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If there was one thing I didn’t enjoy, it was being dragged to an observatory at midnight by my overly enthusiastic family. Apparently, tonight was the closest that Mars would be for another fifteen years, and with the cloudless sky, who could resist? Me, for one. I could. Stars and constellations and planets were of no interest to me. They were simply balls of gas and rock that regularly gave me existential crises.
However, the next thing I knew, I was hiking through a dirt trail in the middle of woods with no lights. Why couldn’t I be at home, sleeping or scrolling through Tumblr? I sighed, flicking a pesky beetle off my arm before trudging after the faint outlines of my family.
We eventually reached the lookout point, where dozens of enthralled individuals gathered around telescopes that probably cost more than my life. My mum and dad and sister went off on their own, probably assuming that I was following right behind them, but I opted to stay on the outskirts of the crowd. I figured they would be a while, so I sprawled out on the dewy grass, snow angel style. Although I had to admit that listening to the grasshoppers and bullfrogs was a beautiful, authentic song, I preferred to listen to my own music. After slipping my earbuds in, I pressed shuffle on my playlist, closing my eyes and letting Tyler Joseph’s voice wash over me.
I wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but I was listening to Brendon Urie’s latest album when a heavy shoe crushed my unexpecting hand. Bright lights flashed on the backs of my eyelids as I yelped, sitting up and yanking out my earbuds.
“Who the fu--”
“OH MY GOD. I’m so sorry! Are you okay? I didn’t mean to step on your hand! I just heard Panic! and followed it and I couldn’t see you and then I stepped on you and--” As soon as I realized he hadn’t meant any harm, I wanted to reassure him, but his rambling was making it difficult for me to sort out my thoughts, so I just blurted out the first words that came to mind.
“Woah, calm down. It’s… um… fine.”
“It’s most definitely not fine! I just crushed your hand!” His voice was frantic, yet still oddly calming.
“It’s fine. Really. I’ll be alright.”
“Are you sure? Cause I can see if there’s ice somewhere or something.” Now he sounded more concerned; dare I say… worried for a strangers health?
“I appreciate the effort, but we’re out in the middle of the woods. I doubt there’s any ice.”
“Oh, right. Well, if you insist.” He paused for a moment, seemingly in thought. “What’s your name?”
I startled, surprised that he wanted to start an actual conversation. “D… Dan. Dan Howell.”
“Nice to meet you, Dan. I’m Phil Lester.”
Phil, Phil, Phil. I rolled the name around in my head a few times, getting a feel for it. “You sound like a Phil.”
I heard a huff, presumably a stifled laugh. “Thank you, I think? I’m not sure if that’s a compliment or not.”
“I’m not quite sure either, but what I’m trying to say is that your name suits your voice.”
At this point, I wished that the pitch black darkness that engulfed us would lighten up so I could get a glimpse of him. See if his voice and name would suit what he looks like as well.
“Yours doesn’t. Dan sounds like he would have a kind of nasally voice, one that’s deeper and stereotypically manly, you know?”
“Oh. But... I don’t sound like that?”
“No, not at all. The complete opposite, actually. Your voice is really clear and would be good for ASMR or singing quiet lullabies or something. And your voice is kind of high, but in a good way.”
For some reason, I was flattered by this information. “Wow. That’s, just… wow. I’ve never had anyone describe my voice like that before. You make my voice sound almost majestic.” I laugh, “I’m not sure I would be good at ASMR, or even singing, for that matter.”
He reciprocates my laugh, “What does my voice sound like? I’m really curious now.”
I had to think for a few moments before answering. His answer was very descriptive, and I felt like I couldn’t let him down. “Well, your voice is really deep and relaxed, like you’re reading a bedtime story, but then when you got excited, your voice became really animated, like you were trying to captivate an audience. It’s actually really enjoyable to listen to.”
It made me nervous with how long his pause was, but when he finally answered, he sounded sincere. “I like that. That’s a really nice description, Dan. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” Suddenly, I felt that I had to keep the conversation going and blurted out, “So, you like Panic! At The Disco?”
“Like? More like love. I’m in love with his music, and Brendon himself.” He let out an adorable giggle. “He’s ridiculously hot, don’t you think?” I’m praying my gaydar isn’t broken, ‘cause that sounded extremely gay. Maybe I can allow myself to hope.
“Oh, for sure. They don’t get any better than him.” I thought for a moment, wondering how I could get him to stay by me. “Would you… want to listen with me?” I was hoping he would pick up on my undertones and understand what I was really asking.
“I really do want to, but here’s the thing: I came to an observatory to, you know, observe. I wanted to peel myself away from technology for a night.”
