Chapter Text
It had been a long time since Dan had last eaten out. He couldn’t actually remember the last time he’d been in a real restaurant, although this place was hardly anything fancy. It was just an Italian chain, cheap enough that he’d still be able to afford rent even if Phil ordered three courses and popular enough that he was reasonably sure they wouldn’t get food poisoning. He didn’t know what the salary of a librarian was like, but it probably managed to beat single dad working at Asda. He was starting to regret this: buying Phil a meal was a fine enough way to repay him, but buying his own meal was an unnecessary expense.
“Did you want some, uh, wine or anything?” Dan asked, flipping his menu over to glance at the drinks.
“Oh, no, I’m driving,” Phil said, shaking his head. “I live out of town, you know.” He was rambling a little, looking almost embarrassed.
“Right, yeah, of course,” Dan said, shooting him a reassuring smile. “Can we get some tap water?” he said, turning to address the waitress.
“Could I get a lemonade?” Phil said, smiling warmly at her as she turned to him. Her cheeks seemed to colour a little at that, and Dan felt a twinge of discomfort shoot through his stomach.
“Great, okay,” she said, finishing off her note. “Did you want any bread or olives while you’re choosing?”
“Oh, no thanks,” Dan said reflexively, before shooting a glance at Phil. Thankfully, he didn’t seem too keen on the idea either.
“Right, I’ll be back with your drinks in a few minutes, then.” She disappeared back around the corner, tucking her notepad into her apron.
“Any idea what you’re having?” Dan asked, casting his eye past the starters and lingering on the pasta dishes.
“I usually have a pizza,” Phil said, and he leaned across to indicate one of the pizzas with an Italian name that Dan couldn’t begin trying to pronounce. “Maybe I should try something new, though.”
“Is the pasta any good?” asked Dan, his gaze lingering for a moment on Phil’s long finger, still lightly resting on his menu.
“Think it’s all right,” Phil said, with a shrug. “I usually go for pizza, though. Ew, there’s a goat cheese one.”
“You don’t like goat cheese?” Dan tried to suppress the amused smile that automatically leapt onto his face.
“I don’t really like cheese,” he said, sounding almost apologetic about it.
“But… pizza… that’s, like...” Dan’s brain fumbled with the concept. “Cheese is like, one of the main pizza things.”
“I mean, it’s fine,” Phil said, jabbing emphatically at his menu. “I don’t mind pizza cheese, it’s just… all the other cheese.”
“Right. Okay,” Dan said. He watched Phil for a moment, then shook his head, returning his gaze to the menu. His gaze tracked automatically to the prices on the right, only moving across to look at the description of each dish once he’d checked whether he could afford it.
“I hope I haven’t offended you,” Phil said, his tone light but the look in his eyes slightly anxious as they met Dan’s.
“No, well, I do come from a long line of cheesemakers,” Dan said, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “So you have just seriously pissed off all of my ancestors, you know.”
“Oh no,” Phil said, his tongue poking between his teeth as he tried not to laugh. “I’m sorry,” he added, directing his gaze at the ceiling. That made Dan giggle, his teeth digging into his bottom lip. “So, what do you want? Just a block of cheese, I guess?”
“Yeah, that’s absolutely it,” Dan said, rolling his eyes. He glanced back down at the menu, lingering on the cheaper end of the pasta dishes. “I’m feeling pasta, I think.”
“An affront to your ancestors,” Phil said, pressing his hand against his heart. His long fingers looked particularly pale against the dark red fabric.
Dan was formulating his response when the waitress reappeared, a small tray balanced on one hand.
“Lemonade,” she said, setting it down in front of Phil, “and some water.” She set a jug on the table as well. “Have you decided what you’d like?”
“Yeah, I think so,” Dan said, exchanging glances with Phil, who nodded. “Can I have the, uh, that one.”
He indicated the cheapest pasta dish on the menu, which was essentially just penne with tomato sauce. The waitress looked over at Phil, and Dan tried to telepathically suggest that he shouldn’t order a starter. It seemed to work, as he just went for the pizza he’d pointed out earlier.
