Rant apparently over, Steph flushed. “Never mind. Can’t we forget that night happened and go back to being friends?”
Nero couldn’t remember him and Steph ever truly being friends, even before they’d drunk a bottle of tequila and shared a clumsy shag, but for once turning away from someone—away from Steph—didn’t feel like the right thing to do. He held out his fist. “Deal. Now . . . tell me what else Lenny said about me.”
A few hours later, Nero grabbed a carton of posh hipster fruit juice from the bar and headed upstairs. Lenny was still on the bed, but he’d migrated from the edge to sprawling out in the centre, Nero’s precious notes spread out around him, along with a healthy pile of balled-up paper.
“That had better not be my shit you’ve screwed up.”
Lenny spared him an absent glance, apparently engrossed in whatever he was doing with a sketch pad and pencil. “It’s not. I wouldn’t screw up anything of yours. You have gorgeous handwriting.”
“My chicken scratch?” Nero leaned on the doorframe. “Can’t say anyone’s ever said that to me before.”
“Well, they should’ve done. Come here.”
Nero pushed himself upright and ventured farther into the room. Lenny tapped his finger on a page of Nero’s notes. “Your letters are small, but you space out your words. That means you’re meticulous and focused, but you like your own space . . . being crowded freaks you out.”
“I ain’t scared of crowds, mate.”
“That’s not what I said. Crowded and crowds aren’t the same thing. I’ve seen you in the kitchen. You’re cool as fuck until someone steps into your zone.”
“My zone? Where do you come up with this crap?”
“I’m not done yet.” Lenny drew a light circle around a sentence Nero had written about gas-pipe placement. “See these big capital letters? That means you’re generous, but the grooves you’ve carved into the page means you’re a little uptight, that your emotions are pent up inside you. What’s your signature like? I bet it’s illegible.”
Nero scowled. “You’re the fucking doctor.”
“No, I’m not, and if you look at my handwriting, you’ll see why.” Lenny held up his own page of notes, all printed in perfectly formed—and legible—cursive script.
“You write pretty.”
Lenny laughed. “I dance pretty too.”
Nero tried to smile, but humour was hard to find when Lenny hadn’t left Pippa’s since he’d arrived, let alone danced his beautiful heart out. “I’m going to make some dinner. You hungry?”
“Not really.”
“Tough. You’re eating.”
Nero left Lenny to his witchcraft and went to the kitchen. His hand itched for his cleaver, craving the satisfaction of bashing the crap out of a big joint of meat, but he picked a small paring knife instead and set about chopping the mountain of vitamins he was planning on force-feeding to Lenny. Making another omelette felt like a cop-out, so he whizzed up some soup and made cheese toasties to have on the side.
Nero took supper into the living room, then went to the bedroom and scooped up Lenny, pencil and all, from the bed before he could protest.
“What the—” Lenny smacked Nero halfheartedly on the back. “Nero! Put me down.”
“Okay.” Nero deposited Lenny on the couch and handed him a bowl of soup. “Eat.”
Lenny took it with a resigned sigh. “Do I at least get a spoon?”
“I reckon I can stretch to that.”
Nero fetched spoons from the kitchen. Lenny took his and patted the sofa beside him. “I want company too.”
As if Nero had any intention of being elsewhere for the rest of the night. He claimed the spot next to Lenny and his own bowl of soup. “How’s the design work going?”
“No idea. You dragged me away from it, remember?” Lenny glared briefly before he took a spoonful of his dinner and his expression brightened. “How do you do that?”
“What?”
“Make a bowl of swamp shit taste so amazing?”
