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There's something clawing at the back of his throat.
It's always been there, he thinks.
Something raw and fragile and tiny. Something he doesn't want to look into too deep. Something that shakes his hands when he’s shopping for clothes online, spending a little too long on the women’s section before quickly moving on. He’s hoping to find something that gave him the same euphoria as the soft black jumper the woman on the front page was wearing. An item that fits him the same way as it does with her to make him feel less wrong.
He's not uncomfortable in his skin. He has learned to live with his too tall limbs and dimples and hair that never sits quite the way he wants it to. He's learned to look at himself in the mirror and feel neutral.
His therapist would tell him it's a great improvement and show of growth.
He doesn't know how to explain to her that there's still an itch at the back of his throat when he looks at himself that he can't quite place. The same thing that grows and claws when someone refers to him by the pronouns he's used and felt comfortable with since birth.
It's not uncomfortable.
But it's something.
-
They're hanging out with Pj and Sophie when he asks them to refer to him with any pronouns.
Him and Phil are sat opposite of their hosts. A board game PJ had been raving about is sat on the table In front of them and the playing cards scattered over the entire table.
There's a tin of cookies to his side with a picture of a woman on it advertising the thin mints that had once been contained in the box, now replaced with PJ's most recent attempt at baking.
She's wearing a long black dress that fans out at the waist. Dan's fingers shake as he looks at her and he links his hands together to make them stop. He squeezes them for good measure as he studies the lady on the tin.
The room is silent for a few seconds after he's said it, and then Phil places a hand on his knee.
‘Of course we can, bub,’ he says quietly, and Dan has to remind himself that they've been comfortable about showing the softer sides of their relationship to their friends for ages now. He wonders why he's ever agreed to be this vulnerable with people if it means he has to have conversations like this.
‘Do you want us to use them in public? Or just with us four?’ PJ’s voice is casual but warm. Like it's a normal thing to ask of your friends, and Dan thinks he might've cried if he wasn't this nervous.
She answers a few of their questions and they resume the game. They don't talk about it more, but Phil's hand remains on her knee the entire game.
As the group alternates pronouns as if it's the easiest thing in the world, the clawing feeling in Dan’s throat lessens.
They do talk about it when they get home. Of course they do. Because Phil wants to make sure they're okay. He wants to make sure he gets what is going on so he can help the best he can while Dan figures themself out.
‘So…different pronouns?’
Dan would have laughed about the awkwardness in Phil's voice when he asked the question if her hands weren't still shaking and the thing in her throat made it hard to speak.
‘Just…trying it out. Don't know if it'll stick.’
‘Okay,’ is all Phil says and he goes to make them a coffee.
Dan is a little bewildered by how easy their partner accepts this. They shouldn’t expect anything less, really. If they allowed themself to think about it for longer than a second, they’d feel ridiculous about forgetting just how lucky they were..
With all the uncertainties that they've gone through together in the last 15 years, the one constant was Phil's unwavering love and care for him.
It stood, unmovable and certain like a pillar in his life. The one thing he could always fall back on was Phil.
Why this had been so hard to tell him, she didn't know.
Things hadn't been this difficult to share for a long, long while, and he didn't really want to dig into why this was so much harder all of a sudden.
-
He tells his friends to use whatever pronouns they feel like for him after a few weeks, and they go back to mostly using he and him out of habit. The rush he feels when Sophie uses ‘they’ in a story doesn't go unnoticed by Phil, who smiles to himself, secret and small and just for Dan to notice and smile back at.
When they end their facetime after promising to meet up in Brighton soon, Dan adjusts so he's sitting more leaned back against the sofa, becoming aware of the thing at the back of his throat still clawing and ever present.
He feels raw. Emotional in a way his anti-depressants don't usually allow, and Phil doesn't say another word as he leans over, sneaking his arms around Dan and pulling them into a hug.
Dan buries his face into the crook of Phil's neck and is only half surprised when he feels tears dampen the fabric of the jumper Phil was wearing.
They don't talk about it.
And Dan thinks she’s the luckiest person ever to have managed to keep a man so understanding of her need for space.
