They were safe inside the car and moving on in no time.
“That was creepy as hell,” Lee said, slightly breathless, as they drove on.
“I wish I could say I wasn’t used to it, but things have been like this now and then since the show came out.”
Lee hated that for Drew. He was just a normal person. No one should have to be chased by reporters and photographers just for succeeding at what they’d always wanted to do.
It wasn’t just the restaurant. As the driver pulled up to the gate of the apartment complex where Drew was staying, they spotted a whole other gang of paparazzi.
“Shit,” Drew grumbled, slinking down in his seat a little.
Lee spoke before thinking, “Do you want to come over to my place?” he asked. “I don’t think they’ve figured out where I live yet.”
Drew looked up at him from where he’d slumped. “You wouldn’t mind?”
“Not at all,” Lee said with a smile.
“Let’s do that, then,” Drew said, relieved.
Lee gave the driver directions, and within twenty minutes, they’d left the paparazzi behind and pulled onto the quiet square where Lee lived.
“I haven’t been to this part of London yet,” Drew said once they were out of the car and had said goodbye to the driver. “It’s nice, kind of quaint.”
Drew laughed as he walked up the steps to the door of the old Victorian terraced house containing his flat. “I’ve seen pictures of when this square was first built in the eighteen-eighties,” he said, unlocking the outer door and letting them inside, then heading to the staircase that would take them up to his second-floor apartment. “It looks exactly the same now as it did back then. Exactly.”
“This is what I love about London,” Drew said, his shoulders unbunching and his expression relaxing now that they were sheltered from the greedy world outside. “The continuity between now and an earlier age is in everything.”
“It’s home,” Lee said with a shrug as they reached his front door.
He didn’t think his apartment was much to look at, but Drew glanced around in wonder as soon as they entered. “This is great,” he said, moving straight into the center of the main room and brushing his hand along the back of Lee’s small sofa. “Definitely a writer’s apartment.”
“What makes you say that?” Lee laughed, shrugging out of his jacket and hanging it on the old-fashioned coat stand he’d bought at a charity shop years ago.
Drew shrugged as he turned a circle, looking around. “It’s got character. I love the way you’ve decorated it.”
The decorations were a mish-mash of charity-shop finds and a few prints of his earlier book covers that he’d had made toward the beginning of his career. Nothing really matched, but the furnishings were all comfortable and his desk sat in the window that looked out over the garden in the center of the square.
Drew finished turning his circle and stood facing Lee. Something in his eyes was darker and deeper than Lee was expecting. And he definitely didn’t expect Drew to say, “It’s got you in it.”
Lee smiled, a fluttery feeling taking over his insides. “I’m just me,” he said, glancing down for a second like he needed a break from eye contact to remind himself this was all pretend.
“You’re perfect,” Drew said quietly and a little awkwardly. He seemed to catch himself immediately and stumbled to say, “I mean, you’re a great guy.”
“Thanks.”
The moment was way too intense for just having walked into the apartment. Lee hadn’t even had a chance to take off his shoes or offer Drew a drink yet. He hadn’t even stopped to wrap his head around the fact that Drew Oberlin was in his apartment, making eyes at him.
“Do you want to watch telly or something?” Lee offered too fast, adjusting his glasses nervously. “I can get you something to drink, tea maybe, if you’d like.” He bolted for the kitchen.
“I don’t really need anything,” Drew said watching him as he fumbled his way around the kitchen, fighting the powerful pull to put the moves on Drew and invite him to check out the bedroom. “But TV sounds nice. Or telly, as you Brits say.”
Lee laughed. It was a nervous release of energy. He moved back into the main part of the apartment. Drew walked around the far end of the couch and he walked around his end. The two of them met in the middle and just stared at each other, grinning and filling the room with charged energy, before sitting.
Sitting close and snuggled together.
“I don’t know if there’s anything good on tonight,” Lee said, snatching up the remote and turning on the TV. “There’s that new mystery-thriller thing that everyone is talking about, but I haven’t watched the first episode.”
He put the program on anyhow, then settled back into the couch with Drew.