‘That sounds chilly.’
‘Yes, unbelievable. But luckily I live in a very small flat with basically only three very small rooms and a shower room and I managed to get some very efficient fan heaters, so all was well within a few hours.’
‘Lucky. So whereabouts do you live? Sasha said Fulham?’
‘Yep. In a tiny flat above a busy restaurant, but it’s mine – other than being mortgaged to the hilt – and it’s a great location. Walking distance to work.’
‘So you must feel kind of like a Londoner now,’ Evie said. Dan had been to university in London and had just stayed. ‘I still feel a little bit, like,woah, about the traffic, the Tube, all thepeople, the noise. I mean, it’s great, because, you know, the restaurants and the shops and the theatres and the cinemas, just everything, and it’s allopenall the time, and I’m having a lot of fun, and I’m lucky because I have some university friends living nearby plus the teachers at school are lovely and there’s a lot of social stuff amongst the staff, but it’s abigchange. Okay, and that sounded ridiculously country bumpkin and underlinedexactlywhy it was time for me to finally live by myself.’
Dan laughed. ‘Yeah, I can imagine. And, yeah, it’s been a long time now that I’ve been here. I can’t totally imagine living in the countryside as an adult. Shit, maybe it’s time formeto make a change.’
‘Where would you go if youweregoing to leave London?’
‘Literally no idea. I’m too busy to ever think.’ The car in front of them turned out. ‘Finally,’ Dan said, edging forwards, right up to the junction.
‘Yeah, I can imagine. It took me years to decide where I was going before I finally moved out of Mum’s.’
Dan put his foot down for a very cheeky right turn onto a main road.
‘Woah,’ Evie said, holding onto the side of her seat.
‘Woah?’ Dan said, eyes focused on the traffic as they waited at a roundabout. ‘That was nothing. You never get anywhere in London if you wait for big gaps in the traffic.’
He screeched out onto the roundabout between a bus and a Range Rover and Evie said, ‘Woah,’ again.
‘Really?’ Dan said.
‘Yes, really.’ Notreallyreally. The strange thing was that he was definitely quite an aggressive driver but at the same time you felt like he was a very safe one. He had his shirt sleeve rolled up and his forearm and hand lookedgreaton the gear stick. So great that if you thought about it, it definitely gave you stomach flutters. And, really,what? This was embarrassing, even just as a thoughtthat he definitely wasn’t going to know about. ‘So do you have a Christmas playlist for the journey?’
Dan shook his head, his eyes still focused on the road ahead. ‘Nope.’
‘Well then,’ Evie said, ‘you’re going to besograteful to Sasha for suggesting that you give me a lift. And tomefor having only the best playlistever.’ Maybe she was being ateensybit over-excitable just in case he’d noticed her lusting after hisarm, for God’s sake.
‘Okay. Are you going to talk me through it or are you going to surprise me?’
‘I mean, I’dliketo say I’m going to surprise you, but it’s a Christmas playlist. How surprising could it be?’
‘I’m pretty sure there are some weird Christmas songs around.’
‘Yeah, I don’t love the weird ones.’
‘Do you likebadones, though?’
‘No, I don’t. All my choices are very, very good.’
‘Okay, hit me with your list.’
‘Actually, first I want to know what you think I have on it. What do you think my top three Christmas songs are? And what are your top three Christmas songs?’
‘Hmm.’ Dan whizzed through some lights very much on the turning-to-red part of amber and Evie yelped. ‘Seriously. You have to drive like this if you’re going to get anywhere. Right. Yours. “Do They Know It’s Christmas?”, “Last Christmas” and I’m going to go out on a limb and say that you have some actual carols in there. And for mine, tricky. Hmm. Maybe “Merry Xmas Everybody”,because that always gets a party going. I do like “Do They Know It’s Christmas?”.I’m struggling to think of three that I like. Maybe that old Kirsty MacColl one. Or “I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday”.I don’t know really.’
‘Interesting,’ Evie said, wishing that she had something unusual and cool in there. She pressed play and ‘Driving Home for Christmas’ started.
‘Nice,’ said Dan, nodding in an appreciative way, and tapping the steering wheel in time to the music. ‘I like a song that describes exactly what you’re doing. Good choice.’
‘Thank you,’ said Evie. ‘I am indeed a song-choosing genius.’
The second song was ‘Do They Know It’s Christmas?’.
