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English
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Published:
2025-11-08
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1,727
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1/1
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sleepless nights with dan

Summary:

The thing was, Phil knew what Dan looked like turned on. Cheeks flushed, pupils widened, that hungry expression on his face. But Dan’s eyes had tracked over the woman in the gif with curiosity more than anything else. Do you even like looking at any of that shit, Phil wanted to ask, because you’re always grumpy afterwards and I feel like you’re pulling away, but he knew that whatever the real answer was, Dan would say yes.

Notes:

broke out the M rating for a special occasion. I tried really hard to get into the headspace of someone who thinks men are hot I hope it worked

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

“It’s late,” Phil said, sticking his head into the lounge.

“Really,” Dan muttered, staring at his laptop screen. “I hadn’t noticed.” That half-sarcastic tone that meant genuinely, he hadn’t noticed, but he wasn’t going to admit it.

Phil walked over to ruffle Dan’s hair, because he knew Dan hated it when Phil messed up his hair, but it was late enough in the day that there was no real harm done. “That’s why you have me. So you don’t have to notice things.”

Dan snorted. “Yeah, that’s what I have you for. So that I don’t need to know what time it is.”

“Exactly,” Phil said, ignoring the clear sarcasm in Dan’s voice. “What are you doing, anyways?”

“Nothing,” Dan said evasively.

Phil stuck his head over Dan’s shoulder, because they didn’t keep secrets and he was nosy as fuck. “Why are you looking at porn in our living room?” he asked.

Dan clutched his laptop closer to his chest. “What, is it, like, a sacred space now? We literally had sex here last week.”

“No,” Phil said, trying to defend himself. “It’s just a weird place to look at porn.”

“It’s not like I came in here to look at porn,” Dan argued. “It just came up on my dashboard. You know how tumblr is.”

“Don’t you care if anyone sees you?” Phil asked.

“Oh no,” Dan deadpanned. “What if you find out what I’m into in bed?”

Phil laughed. He looked over Dan’s shoulder again. “Topless women? I’m not sure I can replicate that.”

“Are you jealous?” Dan asked, curious.

“No,” Phil said. He wasn’t the jealous type, but if he was going to pick apart problems in his relationship, none of them were caused by pixels on a screen.

Dan stared at him. “Okay, then,” he said, finally.

Phil slid into his spot next to Dan, so close he was nearly in his lap. “My tits are better than hers anyways,” he whispered.

Dan laughed, and Phil leaned away, smiling. “Oh, yeah?” He chased Phil’s face with his own, resting their foreheads together. His hand slid up to rest on Phil’s chest. “I don’t know. The only way to be sure is if you take off your shirt so I can check.”

Phil pulled his shirt off, and Dan’s gaze fell to his chest. “So? Have you decided?” Phil grinned. “Do you need a closer look?”

“I’m— I’m supposed to be working,” Dan said. “Why are you distracting me?”

“Mate,” Phil said. “You started it. And you were already distracted when I came in.”

Dan scowled. “Insulting my work ethic is not the way to my heart.”

“Aww, baby,” Phil cooed, “Who said it’s your heart that I’m after?” He snickered, trying to climb into Dan’s lap, but Dan pushed him off.

“You’re a nightmare,” he said.

Phil kept giggling, still laughing at his own joke. “You like it.”

“Whether or not I like it has nothing to do with whether or not it’s true.” Dan scowled, and it was a little unnerving how pretty he looked when he did that.

It wasn’t that Phil was hurt by the rejection. He was an adult, and they had been at this for more than five years; he knew how to take no for an answer. But it wasn’t in character for Dan, even if he was busy. “Are you okay?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” Dan said shortly, which always meant he wasn’t fine.

“I’m sorry,” Phil said.

“Really. It’s fine.” Dan typed something on his laptop, staring steadfastly at his screen. “I’m just procrastinating.”

“With tumblr porn?”

Dan rolled his eyes. “With tumblr. The tumblr porn just came up.”

“And you clicked through to their blog.”

Dan shrugged.

The thing was, Phil knew what Dan looked like turned on. Cheeks flushed, pupils widened, that hungry expression on his face. But Dan’s eyes had tracked over the woman in the gif with curiosity more than anything else. Do you even like looking at any of that shit, Phil wanted to ask, because you’re always grumpy afterwards and I feel like you’re pulling away, but he knew that whatever the real answer was, Dan would say yes.

Dan got in moods like this sometimes. It was just the way he was. But Phil never stopped feeling like it was his job to pull Dan out of them. “Come to bed,” he said. “We don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to. Just sleep.”

“I had some writing I wanted to finish.” Dan was avoiding eye contact. “I’ll be up pretty late, I think. Go to bed without me. I’ll sleep in my room so I don’t wake you up.”

“I want you to wake me up,” Phil said.

Dan snorted. “Yeah, you say that now.”

“Every day. For the rest of my life.”

Dan looked up to eye him skeptically. “Sap.”

“You love it,” Phil said automatically.

Dan looked back at his computer screen. “I don’t love when you’re grumpy in the mornings, though.”

“Come on,” Phil pleaded.

“Stop it. Go to bed,” Dan said.

“Not without you,” Phil said stubbornly.

“If you’re waiting for me, you’ll be here a while.”

