#firstchristmas

“Do you think Jonah will like his gift?” 

Dan looked over at where Phil was busy wrapping a brand new Adventure Time backpack with Jake the Dog on the front. Dan had been stifling his laughter the entire time as Phil struggled to wrap his gifts but now the tone of Phil’s voice was serious. 

Dan knew that the past few months have been really difficult on Phil. He’d just recently moved in with Dan but Dan’s son Jonah was taking the change really hard. Dan couldn’t blame him. He knew how hard it was to have divorced parents and watch one parent begin to date. So he really wasn’t surprised when the first thing Jonah ever told Phil was ‘you’ll never be my dad’. 

It hurt. A lot. For both Phil and Dan. But slowly, Phil has been trying to show Jonah how much he wants to be in his life. Dan had made it pretty clear to Phil before they began to date that he had a son and his son was always going to be a top priority and Phil understood that easily. 

Dan had told Phil that Jonah’s favorite show right now was Adventure Time so Phil went and bought him a limited edition backpack from a store he found in the city.

“He’ll love it.” Dan says. 

Phil looks up at him and smiles, but it’s clear that he is unsure. 

Dan scoots across the floor and places his hand on Phil’s arm and strokes it before leaning in and resting his head on Phil’s shoulder. “I just want him to like me.” 

The words hurt when Dan hears them come from Phil’s lips but he gets it. “I know.” He says. “I want him to too.” 

Phil continued to finish wrapping his gift and Dan eventually left his side to get up and check on Jonah who was downstairs watching a movie on the TV. Before he sits back down, he orders them all some takeaway from their favorite pizza place and then heads back up to his room with Phil. While he sits there, he tries not to focus on the fact that Phil’s eyes are suddenly puffy and his cheeks are flushed red. 

He instead gives him a kiss and then brings him back downstairs where they finish the movie with Jonah and then wait for the pizza to arrive. 

***

Christmas was harder than Dan was expecting. He tried to ignore how Jonah didn’t run down the stairs like he normally did. Instead, he leisurely stepped down each step before he made it to the bottom and walked into the living room. But Dan had to remember that Jonah was 12 now and maybe this was just all of a phase. 

When they sit down and Dan hands out everyone their gifts, he waits for Jonah to open his first. However, when Dan hands Jonah the gift that says it is from Phil, he watches as Jonah puts it off to the side and he sees the immediate fall of Phil’s face. 

“Well,” Dan says, trying to cut through the tension of the room, “Why don’t you begin to open your gifts, sweetie?” 

Jonah begins to open each one and Dan watches his open first the smaller gifts which were just some new video games for his Xbox and also some new clothing that Dan knew he would like. Eventually, he was finished with that and Dan saw him hesitantly pick up the gift from Phil. 

“I hope you like it.” 

Dan looks up to where Phil had just spoken. He was sitting on the edge of the couch, his hands grabbing the material of his pajamas right above the knee as he waited. 

Jonah didn’t say anything. He just slowly ripped open the paper with his small hands and threw it to the side with the rest of the scraps. When the bright yellow backpack comes into view, Jonah lets out a loud gasp and he’s suddenly ripping the paper open faster than Dan had seen him do all morning. 

He grabs the bag in his hands and Dan watches as he holds it up and immediately turns to Phil. “I love it!” He says, standing up from his seat on the floor. He runs over to the couch and throws himself at Phil. 

The notion makes Dan tear up as he watches Phil’s body visibly relax and his arms wrap about Jonah’s tiny frame. “I’m really glad you like it.” Phil says and Jonah pulls back to look at the backpack again. 

“Did you know that Jake the dog…” 

Dan stopped listening in because seeing Jonah smile and carry on a conversation with Phil was progress. It wasn’t a lot of progress but it was also quite a bit at the same time. It’s more than Jonah’s said to Phil in the last year of him and Phil dating. 

Later that night, Dan finds himself all alone in bed after brushing his teeth. When he slowly walks downstairs to see where Phil is, his heart melts at the sight of Phil and Jonah asleep on the couch together, his new backpack on the floor next to them, already open and filled with random items. 

That Christmas was a start and by the next year, Jonah and Phil are already closer than they’ve ever been, so much so that Jonah helps Phil propose.