Phineas can’t stand the rain. Seriously, he abhors it. It reminds him of nights in the streets, cold and shaking and wet as he tried to sleep. The sound of it on the windows of their bedroom is enough to make him curl into a ball and move closer to Phillip—not that either of them mind. The rain is loud and overwhelming and doesn’t help how busy Phineas’ head already is—on another note, it means he can’t go outside so easily—so Phillip reads a book out loud and plays with the other man’s hair as they wait it out together.
Phillip is an incredibly skilled musician. At first, Phineas thought his talents ended with singing, maybe playing a couple of chords on a piano. In fact, it’s not until their anniversary, when Phillip hires a string quartet to play a piece Phineas has never heard before, that he realises. Once the other musicians have left, he asks eagerly what the music was, chattering about its beauty and his newfound adoration for romantic music until Phillip, turning red, admits it was his own composition. Phineas has never kissed him as tenderly as after his confession, and he implores him to play the violin sometime, just for him. Naturally, Phillip agrees.
When he’s stressed out, Phineas almost never leaves his hair alone, pulling at it and twisting it non-stop. Phillip begins to recognise when his partner is anxious about something from the bouncing in his knee and the hand constantly running through hair messier than usual; he always gives Phin a kiss on the forehead and makes sure he doesn’t get too caught up in his head, even if he can’t resolve whatever’s going on.
Someone (if you know who, please remind me so I can tag them!) talked about this on the Discord server and I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it Phillip is, and always has been, incredibly precise about his hair—it was one of the few things he could control when living with his parents. It gets to the point where a single strand being out of place causes him to feel out of place and, if it’s been a bad day, panic. After months of Phineas insisting he’s equally, if not more handsome with slightly messier hair, he slowly grows more comfortable with not styling it to the same degree in the house. Still, though, he has days where he wakes up and the only thing that seems to help the anxious constriction around his chest is styling his hair until every single strand is perfect; if waking up to the smell of hair product is the reason Phineas holds Phillip’s hand and makes copious volumes of tea, well—he’d never admit it.
Phillip loves learning languages and, whenever he starts a new one, Phineas makes an effort to learn to say “I love you” in it. Eventually, he begins leaving Phillip little notes around the apartment with simple phrases like “Have a good day!”—if Phillip takes them and keeps them all in a box somewhere safe, Phineas need never know. One morning, he mentions to Phineas in passing that his favourite language is French. After this, Phineas spends weeks and weeks writing, correcting and learning off by heart a page of French in secret, until he thinks he’s ready. There’s nothing grandiose or spectacular—really, nothing that would be expected of him; instead, they’re just walking through the woods side-by-side when Phineas drops onto one knee in front of Phillip. Before the other man can process the situation, Phineas starts reciting his speech. Badly. Voice shaking, he just about manages to get through the whole thing before Phillip near-yells “Sí!”. Before Phineas can react, he’s slapping his hand over his mouth and exclaiming “Ja— Ie— Yes! Fuck!”. Phineas starts laughing because goddamnit, he loves the man nodding frantically before him more than any language could express. “Even German,” he adds, winking as Phillip all but tackles him into a hug. They’re laughing and smiling and Phineas is beginning to think he’s going to suffocate if Phillip doesn’t let go soon, but he doesn’t care. Instead, he kisses his Phillip, slow and tender and as perfect as him.
Number 5 was written with the help of @silverlynxx, @nerdy-snowflake and Aulyk on the TOS discord!! <3<3<3
