Your phone buzzing is the thing that saved you from your boring-ass, Danny-less photography class. The ringer was loud and obnoxious and definitely drew the attention of thr entire class but at this point you didn't care. Your heart leaped into your throat and you rocketed from your seat, racing for the computer labs exit door as you pulled your phone free from your pocket and jammed your thumb onto the 'accept' button.

"Danny, holy shit you're alive!" Your grin stretches from ear to ear before you can even process the fact that yes, Danny is okay- he hadn't been answering the messages you'd sent him over the course of the day and you also hadn't seen him in any of your classes. You had grown concerned that he regretted the kiss you'd shared, that he never wanted to speak to you again.

"Hey, yeah," He said with a nervous chuckle, his voice sounding a little strained. You weren't given the chance to ask him if something was wrong before he spoke again, "What class are you in right now?" You scoff playfully and begin to pace, thinking his question was a little silly.

"Photography, obviously. We have this class together every Tuesday and Thursday what do-"

"Come over to my place, I can paint your nails like you asked me to." His sudden interruption causes you to stall; halting in your step, your words evaporate from your tongue and you're left to wonder why he was acting so strange. 

"W-What? I don't understand I-"

"Skip class and come over here. My mom's at work and my sister's at daycare. I could really use some company, honey, I... Just skip it." The nickname sends the golden butterflies in your stomach into a frenzy as they always do, and your grin comes back goofy and quirked. 

"I... I can't just ditch class, Danny, I-"

"Come on, that photography class is shit anyways. I can teach you better than that old hag can," At this you laugh out loud, slapping a hand over your mouth to avoid drawing out any teachers. You can imagine Danny grinning triumphantly on the other end, happy that his joke was a hit, and that makes you want to laugh even harder. 

"Jesus, Dan, you're a terrible influence on me." You let out a huff. The class was pretty boring anyways... maybe... "Fuck, fine. I'll be there in a half hour, get your nail salon set up."

"Yes!" Danny shouted, making you wince and pull the phone away from your ear, "Okay, great but wait before you hang up!" 

"What is it?" Letting out an over dramatic sigh your roll your eyes, settle your hand on your hip and begin to tap your foot mock-impatiently. 

"When you get here, promise me you won't question anything, okay?" His tone of voice shifts so suddenly that you're almost taken aback; all at once he's dead serious, and you think this must be some sort of joke.

"Yeah, sure, I promise," A giggle escapes you halfway through your sentence and Danny doesn't answer.

"I'm not joking around here, (Y/N). Just... whatever. I trust you. No questions." He pauses, "I'll see you soon sweetheart."

"Yeah, you too." With that, you hang up, and ditch your computer all-together. You have a new priority. 

---

You wipe the thin film of sweat from your forehead as you roll up to Danny's front yard, dragging your toe stop along the concrete until your motion quit completely. Turning smoothly onto the path up to his door you slid easily across the uneven concrete and let your feet thump to a stop against his bottom step. Turning to sit on the front stairs you quickly unlaced your skates and pulled them from your feet, scooping them up in your arms and taking the last paces to the front door in just your socks, not caring that they were getting a little muddy from the leftover dampness brought on by last night's heavy rain. With a quick inhale you raised your hand to knock on the door, but as you brought your fist forwards it collided with nothing but air when that door was pulled open and your heart plummeted to your feet.

"Danny, what the fuck happened to your-"

"No. Questions. You know what I said, (Y/N), be cool." Before you was Danny Johnson, one of your best friends and, let's face it, crush, with a face that looks like it had been smashed in with a bowling ball. Around his probably tear-puffed right eye was a dark ring of purple and his brow was split, a strip of butterfly tape holding the deep cut together. Below his eye was another bruise, even darker, and you could see a cut in his cheek and upper lip. Swallowing the concern that was threatening to flow off your tongue, you nodded stiffly and forced a tight smile.

"Yeah, yep, cool. Cool as a... cucumber. A very cold cucumber." With an awkward thumbs up and that fake-as-shit smile, Danny rolled his eyes.

"Good acting, sweetheart."

"Danny, you're hurt, I mean- look at you! What even happened?" With another eyeroll he went to shut the door right in your face. "Dannydannydanny wait no-!" You surge forwards, pushing your way through the door before he could shut it, "I'm calm, I'm not gonna ask any more questions," Standing haf inside of his home with a door basically closed on top of you you tried to pull up scraps of sincerity to present on your face but all you could find was fear. Danny's shoulders slumped with a sigh, and he threw his hands in the air, taking a few steps back from the door to let you step the rest of the way inside. "I'm not going to ask who you fought," You say quickly, "But I am going to ask if your cuts are clean and if you're gonna be okay. I don't want you, like, dropping dead on me." At last you finally manage to put your cares into words, and those words seem to tug just a little at Danny's heartstrings. He wears a sad smile, his golden eyes seeming to darken just slightly.