“So-” Dan said, at the same time as Phil started to speak.
“Sorry, no, you-”
“No, what was it-”
“Nothing, really, you-” Their eyes met and they both started laughing. It was the kind of laughter that was difficult to stop once it started, and it took them a good few minutes to calm down enough to try talking again. It hadn’t even been particularly funny, but every time Dan’s eyes met Phil’s he couldn’t hold back his grin.
“Sorry, I just- I was going to ask,” Phil said, his eyes twinkling. “What do you do?” He wasn’t wearing his glasses, and Dan tried to remember whether he’d seen him without them before. Without the glass between them, his eyes looked wider, a startling shade of blue.
“Oh, right,” Dan said, tearing his gaze away. He looked down at his hands instead, fiddling with the napkin. “Uh, at the moment I’m working at Asda, but, uh, it’s complicated.” He could feel the heat rising in his cheeks, and he focused his attention on the napkin, folding it in half again and again until it was too thick to fold any more. “I mean, it’s not, it’s, uh-” He broke off, internally fighting between his desire to justify himself and the knowledge that Phil didn’t need to know his entire life story.
“You don’t have to tell me,” Phil said. He was leaning on his elbows, his expression open and interested.
“I know,” Dan said, a smile tugging at the corner of his lips. “Sorry, it’s just- I know my life isn’t exactly, uh, standard?”
“I guess,” Phil said. He frowned a little. “Standard is boring, anyway.”
Dan barked a short laugh. “Well, at least I’m not boring,” he said. His cheeks felt warm as his gaze met Phil’s again. “It’s just- I mean, I guess I’m a little lost right now.”
“That’s okay. I have Google maps,” Phil said, his eyes crinkling at the corners as he tried not to laugh at his own joke.
Dan sighed, his eyes rolling even as he fought a smile. “I just- well, I don’t really know what I want to do, you know?” He ran a hand through his hair, then let it drop to the table. “I… I mean, obviously Emma is my top priority, but I don’t think she needs me working at Asda forever.”
“Well,” Phil said, a thoughtful glint in his eyes, “do you get a discount?”
“We do get a discount,” Dan admitted, with a laugh. “Don’t think it’s worth sticking around forever, though.”
“Maybe,” said Phil. “So, what was the plan pre-Emma?”
“Well, I was studying law when I met Rachel-”
“Wow, law? What a nerd.”
“Shut up,” Dan said, with a laugh. “Well, I only did one year of it, and that was enough for me, really. I don’t know what else I could do, though.”
Phil appeared to think about it for a moment. “Maybe you could be… a chef,” he said, sounding pleased with himself.
Dan snorted. “I can barely cook pasta.”
“Okay, something else, then.”
“Well, what about you?” Dan asked, keen to change the subject away from his non-existent career goals. “How did you get into, uh, librarianing? Librarising?”
“Huh, I’m not sure what the verb is,” Phil said, with a frown. He looked like he was thinking about it for a moment, before shaking his head with a smile. “I studied English language for undergrad, then I did a masters in information management, and now I just work in the library, I guess.”
“Was it always your plan?” Dan had started fiddling with his napkin again, needing something to do with his hands.
“I mean, I don’t know that I really had a plan,” Phil said, crinkling his nose. “But I guess it was always something I was interested in, if that’s what you mean.”
The sort of life trajectory Phil was describing was something very, very alien to Dan. “Yeah, I guess,” he said. “So, what else are you into?”
Phil launched into a long tirade about Buffy the Vampire Slayer that Dan could only follow so far before becoming completely lost, just about managing to hm and nod in the right places. He lost his thread when the waitress turned up with their food as he tried to help and somehow managed to make things more difficult for her.
“Oh, that does look good,” Dan said, his eyes moving from his own slightly disappointing bowl of pasta to the pizza in front of Phil.
“Mm, yeah,” Phil said. “You wanna try some?”