-
-Slightest hint of smut. Skip to the next - mark if you're uncomfortable <3 -
It's a Tuesday evening when they're laying in bed and Phil calls them a good girl between the heavy breathing and praises slipping from his lips.
It should've felt good, maybe done something for them the way it normally drives them wild when Phil throws any kind of endearment their way during sex. The way his voice goes rough and so incredibly fond while they're like this always makes their breath catch.
This time Dan feels their entire body go rigid and they stop moving all at once.
Phil, lost in the moment as he is, blinks the fog away from his eyes and looks at Dan in confusion and then rapid concern.
And then he's easing himself off of Dan with a groan, hands flying to cup their face and run his fingers underneath their eyes, thumbing tears away and oh, they are crying.
‘Honey? Dan. Dan, what's wrong? Did I do something? Was it—what happened, baby, tell me.’
Phil continues to babble at them with concern until Dan remembers that they are supposed to be responding. They curl into Phil a little more, trying to get their panicked, frantic thoughts in order. Trying to find something to calm Phil down, to show him that it was okay, that they were just overwhelmed and caught off guard.
The thing in the back of their throat is a roaring inferno.
‘ ‘m not a girl,’ is all that gets past his lips.
‘Okay. Okay, I'm sorry Dan. You're not a girl, I'll never say that again, okay honey?’
Dan hummed in response and Phil just pulled them closer. Mumbling another apology into his skin as he pressed his lips to Dan's collarbone and they both listened to the rapid thumping of Dan's heart calm down ever so slowly.
-
‘Anything except a woman,’ was the next update he gave his friends on the whole gender crisis he'd been having.
Once again, they accepted it without question, and once again, Dan needed to remind themselves that their friends were fine with this and they weren't being a bother. Sophie had told them as much, her voice taking on a stern tone as she hugged him after his explanation, and Dan tried not to think about how the tone reminded him of his mother's voice and how he'd never tell her any of this.
They were in Brighton to visit Pj and Sophie and stroll around the lanes a bit. They'd gone to the aquarium the day before, just before closing to avoid being spotted as much as possible, and they'd pointed at the jellyfish and seahorse and looked for fish that reminded them of each other. PJ had laughed loudly when an employee had told him that the fish he’d been staring at was called Phillip, and they'd all bought one of the stupidly expensive plushies in the gift shop to remember the day by.
It had been so good and happy, and Dan felt like everything was a little less heavy than it had been for the past few weeks.
The heavy feeling and the scratch at the back of his throat were back that evening as he wrapped his arms around Phil in their friend's small guest bedroom.
Tomorrow they'd go to the lanes because Dan had said he wanted to try out something new, and Sophie had told them about a small coffee shop she'd been wanting to try whose entire menu was vegan.
They'd be in public and would be stopped a lot, and Dan didn't know if they were quite ready for that while still feeling this vulnerable.
But Phil was there in their arms, his hair tickling Dan's neck as his head rested on their chest.
Phil, who had said that nothing would change between them no matter what Dan figured out about themselves.
Phil, who was so unwaveringly supportive and caring, it sometimes took Dan's breath away.
Phil, who had told them that he was going to get them the two ugliest matching shirts he could find.
Phil, who, as they stood at the very back of a cramped store full of handmade clothing and earrings that looked too heavy to wear, told him he looked pretty after Dan had poked his head out of the changing room curtain and asked Phil to step in.
The skirt he was wearing was black and went to his ankles and fanned out at the waist. A few clasps gave it the edge Dan's clothing normally had, making him feel more at ease with the new garment option.
‘Very pretty actually. You look hot.’
‘Phil!’
‘What? You asked for my opinion, didn't you?’
Phil gave him an easy smile. A genuine one, Dan found.
It was so hard to put this into words. This unrest he felt with himself and his state of being and being perceived by people.
The thing in his throat quieted down a bit as he looked over himself in the mirror.
Phil was right. They did look pretty. Soft with the way their sweater was tucked into the skirt and fell over their hands slightly. With the way the skirt swished as they turned their body a bit to look at themselves.