"Yeah, I... I'll be okay, my mom took care of them, I just-" Cutting himself off, Danny pulls his bottom lip between his teeth and lets out a pitiful chuckle. "I just didn't want to... be..." His gaze shifts away, "Ididn'twanttobealone." The words come out so fast you almost miss them, and then you're smiling real and warm and just a little lovestruck. Danny was being as vulnerable as he knew how. Something had obviously happened and you were the one he had turned to.

"Come on, D, let's go paint my nails. I want you to do little mushrooms, so they match yours." He seems grateful for the topic change, and his grin widens and grows more contented. 

"Whatever you say, my liege," He hums, and takes your hand in his own, fingers laced together, to lead you upstairs. Your heart explodes in a storm of fireworks at the tiny gesture, and you follow close behind. At the top of the steps he takes a sharp right towards his bedroom, and for the first time you're realizing that he's letting you see it. Danny opens his door with the hand that isn't holding your own and then holds his arm out as if presenting the place to you; it is a sight to behold.

"Wow, Danny," You laugh and take it all in. There was hardly a single scrap of open wall space, posters and drawings and photographs and even newspaper clippings pasted from floor to ceiling. There was a desk against the right wall, a closet just beside the door, and one of those cool beds with just a wooden pallet for a frame that you see on Pinterest. A beautiful chain of hearts hung from a flowerpot strung to the roof, it's lush vines a tidy chaos as they cascaded from the soil. There was a large window with blackout curtains pulled to it's either side to let sunlight stream in, highlighting everything in a warm glow. "It's so... normal." You saw your friend quirk a brow out of the corner of your eye and turned over with a teasing smirk. "I expected you to live in some dirty laundry-covered cave with a floor of empty Monster cans."

"Well, uh, that's the funny part," Danny said with a nervous chuckle, moving towards his bed and lifting the edge of the blanket to reveal a slot in the pallets with a basket tucked in between; grabbing the lip of the basket and pulling it free, he presented to you a stash of, yes, empty Monster Energy cans. There were a lot of them.

"Ah, I see. So you cleaned up for me." 

"Shut the hell up and sit down before I kick you out," You could tell he was joking and you held up your hands in mock surrender, flopping down onto his bed and pulling your legs up to sit cross-legged. "What base colour? And what colour mushrooms?"

"The same red mushrooms as yours, but make the base coat yellow." 

"Sounds good to me."

---

It turns out Danny had had quite the selection of different nail polish. He'd come back to you with at least ten different shades of yellow and you'd gotten stuck picking between two of them, so he'd offered to do accent nails with one and the rest of the fingers with another. In an easy hour he'd had all your nails dried and topcoated with more precision than you'd ever thought possible for the boy; it wasn't until your nails were done that you realised the polish on his own was gone.

"Hey, wait, now I wanna watch you repaint your own too." You had spoken up just as Danny was putting the assortment of yellows away in another box underneath his bed. He froze mid-movement as you did so, and then chuckled and shook his head. 

"Can't, sorry. Maybe next week." 

"What? Why? Come oooonnnn," You didn't hesitate to break out the most obnoxious voice you could, flopping over onto his bed and drawing out your every word. "Don't be a coward, Danny, paaaaaiiiiinnnnttttt theeeeeeemmm!" Again, he chuckled, and the bed dipped as he took  his seat where he had been sitting before. You rolled over onto your back, tipping your head so you could look at him from upside down with a frown. 

"Don't mope. You're not as cute when you mope."

"I'm always cute, thank you, and you're cute too when you have your nails painted." With mock offense Danny blew his eyes wide and gasped.

"Does that mean I'm not cute when they aren't painted?" He sounded positively aghast.

"Exactly, now you get it!" Your words come out with a giggle and you bring your hand up to hover over your mouth, your cheeks growing a little rosy. Danny's eyes began to glow with adoration, and he leaned forwards so that his face was right above yours, still upside down.

"I wish I could, hon, but my dad doesn't like me painting my nails. As soon as he fucks off for another business trip I'll let you make me paint whatever you want on 'em." And then, he leaned forwards and pecked your lips with his own. When he pulled back again your moping face turned up into a goofy-looking grin that, in turn, made Danny's smile turn into a goofy-looking grin. What was this boy doing to you? "Sound like a deal?"

"Y-Yeah," You sit up again, turning around to face Danny, and nod your head, "That sounds like a deal." Leaning in slowly, you and Danny kiss again.

(A/N): A bit of a slower chapter, but any day now I'll be posting the chapters for the dance and that's when everything really starts to pick up. I'm going on summer vacation soon, which means the chapters will probably slow for the next three weeks, but I'll still try my hardest to update for you guys! Thanks for the read, thanks for the love, and thanks for sticking with me. <3