A/N: This is pure fluff. Hope you enjoy!
Danny The Spider Slayer
Danny was in the middle of eating a plate of nachos when his phone rang. He glanced between the taco chip piled high with cheese and guacamole, and his phone, wondering if the phone call would be worth the momentary sacrifice of the gastronomic perfection. Thinking that it could maybe be the office, he grudgingly put the chip back on the plate and picked up his phone.
"Hello?"
"Danny, thank God you picked up," Mindy said in a rush.
"Mindy, why are you calling me?" he asked warily. Mindy never called his cell phone. She preferred to send text message after text message with, in his opinion, an excess of exclamation points. One message there was twelve. Her calling meant that it couldn't be put into a text, which meant either the office burned down or one of her celebrity couples broke up.
"I need you to come over," she said quickly, tripping over her words as she explained that there was a spider the size of a Buick in her bedroom and this was an absolute emergency, which she emphasized by repeatedly telling him, "This is an emergency, Danny! Did you hear me? An emergency!"
"Why don't you get your neighbor to help you?"
"I can't."
"Why not?"
"Because," she said dismissively, "she found out that I've been keeping her US Weekly's that the mailman keeps accidentally putting in my mailbox."
Danny shook his head at her antics. Mindy Lahiri had to be one of the most ridiculous women he had ever encountered. And he took the subway regularly, so he encountered some truly ridiculous people.
"Look, Mindy, the Giants are playing tonight and-"
"Seriously, Danny? You're leaving me in peril because of some stupid baseball game?"
"You're not in peril," he said. "There's a spider in your bedroom."
"Exactly!" she said loudly. "Why can you not understand how terrible this is?"
"Because I have common sense."
"Okay, Danny, you said we were friends earlier today, didn't you?"
He thought back on their conversation in the doctor's lounge that afternoon and vaguely remembered saying something in that ballpark. If he remembered correctly, though, it was in response to her prodding on the subject.
"I have a feeling I'll regret saying yes," he said.
"Friends help friends out, Danny. And right now I need you to help me. So set your DVR or whatever you use at your apartment and get your butt over here!"
"Mindy-"
"Oh my God, it moved. Danny, it moved!"
"Spiders are known to do that," he said, exhaling sharply.
"Danny!" she shrieked.
"Alright, just relax," he said, standing up from the couch. He cast a despondent look at his unfinished plate of nachos. "I'll be there in fifteen minutes."
"Okay, hurry," she said. "I think I saw it eyeing my shoe collection."
He clicked his phone off and shook his head, beginning to search for his coat.
"This is why I don't have a lot of friends," he muttered.
It took Danny exactly twenty three minutes to get to Mindy's apartment. He knew this because the moment he walked into her apartment she yelled the number at him.
"This has been the longest twenty three minutes of my life!" she threw over her shoulder, scurrying back to her doorway. "It moved!"
"Again, spiders move. It's natural," he said, coming beside her.
"Yeah, well, not inside. They should be outside with nature and all that."
"Right," he said. "Now where is it?"
She pointed to the side of her room and his eyes widened when he caught sight of the rather large black spot nested in the corner. She wasn't lying about that being a big spider.
"Okay," he said, his voice taking the same decisive manner as when he was delivering a baby. "I'm going to need a chair. A nice sturdy one, not one of those fashion chairs that no one can sit on. I'm also going to need a box of tissues and a shot of whiskey."
"What's the whiskey for?"
Danny tore his gaze away from the monstrosity on her wall and said, "For after. That's a fucking huge spider."
She grinned slightly and scurried back toward the kitchen. She dragged a chair over and then went into the bathroom and emerged with a box of tissues.
"I'll pour your shot while you deal with that," she said, gesturing toward the wall. She went into the kitchen and glanced over her shoulder, watching Danny drag the chair over to beside her bed and then climb up. She turned before he got too deep into the spider-killing-business.
