Shane had messaged me, but I’d ignored him in favour of lying like a dead cockroach on my sofa and staring at the TV with a glass of vodka in hand. There was some sort of soap on, but Ihad no clue who any of them were or what was going on. My only thought was that they were all overdramatic as fuck.
There was a knock on the door, but I ignored it. I hadn’t ordered anything, so whoever it was could sod off.
Another knock, louder and more insistent, like someone was trying to hammer down the bloody door.
God, could I not wallow in my shit in peace?
“Ezra! I know you’re in there! Answer the bloody door!” Danny’s voice was like a foghorn. “If you don’t answer it, I’m coming in anyway. We both know this door is a piece of shit.”
I didn’t doubt he could knock it down. I’d seen him tackle men twice his size and nip around the ones trying to take him down. But while I was tempted to see how long it would take him, I couldn’t be arsed to deal with the mess afterwards, including explaining things to my letting agent.
Hauling myself off the sofa, I trudged to the door and yanked it open as Danny was preparing to hammer on it again. He looked a bit shocked for a second, but then he smiled and adjusted the backpack on his shoulder, bending down to grab the handles of the shopping bag on the floor next to him.
“Jesus, you look like shit,” he said as he walked past me into the flat and kicked off his trainers.
“Thanks, puppy. How sweet of you.”
“I know.”
“What are you doing here?”
He shrugged casually, holding up the bag. “You’re feeling like shit, so I’m here to look after you.”
“I don’t need looking after,” I said acerbically.
“Yeah, because vodka is a balanced meal.” He rolled his eyes and walked through towards my kitchen, leaving me standing by the door in shock.
By the time I’d come to my senses and closed the door, I could hear sounds of cooking, the smell of something spicy anddelicious luring me in. I followed my nose and found Danny unpacking several tubs on the side, spooning things onto two plates he’d fished out of the cupboard.
“I’m not sure what you like, so you don’t have to eat everything, but I got chicken biryani, lamb biryani, saag paneer, aloo gobi, tarka dal, some samosas, some chilli paneer, and some naan. Er, I think I got one garlic and one plain,” he said as he saw me. “There’s some drinks in the bag too, in case you want something other than vodka.”
“Bit bold of you to order for me,” I said. “What if I didn’t like any of this?”
He scoffed and rolled his eyes, but it seemed more fond than scathing. “Please, I know you like Indian food ’cos you went on this whole grumbling rant last week about how you missed your favourite place in Manchester, and you didn’t know where was good here. And yeah, I kinda guessed on the dishes, so I got what I like and figured we’d start from there. Also”—he gestured at his bag on the floor—“I don’t know how good your TV is, so I brought my laptop and thought we could watch a shit film. Like whateverJurassic Parkis the latest or one of theFast & Furiousones. Something fun but kinda bad where we don’t have to concentrate.”
“That sounds… lovely, thank you,” I said, caught off guard by the sweetness of the gesture.
I vaguely remembered moaning to him via Messenger when he’d sent me something about the Knights catering team making curry for lunch, and I’d been stuck in a branding meeting with sponsors. But I hadn’t expected him to take notes.
“Good. Do you want a bit of everything? Or is there anything you don’t like?”
“Everything, please.”
“Cool. You go sit down. I’ll bring it all through.”
“Yeah.” I nodded, then stood there aimlessly for a second, still fixated on the idea that Danny had brought me dinner. And not because he had to, but because I’d been upset and he wanted to look after me. Or something like that. Shane had done similar things in the past, but Danny doing it felt wildly different.
He smiled when he saw me standing there, a look in his eyes that I couldn’t place. “Go sit down,” he said again. “Find us something to watch. My laptop’s there if you need it.”
“It’s fine. I’ve got a couple of streaming services we can look through,” I said in a voice that didn’t really feel like my own.
“Sounds good.”
“Do you want a drink?”
“I’ve got some cans of Coke. I’ll have one of them. Do you want one too?”
“Yeah actually.”
