - a lot happened lol.

also, I really think my writing has changed slightly what.

anyway hopefully I'll update again sometime soon! thanks for reading

^-^ x