Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

A wig. Phil, even though he knew nobody sane would be up this early and see them together, made Dan wear a fucking wig just to enter his hotel room.

Dan wasn’t necessarily angry at this, considering the fact that he was already very feminine, but having to disguise himself didn’t exactly please him. There were few things that Dan had to cling to his masculinity, and his hair (although it was longer than the average guy’s) was one of them. And now it was stuffed in a long red-ish wig. Not cool.

But nonetheless, he was okay with playing along in Phil’s act to distract the public from what was really happening, if only for a second. Only for a second, Dan repeated to himself as they entered the hotel and made their way to Phil’s hotel room.

“Stay out here for just a minute?” Phil asked quietly before opening the door to his suite.

“Why? Do you need to make the bed? I’m a teenager Phil, you don’t need to impress me,” Dan replied, clearly content with his humour.

“Just hold on a second,” Phil said as he entered as quickly as possible.

There was a lot of noise for a moment as Phil tried his best to put together all that was in the fridge into some sort of snack plate. Dan waited outside the door wondering what the hell could possibly be going on in there. Phil couldn’t be cleaning the place, could he? Surely not after housekeeping had gone through. And there was nothing else to be doing, was there?

Dan knocked on the door impatiently, making Phil half-hurry into making the crackers and leftover pizza pretty enough to make him look like the romantic he secretly was and fully hurry to open the door as soon as he was done. After all, there was nothing about what he wanted to do tonight that made him want to wait.

“Fucking finally. This wig kills,” Dan stated as he walked into the suite, immediately throwing the ginger hair onto the table by the door. “What took you so long anyways?”

“Oh, you know, just getting some food out for the guest,” The other boy said, gesturing to the cheese and crackers scattered on a plate next to a half-empty pizza box.

“Wow, impressive,” Dan joked sarcastically.

“Why thank you,” Phil played along in a mock posh accent, “anything for the princess”.

Dan laughed at this, “Phil, I am probably the exact opposite of a princess”.

“I don’t know. You dress like one, you act like one. And I’m sure that with some minor convincing you could be screaming Dadd-”

“No!” Dan flushed, “Not yet anyways…”

“Are my ears deceiving me or did I just uncover Daniel Howell’s secret kink?”

“Definitely not.”

Phil stared at him for a moment, arms crossed, unconvinced.

“Okay maybe not,” Dan said, to Phil’s amusement.

“Either way, I’m treating you like a princess. And speaking of treat, would you like some wine?”

“Of course I do.”

“Alright. It’s red Jacob’s Creek if you were wondering,” Phil stated as he walked to the bar to get out two glasses and pour some of the liquid courage into each.

“I honestly couldn’t care less unless it tasted like vomit.”

“It won’t, and that’s a promise,” Phil chuckled.

“So what do you want to do, other than sit around and eat snacks until sunrise,” Dan said as he sat on the couch and stared out the window at the city. He’d never seen it from this high up at night, and it was absolutely stunning.

“Well, my buddy just gave me a little game of Cards Against Humanity if you’re into that,” Phil offered as he handed Dan his glass of wine.

“Drinking and being offensive? Of course I’m up for that,” Dan smiled, taking his glass of wine gratefully.

As Phil set his glass of wine down and got up to search through his suitcase for the box, Dan stared out at the open night’s sky. They were on the 19th floor, and Dan had never been up that high at night before, so the view to him was about as new as it was to Phil. And it was absolutely stunning. Buildings flooded the ground with their lights with promises of comfort or luxury or money. There were hardly any cars on the roads due to the time, and only a few people shamefully walking home from their nights of drunken sex and yelling to get a point across. Suddenly it felt as if, from the ground, their issues were mountains waiting to be climbed, but from up there every problem in the world was so tiny a bumblebee could crush it.

Dan gave a small giggle at his sudden late-night metaphors and Phil sat down with a small red box in hand.

“Alright, let’s be offensive,” Phil spoke, turning Dan’s train of thought around to focus on the boy he was with.

“Crabs Adjust Humidity?” Dan read the box as the other boy started dealing cards.

“Yeah, it’s like a travel version I think. Or an expansion. You know how to play, right?”

“Who doesn’t?”

“Sane people,” Phil joked, laying out the cards on the sofa. “But anyways, pick your cards, any cards”.

Dan proceeded to take from the deck as Phil chose his own cards and took another large sip from his glass of wine, getting only the slightest bit tipsy, but still enough to pass off any mistakes as drunken thoughts. They had just started playing when Phil came up with an idea.

“Okay. Just a thought, but , what if we make a bet,” he offered the younger boy, taking another sip of his wine.

“What kind of bet?”

“The kind where whoever wins gets to choose what we do after this.”

“Okay, I’m listening,” Dan looked at Phil, expecting just a bit more elaboration. After a few moments of them both thinking, he knew exactly what he had wanted. “How about... If I win, you’ll have to take me wherever I want to go in the world.”

