Phil and I sat in the tent. It was a gift from Phil's father, who'd decided that sleeping in a car during all of our excursions was probably far more uncomfortable than we let on. We were too awake to sleep but too tired to do much more than mutter conversations that ran in circles until neither of us could understand what we had really been talking about in the first place.

It had been two weeks since my mother's accident, and most people had stopped treating me like porcelain. It was nice, to not have everyone tiptoeing around me, but I was surprised by how much of a difference it made, with Shane and Ryland no longer afraid to laugh uproariously and Phil not hesitating to sneak into my kitchen to steal my marshmallows. It felt normal, but also wrong. Like I shouldn't be happy, I should be crying and grieving and screaming at the stars for daring to even shine. But I wasn't.

Dean told me I was probably still in the "reconstruction" stage of my grief, but, really, I think I was past that. My mother was dead, and that was weird, and sad, but it wasn't tearing me apart. Maybe I'd been so used to being alone I'd just forgotten what it was like to have a mother in the first place.

It was thoughts like those that made me hug Phil tighter, and feel glad that he couldn't read my mind.

Sometimes, though, I wouldn't be surprised if he could. Phil wrapped his arm around my waist, pulling me closer against him. "Ding?" He said, pulling a KitKat from his overnight bag and handing it to me.

"Dong." I gave half to him and bit into the chocolate. Ding and dong was a thing we had picked up after reading about it in a book on England. We both had recently watched a documentary on Jack the Ripper, and became obsessed with the idea of moving to England and solving the crime for ourselves. We'd even bought British flags for our rooms, and signed up for culture programs at our university that would allow us to go for cheap.

Phil decided to go to a nearby college, deciding that he wanted to be a painter-architect-teacher-diver-model-person ("The person is the most important part," he confided in me, "with my beauty, and the amount of fame I'll gather, you'll have to be there so I don't lose myself in it all.") and would narrow it down to the best three options after a year studying.

I applied to the same one, so we would be dorming together that fall. It was actually a pretty good fit, seeing as how Phil wanted to be...all that, and I planned to be a writer of sorts, and the college offered courses for both. I wouldn't be able to get my BFA there, but it was a start, and it was the best college to accept me scholarship-wise.

With all the past conflicts, it almost felt like my action was falling. I was grateful. All this stress wasn't good for my complexion.

There was still a month left of summer.

"Candy for your thoughts?" Phil waved another KitKat in front of my face, the gentle swing lulling me back into reality. "There's only a few more, so decide quickly."

I shook my head and closed my eyes, willing myself back into my brain. Normally, it was a place I avoided at all costs, but here, in Phil's arms with the sound of the waves crashing gently below us, and the stars so close I felt like I could be riding the clouds, it wasn't so bad. I could handle myself, if I was around him.

I tried to remember what I had been thinking about. I must've dozed off. College, yes, and my mother...but before that. Something to do with Anthony. And Joseph. The dream came back to me, and I shook it away best I could. There was no need to let bad thoughts ruin such a perfect night.

"Are you sure?" Phil tried again. "It's quality chocolate, really. You can have left side."

Tempting. I really did like the left side. "Why don't I let you have the rest of the candy, and you can tell me what you're thinking." This was easier. Messy hair, random thoughts that seemed to just skip out of his mouth, a complete disregard for health and the food pyramid. Midnight Phil was my favorite Phil.

He smiled. "As if I could refuse that offer." Phil dumped the bag, only five more pieces left, though one was a Reese's I must've missed earlier, by his pillow and laid back down beside me. "Okay. I'm thinking about, candy, obviously, and I'm thinking about sleep, because I'm tired and it's pretty late. And I'm thinking about the stars, and whether or not they're cold up in space, or if they're lonely without even realizing why, since even they probably can't grasp the concept of ten bajillion lightyears. And I'm thinking about you."

"About me? I'm honored. All good things, I hope?"

"The best things. Did you know your hair is curly?"

"No, I did not." Seriously. Midnight. Fucking. Phil.

"It is." He touched my hair, running his fingers through it gently. Thankfully, he'd been trying to braid it earlier, so it was all brushed out. Otherwise it would've been a lot less romantic and a lot more painful. "It's almost like the waves, kind of, with the way it swoops and rolls over."

"Only you could say that and have it make any sense."

"And that's another thing, you always understand what I'm saying, even when I'm being absolutely batshit insane. And you swear, like a lot. I don't even know why. But it's kind of great."

He had a point. Dean tried to count how many times I swore during a day once, and it did not go well. Suffice to say, if I put away a dollar every time I swore, Phil and I would be in England by no time. And I would be super fucking broke.

"Is that all?" I have no shame. None.

"And I was also thinking that you must never think the same kinds of things about me."

"Oh? Why would you think that?"

If only he knew. If only Phil knew how many times Jack had caught me staring at him, and how many times he'd been able to make me jealous just by insinuating that Phil might like someone else. Or how often I sat on my roof, or ended up here, late at night, and wondered what I would have to do to kiss Phil Lester, just once. How many times I'd pushed away all possible situations (claiming I'd tripped, claiming a prank, I'd thought through them all), knowing that it would just be too mortifying.

"I don't know, Dan." He sat up and began to fiddle with one of the empty candy wrappers. "Because I'm me, and you're you. It's like asking the moon why it won't come any closer to the Earth."

"Which one are you in that?"

"The moon, obviously. The big, stupid, boring moon."

"I think the moon is beautiful. It's the Earth that's got its problems. War, famine, pollution. It's no wonder humans are always looking for new ways to escape it, really."

"I guess neither one is perfect."

"But the moon needs the Earth to be the moon, and the Earth needs the moon to function. So I guess it just kind of works."

"Yeah."

"Yeah."

We sat in a hesitant silence for a while before Phil spoke again. "Why'd you never date, anyway? You could've had anyone in school, in my school, at least, but you never did. You could've sat with Jack every day, but you chose to sit with the loser's club. I don't get it."

"You guys aren't the losers club." It was a lie; they so were. But how could I explain to Phil how awesome that was? How much I admired all of them for being themselves, so unapologetically and openly? It would take words I'd never be able to string together. "Plus, you liked me. Accepted me. That's really all I needed."

"You only get half credit for that answer."

"Damn, out of school and still failing. Alright. I didn't date anyone because I didn't like anyone. At least, probably not the people you're thinking about."

"Oh." Phil looked down. "But there was someone?"

"Yeah, but, you have to promise not to tell anyone, because they're kinda weird and also majorly out of my league."

"Who am I supposed to tell?"

He really didn't know, did he? Eyes dropped, shoulders slumped...he looked like a puppy. A really, really sad puppy. I grinned and kissed him.