Great, now I’ve made him uncomfortable and he’s trying to let me down gently. Maybe I took his hints the wrong way. Maybe he’s not gay after all and now it looks like I’m trying to seduce him and whatnot. “Oh, yeah. Yeah, of course. I mean, yeah, you came to--”
“Dan.”
The way he said my name made me instantly freeze. He sounded like he genuinely wanted me to hear something important. “What?”
“I want to hang out with you. Do you want to go stargazing with me?”
Oh. OH. Maybe he did want to get to know me? “Um… okay.”
I heard him shifting around before seeing a shadow tower over me, offering his hand. I cautiously extended my arm, gripping his hand in mine as he pulled me up. I was proud that I had managed to stay relatively cool in his presence, until I managed to screw that up too. I had just righted myself on my feet when I lost my balance and fell into him, our chests flush. My cheeks burned as I yelped, jumping back.
“Sorry! I’m… god, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to do that. I’ll just… are you sure you want me to join you? I’ll probably trip and break one of the telescopes and then--”
“Dan, I want you to join me.”
“Okay.” I went to take a step away, when I noticed that our hands were still interlocked, his cool, soft fingers laced with my clammy ones. I froze, my hand tensing immediately, causing him to freeze as well.
“Is this… okay?” He asked.
“Uh…”
Hurriedly, he added, “I mean, I don’t want us to get separated, you know? It being dark and all. I don’t wanna lose you.”
“Oh yeah, of course. We don’t want to get separated.” I smirked, glad he couldn’t see me, and then added quieter, “I don’t wanna lose you either.”
His only response was to relax his grip and give my hand a small squeeze. He gently tugged on my hand to pull me in the direction of a telescope with a few people mingling around it. We settled to a stop in line, Phil’s thumb tapping out a rhythm on the back of my hand.
“So how old are you, Dan?”
“16, how old are you?”
His thumb stilled to a stop for a fraction of a second before continuing. “I’m 20.”
Now it was my turn to still. Of course he had to be older. Hell, he was nearly an adult. And now that he knew I was an actual child compared to him, he wouldn’t want to even talk to me anymore. I couldn’t let myself be set up for that disappointment, so I thought I would beat him to the chase. “Oh, okay. I should, uh, get going right now, actually. Get back to my family, you know? It was nice talking to you.” I extracted my hand from his and turned away, feeling my throat close up. Suddenly, I felt his hand grasp my wrist, holding on with a tight grip, but loose enough to let me escape if I wanted to.
“Dan, wait.”
I forced my body to relax, and turned back towards him, keeping my eyes on the ground.
He continued, “Listen, if you have a problem with my age, fine. But don’t leave. I won’t do anything weird, we can just be friends.”
His words echoed around in my brain for a few seconds before I swallowed. “I don’t have a problem with your age.”
“Oh,” He seemed genuinely shocked. “Then… why did you want to leave?”
“I didn’t.”
He was silent for a few moments before I heard a sharp inhale. “Dan, is this your way of self-defense? You think that I care about your age?”
I hesitantly nodded, but then stopped, confused. “Well, don’t you? Care about my age, I mean.”
“No, Dan, I… Look at me, please.” My eyes stayed on the ground, but I soon felt his gentle fingers lift my chin up and I was close enough that I could feel his breath on my lips and see the paleness of his evidently blue eyes. “I don’t care that you’re 16. That doesn’t matter to me. All that I care about is that you seem like a genuine, amazing, sweet person that I want to get to know. Okay?”
“...Okay. I’m sorry.”
“No, don’t be sorry.”
I saw his lips turn up into a sort-of sad smile, and the next thing I knew, his arms were wrapped around my torso in an embrace and I was overwhelmed with his smell. He smelled like warm and clean sheets and, quite honestly, he just smelt like PHIL. I would have been perfectly content staying in his embrace forever, but the man running the telescope announced that it was our turn. I reluctantly pulled away from Phil and he took a few steps, bending down to get his eye in the eyepiece. I watched his figure as he examined the sky, until he pulled back and stared at me with awe.
“Dan, LOOK. It’s beautiful.”
I stepped up to the telescope, bending down to the eyepiece. It was about as anticlimactic as I had expected. All I saw was a floating red circle in amongst the night sky that suddenly caused me to realize how tiny and insignificant I am. I stepped back, looking in Phil’s direction.
“I don’t see it. It just looks like… nothing to me.”
“Look again. Look at the rusty orange of Mars and all the twinkling stars, and how the sky isn’t really black, it’s just a really dark blue. And look at the haze surrounding the planet and the swirls of dust where there’s probably a blazing storm happening right now.”