‘I like it too,’ they said in a quiet voice, and Phil nodded, his smile crinkling the skin next to his eyes. He gave Dan a quick peck on the lips, daring in the small space with only a curtain separating them from the outside world, and then stepped out, telling Dan to change into the next outfit so they could meet the others for coffee in time.
They got stopped three times on their way to the cafe.
Chatted and took pictures with the fans that had asked them to do so. Nobody asked about the shopping bag or the fact that the skirt was clearly visible through the see-through material, and Dan felt like he could breathe a little easier.
They sat on the train on their way home with two extra shopping bags tucked away under their chairs. Leaning against each other slightly just to feel the other's presence. Just because he could, Phil interlocked their pinkies where their hands rested next to each other, hidden from public view, and Dan felt lighter than they had in months.
-
They don't talk about it.
They don't really need to anymore.
Every so often Dan shows Phil a new term that describes how he feels. A label that seems fitting for a few days or weeks but never seems to stick. Feeling restrictive in the way the label gay had felt when he'd first come to terms with his sexuality.
Phil nods and listens every time Dan comes to him with a new one. Offers unwavering support and patience every step of the way.
And Dan keeps trying.
They try makeup. Bold colours and half successful attempts at eyeliner before it melts into something more manageable.
More Dan.
The colours are replaced with black eyeshadow or a small wing. Sometimes a single bit of colour that makes their eyes pop in a way that has Phil staring at them for moments a little longer than appropriate while they're in a Zoom meeting.
They try other clothes. Soft floor-length skirts and high-waisted jeans that shape his hips in a way he hadn't thought possible. Knee-high socks and short rocker skirts with big sweaters and the occasion choker necklace.
They try nonbinary. Agender, genderfluid, genderqueer, and a few microlabels that all seem to describe them but not fully, and that all seem like too much of an effort to try and fit into.
All of it feels new and different and right. All of it feels either great or awful depending on the day, and it keeps frustrating him.
They try high heels and ripped jeans with crop tops and lace garments, which have Phil spilling his coffee all over himself when Dan first walks in with it on
All of it feels right, but only sometimes, and it annoys Dan to no end
-
‘What if it's just like the queer thing?’ Dan says one night.
They are turned sideways on the couch so their legs drape over Phil's lap, and he is massaging their feet from where they're sore from walking in the heeled boots they'd been running errands in all day. They're in a cropped sleep shirt and one of Phil's obnoxiously bright pyjama bottoms. Hair a mess and eyeshadow slightly creasing from a day's wear.
‘Hmm?’ comes the reply from Phil. He has his eyes closed against the dim lights in their lounge as he leaves the massage as is and wraps his fingers around Dan's ankle.
Squeezing gently to urge them to keep going.
‘I've been so frustrated with the labels not fitting, so what if there just isn't one for me? If it's just Dan, just like the sexuality thing is just me.’
A small smile tugs at Phil's lips, and Dan watches it form and evolve into a bright, beautiful thing as they lock eyes.
‘Does that feel right?’ Phil asks in a quiet, overly fond voice.
‘I think so. I want to try it out first, but... I think this might work.’
Phil's thumb starts rubbing gentle circles into the skin just above his ankle as he nods slowly.
‘Okay.’
-
They don't talk about it.
There's no need to anymore.
Dan wears skirts and dresses and flared jeans around the house. Wears eyeshadow, nail polish, and lipgloss, and Phil looks at him like he's hung the stars, no matter if he's in thigh-high socks or a ratty old sweater he refuses to throw away.
They say they don't care about pronouns when asked in interviews, and Phil slips up with using 'they' in gaming videos, and none of it matters.
They've settled in their skin in a way that feels as close to home as they seem to be able to get. Comfortable and homely, and a little bit sexy when they feel like it.
And he makes jokes about gender expression and identity in videos. And he wears skirts in recordings even if nobody but him and Phil will know. And the clothes and makeup and pronouns and names don't mean anything more than what he felt like wearing that day, and that is enough.
And the thing in his throat has quieted down into a gentle purring creature. Curling up in their chest and finally, ultimately,
It lets them breathe.