“Aren’t you hot in that shirt, hun?” Phil was startled out of his thoughts by his mum’s hand on his wrist. She kept one hand on the wheel as she guided the small car around the potholes littering the streets of Manchester and gently patted his sleeve, the sleeve that hid the remnants of the previous night. Phil stiffened and subconsciously clenched his fist, the temperature was nearing 27°C and, yes, he was boiling in the plaid button down but he couldn’t figure out how to use her makeup to cover the cuts that morning and certainly wasn’t going to take the chance of someone at school noticing.
“Erm, not really? I’ve been cold all day.” The lie rolled off of his tongue easily and he crossed his fingers in his pocket, hoping that she wouldn’t detect the change in his voice.
“I hope you’re not getting sick. That could explain why you haven’t been very hungry lately.”
“Yeah, maybe.” She noticed? Phil swallowed nervously. They were almost home. Then he could escape to his room and put on his headphones and turn up the music until he couldn’t hear his heartbeat anymore.
“Oh, sweetie, I forgot to tell you this morning!” His mum exclaimed as she turned into their driveway, “We’re going to dinner with Aunt Marlene tonight, it’s her birthday next week and I wanted us to get together before she leaves for Scotland.”
“What?” Phil asked loudly, his heart rate picking up at the thought of a restaurant, filled to the brim with good smelling food and so many people watching him eat.
“Yeah, at that little place in the city with the attached bakery. I heard they switched owners a while back and your father and I have wanted to try it.” Phil’s stomach was in his throat and he tried desperately to think of a way out.
“I have so much schoolwork to do tonight, mum…” Pathetic.
“You can do it later, dear.” She turned off the car and opened her door, “I know you focus a lot on school but this is important to Marlene. She really wants to see you before she leaves! So go on upstairs and change into something nice.” Shit. But he had lost his chance and he trudged inside the house to try and find something that he didn’t look horrible in. And fix his hair. I just won’t eat anything.
Phil was finding it harder and harder to keep his promise. He had been fine at the beginning of the meal while catching up with his family and marveling at the awesome décor inside the restaurant. But now the adults were carrying on their own conversation and Phil was left to stare down at a giant plate of pasta. He had ordered the ‘Triple Cheese Rigatoni’ in the hope of avoiding wanting to eat the dish but even though he detested cheese, his stomach was growling and yowling at him to eat the damn thing. No. Phil tried to tell himself. You’ll regret it later. You know that you will. He cracked his knuckles under the table. He could become a binge eater couldn’t he? Then he would be free to eat all he wanted and look normal in front of everyone and then just discretely find a bathroom and, but I hate throwing up. Phil frowned down at the pasta that was sending an intoxicating steam into his face. He didn’t have a solution to his problems. He hated himself, but he loved food. But he also loved the emptiness he felt when he managed to refrain from eating, loved how light he felt when he knew that he hadn’t consumed anything in more than a full day. Phil felt his eyes being to burn and snapped his head up, searching for a restroom in which to let his feelings out. Instead, he found a pair of chocolate brown eyes staring at him from over his shoulder.
Startled, Phil leapt to the side and instinctively raised his hands to defend himself from those eyes holy shit and oH SHIT Phil’s chair was not equipped to handle an almost-fully-grown man hurling himself to one side of it and began to tip precariously, almost throwing him to the floor before-
“I’ve got you.” Phil felt his hands being grasped by long, soft fingers that pulled him back onto stable ground. He lifted his eyes to the brown ones of his savior and found himself unable to look away. They were not just the color of melted milk chocolate, they were filled with flecks of sunset gold and some lighter color that Phil could describe only as red, though it was so much more complex than that one word. And now they were crinkled into a smile that quickly stretched across the boy’s face. Phil’s eyes roamed over the features, seeing a thin nose and round, pale cheeks before he realized that the boy’s lips were moving and he was speaking to Phil.
“… Pasta?” Phil blinked twice and resisted the urge to fix his hair before gathering his mind together enough to reply.
“What?” The brown haired boy with the haircut mirroring his own grinned and Phil noticed a deep dimple, a dimple!, gracing his left cheek.
“Something wrong with the pasta?” He asked again, lifting his eyebrows and gesturing to Phil’s untouched plate.
“Um, no, it’s great I just… Don’t really like cheese.” Phil stammered, breathing a sigh of relief when he finished his sentence. The boy laughed, a loud, contagious peal that made Phil’s own face break into a smile.
“Then why did you get the ‘Three Cheese’?” He asked, but it wasn’t exactly a question and Phil shrugged as his face turned red, casting his eyes toward his lap and fiddling with the hem of his shirt. When he lifted his head back up, Phil watched the boy’s eyes flit away from him the second they made eye contact, as if he had been studying him while Phil wasn’t looking.
“Do you work here?” Phil blurted out when he saw the boy’s black attire and white apron. The boy lifted a hand to scratch his neck, looking a bit embarrassed.
“Yeah. My parents bought the place a couple months ago and make me wait tables.” Phil noticed the way the boy’s tone changed and the corners of his mouth turned down and he gave him a questioning look, to which the boy sighed. “I just want to bake.” He said timidly.
“Bake?” Phil asked. The boy smiled and looked a little dreamy as he replied,
“I really, really, really like baking.”
A loud “Howell!” echoed through the restaurant and the boy jumped.
“Shit.” He breathed, looking toward the door labeled STAFF ONLY before quickly turning back to face Phil. “I’ve got to go, I’m sorry.” Phil felt his lips being pulled back into a frown.
“Yeah, okay, I get it.” He said, forcing his voice to seem cheery and unaffected, after all, he had just met this boy. The boy took a couple reluctant-looking steps backward before waving awkwardly and turning around. Think of something clever, damnit!
“Um, see you around!” Was all Phil could come up with before the boy ducked into the doorway and out of sight.
Phil was certain he saw a hint of dimple returning before the boy was lost from his view.
The remainder of the night passed quickly and, to his surprise, Phil was too busy thinking of chocolate hair and matching eyes to even consider touching the now-cold pasta. In less than an hour, Phil was back in his room, lying on his bed with his headphones on. Though it wasn’t all that late, he couldn’t bear the thought of doing schoolwork and he had simply turned off the light and crawled under his blue and green covers. For the first time in many months, he did not feel heavy. He did not feel like listening to songs with screaming guitars or shouting singers. He definitely did not feel like touching the blade in his drawer.
Phil felt light. He felt airy, like he could breathe freely without choking on his thoughts. Phil pressed play on the soft acoustic rock ballad and closed his eyes, letting out a breath he had held in for too long. Phil did not toss and turn that night. He did not have nightmares. Phil just slept, and woke up excited for the future for the first time that he could remember.
