Falling for a Stranger (DannyPhantom.exe Fanfiction: Book 1)

Chapter Sixteen

I dropped my stuff right at the door and threw myself at him in a huge hug. The force of it knocked us both back onto the bed, a tangle of limbs as Danny laughed. 

"I need to go away more often," he chortled, "If this is gonna be my reception when I come back."

I pushed myself up off him and then gave him a hard slap on his shoulder after which I moved away to my desk and sat with my back to him arms crossed, fighting back the angry tears that were burning my eyes now. 

I heard his footsteps and felt my chair swivel around. His hand pulled my chin up to look into his eyes and I pulled my face away, not wanting him to see me in tears again.

"Hey," he said soothingly with a tinge of concern, peeking around to try and look me in the face, "what's wrong? I thought you were happy to see me?"

"I am," I immediately replied to the floor. 

"Then why the sudden physical abuse?" he chuckled, clearly teasing me and trying to get me to cheer up.

"Weeks Danny," I simply said out loud, finally looking him in the face. His expression darkened and he ran his hand through his hair as he always does when he was nervous or he didn't feel comfortable with a subject.

"I know you weren't active on social media and I know you had some big emergency but the least I was expecting was a call or text every now and then. You couldn't do that once?"

"I-," he began.

"I don't want your explanation now," I said quickly before he could say anything, "I am just really emotionally confused right now and I need time to think cause, on the one hand, I am ecstatic to see you and on the other hand I am so pissed that you treated me like I didn't exist for weeks and then pop up and expect us to pick up where we left off like a movie or something."

"Well you're not being such a good person either," he snapped suddenly, standing up straight and looking me in the face. 

"How is this my fault?" I retorted, my eyes creasing and my tone somewhat defensive. 

"I had a family emergency. One of my parents almost died and I had to be by their side literally 24/7. They've just now started recovering and that's why I am even back here. I didn't have time for phones or media or anything because my parent came first. So don't try and make it seem like I owe you every second of my life just cause I kissed you, Kareem. I have other obligations too besides you. Right now, you're being selfish."

"Selfish?" I replied, "I knew you had an emergency. I never expected you to spend every waking moment on the phone with me but I called and texted and left voicemails daily to find out how you and your family were doing. Did you even listen to any of them?"

"You-, you- called every day?" He asked surprised. 

"Check your phone. It's clear you haven't."

"I called you tonight," he said matter-of-factly shaking his phone at me.

"You called me on a new number tonight," I reminded him, "Check the number you gave me months ago."

He left the room at that point and returned a few minutes later with another phone in his hand which was making consistent pinging noises as no doubt all the texts and voicemails were just now coming in. He looked up at me and blinked as the phone kept going ping! ping! ping! in his hand. Finally, it quieted down. He didn't speak but he seemed to be scrolling and then he pressed the screen and my voice carried across the little room and I recognized it as the message I had left that very morning. 

'Hey Danny, It's Kareem but you knew that haha. Sending you another voicemail cause it has been weeks since I heard from you and I am actually really worried that things aren't going well with you and your family. Please just remember I am here for you if you want to talk and I miss you so very much. Call me. Take care of yourself and your family.'

The message ended.

"I left dozens of messages like that and those are just the voicemails."

"I do not know what to say," he replied.

"Well I do," I said firmly, "We are not a couple, I know this and I do not expect you to treat me like a partner or a boyfriend because we aren't. That much I am certain of. I know you do not owe me every second of your life because we kissed. People kiss all the time without meaning and now I see that ours meant nothing. It was obviously just a spur of the moment thing."

"That's not-," He began.

"Just let me finish Danny," I said with a small smile and he nodded. 

"I do not just like you because you are handsome. I like you because you're my friend and a genuinely great guy and I care about you and your family. If you interpret from me saying I didn't hear from you for weeks that I am selfish and that I want every minute of your time when I was here worrying so much I had to get counsel from Mrs. H at the library and I checked up on you every day as you can see, that's up to you. Maybe I was selfish to want to talk to you or maybe I was annoying to have sent you messages daily, I don't know. All I know is I care, do you?"

"Our kiss meant something," he assured me stepping closer, "and I didn't mean to call you selfish. I just felt like you were putting my family emergency on the back burner in favour of me always talking to you. It is clear from your many messages that you care just as much as I do."

"Yes well, I guess it was just a misunderstanding."

"Yeah."

I turned away and went to fetch my towel.

"I'm going to take a shower now," I said as I walked past him. I stopped at the bathroom door and looked at him. "I'm glad you're back Danny."

I walked away before he responded and the last sound I heard before I turned on the shower was the door to my room closing softly.