Fermentation Station

Chapter 1

It was a cloudy day when Dan and his boyfriend Phil decided to take a bus to Portsmouth to visit the harbor and watch the sun set over the ocean. It wasn't supposed to be, originally, but it was England, and neither of them were surprised to be frank.

Phil had taken the window seat and was leaning his head against the glass, letting the vibrations of travel rattle his skull as he looked out into the heavy sky.

Dan brought a paperback book he'd picked up at the five and ten earlier that day and had been quietly reading to himself for the past few hours, enjoying the touch of his arm pressed against Phil's through their shirts.

Dan wasn't as fast as a reader as Phil was, but even if he had been Phil wouldn't have bothered to read over Dan's shoulder. Phil got motion sick while trying to read, and besides, he preferred to daydream. There was something about the landscape rolling by and the rhythm of the bus that created a calming effect and enabled his imagination to produce images, ideas, stories, and words at ease.

After a while Phil started to see signs of being in an ocean-side town and he expectantly adjusted himself, watching the buildings more clearly, wondering how long it would be before their stop. He was eager to get off the bus and stretch his long legs.

Dan sensed Phil's change in energy and felt him sit up. He finished the chapter he was on and closed the book without a sound, tucking it into the pocket on the inside of his jacket, which he had placed in his lap. It was chilly out, and the bus had the heat running, so both him and Phil had undressed down to their bottom layers. Phil had brought a scarf with him to wrap around his neck and lower face, but Dan didn't like having things touching his neck, opting for a newsboy cap instead.

After another few minutes the bus started to slow down as it pulled over to a little glass shelter with metal benches inside. Dan stood up and moved into the aisle quickly before any of the other passengers could, giving him room to put on his jacket as well as Phil room to move over into Dan's seat before Dan started to disembark down the aisle. Phil stood up into the aisle and followed Dan down the bus steps, running a hand through his hair.

They'd paid their fees to ride down to the coastline when they got on the bus in their home city of London. They expected to make it back later that night after spending the evening at the wharf.

The two of them stood under the shelter as they watched the bus pull away, only looking at each other when the bus had disappeared out of sight.

"Let's go," Phil gestured down the road towards where the bus had headed. Dan nodded and followed Phil. Neither of them were good at directions, so even if they could drive here themselves, they wouldn't. Phil, however, had come down to Portsmouth as a kid often to visit some of his extended family who'd lived down there at the time before they moved up north with the rest of his family. Dan could still pick up the traces of Phil's northern upbringing in his mannerisms and speech from time to time. He'd tease Phil about it, telling him he was doing it wrong, but it was a cover for how much he loved those little differences in Phil.

They walked in silence, giving Dan time to think about the two of them. They'd met on the streets of Manchester. They'd stop and spoken for a bit, and when it was clear that they'd had a lot in common, Phil invited Dan to grab a drink with him in a nearby coffee shop. It had been chilly that afternoon as well, and Dan happily agreed, as he'd just been wandering around the streets that day waiting for his family to take care of some business in the city.

The coffee date had gone well, and at the end they exchanged addresses, promising to write each other. Through their letters they became even closer, until one day Phil wrote to Dan that his family was moving to Manchester. The day Dan received that letter was one of the happiest of his life, right up there with the day Phil actually arrived, the day he and Phil realized their relationship was something more than was allowed to be, and the day that him and Phil were able to rent a small apartment together in London after Phil had decided he wanted to go to university down there and it would be helpful to have a roommate to split the costs with.