She didn't drink whiskey often, and her only bottle was pressed to the back of a cabinet filled largely with cereal and granola bars. She pushed aside a box of Cookie Crisp before pulling out an old bottle of Jack Daniels. She wondered if Danny was a Jack Daniels sort of guy. At the least, he didn't seem like a not Jack Daniels guy.
"Well, it'll have to do," she said under her breath, taking a shot glass out of the cupboard and pouring the brown liquid in. After a moment of hesitation she took out another shot glass and poured herself one.
"Hey Danny, what-"
"Damn it!" he said loudly, voiced laced with irritation. "Shit."
"What?" she asked, body frozen as she waited for him to tell her what happened. Maybe the thing had bred already and there were more than one. She decided right there that this was the worst thought ever. "Danny, what happened?"
"It dropped."
Refusing to turn she picked up her shot and slammed it down.
"Wait, I think I see it," he said. "Shit, this guy moves fast."
"Oh my god," Mindy said, bracing her hands on the island. "It's scurrying around my room now? It's official. I can never sleep in that room again."
"Relax, I'll find it," he said, now on all fours. He peered under her bed and commented, "What is all this stuff under here?"
She turned around to see what he was doing and said, "What are you – hey, stop snooping around!"
"I'm trying to find the spider," he returned. "I-oh, I see it again."
"Be careful!" she called out, still in the safety of the kitchen. "It could be poisonous!"
"We're in New York," he returned. "There aren't poisonous spiders."
"Yeah, well, it could have come here in someone's luggage. You know, someone goes to Zimbabwe or something and brings a whole bunch of heebie jeebies back with them."
He didn't respond but she heard the loud thump of a shoe ramming against her wall. She waited for him to tell her what happened, and she he didn't she gingerly approached her bedroom. To her horror, she saw him wiping off the sole of one of her several hundred dollar Loboutins.
"Danny, do not tell me you used that to kill it."
"That thing was too big for just a tissue," he said. He noticed the wide gaze of her eyes and said, "What? I'm cleaning it off."
"You…but…"
He placed the shoe back in her closet and stood up, wiping his hands on his pants.
"You have that shot ready?" he asked. She nodded blindly, following him back into the kitchen and pouring herself a second. They took the shots together, Mindy's eyes watering afterwards.
"That's the stuff," Danny said, making a face. "Always hated whiskey."
She gave him a look and said, "Why'd you ask for it then?"
"It's what men drink."
"That's the most ridiculous thing you have ever said."
"This coming from the grown woman who made me go halfway across the city to kill a spider for her."
"Thanks for that, by the way. I'm not sure if my shoe will ever recover, but I guess both of us had to sacrifice something."
He smirked, shaking his head. "Yeah, I guess so."
"Can you still catch the rest of your game?"
He shook his head. "It's probably near the end now. I wouldn't make it back in time."
"Watch it here," she said immediately.
"You don't have to," he said.
"Hey, after saving me from Godzilla in arachnid form, it's the least I can do. Sit down."
He shrugged, sitting down on her large sofa. It was more comfortable than he remembered from the Christmas party and he settled back into the cushion. The remote was on the table and he leaned forward and clicked on the television. She settled next to him with a beer for each of them.
"Thank you for coming tonight," she said. "You just earned some major friend points."
He laughed lightly. "It's no problem. I guess it would be pretty hard to sleep with that thing in your room."
"Glad you're seeing things my way," she said with a nod.
"I wouldn't exactly call it that, but sure."
She propped her feet up on the coffee table. "You know, this might be the first time sports has been on my television."
"Seriously?"
She nodded. "Yeah, usually it's just Bravo and The Food Network."
"You watch the Food Network? But you don't cook."
"I like to watch other people cook," Mindy replied easily. "Speaking of food, you want anything?"
"I'm fine."
"How much longer is there of this?" she asked.
He glanced at the clock and said, "Um, about twenty minutes? Maybe a little longer?"
"Okay, food is necessary. I'm going to order something." She picked up her phone and began to scroll through her take-out numbers. She paused on a good Mexican place and asked, "Hey, what are your thoughts on nachos?"
A/N: This was such a fluffball! Let me know your thoughts!
