Powder [phan]

XXVII

Phil's POV

I poked around in my food and felt Oliver's eyes on me, who had hardly let me out of sight in the past few weeks.

He even offered to stay with him, but I thankfully refused.

Suddenly I had become the one to be taken care of because Dan, unlike me, could still pretend that he was fine. I was beginning to doubt that anyone was even thinking about helping him, let alone guessing that he was still using drugs. You didn't notice it, but I knew it. I knew it as surely as I knew I wasn't taking any.

After my failed attempt to imitate him, it only became increasingly clear to me that Dan loved nothing and nobody as much as indulging in drugs. He had made up his mind, although one couldn't speak of free choice here. He had to go his own way, because I knew that otherwise we would only run into the knife together. I had to protect myself from him and yet I felt worse every morning.

"Eat something and don't just poke around in it." demanded Oliver and I looked up at him.

"I'm not hungry, okay?" I replied, annoyed. "Don't you have anything else to do?"

"No sorry. I just take care of my friends."

I pushed the plate of pasta dish away from me.

"Fuck you." I said pissed and crossed my arms in front of my body. Oliver sighed.

"What's going on?" Asked my counterpart.

"I-" I started out with some excuse, but I looked at Oliver and knew that he wouldn't let me get away so easily.

The truth was that I was only sitting here because of him. Actually, I would like to do exactly the same as Dan and rot in my apartment, ignoring all other people. But I couldn't do that to Oliver, who was slowly looked like he wasn't going to do it for long.

"I don't know how long I can take it." I confessed to him.

"What exactly?"

"Just everything. I don't know if I can still live here or continue with videos at all. It's not the same without him and people are wondering where the hell he is. And I can't give them an answer. And everything reminds me of him."

Oliver sighed sadly, but understanding.

"I kind of thought that." he said then, smiling weakly at me.

"I know that I am the one who said that you should take a break. I am really a person who wants you to be fine. That you do what makes you happy, no matter what it means. But Phil, that will kill him." He explained to me and I swallowed hard. "And even if you say again that you don't care, I know that that's not true."

I fell silent and looked at him caught until my ringtone sounded. An unknown number tried to reach me and I picked it up, which ended with me talking to Dan.

So I took the first train that went towards the hospital and ran as fast as I could towards the entrance, almost getting into the race again and again, but didn't want to draw any attention to me.

Part of me cursed myself for being here, for once again leaving everything behind for him, to assist him. But his sound on the phone had shaken me from the first second, immediately making me understand that I had to forget myself and everything he had done to me that day.

A queasy feeling crept up on me when I ran up the stairs to the entrance and saw Dan in front of me, sitting on the floor against the stone wall. I stop and looked at him speechless.

And as if he had sensed my presence, he looked up, recognized me and my body tensed and only then did I notice that he looked totally done. He hurriedly got up and came up to me, which also made me start to move until we seemed to freeze to the floor when we weren't a stride apart.