“Hmmm…” Phil thought for a moment as he fiddled with the edge of a card, “And if I win, I get to do whatever I want to you.”

Dan paused for a moment, struck by the words in which he knew the exact meaning, even if it wasn’t really said. He would have to have sex. With Phil. With a person he had just met. And in the wierdest way to him, he honestly wanted to do it.

“I don’t usually have sex on the first date,” he confessed. It’s true that Dan slept around a bit, but he usually had one rule: not just after meeting somebody. Maybe he would just have to make an exception.

After a few awkward seconds of Phil wondering if he could take back his words and Dan realising that whatever situation this was, he loved it, Phil leaned in, centimeters from Dan’s face.

“Then win.” he said in a voice that was nearly a whisper.

“We have a deal, then,” Dan replied, making almost daring eye contact with the man in front of him before pulling away and looking to his cards to continue the game.

The rounds continued, no more provocative than before but filled with more ironic winking from Dan and fits of giggles from both of the men who knew that ‘Plowing that ass like a New England corn farmer’ could most definitely be another one of their early-morning activities. For a while, it almost seemed like Dan was going to win and be taken to God knows where, until Phil got ‘I’m not like the rest of you. I’m too rich and busy for the miracle of childbirth ’ and their scores tied.

Phil let out a laugh of victory.

“9 to 9! Now all I have to do is get one more and I win!”

“Oh, not so fast. I’m a natural at this game, clearly I’ll win over some pretty superstar,” Dan teased, getting borderline too close to Phil’s face as he spoke.

“We’ll see about that, you camel ass!”

“What the fuck is a camel ass?”

“You, clearly.”

Phil reached for the next card at the top of the pile and read it out loud: “Here at the Academy for Gifted Children, we allow students to explore blank at their own pace.”

Both boys stared at their cards briefly, before deciding on their cards and saying “got it.”

“Okay are you ready for this?” Dan said, clearly chuckling on what he had on his card.

“As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“Okay okay, so. “Here at the Academy for Gifted Children, we allow students to explore driving into a tornado to learn about tornadoes at their own pace,” he said, giggling throughout his whole sentence.

“Hmm… A fair challenge, but I think that mine is much better,” Phil laughed with him.

“Then what are you waiting for? Say it already!”

Phil tried to compose himself, returning to his mock-posh accent and posture that made Dan laugh just a tad harder.

“Here at the Academy for Gifted Children,” he started, sounding like he could actually be the headmaster of a preppy private school, “we allow students to explore being white at their own pace.”

Dan stared at Phil for a moment, feeling tragically defeated by the probably too offensive statement but also cracking up because it was funnier than his could ever aspire to be.

“So I guess I win then,” Phil said, basing the assumption off of Dan’s tipsy fit of laughter and his own opinion of which card is funnier.

“Sadly, yes.”

“What do you mean sadly? You don’t look too upset.”

“Okay maybe not,” Dan said, gathering the cards in a pile and moving them onto the coffee table so that he could move closer to Phil.

“Besides, in what universe is my victory a bad thing?” Phil asked, shifting towards Dan.

“None, really. So now that you have me, what do you think you’re going to do?”

Phil though for a moment, before grabbing brunette’s hips and pulling him into his lap.

“I don’t know. How about… This!” He exclaimed as he started to tickle Dan’s stomach, attacking him so much that he sat up and tried to move away. This new position, however, only allowed Phil more access to his neck and back, making Dan cry out  with laughter as he most definitely couldn’t be touched there without bursting into laughter or slapping somebody’s hand away. In this case, he tried to do both.

“Ph-phil! S-stop it!” He laughed, lying down on his back to prevent Phil from touching his neck and letting Phil fall forwards to lay between his legs.

“Never!” Phil Stated as he continued to tickle Dan’s stomach and sides until Dan started kicking him away. “Okay fine, I’ll stop!”

“Finally! And who gave you the right to tickle me?”

“You said I could do whatever I wanted.”

“I thought that meant you fucking me into an alternate dimension, not tickling me like a child.”

“Well as much as I like this, the other option could be arranged,” Phil said with a smirk, resting his head on Dan’s stomach.

“So is this where we start then? You between my legs on a high of cheap wine?”

“Sadly, no,” Phil said, shimmying down to leave a brief kiss to Dan’s lower stomach before getting up and taking both of their wine glasses to the mini-kitchen.

“Hey! You can’t just leave me here!” Dan said from the other side of the wall.

“I can do a lot of things, Danny. And this is probably the best one,” Phil replied as he set the glasses on the countertop and looked out the  massive window at the city, wondering what to do with the boy.

Suddenly, he had an idea. He ran to the bedroom, rummaging through his belongings before grabbing exactly what he needed and heading back to the kitchen. After placing the materials in the cabinet, he went back to the living room to get Dan, who seemed to be staring longingly out the window at the darkened world. With what Phil had planned, his thoughts could continue later. After all, he needed to get one last activity out of the way before tying the time to a close.