I sighed, but leant in again, expecting the same result as last time. However, this time I was aghast, because the sight was nothing short of spectacular. The man was saying something about how I was seeing Mars at the clearest it’s ever been, but my attention was on the glowing rusty ball in the sky, surrounded with hundreds of tiny sparkling stars. I imagined the storm that was probably occurring at this exact moment, stirring up dust clouds for as far as the eye could see. I took a step back, staring at Phil in bewilderment.
“What did you… you’re… magical, Phil. How did you make me see it? I don’t like stars or planets, but they looked beautiful after you described it to me.”
I heard him giggle, and thought I saw a tongue poke out of his mouth before he answered. “I’m not magical, Dan. I just helped you along. I knew you could see it if you weren’t so pessimistic for a second.”
“Oi. But you still… never mind.”
“It must be my captivating voice, Dan. You’re my audience. I’m trying to entertain you and show you the wonders of the world. Well, more like the galaxy I guess.”
Suddenly, the telescope operator spoke up. “Hey boys, there’s some other telescopes if you wanna look through those, but other people wanna look at this one.”
“Oh right, sorry about that.” Phil apologized, grabbing my hand and dragging me off to the side. “Do you want to look at the other telescopes? Or we could just stargaze the natural way.”
“The natural way?” I asked.
“Yeah, you know. Laying on the grass admiring the stars. Like cloud gazing but star version.”
I huffed out a laugh. “Let’s do that.”
He grinned at me, and we made our way back to the spot where I was laying before. Phil laid down first, and I laid down next to him, careful to leave space between us, but the gap was closed as he scooched closer to me. My skin prickled where his warm skin was grazing mine, and I laced my fingers through his own as we stared up at the starry night. We stared at the night sky, seeking out star constellations.
“Look,” Phil pointed up at the sky with his free hand, “There’s Orion’s Belt.”
I just saw bright stars. “Where?”
“Right…” He took my hand, directing my pointer finger to where a collection of stars lay, “...There.”
Suddenly, the stars formed what I presumed to be Orion’s Belt, “Oh! I see it!”
“Isn’t it amazing?”
I smiled gently, gazing at his excited eyes. “It is.” Suddenly, a flash of light streaked across the sky, and there was a collective gasp from the spectators.
“A shooting star!” Phil murmured. “Make a wish!” A beat of silence before, “What’d you wish for?”
“I can’t tell you, that would ruin it. Didn’t your mother ever tell you that?”
“Well, yeah, but that doesn’t keep my curiosity at bay.”
I just sighed good naturedly. “Hopefully you’ll find out soon.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“Shh. We’re supposed to be stargazing, Phil.”
I glanced over at him out of the corner of my eye to see his outline pouting adorably. He stayed silent for a few more moments, and I had just picked out the Cancer constellation when he spoke up again.
“Dan?”
“Mhm?”
“Can I put my head on your stomach?”
I looked over at him in surprise. Caught off guard, I simply responded with an “Okay.” He shifted around until his head rested on my stomach. I fought to keep my breathing steady, as not to disturb him. One minute I was staring up at the night sky intensely, and the next thing I knew, I noticed my fingers threading through Phil’s hair. I froze and quickly pulled them out.
“I’m sorry.” I stammered.
“Why? It felt really good. I like when people play with my hair.” And then, as almost an afterthought, “Keep playing with it?”
Of course, I couldn’t say no to him. “Sure.”
I returned my fingers to his hair, toying with strands of it. “Your hair is so soft.”
He chuckled softly, “Thanks.” A split second of silence before, “I don’t know what your hair feels like.”
I grinned down at him, “Is that you way of saying you wanna play with my hair?”
His sheepish pause told me what I needed to know before he responded. “Yes, I would like that very much.”
He sat up, the cool air hitting my stomach. I waited until he had gotten situated before I laid my head on his stomach, feeling the warmth it radiated. I felt his gentle hands threading through my hair a second later, and I couldn’t deny that it felt nice. He extracted one of his hands to pat my hair.
“Your hair is really fluffy. Is it curly?”
I sighed, defeated. “Right now. I normally straighten it through. I hate my curly hair.”
“I love curly hair! What colour is it?”
“Just your average brown. What’s yours?”
“Brown on you would be anything but average. Mine’s naturally a mousy brown, almost ginger, but I dye it a dark black.”
I decided to ignore the first part of his statement, “You’re ginger? No way!” I snorted involuntarily.
“Hey! There’s nothing wrong with being ginger.”
“No, there’s not. I just find it funny that you happen to be ginger.”
He huffed indignantly and rolled out from under me, causing my head to thump to the dewy grass. I rolled onto my elbows to face him.
“Hey! I said there was nothing wrong with being ginger!”
“I know.”
“Then what’d you do that for?!”