Phil suppressed a yawn. “Don’t care.” He ducked his head under Dan’s arm to rest it in his lap.

“What are you— okay,” Dan said, raising his arm to make room for Phil before draping it over Phil’s neck so he could still reach his keyboard. “You need to get some extra pillows, mate, I don’t know if you know this, but I’m actually a human being and not your personal cushion.”

“Hmm?” Phil asked, acting confused. “Since when?”

Dan jostled him. “Fuck off.”

“No,” Phil said, relaxing into Dan’s body heat.

“Fine,” Dan said. He kept typing, or at least tried to, around Phil’s head. “Be like that. Just don’t make it my problem in the morning.”

Phil suppressed a yawn. “What’re you working on?”

“Diss track,” Dan said. “New video.” He hit the delete key and frowned. “Rap music is hard.”

“Who’re you dissing?”

“Me,” Dan said. He rolled his eyes at the look Phil gave him. “Come on, Phil, don’t lecture me about self-esteem. I’m fine, it’s just a funny bit of self-deprecation.”

“Hmm,” Phil said, turning his head to look at Dan’s screen. He had a mostly empty document open, with just a few lines written. You look like a ??????, Winnie the Pooh + slenderman, and then, at the very bottom, wtf even is your sexuality? “You—”

“Don’t look at my script before it’s done,” Dan said, switching back to the tumblr tab.

“Stop making me look at straight porn,” Phil complained.

“It’s not really any sexuality if there’s only one person in it,” Dan pointed out. “And I’m not forcing you to look at anything. You’re not my prisoner, you can leave whenever you want.”

His last sentence was pointed, a suggestion that “whenever you want” should be as soon as possible, but Phil ignored it. “Why do you look at that?”

Dan stiffened. “Come on, Phil, you know why people look at porn. What do you mean?”

“I don’t know,” Phil said. “It always makes you sad.”

“If I want to look at shit that makes me sad, I’ll look at shit that makes me sad.” Dan hit the keyboard with more force than usual.

“It makes me sad,” Phil said. “When you’re sad.”

Dan’s fingers stopped. He looked at Phil with a hurt expression on his face.

Phil reached a sleepy hand up to touch the crease between Dan’s eyes. “You’re frowning.”

Dan picked up Phil’s hand and moved it away, gently placing it back onto Phil’s chest. “Go to sleep, Phil.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Phil protested.

“I know,” Dan said. “Just sleep.”

Phil let his eyes fall shut.

He woke up to someone trying, and failing, to pick him up.

Dan stood over him, rubbing his neck sheepishly. “I, uh, thought I’d carry you to bed.”

Phil’s body still felt heavy from sleep. “What the fuck?”

“You’re a lot heavier when you’re asleep,” Dan said. “I really thought I could do it.”

“You couldn’t,” Phil said.

Dan rolled his eyes. “Thanks for pointing out the obvious.” He shifted from foot to foot. “So, uh, are you sleeping on the couch?”

“No,” Phil said. He adjusted his glasses, which had been knocked askew while he was asleep. “I’m coming to bed.”

Some of the tension seemed to bleed out of Dan’s posture. “You’re not that cross with me, then?”

Phil frowned. He stood to pull Dan into a hug. “Dan, I’m not cross with you at all.”

Even after more than five years of practice, it sometimes seemed like Dan didn’t know how to be hugged. He just stood there, until Phil pulled him even closer and he let his head fall to rest on Phil’s shoulder. Phil could feel the tickle of his breath, the flutter of his eyelashes when he blinked. “Sorry,” he said quietly.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for.”

Dan gave a half-laugh, half-sob. “I’m a mess.”

“Come to bed,” Phil said, combing his hands through Dan’s hair, which was starting to curl. “You’ll feel better after a good night’s sleep.”

Dan gave a wet, exasperated sigh. “If I ever get one.”

“I’ll tire you out,” Phil whispered, squeezing Dan’s waist.

Dan laughed, pulling back to look Phil in the eyes. “Thank you.”

Phil grinned, pulling at the neckline of Dan’s shirt with his teeth. “I mean, it’s not much of a hardship.”

“You’re ridiculous,” Dan said, in that voice so soft it made all of his insults sound like terms of endearment. “And I need to get you back to bed or you’re not going to get a good night’s sleep, and we’ll both have a bad day.”

Phil yawned. “Fine.” He let Dan go to bed first, then followed him, turning off the lights as he went. He crawled into bed in the dark, his legs bumping into Dan’s before he realized Dan was closer to Phil’s side of the bed than usual.

“Sorry,” Dan said, scooting away.

“No,” Phil said. “Come back.”

Dan sighed and shuffled closer, but not close enough for Phil’s liking. Phil closed the rest of the distance, burying his face in Dan’s hair.

Dan made a sleepy, contented noise. And then, they fell asleep.

Notes:

sometimes I feel like dan and phil come to life on my page just to try to have sex together and make my life difficult

thank you for reading, I am breaking my rule about not posting when I have one of the migraines that makes me kind of stupid but I'm sure it's fine. Last time I did this I posted someone else's fic link in my tumblr post but like it's fine probably. reblog this fic on tumblr to prove me wrong somehow and kudos and comment to tell me I'm so brave for prioritizing yaoi over my chronic health condition(s). as phil would want