He lifted up a slice and held it out over the table. Dan hesitated, then leaned across, taking a delicate bite from the tip.
“Fuck, that’s good,” he said, his eyes closing as he chewed, a small moan rising up involuntarily. “Shit, maybe I should have gone for pizza instead.”
“Is the pasta good?” Phil asked.
Dan could feel himself staring as Phil took a bite from the slice he’d just shared with him. It took him a moment to tear his gaze away long enough to try his own meal. “You know what, it’s not bad,” he said, looking up to give Phil a grin before focusing his attention back on the food.
With the food there, their conversation fell into a bit of a lull, with both of them more focused on eating than talking. The pasta was good enough that Dan enjoyed it, but he still regretted not getting the pizza, and the two pounds he was saving by picking it weren’t as much of a comfort as he’d hoped.
“Would you like to see the dessert menu?” The waitress had reappeared, and was in the process of removing their now-empty plates.
“Sure,” Dan said, smiling at her. He’d budgeted for this.
“Thank you,” Phil added, as she disappeared again. “The cheesecake here is really good.”
“I thought you didn’t like cheese?” Dan said, quirking an eyebrow.
“Well, it’s not really cheese, is it?” Phil said, his tone matter-of-fact. “It’s cake.”
“It’s cake made of cheese,” Dan countered.
“It’s not cheese-cheese.”
“What the- it’s cream cheese,” Dan said, his face contorting in confusion. “That’s still cheese.”
“Is it?” Phil said, his expression looking genuinely surprised. “I thought it was just a name. Like mince pies.”
“No, it- you thought cheesecake wasn’t really made of cheese?”
“I don’t know,” Phil said, having the good grace to look a little sheepish. “I thought- well, never mind.”
“No, go on, tell me what you thought cheesecake was made of.” A wide grin was spreading across Dan’s face as he watched Phil’s cheeks flush pink. He was saved by the waitress returning with the dessert menus, which she placed in front of them before vanishing again.
“D’you want the cheesecake, then?” Dan asked, quickly scanning the small piece of card. “Or has finding out it’s actually got cheese in put you off?”
“It’s still good,” Phil said defensively. “What about you?”
Dan looked down the list again, looking through the prices. “Might get some ice cream,” he said. As usual, that was half the price of anything else.
“Right,” Phil said, nodding sagely. Dan couldn’t figure out why.
“Do you want a, uh, coffee? Or tea?” Awkwardly changing the subject seemed like the best course of action.
“No, I’d be up all night,” Phil said, shaking his head. “I had to learn the hard way not to drink coffee after five.”
“I’m not sure there’s any other way to survive uni,” Dan said, although his experience wasn’t exactly definitive there.
“Maybe not,” Phil said, with a laugh. “I’m too old for that, now, though.”
“Are you?” Dan realised he hadn’t actually asked how old Phil was. He’d just assumed they were roughly the same age, and now he was desperately hoping he hadn’t invited some middle aged creep to his daughter’s birthday.
“I’m twenty-eight.”
“Oh, that’s not old,” Dan said, with a dismissive grin.
“Well, what are you? Twenty-three?”
“Twenty-four.”
“Practically an infant.” Phil was grinning too, in a way that made something warm flutter in Dan’s chest.
The jokes continued through dessert, flowing easily in a way that made Dan feel a little lighter. The tension he’d been feeling - of spending time with someone whose life was so much more together than his own, or of worrying what Phil must think of him - was easing slightly, as it became obvious that, regardless of anything else, he was easy to talk to.
The tension came back with the bill.
“Oh, let me pay.” Phil’s hand was on the bill.
“No, shut up, it’s my treat.” As he reached for it, Dan couldn’t help but notice Phil’s hand was almost weirdly soft. Maybe he just moisturised regularly. It wasn’t greasy, though - just kind of nice.
“We can split it.”
“I’m paying,” Dan said, shooting him a warning glare.
With a sigh and a small smile, Phil withdrew his hand. He let Dan pay without further argument.