“You’re cute when you’re annoyed.”
That threw me for a loop, and I laid there in stunned silence before I noticed his face right in front of mine. Suddenly, he leant in, planting a soft kiss on the tip of my nose. My eyes widened and I was speechless. I eventually stammered out a dignified “Wha--” before he cut off any following words by pressing a kiss to my parted lips. My brain short circuited and I sat there, frozen as he kissed me. But as soon as his lips were there, they were gone. He pulled back as if my lips were searing hot coals, and he stared me in horror.
“Oh god. Dan, I’m so sorry. I didn’t even ask, I just assumed, and we’ve only known each other for a few hours and you’re probably not gay and you probably didn’t even WANT--”
This time, I cut his rambling off with a surge of confidence as I smashed my lips into his, our teeth clacking at first, but then our lips connected, and I poured my emotions into the kiss. His soft lips moved against mine with fluidity, as he brought his hand up to cup my cheek while my fingertips grazed over the exposed skin on his hips. My insides turned to warm honey, oozing around inside me, and I melted into the concaves of his body. We stayed that way until my lungs begged for air, and I regretfully pulled away from his lips.
“My wish came true.” I whispered.
“Wow,” he giggled, “Cliché much?”
“Only sometimes.”
No words were exchanged the next few seconds as we simply drank in the limited sight of each other in the dim moonlight. My eyes traced the outline of his lips and I watched him trace mine before his eyes drifted slightly to the side of my mouth. His eyes narrowed in confusion a second, before he gasped.
“Dan! You have dimples!”
I sighed, “Yes, unfortunately.”
“Oh my god, you’re literally so cute.” He grinned, and I watched his tongue poke out of the corner of his mouth.
“And you have that tongue thing!”
“Oh no, I hate that I do that.”
“What are you talking about? It’s adorable.” I laughed as he groaned, tilting his head away from me, so I leant forward to peck the corner of his mouth. “YOU’RE adorable.”
I was about to lean in to kiss him again, when my phone pinged, alerting me of a text. I sighed, pulling it out of my sweatshirt pocket to check.
“It’s from my mum,” I said, “she says we’re leaving.”
His lips pursed to form a pout. “But I want to kiss you some more.”
Suddenly, I became incredibly insecure and began panicking. “You do? This wasn’t just a one-time thing? I mean, it’s okay if it was, but I just… want it to be more?”
I saw his grin before he answered. “Hey, Dan? If it’s okay, can I get your number so I can check in on your hand?”
I was baffled into silence before I could answer. “My… my hand?”
“Yeah, from when I stepped on it earlier.”
I breathed a sigh of relief, the anxiety leaving my body. “Jesus Christ, Phil. You could reassure me instead of trying to be smooth.”
His grin grew wider. “Smooth is my middle name. I mean, I guess I could also use your number so we could go on a few dates later too.”
A grin formed on my face as I took in that information. “I like the sound of that.” I handed him my phone as he handed me his. I typed in my number with my name and we switched back phones. I looked down to see that he had saved his number under ‘Phil’, followed by an old school smiley face. I gave him one last smile before pressing a goodbye kiss to his lips and standing up.
“Goodbye, Phil. Text me?”
“Right away. Goodbye, Dan.”
I began walking away and had only made it a few yards when my phone chimed with a new text. I looked at my phone, grinning like an idiot when I saw who had texted me.
2:17: Phil :) : Is this right away enough?
2:17: dan : yes, phil, you spork
2:18: Phil :) : Am I just a spork?
2:18: Phil :) : Or am I your spork?
2:19: dan : my spork. always my spork
2:23: Phil :) : Can I change your contact name?
2:24: dan : sure idc
2:26: Phil :) : You’re now ‘starboy’.
2:27: starboy : you know i don’t really like stars tho
2:28: Phil :) : But I met you while stargazing, and you’re a boy. And you would make a very pretty starboy.
2:29: starboy : thanks :)
2:35: Phil :) : We’re like Romeo and Juliet, dontcha think? Star-crossed lovers?
2:37: starboy : … that means we’re not meant to be. and romeo and juliet died, phil
2:37: starboy : you absolute turnip
2:39: Phil :) : … Oh yeah. Not star-crossed lovers then.
2:42: Phil :) : Hey Dan, look up at the sky. Do you see anything?
2:44: starboy : i see stars…?
2:44: Phil :) : Look closer. I see something written in the stars.
2:45: starboy : what’s written in the stars, phil?
2:45: Phil :) : We are, Dan.
2:53: starboy : …
2:53: starboy : …
2:53: starboy : ffs
2:53: starboy : and you called me cliche
2:54: Phil :) : <3
2:54: starboy : <3