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Dan doesn’t remember exactly when he started avoiding the mirror after his showers. It’s been a few months, or at least a few weeks, but today is worse than usual. Today, he went to a pizza parlor with Phil, P.J., and Sophie, and ate half a Margherita with almost no second thought. Today, it takes him an hour to hype himself up to take a shower, because just not looking doesn’t feel like it’ll be enough.
He doesn’t want to lather soap over his body. He doesn’t want to feel how much things have changed. He doesn’t want to notice his bloated stomach, his swollen thighs, the reserves of fat around his waist. He doesn’t want to touch his face and notice the change in his jawline. What he wants is to put on a baggy black hoodie and hide. Just for a little while. Or forever, whatever works.
This morning, he looked down at his own hands as he was making Phil his coffee and the thought came to him that his wrists looked too thick. His wrists. Is that even possible? Dan honestly doesn’t know what’s worse, the way that his body has changed, or the self-pity that he’s allowed himself to drown in.
Dan doesn’t even really want to have a body right now. Right now, and not for the first time, he thinks he would be happier if he were dust in the air. He wants to be an idea, a concept. A little creature. Perhaps a cat, napping on a radiator, or a fish swimming around in a well-decorated tank. Being a human being is fucking exhausting, and he’s gotten pretty sick of it.
Dan washes, rinses, and towels himself off methodically. There’s no emotion, no deep breathing, no calm pause. He basically gets out of the shower as soon as he’s sure he doesn’t smell, and if he were sleeping alone, he’s not sure he would even bother doing that much.
But he’s not sleeping alone. When he steps out of the bathroom and makes a beeline for his dresser, searching for his thickest, blackest item of clothing to drown in, Phil is there, playing with his Nintendo switch on the bed.
“That was fast,” he says absent-mindedly, not looking up at Dan. Dan doesn’t want him to look.
“Yeh,” says Dan, followed swiftly by a quiet, “fuck.”
“Wot?” asks Phil.
“Uh… nothing,” says Dan, ever the unskilled liar, “Just can’t find my hoodie. Have you seen it? Did I leave it downstairs?”
“Your hoodie?” asks Phil, “You may have to be a bit more specific there, Danny.”
“You know, the big one.”
He could be more specific, but he doesn’t have to be. Phil frowns. “You’ve been wearing that one around the house quite a lot. I put it in the laundry.”
“Fuck,” Dan swears again.
The compulsion comes up inside him, to snap at Phil for putting his hoodie in the wash without asking. It’s a completely ridiculous thing to be upset about, and he’s not upset, at least not at Phil. He is, however, fucking furious with himself for reasons that he can’t fully explain. He’s not going to snap at Phil. He’s not going to be angry at Phil just because Phil is there and the people who Dan is actually angry with aren’t. He’s done that before and he won’t do it again. He takes a deep breath, lets it out.
“Why do you even want that hoodie anyway?” Phil asks. “It’s the middle of summer.”
It’s actually May, but Phil’s point still stands. It’s getting hot out, and for the past three consecutive nights that Dan has worn that hoodie to bed, he’s woken up dripping in sweat. It’s not comfortable for him, and it can’t be nice for Phil, either. But the alternative feels somehow even less comfortable.
Dan says nothing, hoping that Phil’s question was rhetorical, or that he’ll just drop it. No such luck.
“Dan, baby?” Phil says, his voice gentler now, the way it gets when he realizes that Dan needs his help, “What’s going on?”
“Nothing, it’s nothing,” says Dan. Phil fixes him with a soft glare, if such a thing exists. Whether or not he’s trying to stare into Dan’s soul, those piercing eyes are hard to lie to. Dan sighs. “I just… don’t feel super comfortable right now,” he says, trying to be as vague as possible. “The hoodie helps.”
Phil hums. “Because you’ve gained some weight, you mean?”
Dan jerks to look up at Phil. He can feel that he’s giving Phil his wounded animal look, he can feel it. “You’ve noticed?” Dan asks.
What a stupid question. Of course Phil has noticed. He has eyes, doesn’t he? Eyes that sometimes don’t work, but still. Some things are hard to miss.
“Yeah,” says Phil, “I never said it was a bad thing.”
Dan scoffs instead of answering, and Phil climbs out of bed, making his way across the room. He moves to wrap his arms around Dan, something that he’s done hundreds of times. Dan can’t help the way he tenses. “Don’t,” he says, before he realizes that he’s speaking. “Don’t touch my stomach.”
Phil’s frown deepens. He looks suddenly, unbearably sad. But he listens. He always listens. “Okay.” Phil drops his arms away from Dan’s waist and takes his hands instead. “Okay, whatever you want. But Dan, you know… why you’ve gained weight, right?”
Dan knows the right answer to this question, but he doesn’t want to give it, because he knows what Phil is getting at and sometimes he’s just really not in the right headspace to be kind to himself. “Well, I feel like that fucking pizza might have something to do with it.”
“No,” Phil says sternly, “Try again.”
Dan sighs. He stares at Phil, unwavering. Phil is somehow even less wavering. He has this patient look on his face that tells Dan that he’ll stand here for the rest of their lives if that’s what it takes. When Dan speaks, his voice comes out quiet. “Because of the meds.”
