“Could I, uh.” Ezra cleared his throat. “Could I get in on that order? I haven’t had fish and chips since that conference in Edinburgh, and I’m hungry.”
“No,” Diwa said. “You’re going to a hotel. You can eat by yourself off a tray.”
“Diwa,” Colin said.
Diwa turned back to the app again. “What fish do you want?”
“Flake.”
Colin shook his head. “You don’t want flake.”
Ezra blinked. “I don’t?”
“It’s shark. They batter it because it’s cheap and falls apart on the fork, and it tastes of nothing. You haven’t come all the way from the US to eat a fish that tastes of nothing.” Colin picked up the glass of water Diwa had set down in front of him and took a sip. “Have the haddock. It’s a better fish.”
“Haddock,” Ezra said. “I’ll have the haddock, then, please.”
Chapter Thirteen
Thefish and chips arrived in brown paper bags dark with grease, and Diwa spread it out on the kitchen island. Ezra pulled up a third stool and planted himself between them.
Colin had shaken vinegar all over the chips without asking whether anyone else wanted it first, and the smell of it cut through the kitchen with a tartness that made Diwa’s nose sting.
“So,” Ezra said, pointing a chip at Colin. “How long have you two been a thing?”
“We’re not a thing,” Colin said, at the same time Diwa said, “A while.”
Ezra looked between them and ate his chip, his grin widening.
“There was a kiss in the kitchen,” Diwa clarified. “Last week. It was a really good kiss.”
“It was fine,” Colin said.
“It was anexceptionalkiss, Colin. Don’t undersell it.”
“It was three seconds long.”
“Quality over quantity. That’s a universal principle everyone needs to live by.” Diwa turned to Ezra. “The kiss was incredible. Moving on.”
Ezra grinned and settled deeper onto his stool. He was not, under any circumstances, moving on. “Good. Don’t commit fully to him yet, Colin. You need the full picture first. You’re very lucky I’m here to give you the rundown on his many, many faults.” He pointed his chip at Diwa. “Has he told you about the Atherton thing?”
Diwa’s fork stopped. “We’re not talking about the Atherton thing.”
Colin raised a chip. “I think Iwouldlike to know about the Atherton thing.”
“So Diwa’s twenty-four,” Ezra said, already facing Colin, who had paused his inhaling of his food and was listening to Ezra intently. “We’ve just closed our Series A. Fifteen million. Diwa decides this means we need to throw a party, because he’d read somewhere that founders are supposed to throw parties. He doesn’t know any party people. His entire social circle is made out of software engineers and one guy from church. But he has a house in Atherton now. That’s a pre-requisite when you close your A. You buy a four-bedroom in Atherton that you’re going to rattle around in by yourself.”
“I had a vision for the space,” Diwa muttered.
“His vision for the space was a reformer in the living room, and flooring that he could ride his e-scooter on. That was it. That was the entire vision. Anyway. He throws this party. Hires a caterer, organises the full thing, but he doesn’t hire a bartender because he’s decided he can handle it. So he’s behind his own kitchen island, which, by the way, is the only piece of furniture in the house apart from the reformer at that point, and he’s serving drinks. He’s Googled cocktail recipes on his phone and he’s gotit propped up against the blender. He makes one mojito. It takes him eleven minutes. There’s a queue of fourteen people.”
Colin’s chip had made it to his mouth at some point during this, and Diwa watched the corner of his lip twitch.
“By the third mojito he’s abandoned the recipe and he’s just putting rum in things,” Ezra went on. “Rum and orange juice. Rum and sparkling water. At one point I watched him pour rum into a glass of milk because someone asked for a White Russian and he didn’t have Kahlúa. The woman drank it. She drank the entire thing. I think she’s in Congress now.”
“It was a perfectly serviceable drink,” Diwa defended himself.
“It was rum and milk.”