“That’s right,” Phil says. He sounds genuinely proud, which makes Dan feel pathetic and at peace all at once. “Dan, do you realize that six months ago, you wouldn’t have even been able to go out for pizza with your friends?”
Dan blinks against the sting behind his eyes. He refuses to cry, not right now. But Phil is right. He can’t honestly look back on being thinner with any kind of nostalgia. He was so fucking miserable. The meds have worked for him, better than he ever could have hoped. They’re just also… weighing him down. Ha ha.
“And one other thing,” says Phil, “What if I gain weight over the course of the next two months?”
Dan thinks about it, but he doesn’t have to think very long. “I can’t imagine myself caring.”
“Would you have cared if P.J. showed up today looking a little heavier than you remembered him being? Or Sophie? Or what if Louise looks different the next time we see her, or…”
Dan is now just continuously shaking his head. Phil stops rattling off examples. He gently rubs his thumb over the back of Dan’s hand, and says, “I wish you could be even half as kind to yourself as you are to any of the people you love.”
And that, that just about does it. Now Dan really is crying. Not sobbing, but still, the tears that escape through the corners of his eyes are hot and noticeable. Dan knows that they’re noticeable, because Phil kisses them away. Then, he pulls away from Dan. “Baby, you’re still dripping wet.”
Dan snorts. “That’s… what… she said?”
Phil rolls his eyes, exasperated and fond. “Walked right into that one. Why don’t you go towel yourself off properly? I’ll get you one of my hoodies to borrow. It won’t be black, but…”
Dan feels warm with gratitude. This is what Phil does. He’ll outline all the ways that he thinks Dan is being destructive, he’ll make points that Dan can’t argue against, but at the end of the day, it’s all Dan’s choice. And Dan is glad. The fact that Phil is right doesn’t change the fact that he feels like shit.
“Okay,” Dan says, his voice too thick, “Thank you.”
“Of course, love.”
Dan kisses Phil on the cheek before going back into the bathroom. He closes the door behind him and grabs the towel off the rack. He drapes it over his head, covering his face, and for a second, nothing exists except the softness of their fluffy white towels and the sound of Dan’s breathing. In for five, hold for five, out for five, just like his therapist taught him. Then, he pulls the towel away.
He’s not sure why he does it, why now. Maybe his deep breathing and Phil’s little speech have imbued him with a sense of bravery. Maybe it’s an honest to god accident. Or maybe it’s late, and he’s too tired to fight. Either way, he ends up looking in the mirror.
It’s… not great. In fact, at first, it’s just as bad as he expected. He’s not used to it, for starters. He hasn’t spent enough time looking at his new shape to get used to it. How fucked up it is, that the only way to get comfortable with something is to do something uncomfortable again and again and again.
He keeps looking. And the longer he looks, the more he notices… other things. He’s been sleeping easier, so there are no more dark circles under his eyes. His cheeks may be chubbier, but they have a healthy sort of flush about them that he quite likes. And as cliche as it sounds, there’s a certain glow in him, something that he didn’t appreciate before. Maybe he’d never seen it before. Maybe it went out when he was five. But whenever he lost it, he’s slowly getting it back. And that’s good. It’s too good, in fact, to try and hide it under baggy black clothes and petty insecurities.
Dan knows that it’s not that simple. He can’t just decide not to be bothered by his weight any more than he could just wake up and decide not to be depressed. But just like those thoughts that come to him in the middle of the night, the ones that threaten to pull him back under, he’s getting a lot better at recognizing them, giving them space to breathe, and then living alongside them, instead of getting crushed under their weight.
So he feels sad about how his body looks. He feels happy about a lot of other things. How much easier getting out of bed feels. How much he’s seen his friends this year. How much better it feels to be in his relationship.
All of it can be true at once. He contains multitudes.
Having dried himself off properly, Dan steps back out into the bedroom, where Phil is sitting with a hoodie, as promised. It’s his bright green one, the one he wears when he’s sick. He knows that it brings Phil comfort, and that that’s probably why he brought it out. But Dan is no longer in the mood.
“I’m not wearing that,” he says with disgust so fake that it’s funny, “It’s bright green.” It’s never been his favorite thing, to admit that he was wrong, or that he changed his mind.
Phil raises an eyebrow, catching on to Dan’s game immediately. “Oh yeah? Well, what will you do instead?”
Dan hums. He goes back to the dresser and pulls out a black t-shirt. “Here. At least this is black.”
Phil beams. “Alright, well. If you insist.”
“I think I do, yeah.” He pulls the shirt over his head and lies down in the bed. Phil joins him.
“Can I hold you?” Phil asks, “Or is that going to be too much?”
Dan’s heart swells in appreciation for Phil, still keeping in mind that Dan told him not to touch. Dan briefly weighs his own discomfort against the promise of having a nice, soft Phil to curl up with. It’s not even a contest.
“Please,” Dan murmurs.
Phil makes a happy little noise and pulls Dan into his arms. Dan immediately feels more physical than he wants to, and painfully aware of his body. But as Phil draws little shapes into the skin of Dan’s waist where his T-shirt has come up, his touch feels nothing but appreciative. Dan focuses on that, on the love coming through, and he drifts off to sleep.